Body Awareness For Grounding

Hello and welcome.

The following is a guided meditation by Renee Seals,

A somatic movement educator,

Energy worker,

And astrologer.

This meditation is intended to help support your embodied meditation practice.

If in the recording you are prompted to do something that doesn't feel good for your body,

Please adapt and modify to make it work for you.

Please also note that the content of this meditation sometimes explores deep and subtle states and memories,

And sometimes guided visualizations.

You are encouraged to work with discernment as you practice with them.

If any of the guidance Renee offers feels too activating or uncomfortable,

Please listen to your body's knowing and pause the recording until a later time if you wish to return to it.

These guided meditations range anywhere from 20 to 40 minutes and do not require any supplementary equipment to participate.

We hope you enjoy.

All right,

So we're just going to start with breathing and I'm going to invite you to close your eyes if you can and let everything just settle around you.

So everything that has already happened today and yesterday and last week and this last years,

It has already happened.

It's in the past.

Can't be redone.

Nothing to do about it now.

All the stuff that's in the future that hasn't happened yet,

It hasn't happened yet.

There's nothing to do about it now.

Right now,

Right here,

Feel where you are.

Feel the spaciousness of this moment and feel your body breathing inhaling and exhaling.

And with every inhale,

I want you to kind of feel the inhale as a nurturing inhale.

And you could imagine this inhale like a hug,

Like a presence that is moving from the inside of your body out into your skin and all that presence is is doing,

Is saying,

I'm here.

I'm here.

So as you inhale,

Just feeling your breath,

I am here.

And as you exhale,

Allowing yourself to just relax and release the need for anything outside of you,

To do or to be anything.

And it's not that you are relaxing your relationship,

All the things that are outside of you are still there,

You still have relationship to them.

It's simply letting go of neediness or controlling-ness.

You know,

Sometimes we can be like,

Oh,

I need something.

And you know that feeling.

It's like food or cigarettes or a person or whatever,

You know,

I need that thing.

And just let it go.

It's not that you can't have it at some point,

It will still be there,

But not right now.

And with every inhale,

You feel your own breath,

Feel it move into your body,

I am here.

Just present,

Rhythmic,

Consistent,

Here I am.

I'm just going to practice that together for a couple of minutes.

So breathing in,

Feeling yourself,

Feeling presence.

I'm here,

Not going anywhere.

Breathing out,

Letting go of those tendrils and tentacles that kind of bring us out of ourselves,

That try and pull other things into us or pull ourselves towards something else.

So there's nowhere to go,

Nothing to do,

Just this breath.

So we're going to continue with exactly this and direct it into different ways.

So we're going to start with the breath,

And then we're going to start with the breath.

So we're going to continue with exactly this and direct it into different parts of our bodies.

And when I say breathe into a place,

I probably don't literally mean expand your lungs into that place,

Since your lungs probably can't expand there.

But the movement of your breath can travel anywhere,

And remember that your breath is carried on your blood,

And every cell in your body needs oxygen.

So figuratively,

But also somewhat literally,

You can breathe into any part of your body.

And how I feel breathing into different parts of my body is,

First of all,

Presence and awareness,

Just paying attention to that part.

And then it's almost as if the cells themselves start to inhale and exhale.

So I feel a little like expansiveness and awareness arising within the tissues,

Wherever that is,

And I feel the like,

You know,

Pulsation is one word for it,

Kind of the giving and receiving.

How the blood works is it travels out on your arteries and back on your veins,

And that's the idea here,

Is that we're just breathing into every part of our body.

Okay,

And the same intention of the inhale being presence and the exhale being just calming,

Letting go of grasping.

So we're going to start on our feet,

And I invite you to feel your feet,

And if you can move them,

You might want to move them.

You can wiggle your toes around,

You can look at your feet,

You can map where they are in your mind,

Imagine them.

And I want you to breathe all the way into your toes,

Inhaling,

Here I am,

And exhaling,

Relaxing your toes.

And then inhale into the arches of your feet,

And exhale and relax the arches of your feet.

And breathe all the way down into your heels,

And relax your heels,

The backs of your heels and your Achilles,

And feel your ankles and those joints,

And imagine your breath moving all the way down through your legs and into your ankles,

And as you exhale,

Relax your ankles.

And then inhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

Exhale,

And we're going to travel up our lower legs.

Take a couple of breaths here,

And feel the shape of your lower legs.

Sometimes I like to even just give myself massage or again movement,

You can stretch,

You can just envision them,

But feel how your calf muscles attach to your shin bones and breathe into them,

And exhale and relax your lower legs.

And we'll travel up into our knees,

And the joints of our knees,

You're going to inhale and feel your breath wrap around those joints,

And as you exhale,

Relax your knees.

And then we'll spend a couple of breaths in our thighs,

And the thighs are powerful.

There's a lot of muscle in there and a lot of places where we can hold tension.

