Greetings,
Stacey Iriesoul here.
Like to guide you through a meditation that I like to call the Take 10 for those moments of panic,
Anxiety,
Or stress.
Find yourself in a comfortable seated position either on a chair or on the floor,
Or you may lie down and softly and gently close your eyes.
As your eyes softly close,
Just inviting your awareness from your external environment to within.
Allowing yourself to connect with your body and to connect with your breath.
Feeling into the body,
Noticing your current posture,
Perhaps elongating the spine,
Straightening the back.
And with each breath,
Each exhale,
Allowing yourself to breathe out and release any tightness,
Stiffness or tension from your physical body.
With each inhale,
Becoming present and aware of your body and breath.
And with each exhale,
Just softening,
Releasing,
And letting go.
Breathing in and breathing out.
Breathing in slowly and deeply.
Breathing out,
Relaxing the muscles in your face.
With your next exhale,
Releasing the jaw and the shoulders.
Breathing out,
Relaxing the muscles along your back,
Your chest,
And your belly.
Breathing in slowly,
Softly,
Deeply.
Breathing out,
Let your whole body surrender into stillness.
And when we're faced with these moments of panic,
High stress,
Or anxiety,
Our body activates our sympathetic nervous system,
Which causes that increase in heart rate,
Increase in blood pressure,
The release of stress hormones like cortisol into the body,
Causing confusion,
Muddled thoughts.
So I'd like to introduce this practice to you that you can use in any of those moments to consciously intentionally activate the parasympathetic nervous system,
Which will slow the heart rate,
Bring down the blood pressure,
And help you gain clarity in those moments.
So,
Staying with that long,
Deep breath,
And then counting five long,
Elongated,
Slow,
And deep breaths together for these five conscious breaths.
Breathing for each inhale and each exhale until we reach a count of 10.
Let's begin together as I count with you.
Taking a long,
Deep breath,
Inhaling for one,
Exhaling for two.
Let all the air out.
Inhaling for three,
Exhaling for four.
Let it all go.
Slowly breathing in for five,
Exhaling for six.
Inhaling for seven,
Exhaling for eight.
Inhaling nine,
Exhaling ten.
Continuing,
Inhaling one,
Exhale two.
Inhale three,
Exhale for four.
Inhaling five,
Slowly,
Deeply,
Exhaling six,
Gently,
Completely.
Inhaling seven,
Exhaling eight.
Inhaling for nine,
Let it all out for ten.
Just continuing breathing and counting for yourself.
Stretching those counts as long as you can with each breath in and each breath out.
Counting as you breathe.
If you reach ten,
Simply begin again.
If you lose count,
Simply begin again.
Counting as you breathe.
If you lose count,
It simply means the mind has wandered to thoughts.
Release any judgement or frustration for that.
It's completely natural and again,
Simply start from one.
Counting as you breathe.
Breathing in and out.
Breathing in and out.
Softly just releasing the numbers.
Gently beginning to deepen your breath.
With each deep breath,
Gently bringing awareness back into your bodies,
Into your seat.
Gently expanding that awareness from your body back into your surroundings,
Keeping your eyes softly closed.
Before we end our practice,
Just finishing with that great big smile,
Keeping your eyes closed as you hold and feel into that smile.
Reminding your body how good it feels.
And as you hold that smile,
Just taking a moment to say thank you to yourself for making this time to pause for stillness.
And whenever you're ready,
In your own time,
Softly and gently open your eyes.
Rotate the shoulders,
Rotate the neck,
Stretch in any way that feels right.
Welcome back and have a beautiful day.
