| Length | 12:41 |
|---|---|
| Subject | Busy Minds & Overthinking |
| Best time | Anywhere you already are |
| Position | Sitting, eyes open |
| Style | Recorded outdoors, live, with the ducks in it. Music underneath |
About this meditation
Recorded on a bench by the duck pond, birds and all. Proof that this does not need a cushion, a candle or a quiet room.
About 13 minutes, recorded outdoors, eyes open.
You label things instead of making stories out of them. Plane. Duck. Thought. No picture, no plot. The ducks do the teaching. One lands too close to another, there is a two second flap, and then straight back to calm. They do not ring a friend about it or complain online for the next five hours.
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Thank you for sitting with me.
Steven
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Who this is for
You think you cannot meditate because you have not got a quiet room, a cushion and half an hour.
This was recorded on a bench beside a duck pond, birds and passing voices and all. Nothing was edited out because the noise is the point.
What happens in this meditation
Your eyes stay open. Everything coming in is part of it rather than something to shut out.
Then labelling, which is the whole technique. A plane goes over and you say plane. A child calls out and you say child. A duck, and you say duck. No picture, no story, no plot. A thought turns up and you say thought.
Then a couple of minutes of opening your awareness as wide as you can and missing nothing.
Then five to one, and back.
How to get the most from it
Thirteen minutes, and it works best outdoors, though a parked car or an open window will do.
Do not try to block anything. The moment you decide a sound is an interruption you have started a story about it.
The ducks do the teaching, and it is worth watching for. One lands too close to another, there is a two second flap, and then straight back to calm. No ringing a friend. No complaining online about it for five hours.
Questions people ask
Why are my eyes open?
Because this is practice for the life you actually live, and you live it with your eyes open. It also stops you treating the outside world as the enemy of the practice.
Is the background noise a problem?
It is the material. There is a video of this one too, and the noise is in that as well. A meditation that only works in silence is not much use in a normal week.
What does labelling actually do?
It stops the story before it starts. Duck, rather than a duck and a memory and what you should be doing later. It sounds too simple to work, which is roughly why it does.
Read the transcript
The transcript follows the audio. Press any line to jump there.
0:07Steven Webb: I thought I would just sit and have a little guided meditation down here beside the duck pond,
0:14Steven Webb: along with all the ducks. So if you want to see the video that goes along with this meditation, you
0:21Steven Webb: can head to the links in the show notes just below. I've uploaded the YouTube video of this meditation.
0:33Steven Webb: This is just a meditation to show that meditation and time out. And mindfulness doesn't have to be
0:40Steven Webb: complicated and we can do it anywhere.
0:43Steven Webb: although it's a little easier when we've got all these swans and ducks and birds and all that, showing us
0:51Steven Webb: how to be at one with nature
0:55Steven Webb: so Just relax your body, invite your shoulders to relax,
1:01Steven Webb: invite your face and your head to relax and
1:06Steven Webb: your neck
1:12Steven Webb: it's about just allowing your body to relax In this moment.
1:21Steven Webb: And if you're out and about, like me or you're watching this video, I encourage you to do it with
1:27Steven Webb: your eyes open, looking around just
1:30Steven Webb: the same as your ears are open, looking around
1:38Steven Webb: And you're making all the sounds and the colours
1:43Steven Webb: all part of the same
1:46Steven Webb: meditation
1:51Steven Webb: it's all part of it
1:56Steven Webb: meditation is about allowing as opposed to
2:02Steven Webb: trying to block out
2:08Steven Webb: and bring your attention to your breath
2:14Steven Webb: and breathing in and you're breathing out
2:27Steven Webb: And why are you doing that just
2:31Steven Webb: Just be aware of the sounds
2:49Steven Webb: And meditation is all about just allowing things to happen.
3:07Steven Webb: And if we find it difficult to just relax in this moment and be present, we can label the sounds
3:15Steven Webb: and we can label different things, we can label a thought
3:25Steven Webb: You may hear a plane going over and you go oh plane you
3:30Steven Webb: don't need to do anything with it
3:47Steven Webb: you might hear a voice in the background or a child scared
3:53Steven Webb: voice child
4:02Steven Webb: Normally when we hear something, we jump to a story with it
4:07Steven Webb: we hear a duck and we jump to a story and a picture of a duck
4:13Steven Webb: what if we just go duck
4:23Steven Webb: just the same as the breath what if we just go
4:30Steven Webb: breath thought
4:50Steven Webb: and what you notice you don't have to do anything with anything.
