This is a recording created for the Mindfulness Tools Program at the Center for Mindfulness at UMass Memorial Health.
Welcome to this practice.
Let's begin by finding yourself a comfortable place and whatever posture feels right for your body.
It might be a sitting posture, or you may feel that lying down is what's appropriate for you today.
If you're in a chair or on a cushion on the floor, sit comfortably, well supported, in an upright posture, with a straight back, legs uncrossed if you're in a chair.
Feeling this gentle uprightness of the spine, and maybe even stretching ever so slightly, bringing the tip of the head about a half inch closer toward the ceiling.
Feeling a nice, welcome elongation of the spine.
If you're lying down, have your legs uncrossed and arms at your sides if that's comfortable.
Whichever posture you choose, make it one that will allow you to relax and settle in, but that also embodies wakefulness and a sense of dignity.
A reflection of your intention to be here, present and alert.
And allowing the eyes to be closed if that's comfortable for you, or just taking a soft downward gaze.
Maybe taking a few deeper breaths to help the body settle.
Being aware that you're in this posture, and being aware that breath is happening.
Letting go and releasing anything that's not needed.
Maybe any tightness in the shoulders, any holding.
And if the body is settling, maybe the mind is also settling, or maybe not.
Noticing whatever is here.
And turning our attention inward now to the body.
Sensing the body from head to toe.
Giving yourself permission to be exactly as you are.
There's nothing to fix, or change, or improve.
Bringing our awareness to what it is to be here, right now.
And now, finding an anchor, or a touch point, that we can use as our home base, where our attention can return over and over again.
Some examples for these anchors, or touch points, may be the breath, the feet, the hands, or sounds around you.
And so now, paying attention to the touch points, where your body makes connection with the floor, with the chair, couch, or the bed.
Awareness of this contact.
Sensing the feeling of the effects of gravity, and the solid support of the earth beneath you.
The weight of the body being held by the chair, or by the surface you might be lying on, or how firmly your feet are on the ground.
Sensations on the surface, and also deep inside.
Sensations of breathing.
The pulse.
Digestion.
Everything in the body that's here for you right now.
Resting in the sensations of the body, moment by moment.
And now let's narrow our attention to the sensations of the breath coming and going in the body.
Finding some location or aspect of the breath that feels steadying for you.
Committing your attention to this narrower focus.
And if the anchor of the breath does not feel available to you right now, you can choose one of the others for the next few minutes.
The feet, the hands, or sounds.
Noticing all the different sensations as air comes in through the nose.
As it moves down to the back of the throat, filling the lungs.
And as the lungs expand, the chest moves outwards.
We feel the legs, we feel the ribs move, or we feel the belly rise and fall.
We feel contact with our clothing.
Just following the thread of the breath.
You may feel a brief gentle pause when the in-breath reaches its fullest expression.
Then it turns around to leave the body as an out-breath, and the invitation here is to continue following with awareness, following all the different sensations, not trying to control the breath or alter it.
Just willing to stay with its changing nature, breathing and being breathed.
Maybe noticing a change in temperature as the breath leaves through the nose or the mouth.
This very subtle distinction compared to the in-breath.
Then sooner or later you may notice that your mind is wandering.
Attention is shifting toward the past, sometimes to the future.
Thoughts about the day, plans, responsibilities, and to stories that our mind makes.
When you notice when the mind is wandering, then gently, kindly, and without judgment, bring your attention back to the anchor of the breath in your body.
Staying in the present moment, resting attention on this anchor, being present with the breath.
And now releasing the anchor of the breath and drawing your awareness all the way down
to your feet, a reliable touch point to the present moment.
Noticing whatever sensations might be present in the feet.
Noticing where the feet come in contact with another surface.
Maybe the floor, or maybe a carpet or a couch, depending on your posture.
Perhaps a sense of pressure or weight.
Sensations may be in the soles of your feet, or the sides or the heels.
Noticing what's here.
Maybe there's a sense of constriction or ease, warmth or coolness, tingling.
There might be a sense of dryness or moisture.
Coming into direct contact with sensations here.
Exploring them moment by moment.
And perhaps there's no sensation at all.
And what is it like to just experience that?
