SGM Sept. 2013 Meditation of the Month: “Being Present With Your Perspective”
Press the play button or click here (right click + save target as) to download the audio file
“Being Present With Your Perspective”
Press the play button or click here (right click + save target as) to download the audio file
Welcome to our Spiritual Growth Monthly September 2013 Meditation of the Month. I’m Kevin Schoeninger. It’s great to have you with us here at SGM.
This week, we’ll build on what we’ve learned in Weeks One through Three about suffering, frustration, and poor results being connected to patterns of thinking, feeling, and behavior. These in turn come from certain perspectives we’re holding onto about life. Before we go to try and do anything about those patterns and perspectives, it’s important to get to know them a little better. By fully acknowledging how you’re currently looking at life, you ready yourself to move forward into new possibilities.
So, our meditation today is about being present with how you are thinking, feeling, and acting in a particular situation that is causing frustration, suffering, and poor results in your life. At this point, we’re not going to try to solve that, fix it, or try to do anything with it. There will be plenty of time for that in the coming weeks. Today, we want to practice “seeing” and “feeling” what this perspective is all about. Instead of avoiding it or distracting ourselves from it, we’re going to get inside it and be present with it. This will set up the next stages of the healing process.
This meditation will also help you be more at ease in this frustrating area of your life, even if the results you’re currently getting aren’t what you truly desire. Adding mindful presence to any experience gives you a different relationship to it. Instead of being consumed or controlled by it, you can just be with it, observe it, and learn from it.
So, if you will, choose one situation in your life that you would like to address.
Then, bring to mind a recent moment when you were experiencing frustration, suffering, or poor results in this particular area of your life. We’ll use that event as the focal point for this meditation.
You can follow along with the guided audio in Part B of the recording above.
Enjoy!
Guided Meditation Script
“Being Present With Your Perspective”
Please join me in sitting comfortably upright in a quiet, private environment with the soles of your feet flat on the ground and parallel to each other. Rest your hands, palms down on your thighs. Lightly close your eyes.
Imagine a string attached to the top of your head, drawing your spine gently upright, creating a little more vertical space up through the core of your body.
Take a few slow, deep breaths, feeling the sensations of breathing inside your body.
Now, bring to mind one area of your life in which you are not getting the results you desire. It could be a health issue, a relationship, a pattern of behavior, or, perhaps, your finances. Choose one area to work with in this meditation today. . .
Now, bring to mind a recent moment when you felt frustrated, suffered, or were unhappy in this area of your life. Choose one recent event to work with. . .
Remember a few important details of what happened at that time and how you felt about it. . .
Has anything like that ever happened to you before? In other words, might this experience be related to a repeating pattern in your life? Briefly, think about any other times something similar has happened. Allow any related moments to arise in your awareness, without trying to analyze them or figure them out, just let them move through your awareness. . .
Now, in one short phrase, how would you describe the limiting pattern these experiences relate to? Don’t worry about getting this exactly right, just notice any words that come to mind to describe this pattern.
What thoughts are related to this pattern? What words and images go through your mind when you are experiencing this pattern?
How do you feel when you think this way?
What do you do when you think and feel this way?
What happens when you think, feel, and act this way. What are the usual results of this perspective?
Now just be present with this limiting pattern along with the thoughts, feelings, actions, and results that are related to this way of looking at the world. You don’t have to do anything about this now. Just notice it, feel it. Notice how this perspective relates to what is happening in this area of your life. There’s power in this noticing, this being present, because the part of you that is noticing and being present is free. . .
Now, slowly open your eyes and take in the space around you. Take this new level of awareness with you and recognize any ways that this limiting pattern is impacting your life. Whenever you need to, pause, take a few slow deep breaths, and be present with how you are looking at life.
Well done!