So as you inhale,

Breathe into your lower thighs,

Just right above your knee,

And exhale and relax all the way from your lower thighs to your feet.

And as you inhale,

Relax your middle thighs and big bulk of your hamstrings and your quads.

And as you exhale,

Just let go of them needing to do anything,

Just feel the muscles soften over the bones.

And then as you inhale,

Breathing into your upper thighs,

And exhale,

Breathe into your upper thighs,

And exhale,

Breathe in,

Breathe out.

Especially the attachments of your groins and hip flexors are a place where many of us are chronically tight and tense,

And actually it's this part of the body that first reacts to a fear response.

So that kind of instinct to run,

The nervous system lights up the hip joints.

So can you relax them?

Can you inhale and just say,

Here I am,

I'm present,

There's not an immediate threat.

And as you exhale,

Relax your upper thighs,

Relax your hips.

Relax your hips.

Then we're going to bring our attention into the pelvic floor,

And this includes anus and genitals,

And the muscular lining at the lower pelvic floor.

Again,

Another place in our bodies that are chronically tight and tense and fearful for many people.

Can you simply bring your awareness to this part of your body as you inhale,

I'm here,

And relax as you exhale,

Letting go.

Take another breath there,

Inhaling into your pelvic floor,

And exhaling and relaxing.

I'm going to invite you to start using your hands,

If you haven't already,

To touch your body and to bring one hand to your sacrum.

And your sacrum is at the base of your spine.

It's a bone,

It's a triangular kind of diamond-shaped bone,

And it culminates.

Its ending point is your tailbone,

And the top part is like your spine,

And the upper part is like where a lot of people get lower back tattoos.

So just let your hand cup your sacrum and then bring your other hand to your low belly between your pubic bone and navel.

Now we're just going to take a couple of breaths into this place in the upper pelvis,

And here at the base of the spine we have kind of the root of the spinal energy,

The life force,

Or it's sometimes called the Kundalini,

And we also have the life force and the internal energy of the reproductive organs,

The internal reproductive organs,

And their ability to procreate.

This is a part of our body that is really,

Really powerful to just bring presence and awareness to.

Presence,

Awareness,

And breath.

And then to relax from feeling gripped by the hands.

Again the feeling is,

You know,

Just there's not a need for any kind of external anything,

Just you are present,

That's all you need.

And then with our hands we're going to travel up and the front hands can hold,

You know,

Just the navel area,

The belly button area,

And slide to the place where your back curves in the most,

Your kind of upper lumbar lower rib area.

And we're just going to breathe here and imagine that all of our digestive organs can receive our breath.

And as we exhale,

Relaxing.

Super important for those organs to be both supported and relaxed.

You can soften the muscular walls of your abdomen and back and feel how your breath can move into the internal space.

And maybe the back hand can go a little higher,

Don't damage your shoulder or anything,

But the front hand can travel to your solar plexus and that's right below where your ribs meet in the front.

So again we'll inhale and breathe into the space and exhale and relax.

And this is a space where at the back body we have our kidneys and adrenals and in the front body we have this amazing plexus of nerves.

Our initial kind of initiatory breath happens here,

The diaphragm just starting to expand or contract.

And this is a place where in esoteric anatomy,

In the chakra system,

We find power,

Personal power and will force.

Just want you to breathe into this space.

So inhaling,

Feeling your tissues,

Receive your breath.

I'm here,

That's it,

Present.

As you exhale,

Relaxing any tension.

Relaxing the need to control anyone else,

Anything outside of you.

I'm here,

That's all that we need.

You can just breathe.

And then let your hands come up to your heart and your chest.

And as you fill your lungs now,

The biggest widest parts of your lungs,

Feel the way your breath expands your lungs and your ribs.

And without force,

Notice if you can breathe into your front side and back chest,

Letting your breath move through your lungs and into your heart and your heart is just present.

So if there are feelings here,

Where we often feel relationship,

The same as any tissue,

Just breathing in,

Feeling it,

I'm here.

And as you exhale,

Relaxing,

There's no need to grasp.

It's okay.

And then from our hearts,

We're going to just start to breathe out into our shoulders.

And you might want to move your shoulders around a little bit or stretch your shoulders and feel how your wings span,

Your arms span,

And how your shoulders are going to move.

And then from our shoulders,

We're going to start to breathe out into our shoulders.

And as you exhale,

Let your shoulders relax.

And then from our shoulders,

You're going to come back to your heart center,

Your chest center.

Can you breathe from the width of your lungs out into your shoulders?

And feel your breath in your shoulders.

And as you exhale,

Let your shoulders relax.

And let your breath travel into your upper arms,

Feeling your biceps and triceps and arm bones.

And as you exhale,

Letting those muscles just soften around the bones.

Let your breath travel into your elbow joints.

Say hello,

Elbows,

Here I am,

Greeting them.

And let your breath travel into your forearms.