4:56Steven Webb: It's all just arising
5:06Steven Webb: Every moment is different. Every sound is different.
5:35Steven Webb: And what you notice when you just sit down in awareness when you're out in nature or sat next to
5:43Steven Webb: a river or even in your car it doesn't matter where. When we just become aware of what's happening around
5:50Steven Webb: us
5:53Steven Webb: And we don't jump to story and we don't jump to what we need to do later and just be
6:00Steven Webb: here
6:02Steven Webb: there's a beautiful gift of I
6:06Steven Webb: don't need to do anything with this moment
6:11Steven Webb: It is just as it is
6:31Steven Webb: And the idea is not to miss a single part of
6:35Steven Webb: Don't miss a breath
6:38Steven Webb: don't miss a thought.
6:42Steven Webb: Don't miss a
6:45Steven Webb: single duck noise or a single bird singing.
6:52Steven Webb: Don't miss a car driving by
6:57Steven Webb: or a child laughing.
7:05Steven Webb: Just open your awareness so wide that everything is coming in. But you don't need to do anything with any
7:11Steven Webb: of it
7:26Steven Webb: and we're just going to sit for a couple of minutes and
7:30Steven Webb: just try opening your awareness as much as possible
7:36Steven Webb: from what feelings are coming up to the thoughts that are coming in to the sounds that are coming in.
7:49Steven Webb: You Don't need to worry about time. I will keep an eye on that
8:55Steven Webb: and one thing I notice whenever I'm looking at
8:59Steven Webb: nature
9:01Steven Webb: is the way things happen and then it returns back to calmness very quickly
9:08Steven Webb: A duck lands on the water next to another one and The other one, panic freaks out.
9:13Steven Webb: They do their bit and then they return to normal.
9:18Steven Webb: They don't phone a friend.
9:22Steven Webb: They don't complain on Facebook for the next five hours that a duck landed in my space, they
9:30Steven Webb: just return to their peaceful state.
9:34Steven Webb: They just return to their calmness.
9:39Steven Webb: And if we learn to do that, that's what meditation's about is returning to this moment of calmness So thought
9:46Steven Webb: arises, maybe unpleasant or maybe one that we want. So instead of jumping on it and going down the desires
9:54Steven Webb: of a nice thought, we
9:57Steven Webb: just recognise the thought and enjoy it
10:01Steven Webb: Same as if a thought comes in that we don't desire.
10:06Steven Webb: We may
10:10Steven Webb: Just choose to do nothing with it instead of
10:15Steven Webb: laughing about and making a big deal of it
10:19Steven Webb: and we notice we don't have to grow these moments into something they're more They're already beautiful and whole just
10:26Steven Webb: as they are
10:36Steven Webb: so in a moment if you did close your eyes you can open the eyes we're going to bring back
10:42Steven Webb: our awareness to this present moment
10:47Steven Webb: so five four just gently open your eyes. Three just shake out your arms and take a deep breath and
10:55Steven Webb: just really appreciate the fact that every moment is already calm in itself Or it's about
11:02Steven Webb: returning to the calm wherever you're to whatever you're doing you don't need to be sat in front of that
11:07Steven Webb: pond, although it does help granted I I do get that.
11:14Steven Webb: But ultimately, you can be anywhere doing anything and you can just I don't have to do anything in this
11:21Steven Webb: moment. In this moment. And there's a deeper wisdom within you that recognizes this and means you can respond
11:29Steven Webb: beautifully in any given moment from a deeper calmer Wisdom just like these ducks just like the
11:37Steven Webb: wiser zen master the all these ducks are way wiser than us and they're just going about their life
11:45Steven Webb: where we make big things of everything
11:49Steven Webb: I'm Steven Webb And I also got a another podcast called Stillness in the Storms that talks about these things
11:57Steven Webb: and we go a little bit deeper into finding a little inner peace in life. And if this meditation has
12:03Steven Webb: helped you, you can always send me a virtual hug instead of a coffee Now I've changed it to a
12:09Steven Webb: hug because I don't drink a lot of coffee. I just thought it's more appropriate as a thank you. And
12:16Steven Webb: you can download the five Simple practices for Inner peace. Head over to thankyousteven.com I'm wishing you the most
12:24Steven Webb: beautiful day and enjoy it and return to calmness whenever you have the opportunity
12:31Steven Webb: and that opportunity is always Now take care bye
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