Real Self-Care: Sitting

This post is part of a month-long series on Real Self-Care for world-changers. It’s about the experimentation: figuring out what works for you and following your heart. Simple, messy and everything in between. Self-care should be custom, intuitive, feasible and kind – to serve your actual life.

Sitting

Sitting meditation is one of my most challenging forms of self-care. It can be a long learning arc of untangling how to simply sit and be with ourselves without struggle, with compassion. It is a process of learning to trust, learning to cultivate curiosity, learning to let go.

At first, our instinct may be to cling to our thoughts or flee to distraction, but the relationship that develops through sitting with ourselves–not even in meditation, but simply without distractions–can be deeply rewarding. This is how we begin to hear our own true voice–though judgment may arise at first.

Self-care isn’t always pretty: we may squirm or fuss or simply get up and walk away from our cushion at first. We may believe that we simply “can’t”. But I invite you, even for five minutes, to find a comfortable seat, close your eyes and observe your breath. You may find some beauty there.