Hi, welcome back to

your Daily Mindfulness.

In today's session, we're going to

talk about relaxing bodily tension.

Let's just take a moment to

assess where we're at right now.

And notice if you're holding any tension

in your face, particularly the jaw.

Maybe invite that to relax.

Notice your shoulders.

Are they bunched up a bit?

Can you invite those to soften?

How about your belly?

Your hands?

So often as we're going through

life, it's very easy to accumulate

tension and stress in the body.

And we tend to have this subconscious

association with doing a lot of work

and holding tension or being tense, as

if one is a prerequisite for the other.

Since the body is so connected to

the mind, often when the body is

tense, the mind gets tense too.

Even if the tension in the mind

first caused tension in the body.

So a big part of my mindfulness practice

these days has just been checking in with

my body periodically throughout the day.

And I tend to focus on three main things,

the jaw, the shoulders, and the belly.

Relaxing those areas tends to create

a greater sense of groundedness and

peace throughout my entire body.

And it's something that I

encourage you to explore as well.

But the other big thing I'd love

for you to explore when you're going

about your day, doing a lot of things,

trying to be productive in the world,

see if you can ask yourself, can I do

everything that I'm doing right now but

with a little less tension in my body?

Chances are you'll see that, that you can,

and it doesn't require as much gripping

or force as you might think it does.

Try it out for yourself and explore.

Thank you for your practice.

We'll start by settling into

the meditation for today.

Talk to you soon.