Not needing to know something about the feet or have expectations of any sensations, whether
they're here or not, but to be present just in the knowing of the feet.
And if some sensation, emotion, or thought brings your attention away, you can kindly notice it, knowing that the mind has a tendency to wander.
Remember, this is a thought, this is an emotion, this is a pain or an itch.
And knowing that you can always invite yourself back home to this moment.
Continuing to sustain your awareness as best you can.
Gently, firmly, with intention, bringing your awareness back to the touch point.
No need to go anywhere, we are just being here, with ourselves, with the sensations in this moment, at the chosen touch point.
And like the feet, the hands can also help anchor attention.
So shifting our attention now to the hands, becoming aware of the surface that they're resting on.
Perhaps your lap, or one on top of the other.
Perhaps the arms of a chair or a table.
Being aware of the shape of the hands and the sensations of contact that you're receiving through fingertips and palms.
Perhaps noticing texture.
Maybe even noticing temperature.
Especially if your hands are feeling the warmth of your legs or some other place where they're resting.
Curious, kind attention.
Attending to these moments of our lives.
From time to time you may notice some restlessness, or thinking, or planning, wondering, where is your mind right now?
If you've wandered, just coming back again to the chosen anchor or touch point.
And doing so as gently and kindly as you can, without judgment, without striving to do it perfectly, or scolding yourself for having wandered.
Patience and kindness just returning over and over again.
Inviting yourself to stay present moment to moment.
And now we can take this same natural curiosity, this willingness to simply allow things to
unfold and direct it again, releasing the focus on the hands and directing our attention
to the arising of sounds around us, opening to receive the sounds that are close by.
It may be that the first sound you notice is the sound of your own breath, or maybe there
are sounds of digestion in the body, and now expanding to hear the sounds in the room around
you and in your environment, ambient air sounds, fans, clocks, people and pets, maybe noticing
these sounds and the difference and the distance, exploring.
How is it to bring attention to all the sounds without interpreting or making up stories about
where the sound is coming from?
Or if you're sitting in a place which is completely quiet, you may just sit with the silence, focusing
on anything and everything that you hear with your ears, moment by moment, staying with the
sounds or with silence.
Sounds flow in, some linger, sounds flow out.
And as we're attending to sound in this way, you may notice your attention getting caught up
in thinking about the sounds, wondering what the location or the purpose, or how you don't usually
hear that sound, or the tendency we may have to judge whether we like the sound or not.
And so, noticing that thinking is arising, and as best you can, just letting go of the thought,
and coming back to the knowing of sound itself, noticing it, and coming right back to whatever sounds are here now.
It doesn't matter how often you have to bring your attention back to your anchor, just hearing,
sitting with the sounds.
Being present.
Noticing how they change.
Rising and falling.
Resting your attention in the sounds and the space around you.
And so now, choosing for yourself what anchor feels most supportive for the remainder of this awareness practice.
It might be the hands or the feet.
It might be the breath flowing fully through the body, or at a particular place where you feel it most prominently.
Or maybe you'll stay with sound.
Choosing an anchor and resting attention right there.
Remembering that the quality of attention we're cultivating is friendly.
Allowing what's already here to be here.
Befriending ourselves how we are and how it is.
Moment by moment.
Offering this friendliness to yourself, even if you're aware that you keep wandering, or that you're judging the wandering or the experience.
Gently escorting yourself back over and over again whenever you notice you've gotten distracted.
And as we go about our day, remembering that you have access to these different anchors.
These reliable touch points to the present moment.
And now, once more, shifting attention from the more narrow focus on your anchor to an
expanded sense of awareness, again this wide field of awareness to take in the whole body,
sitting or lying down and breathing, all the sensations in your body from head to toe,
not judging, not pushing away, to observe what is here in this body, in this moment,
with a kind and friendly attitude, not wanting to feel a certain way, just sitting with whatever is here,
noticing how it changes, how every moment is different.
And for the last moments of this sit, you may thank yourself for the time and dedication,
the attention and the presence you brought to this sit.
And now allowing the eyes to gently open
if they were closed, or the gaze to lift, seeing and being aware of seeing, present for
all that's here right now.