Today we are looking at meditation as a way to train the body to settle into a state of stillness.
My name is Vivian.
If we haven't met yet,
Welcome to your meditation practice.
Allow yourself to find a comfortable space,
Letting your body land on whatever is supporting you underneath.
Let that hold your weight fully with each exhale,
Noticing your breath move throughout your body,
Up and down,
Side to side,
Unconditionally moving through you.
Now in our meditation practice,
People often say that they can't sit still,
They can't stay still,
They keep fidgeting,
They keep moving and this is so normal.
It's so normal to start off this way.
The body has a tendency to want to react to stimuli and if we're not aware or if we're not present,
It happens automatically.
So now you've done that first step,
You've noticed that maybe your body is fidgety,
Maybe you're restless,
Maybe you just have habits where you start to move your body and that is okay.
The first step is just to notice.
Notice if your feet start to tingle.
Notice if the lower half of your body maybe starts to get numb but notice where your mind goes when your body just wants to do its thing.
Come back to yourself and notice the discomfort that rises to the surface,
The discomfort when it comes to just staying still,
Cultivating a steadfast,
Steady state of presence.
Let them,
Let the body be.
Simply notice and acknowledge.
Allow yourself to gain awareness into this length of time between the point where you first start to become aware of something and the point of your reaction to it.
It's this little pocket of time where we get to take a pause,
A little moment of stillness where we come back to ourselves before we react and once we learn how to stretch this pocket of time through the work of meditation,
That's when we start to become different.
That's when the change happens.
That's when we don't allow our reactions to get in the way of what we actually mean.
When you learn to stretch this pocket of time between awareness and reaction,
You notice you respond to stress differently.
You respond to external stimuli differently.
You respond to it with something softer,
Something more compassionate,
Something more authentic.
In meditation,
It's not that we're trying to win or something.
It's not that we're trying to hit or achieve a certain goal.
We're simply just noticing,
Becoming observant with our judgments,
Seeing where our mind goes when we have nothing to do,
Nothing to attend to,
Nothing coming at us,
Nothing that is taking our attention away.
We are just being.
We are just here,
Right here,
Right now.
And for some,
For many,
That can be very hard to do at first.
But the act of meditation is to train this.
It's kind of like a muscle.
We're training.
We're training ourselves.
We're training the body to be still.
We're training our minds to become more resilient.
We're training ourselves to notice and stretch this pocket of time between awareness and between reaction.
Let your breath travel throughout your body from the base of your sit bones to the crown of your head,
All throughout your body,
Reaching towards the peripheries of your ribcage.
Soften again into your body.
Soften again into your breath.
And take this softness with you as you carry on with your day with steadfast presence,
Awareness,
And intention.
