I'd just like to extend a gentle,
Friendly invitation to find a posture that feels relaxed and alert.
Just finding a position that feels embodied,
Perhaps somewhat noble,
Where you can bring full awareness to the body,
Full awareness to the body,
Perhaps feeling the bottoms of your feet flat on the ground,
Really sensing into the earth below,
Support of the ground,
Feeling the weight of your body on the seat,
Just opening up to the sense of gravity,
The feeling of a downward pull,
A downward pull,
Noticing a sense of groundedness of your body and whatever it's touching.
Opening to the fullness of the body,
Noticing all of the predominant sensations around the feet and the legs,
The pelvic area and the belly,
The chest and the heart,
The shoulders,
The neck,
Feeling the arms and the hands,
The head and the face,
And taking a couple of deep breaths,
Relaxing the belly as we breathe in and out,
As we breathe in and out,
In and out,
Now shifting our awareness to recall a moment or a topic that you might feel perhaps a little bit of shame around,
Perhaps a little bit of shame around,
Perhaps there's some form of self judgment,
Some part of your life that perhaps you don't feel like you measure up in some way,
Or there's just a little bit of shame,
Nothing too intense,
Something where you might feel like you wanna cringe or hide or self-criticize.
And allow yourself to just reflect on that topic or that aspect of your life and allow that sense of shame to come forth,
Allow it to be felt and to be known.
Begin to notice what's happening around the body,
What's happening in your experience.
If you had to describe how this feels to a friend,
How might you describe the sensations and the thoughts and the feelings?
And what happens to you when you allow yourself to go there?
We may be judging the experience to be right or wrong,
Noticing any judgment and seeing if we can pause the judgment for a moment and be curious about the actual experience itself opening to a mild sense of shame with gentle,
Caring curiosity for how this experience feels right now.
Staying open,
Staying curious about the changing sensations,
Changing experience,
Noticing judgments arising,
Being curious about the actual experience.
Remembering to breathe and staying connected with the body.
Noticing how this experience changes as we open to it with this gentle curiosity.
We're okay.
Thankful for ourselves for having the courage to open to what is uncomfortable.
Thankful for this opportunity to heal or to understand or to simply be without judgment.
Now,
Perhaps taking a couple more deep breaths with the belly,
Feeling that sense of groundedness,
With the ground below,
Sensing into the fullness of the body as you breathe.
And may we bring this sense of caring curiosity with us for our experience for the rest of the day.