Feel how cool your forearms are.

They rotate around,

They move your hands in all kinds of directions.

Relax from your inner elbow to your thumb and your elbow point to your little bit.

And then from your hands,

You're going to come back to your shoulders.

Relax from your inner elbow to your thumb and your elbow point to your little finger.

And just feel all the muscles between your forearm bones soften.

Breathe into your wrists.

Let your breath move through all those tiny little bones that form your carpal tunnel,

The carpal arch.

And as you exhale,

Relax your wrists.

Breathe into your hands and feel your palms and the backs of your hands receive your breath,

The flesh of your hands inhaling.

And as you exhale,

Relaxing.

Let your breath travel out into your fingers and fingertips.

And as you exhale,

Relax your fingers and your fingertips.

And then we'll inhale and feel the arms as a whole.

And as you exhale,

Relax the weight of your arms from your neck.

And again,

Inhale into the place where you could imagine your arms come together,

Kind of at the upper chest.

Bringing your presence there as you inhale and relaxing as you exhale.

We're going to feel our throats.

Again,

You can use hands.

You might want to verbalize here.

You might want to sing or yell or blah blah blah,

Make some sounds.

Open up your chest.

Yawn,

Swallow,

Feel your throat.

And then as you exhale,

Relax your throat.

Relax the front of your throat.

And relax your neck.

And then exhale,

Relax your chest.

And relax your neck and the sides of your neck and that line that travels from your collarbones to your earlobes.

And then inhale into your jaw,

Your lower jaw,

Your lower teeth.

And as you exhale,

Relax your jaw.

Let your lower jaw release from the upper jaw.

And inhale even into your tongue.

And as you exhale,

Feel your tongue relax all the way down to its root.

And breathe into your upper palate.

So it's your upper teeth and the top of your mouth.

Even the bone behind your nose.

And as you exhale,

Relax.

And breathe into your upper palate.

And breathe into your ears.

Be present in your ears.

And when you exhale,

Relax your ears and the skin around your ears and also the tunnels of your ears.

Feeling the hearing mechanism also relax.

And relax your eyelids and inhale into your eyeballs.

And as you exhale,

Let go of any tension in your eyeballs.

And then imagine that you're feeling the hearing mechanism.

And then imagine the whole space of your brain and the cranial cavity that is behind your forehead,

Above your ears,

All the way down to the base of your skull.

And this amazing organ that is floating in liquid that is connected to your spinal cord.

And as you inhale,

Breathe into your brain and breathe into that fluid that runs all the way down your spine,

All the way to your sacrum.

And as you exhale,

Relax.

Letting go of the need to know anything.

You don't need to know.

And we're going to feel our skin as a whole,

A container of our skin.

And as you inhale,

Imagine your breath moving out into your skin,

Your whole body,

This wrapping.

And as you exhale,

Relaxing your skin.

And then we're going to feel all of our muscles,

Just imagining them as a whole.

You've got muscles all over your body,

In your face,

Your scalp,

All over your limbs.

And tense everything,

Get it as tight as you can.

And then relax.

And one more time as you inhale,

Just tense everything,

Just make your muscles really,

Really tight.

And then exhale and let them go.

And take a breath in to all of your muscles and say,

Here I am,

You guys got a lot of power.

And then as you exhale,

Letting them soften.

Inhaling into your bones,

Imagining your skeleton and its structure.

These amazing living organisms that are so strong,

But also at their core are still fluid,

Always changing the bones,

Absolutely miraculous.

Breathing into your bones,

Just hello bones,

Here I am.

Exhale,

Relaxing your bones.

Imagining your organs,

All the internal organs that make you breathe and digest and transform energy and moderate,

Modulate your life processes,

Including your brain.

Breathing into your organs,

Hello organs.

And as you exhale,

Relax.

And imagining whatever it is,

You can call it,

Just relax.

Imagining whatever it is,

You can call it spirit or self or soul.

However you feel the energy of you that is definitely occupying your body,

But is also more than your body that extends out through your thoughts and actions and into your relationships and will continue to have resonance after you are gone.

Breathe into that place.

Breathe into your self.

And as you exhale,

Let that place relax.

It's nothing to do,

Nowhere to go,

Everything is okay.

All right friends,

Well thank you for giving me the opportunity to practice this as I speak it to you.

I definitely feel better than I did half an hour ago,

And I hope that you do too.

Again,

This meditation is something that I found to be incredibly helpful in any situation in my life that feels overly stimulated or anxious or scary or needy.

And it can be done in 30 seconds,

It doesn't need to take 30 minutes.

And it can be done continuously throughout the day,

Just greeting yourself,

Here I am,

Feeling your breath,

And relaxing the ways in which we grasp and struggle.

So I hope that you found it useful.

I sincerely wish you health,

Happiness,

And confidence and calmness.

In your entire being and in all of your relations.

Bye for now.