This entry was posted on Could 23, 2023 by Charlotte Bell.
A clever yoga instructor as soon as informed me: “The earth is the guru of the physique. The sky is the guru of the thoughts.” I keep in mind this quote usually once I’m mountain climbing within the mountains the place I stay. Our surroundings is wealthy with studying alternatives. Out of doors meditation can tune us into our environment and reawaken gratitude.
Out of doors meditation provides us a direct expertise of the guru nature of earth and sky. The earth is unpredictable, and wealthy with sensory experiences. However just like the sky, consciousness can take all of it in with out dropping its readability and vastness.
We normally consider meditation as synonymous with sitting. However particularly after we follow outdoor, we will benefit from the different meditation postures. These embrace strolling, standing and mendacity down.
How one can Follow Out of doors Meditation
Out of doors meditation is much like outside yoga follow in a single important means. After we meditate outdoor, it’s necessary to open our senses to what’s round us. Much like the follow of “forest bathing,” outside meditation invitations us to drink in all that’s coming in by means of our senses—and it’s so much while you’re outdoors. Listed here are some methods to discover outside meditation:
Sitting: Discover a piece of stage floor. Utilizing a meditation cushion or bench may help you keep a sustainable posture. The Sukasana Cushion is a light-weight, compact choice for working towards outdoor. Zafuko cushions are additionally supreme for outside follow.
- Start by settling into your seat. You possibly can preserve your eyes open or closed. Really feel the contact factors in your physique.
- Open your sense of listening to, permitting sounds to return and go as they naturally do. Take care to not attain out for the sound. Merely enable it to return to you.
- Discover if there are sensations of the solar or a breeze in your pores and skin. Let the breezes come and go as effectively.
- Discover any smells or tastes that come up as effectively.
- Think about all these sensations coming and going like clouds within the sky, within the huge house of consciousness.
Various Poses for Meditating Open air
Strolling: Strolling meditation permits us to concentrate to the dynamics of motion and stability. After we follow strolling meditation, it’s necessary to maintain the eyes open. It’s straightforward to lose stability with the eyes closed, to not point out that it’s straightforward to journey over or run into an surprising impediment on our path. In strolling meditation, we decelerate our actions in order that we will tune into the extra refined features of strolling. Right here’s a put up that explains strolling meditation intimately. Follow steps 2 by means of 5 above when you stroll.
Standing: I really love standing meditation for its grounding qualities. Generally strolling meditation can appear overly stimulating. And a few of us get drowsy in sitting meditation. Standing meditation strikes the right stability. It permits us to cease and pay attention with openness and receptivity. The vitality it takes to keep up a standing posture may help clear the fog of drowsiness. Follow in Tadasana (Mountain Pose), and use steps 2 by means of 5 above to information your consciousness.
Mendacity Down: As with outside yoga follow, meditating in a lying-down place takes a little bit of setup. However what’s beautiful about mendacity down on the bottom is that it means that you can tune into the vitality of the earth beneath you. If you happen to’re on grass, be at liberty to lie down instantly on the bottom. If you happen to’re not nervous about filth, you possibly can lie down instantly onto the forest flooring or a sandy seashore. However be at liberty to position a Yoga Mat beneath you. Then enable your self to sink into the earth. Think about being fully supported by the earth as you then open your senses to all the opposite wonders round you.
About Charlotte Bell
Charlotte Bell found yoga in 1982 and started instructing in 1986. Charlotte is the writer of Conscious Yoga, Conscious Life: A Information for On a regular basis Follow and Yoga for Meditators, each printed by Rodmell Press. Her third e-book is titled Hip-Wholesome Asana: The Yoga Practitioner’s Information to Defending the Hips and Avoiding SI Joint Ache (Shambhala Publications). She writes a month-to-month column for CATALYST Journal and serves as editor for Yoga U On-line. Charlotte is a founding board member for GreenTREE Yoga, a non-profit that brings yoga to underserved populations. A lifelong musician, Charlotte performs oboe and English horn within the Salt Lake Symphony and folks sextet Purple Rock Rondo, whose DVD gained two Emmy awards in 2010.
