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How to Meditate: Meditation 101 for Beginners

10 Science-Backed Benefits of Meditation

What is Meditation?

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Sounds and Thoughts

Melli O'Brien

00:00

00:00

Meditation

4.4

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Sounds and Thoughts

In this meditation you'll be guided into observing the sensations of your breath as a way of grounding in the calm and stillness of mindful awareness.

So settling into a comfortable

position for this meditation.

Allowing your eyes to gently close.

And as a way of gathering awareness

to the present moment, just taking

three deep, slow, full breaths.

Breathing in and following the

breath for its full journey in.

And breathing out, following the

breath for its full journey out.

And two more like that.

And now just letting go of

any control of the breath.

Allowing the breath to be natural.

And expanding the focus of your

attention out to the sounds around you.

And sounds in all directions.

And having a sense of taking in the

whole surrounding soundscape at once.

Allowing this dance of sound

to unfold in awareness.

And noticing the changing

nature of sounds.

How sounds are transient and fleeting.

They may have a beginning.

they unfold, and then

dissolve back into stillness.

And now letting this awareness of sounds

fade into the background and bringing

your awareness now to the internal

world and listening to thoughts.

And bringing your full attention now

to observing and listening to thoughts.

They might be thoughts about

problems, plans or worries, or

perhaps about what we're doing now.

There might be negative,

happy or neutral thoughts.

Just see if it's possible to

simply observe them all as they

come, stay awhile, and then go.

So just letting the

dance of thoughts unfold.

There's no need to try to

control your thoughts in any way.

So just letting them come and go on

their own, just like you did with sounds.

And now withdrawing attention

from the thoughts and noticing the

still spaciousness in which every

thought is born into, unfolds in,

and then dissipates back into.

So this is not something you can

grasp with the mind, but simply

sensing into that stillness that's

there at the heart of who you are.

And just resting for a few moments

in that awareness and just letting

the dance of thoughts unfold.

And then taking a deep breath in.

And breathing out, begin to

wriggle fingers and toes.

And then opening the eyes.

And as you go about your day to

day, just remembering that no matter

where you find yourself and no matter

what happens, the breath is always

available to you as an anchor back

to that awareness and to a sense of

stillness, wholeness, and inner peace.

And wishing you a wonderful day.

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