Announcer (00:09):
This recording is an offering of Networks for Training and Development's Online University.

Speaker 1 (00:19):
All right. Hello friend. So welcome to the Network's Healing Call. So here we are, 2023. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and excellent New Years. With the New Year already here I was thinking today, you know, we culturally bring in thoughts of new beginnings with the new year. Some of us think of New Year's resolutions, what we might wanna work on, what we might want to accomplish this year.

Speaker 1 (00:54):
Maybe we're thinking about what interesting things the year might bring to us. After all, the past few years have been pretty eventful, we could say, on the world stage, in the national stage. So, it's easy to get caught up in things, and it's part of our culture. There's nothing wrong. But I wanted to point out that we are still in the season of winter for a few more months. Even though it's been warmer here where I'm at in Pennsylvania, it certainly was pretty cold last week and the week before, if any of you were caught up in that power outage, God bless you for making it through that.

Speaker 1 (01:38):
Even though we have all this newness coming in 2023, we can benefit from remembering exactly where we are in the present, not just looking ahead, not just looking forward. Not just projecting ourselves into the future, but remembering exactly where we are right now and where in nature that we are right now. So for the Chinese, traditionally, the thing that they associated with aligning in nature's energy and the winter season is storing, the store. Storing in nature and everything that goes along with that is what allows vibrant new growth to emerge in the next season.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
Nature's storing up for spring, so the trees force have dropped all their leaves and they're resting. Many animals are hibernating. We can learn to go with this flow by getting more rest, by being a little more restrained in our activities. I know if you're anything like me, you tend to put out more energy around the holidays with gifts and celebrations and loved ones. And those are so wonderful and always grateful for that time and the goodwill that goes with it.

Speaker 1 (03:09):
But even in the midst of that celebration, still remember to make time for things like meditation, contemplation, quiet practices, reading. Even something as simple as enjoying a good cup of tea without needing anything else, without needing to be on the phone. Without needing to binge-watch Netflix at the same time. Without needing to do anything other than just be, as you are. Enjoying that warmth in your hands, enjoying the theme, the smell of the tea, going into your nose, enjoying the sip, letting it linger in your mouth. Just being.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
Recognizing that, as good as it is to get things done, and certainly that's what our culture tends to be all about most of the time. Get, get it done, get it done. You know, the fertile ground of all that activity, all the outward motion, all the movement that we like, things we like to do, all the traveling, the ground of all that is in being. So as much as we tend to, perhaps judge ourselves or judge others through what they get done or, or what we don't get done, we have to remember that it is 100% just as valuable just to be, just to be a human being as well as, we need both, and we need both in balance.

Speaker 1 (04:54):
And right now being in the winter season, that balance means doing a little bit less right now. If we think of this in terms of just the day, we would say that high noon would be the summer of the day, and the winter of the day would be midnight, sleeping time. So we can expand on that to think of our place in the year as kind of being that, even though we don't hibernate like a bear would, for example. We still evolved over thousands of years to follow the activity of the season, having to deal with the cold, with shorter days, longer nights.

Speaker 1 (05:43):
I mean, we only had electric lights for what, about the last hundred years? Oil lanterns were only widespread for a few generations before that. So, prior to the last several generations, the only nightlights that our ancestors had were the moon, were candles and campfires. So these short days went by and long nights were spent star-gazing, maybe contemplatively reading by candle candlelight, and most certainly getting extra rest.

Speaker 1 (06:18):
So our, our very biology, DNA, our hormonal rhythms. They're all still very much based on not so much a part of our culture anymore. Remember, we have not evolved very much (laughs), if at all, in the past couple of generations. It's not just, uh, a way to honor tradition or honor ancestors. It's literally our evolutionary biology so it pays to be aware. So on this note, let's have an experiential practice that will take us into, hopefully, a meditative state, a restful state, a peaceful state, something that will have us aligned with winter.

Speaker 1 (07:05):
So, take your awareness, your mind, and put it on the breath. Always the doorway to the present moment, the doorway to the body, the breath, always with us. Start by breathing a little bit faster, a little bit more forcefully than you normally would. Breathe so that you can hear it. Still with an even rhythm, still with smoothness, but with using a little bit more of those breathing muscles in the belly, the diaphragm, and the intercostals.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
Now that you can hear your breath, put your mind and awareness into your right nostril. See how much awareness you can bring to the right side of your nose. Feel that air moving across the skin of your nostril, breathing so you can hear it. Feel it caress the sinus inside of your head. Feel that air moving through your throat. Again, coming in through the right nostril, the right sinus coming through the throat, through the chest, and into the belly. You feel the air into your belly. Feel that belly pushing down against your chair or couch or whatever you're sitting on or whatever you're lying on.

