“Tension is who you think you should be, Relaxation is who you are” Lao Tzu
It’s kinda funny to think that it takes practice to be who we really are, to return to our ‘naturalness’. So often it seems we are trained by the world to hold our true being at arms length, so to speak, so as to meet the expectations of others, or to do what we think we ‘should’ do and ‘should’ accomplish. Any or all of those expectations may indeed be well-meaning and positive, but do they arise from our true needs, from our own heart? Are we afraid if we do not push ourselves that we will not measure up? These are good questions, and ones we can ask ourselves in our practice of Meditation.
Taking the time to sit, to breath, and to cultivate the intimacy of inward looking and asking is a simple, but profound, practice. Yes, it’s simple, but sometimes surprisingly difficult. Our bodies may be calling to us with some symptom of stress and we may feel ‘out of sorts’ or irritated, but maybe we just feel there is no time to connect with our self…or it’s just not a priority. The good news is this: taking just 5 or 10 minutes to sit and breath can help so much. It doesn’t need to be any particular technique with any far flung goal of ‘stopping our thoughts’. Just sit. And breath. Make the intention to let go of tension, and exhale. Feel your belly rise and fall with your breath….just that. Just that can change your chemistry, and shift your state in a healthy way.
A few minutes a day of conscious breath and tension release can be such a great gift to yourself. Each time you do that you are soothing and healing your nervous system, and building the capacity to simply BE. And the beauty of it is, when we let ourselves just be, right action arises naturally, and we don’t continue to compound stress. When I sit and breath it feels like Kindness…the sweet feeling of really tending to and caring for myself. What Love does…