A Natural Place of Rest

We talk about training the mind, but we're not training it to do something, rather training it to come to a natural place of rest. Where we can see life more clearly, with a new perspective. This is a really important point I think. In some ways, the analogy of training the body and training the mind work really well. As a sense of, sort of learning a skill, of repetition, of being healthier and happier as a result. In that sense, the comparison works, works really well. And that idea of training is quite useful. At the same time, training I think generally most of us think about it as training for something. But when it comes to meditation, when it comes to awareness, we not like training in remembering, we simply remembering to be aware more often, or we're remembering to notice when we're distracted. So it's a little different. It's not that we are on this journey where we're training for a final goal. It's more learning, reminding ourselves to notice. To notice what's happening in our own mind. To notice what's happening in our relationships. To notice what's happening in the world around us. And to notice how we respond to those things. How we react to those things. What's the length that we're looking at our own mind or at the world around us? What's our perception? And as we approach life in this way, our perspective begins to change and we start to have a different relationship. Both with ourselves and with those around us. So make sure you're sitting comfortably, that you're not gonna be disturbed for the next few minutes. And we're gonna begin with a deep breath. Breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth. As you breathe in, just noticing how the chest expands till it fills with air. And as you breathe out, as you exhale, just watching as the muscles in the body soften a little bit. You can just gently close your eyes if you haven't done already. And just take a moment, just to notice the sensation of touch. That feeling of weight, of contact of the body pressing down against the seat or the floor beneath you. The sensation of the hands, the arms just resting on your legs or on your lap. Perhaps your feet on the floor. And noticing any sounds around you. As you bring the attention back to the body now. Notice how the body feels. There's any discomfort, or if the body feels quite relaxed, at ease right now. We're just gonna gently rest our attention on the breath, the movement of the breath and the body without trying to change the breath in any way, allowing thoughts to come and go. We're just following that movement of breath. Resting the mind in that place. And then very gently letting go the focus on the breath just coming back to the body, coming back to that feeling of...