Tag: health

Posted on

Aliveness

Aliveness

Mindfulness meditation offers a practice of returning to experiencing the world as it is, to return to the raw experience of feeling each moment without thinking, thinking, pre-conceived ideas and judgment. Feeling alive is feeling the sensations that come to us – the cool air brushing against the skin, the rhythm of the breath, and the faint pulses felt in the body. Each breath is a quiet miracle of keeping us alive. We are simply here, breathing, giving ourselves the gift of the present moment instead of being lost in doing, thinking, doing, thinking.

Alive by Haashimite (extract)

To be Alive is to grow
To keep Living
Through the calm of dawn, and the bustle of noon, and the sloth of sundown
Just stay living
Embrace the self balancing emotions
And dread living-dead
For in that is true death
A great life is a life lived Alive

Awake to every feel
A life of sading and cries, and of happiness and laughter
And growth
Intertwined in perfect harmony
And when the sunlight blesses our paths a last time
Thanks to living Alive
The joy of rest is fully savoured.

Guide: Noelle Lim

Image credit: Bianca Ackermann, Unsplash

Posted on

Breath Around The Nostrils

Returning to the breath by noticing the sensations around the nose.

In mindfulness meditation, we often speak of “returning to the breath”, and one way is paying attention to the sensations felt around the nose or nostrils. Feeling the air as it enters, perhaps cool, soft tingling, feeling the muscle of the flap of the nose moving, feeling the air leaving, warmer, subtler. The tiny area becoming an anchor, simply allowing yourself to fee the breath. As thoughts can pull us in a hundred directions, noticing the breath at the nostrils invites us back to the present moment.

By feeling the breath at the nose, we’re not just training attention. We’re remembering the preciousness of life — not in grand gestures, but in the wondrous sensations of each inhale and exhale.

The Breath Is Life’s Teacher, Donna Martin (extract)

Observe me, says the Breath, and learn to live effortlessly in the Present Moment.
Feel me, says the Breath, and feel the Ebb and Flow of Life.
Allow me, says the Breath, and I’ll sustain and nourish you, filling you with energy and cleansing you of tension and fatigue.

Move with me, says the Breath, and I’ll invite your soul to dance.

Make sounds with me and I shall teach your soul to sing.
Follow me, says the Breath, and I’ll lead you out to the farthest reaches of the Universe, and inward to the deepest parts of your inner world.

Notice how you take me in, invites the Breath. Is it with joy… with gratitude…? Do you take me in fully… invite me into all the inner spaces of your home? …Or carefully into just inside the door? What places in you am I not allowed to nourish?

And notice, says the Breath, how you release me. Do you hold me prisoner in closed up places in the body? Is my release resisted… do you let me go reluctantly, or easily?

I am the Breath.
Life is the Musician.
You are the flute.
And music – creativity – depends on all of us. You are not the Creator… nor the Creation.
We are all a part of the process of Creativity… You, Life, and me: the Breath.

Guide: Noelle Lim

Image credit: Liwanu Sutter, Unsplash

Posted on

Art of Watching

The art of watching without analysing, fixing, chasing and suppressing is a radical practice of presence, patience and compassion, allowing us to relate to whatever that arises, the welcomed and unwelcomed, with spaciousness and graciousness.

In mindfulness meditation, to watch is to observe with openness, care and without judgement, letting thoughts, emotions and sensations move along. We simply witness and not judge.

As we settle into stillness, anchoring ourselves to the breath or the body, we begin noticing the stream of experience flowing through our awareness—thoughts, emotions, sensations. Often subtle, sometimes stormy but we just keep sitting in awareness.

When thoughts, emotions, or sensations arise, we note: “thinking,” “feeling,” “sensation“, with the breath as the home base.

As we practice watching, over time, strong feelings lose their grip, and we learn to simply give ourselves space not to react.

Watching is not to control, to escape or to avoid. It is to truly see—and in seeing, to be.

Art of Watching, by Wendy Mitchell

Just sitting and watching in silence

Patience is all that you need

To see nature appear

To appreciate what was a tiny seed

To hear the birds singing happily

To watch them fly around

Yet when they settle near by

Joy, simply abounds

You have to be still, you have to be quiet

And wait just patiently

And then the reward will appear

And be there in front quite graciously.

So patience is a virtue

Or so they say

But for nature it’s paramount

Blink and it will have gone away….

Guide: Noelle Lim

Image credit: Shobha GS, Unsplash

Posted on

Noticing The Belly

One of the basic meditation practice is paying attention to the natural rise and fall of the belly as we breath. When we are shifting our attention to this gentle rhythm, we step out of the whirlwind of thoughts and into direct experience. The belly rises—there is breath, there is life. The belly falls—there is release, there is letting go. No need to force, control, or judge. Just noticing. In a noisy world, this simple act of noticing a natural phenomena unravel can be our refuge.

If I had my life to live over again, Nadine Stair

If I had my life to live over again,
I’d dare to make more mistakes next time.
I’d relax.
I’d limber up.
I’d be sillier than I’ve been this trip.
I would take fewer things seriously.
I would take more chances,
I would eat more ice cream and less beans.

I would, perhaps, have more actual troubles but fewer imaginary ones.
you see, I’m one of those people who was sensible and sane,
hour after hour,
day after day.

Oh, I’ve had my moments.
If I had to do it over again,
I’d have more of them.
In fact, I’d try to have nothing else- just moments,
one after another, instead of living so many years ahead of each day.

I’ve been one of those persons who never goes anywhere without a thermometer, a hot-water bottle, a raincoat, and a parachute.
If I could do it again, I would travel lighter than I have.

If I had to live my life over,
I would start barefoot earlier in the spring
and stay that way later in the fall.
I would go to more dances,
I would ride more merry-go-rounds,
I would pick more daisies.

Guide: Noelle Lim

Image credit: Myko Makhlai, Unsplash