Scroll down for a transcription of this episode.
Expertise the bodily sensations of affection via this guided meditation that nurtures connection, rest, and emotional consciousness.
How To Do This Apply:
- Sit or lie down in a relaxed posture. Shut your eyes or soften your gaze. Take a deep breath in, then slowly exhale. Discover the burden of your physique and launch any stress in your shoulders, jaw, or arms.
- Recall a time whenever you felt deeply cherished and cared for—whether or not from an individual, pet, or a significant expertise.
- As an alternative of specializing in the reminiscence itself, discover the place love manifests in your physique—heat in your chest, a tingling in your arms, a tender smile, or mild rest.
- With every inhale, visualize love spreading via your physique like a heat gentle or tender vitality, filling your coronary heart, arms, and whole being.
- Enable your self to completely expertise this embodied sense of affection, figuring out it’s all the time inside you.
- When prepared, convey consciousness again to your environment, wiggle your fingers and toes, and take a remaining deep breath earlier than opening your eyes. Set an intention to convey this felt sense of affection into your interactions all through the day.
This episode is a part of our sequence The Science of Love, supported by a grant from The John Templeton Basis on spreading love via the media.
Join The Science of Happiness podcast’s 7-Day Love Problem to obtain these science-backed practices delivered on to your inbox: tinyurl.com/7daylovechallenge
Right this moment’s Happiness Break Host:
Dacher Keltner is the host of The Science of Happiness podcast and is a co-instructor of the Higher Good Science Heart’s common on-line course of the identical identify. He’s additionally a professor of psychology on the College of California, Berkeley.
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Transcription:
DACHER KELTNER: This episode was supported by a grant from The John Templeton Basis on spreading love via the media.
Hello Dacher Keltner, welcome to Happiness Break. Right this moment, we’re persevering with our sequence on the science of affection with a guided meditation designed that can assist you really feel and develop the expertise of affection in your physique.
After we expertise an emotion, our our bodies reply with bodily adjustments— our coronary heart could race, we could really feel heat in our chest, our respiration quickens, possibly we get the goosebumps or tearing within the eyes.
Love, specifically, can activate oxytocin launch and the parasympathetic nervous system, the “relaxation and digest” system that helps issues like decrease coronary heart fee, rest, and higher digestion in addition to being open and connecting to others.
Listening to our physique’s alerts, often called interoception, helps us handle stress, construct emotional consciousness and understanding, and join extra deeply with different individuals.
So let’s start.
Discover a snug seat or lie down. Shut your eyes if that feels good to you, or soften your gaze. Take a deep breath in, and slowly breathe out. Enable your self to settle into this second.
Begin by bringing your consideration inward into your physique’s sensations. Discover your breath, your coronary heart beating, and any bodily sensations, for instance in your face, your chest, or arms.
Really feel the burden of your physique resting in opposition to the floor beneath you. Let go of any stress, softening your shoulders, your jaw, and your arms.
Take a deep breath in, and gently sigh it out. Enable your self to reach absolutely within the current.
Now, recall to mind a second whenever you felt deeply cherished and cared for.
This could possibly be from a accomplice, a pal, a member of the family, a mentor, or perhaps a pet or a place or second in nature. Maybe it was a heat hug, a reassuring phrase, or a easy act of kindness.
As an alternative of specializing in the story and the phrases, shift your consciousness to the sensation of affection, as when you have been reliving it now.
As you maintain this second in your thoughts, gently scan your physique.
The place do you are feeling heat, openness, or lightness?
Does your chest really feel expansive?
Do you discover a tingling in your arms, a heat in your stomach?
Perhaps a mild smile forming?
Even tearing in your eyes?
Wherever you are feeling it, merely observe.
If the feeling is refined, that’s okay—simply discover no matter arises with out judgment.
In case your thoughts wanders, gently return to the sensations in your physique.
Now, think about that every inhale expands this sense of affection, filling your coronary heart, your arms, your fingertips, your legs, your complete being.
If it helps, you possibly can visualize love as a tender shade, a heat gentle, or a mild vitality transferring via you.
With every breath, let this sense of affection develop stronger. For a number of moments, merely relaxation on this embodied sense of affection.
Once you’re prepared, slowly convey consciousness again to your environment. Wiggle your fingers and toes, take one remaining deep breath, and gently open your eyes in the event that they have been closed.
Earlier than transferring on together with your day, set an intention: I’ll carry this felt sense of affection into my interactions.
Know that this sense is all the time inside you, able to be accessed everytime you want it. Have a beautiful day.