Everyday Practices
Coming Back to the Breath
For Learning the Heart of Mindfulness
US$6 3 practices · 9 tracks · listen or download
Get the pack · US$6The mind wanders. It’s what minds do. We sit down to be present for a minute, and before we know it we’re replaying a conversation from last week or planning tomorrow. Many of us take this to mean we’re doing mindfulness wrong.
In these practices, the wandering is part of it. Every time you notice you’ve drifted off, as I say in the audio, it’s ‘a win, not a moment of failure,’ and a chance to come back. The breath is there to come back to. It’s with us all day, and it’s always happening right now. The more often we come back, with gentle persistence, the more connected we feel, to ourselves and to the moment we’re in.
These are classic mindfulness practices, slower and with more room in them. In one, you notice the cool air coming in and the warm air going out. In another, you say ‘here’ on the in-breath and ‘now’ on the out-breath, silently, in your mind.
There are three practices here. Each one comes in three versions, from around four minutes to just under twenty-five, so you can practise with whatever time you have.
What’s inside
Mindfulness of the Breath
3 versions
Full version · 25 minShorter version · 11 minMicro version · 6 min
The classic practice, one step at a time. You start with your feet on the floor, then rest with the rise and fall of the belly and the texture of each breath. Then the cool air coming in and the warm air leaving. The full version adds the sound of your breathing and your hands, then opens out to everything, ‘like a sponge to water.’ The shorter version ends after the cool and warm air. The micro stays with the belly and the texture of the breath.
The Here Now Doorway
3 versions
Full version · 11 minShorter version · 6 minMicro version · 4 min
For when you want something simple. After a few words to let the body soften, ‘right here and now, I am safe,’ you follow the breath and say a word in your mind with each one. ‘Here’ on the in-breath, ‘now’ on the out-breath. The gentleness of the breath becomes a reminder that you can be just as gentle with it. The full version ends by thanking the breath. The shorter version gets to ‘here, now’ sooner, and the micro version leaves out the ‘I am safe’ words.
Allow Here Now
3 versions
Full version · 17 minShorter version · 11 minMicro version · 6 min
For letting everything be. You settle into a posture that’s ‘dignified and alert’ and open your awareness to what it’s like to be you right now, on the inside. Thoughts and feelings can come and go. Then the breath becomes your anchor, especially the out-breath, while everything else carries on around you. It ends with a reminder that there’s always time for now. The shorter version has less time resting with the breath. The micro version stays with the opening awareness and leaves out the breath section.