Arriving Through the Five Senses, Mindfulness Series

Transcription

The next invitation is for you to come to your senses, literally. The purpose of coming to your senses is to really arrive in the moment that you're living in, the only moment that truly exists. What's important about this is how easy it is to get lost in thoughts of the past or the future. How often have you replayed past moments in your life over and over again as if maybe something new might emerge? Or how much time have you spent rehearsing possible scenarios in the future, and in the meantime, we miss out on the very moment we inhabit? So the benefit of coming to our senses and arriving in this moment is we get our life back. You're here to take up space to live fully. So imagine feeling fully present and alive in the actual life you're living. To come to our senses, we practice something called Five, Four, Three, Two, One, and your invitation is to find your way back to that dignified, comfortable, alert position, giving yourself permission to settle in and arrive in the here and now.

If you have sight vision, see if you can find five things in your environment right now that you can see. And go ahead and take them in, the size, the color, the texture. If you do not have sight vision, you might lean on your mind sight and just think about, what do you know are five things in your immediate presence? Go ahead and take in those five things. Next, see if you can bring awareness to four things that you can actually feel. Just bring awareness to it. Four things that you can feel right here, right now. Could be temperature, could be texture. And next, how about three things you can hear? Just take a minute to take in the soundscape of wherever you find yourself right now. What are three things you can hear?

And how about two things you can smell? And just bring awareness to that too. And, finally, one thing you can taste. And this just brings us back to our senses. And you can do it that way or you can even shorten it and go one thing you can see, one thing you can feel, one thing you can hear. Whatever suits you. But I hope that helped you settle into the moment and come back to your senses.