In this short meditation, reflect on all the ways you are open to receiving change in the physical, mental, and emotional bodies.

We can arrive at our seats with an assumption or expectation of what we want our practice to look like; part of acceptance is letting go and simply receiving the meditation as you are, right here and now.

Ahimsa is the idea of nonviolence from the Yoga Sutras. To practice Ahimsa is also to honour radical acceptance of all we experience without manipulating or forcing change. Instead, we open to receive the fluctuations and observe our states as we undergo the changes we cannot control.

Here is the quote to anchor the meditation:

“In The Wisdom of Insecurity, Watts makes a case that always convinces me, but which I always seem to forget: that life is, by its very nature, uncontrollable. That we should stop trying to finalise our comfort and security, and instead find a radical acceptance of the endless, unpredictable change that is the very essence of this life. Our suffering, he says, comes from the fight we put up against this fundamental truth.”

― Katherine May, Wintering: How I learned to flourish when life became frozen

Style: Meditation

Duration: 21-minutes

Level: open

Props: blocks or a bolster to sit on.

Focus: a meditation on radical acceptance (ahimsa).

Location: Vancouver, BC

Opening Meditation

Find a seat of your choice or lay down.

Use as many props as you need to feel comfortable, and close your eyes.

Soften the gaze and allow your body to soften where you are.

Inhale through the nose and exhale out the mouth several times to relax the jaw and release any tension or stagnant energy.

Take a moment to observe how you’re physically, mentally, and emotionally feeling today. Perhaps choose a word to describe how you feel.

Prompts to check-in with your physical, emotional, and mental bodies:

Physical body

• What calls your attention in your body as you breathe?
• What sensations do you observe?

Perform a simple body scan from the crown to your toes as you breathe. Bring awareness to all the sensations in your body.

Mental body

• Observe your thoughts; how many show up? What arises?

Practice detachment as you watch your thoughts come up and drift away like clouds passing in the sky.

Emotional body

• Take your awareness into your belly and heart, where the emotions reside; how do you feel?
• Do any images, colours, textures, words, sensations appear when you breathe into how you feel?

Savasana, balasana, or stay in your seat to close practice.