Speaker 1 (08:57):
Feel that belly pushing into your back if you're laying down, feel it pushing into the pelvic floor, into the seat if you're sitting. Breathing so you can hear it, in and out the right nostril. Good. Now let's switch sides. Bring your awareness to the left nostril, the left side. This time breathing gently, more softly so that you can still hear it, but just barely. Breathing so that nobody could hear it except you. Feel that gentle breeze tickling the rim of your nose on the left side. If one side seems harder than the other, that's okay, too.

Speaker 1 (10:07):
Gently breathing so that you can hear it. Feeling the air moving past the skin of the nose into the sinuses of the head. That air caressing every part of the air passages that it passes, revitalizing. Gently breathing the air in the left side of the nose through the sinuses. Feel it in the throat. Feel a sense of openness in the throat, a sense of spaciousness. Plenty of room for that air to move through. Breathing gently, feeling the air move through the left nostril, through the sinus, through the throat, through the chest, and into the belly, almost as if the rim of the nose and the belly itself were connected, which in fact they are.

Speaker 1 (11:22):
If you can get that air from the left nostril to the belly, imagine breathing it. Imagine sucking it through the legs, like straws all the way down to your feet. Chuang-Tzu, who was a Chinese philosopher, wrote one of the most famous books about 1800 years old, perhaps a little more. Not quite as famous as Laozi. Famous Chinese philosopher, Chuang-Tzu, said "the true person breathes unto their heels."

Speaker 1 (12:05):
You can't feel that, just imagine it breathing all the way down into the belly and it just keeps going, all the way down to the ankles and heels. Just a few more breaths, letting the whole body feel spacious and alive. Good. Going to move on to the second part of our contemplative winter practice, starting by rubbing the hands together. They say to rub them 36 times, but the point is to rub them together enough times and briskly enough that feel some blood flowing there and feel them warm and tingled. Let's go ahead and do that.

Speaker 1 (13:07):
Rub the hands together about 36 times, still breathing gently so that you can just barely hear it. Now, put your hands on your lower back. If it's uncomfortable to put your hands on your lower back, you can rest them on the belly, just below the belly button. Hold your hands there as you continue to breathe gently so that you can hear it and notice the sense of warmth coming from your hands into this vital part of the body where we have the intestines, the kidneys, the stomach, what the Chinese referred to as the "ocean" of the body, "the lower [inaudible 00:14:06]". Just a few more breaths.

Speaker 1 (14:14):
Good. Rub the hands again, getting them nice and warm, bringing that blood and heat in the surface. This time place the hands over the eyes. Let the hands rest over and cup over the eyes. See if you can find a sense of warmth and aliveness coming into the eyes through the hands. Just let the eyes rest in their sockets. All those small eye muscles that we're using all day that hold stress like many parts of our face. Just let them go. Let them be as they are, continuing to breathe gently so that you can just barely hear it.

Speaker 1 (15:24):
Rub the hands again. This time we're going to place the hands over the ears. And as we do this, notice the sound that the breath makes in your ears with your hands over them. Notice how the sound is louder. Pay close attention to that sound and just notice it as if it were the most beautiful sound you've ever heard. Here we go, hands on the ears, continuing to breathe, hearing that breath as though were a beautiful breeze blowing through the most peaceful and sacred trees. Nature's melody made just for you.

Speaker 1 (16:30):
And one more time, rub the hand. This time we're going to use our index or middle finger, whichever you prefer, and just give it a rub along the sides of the nose. Rub up and down. Go up the nose to the ridge above the eyebrows. Rub that ridge in little circles across the eyebrows. Rub your palms over your cheeks, run your fingers through your hair, starting up a scalp and going back several times. Again, just feel the aliveness of your fingernails, touching your scalp, stimulating all those nerves and hair follicles.

Speaker 1 (17:36):
Take a deep breath and say, ahhhhh. See the world as if you were seeing it for the first time or as the Greek philosopher, Heraclitus said, "You cannot step in the same river twice." And even though, at first glance, the things around us might seem the same, we are different. Our practice has made us different. Our digestion is different, our hormones are different. The world is different. The planet is in a different place and space. So just smile and notice the beauty of all the things around you. Whatever it is. A pile of papers you have to take care of, the laundry for tomorrow. Maybe a cluttered desk that could use cleaned up. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter.

Speaker 1 (18:38):
See it as if you were seeing it with fresh eyes for the very first time. Just notice how amazing everything is. And with this, our time is up for this evening. I want to thank you so much for taking the time to join us this evening. I want to remind you that the Network's Healing Circle calls are available for you on the website if you ever wanted to revisit this call or any other one. And I just appreciate you taking the time to do something good for yourself, to try something different, to join me as I ponder these thoughts.

Speaker 1 (19:25):
And I learned something just from going over this with you. Thank you for joining in this practice. For truly, our hearts are connected beyond time and beyond space. So may you carry the blessings throughout your evening. May you rest so very well, and please take good care of yourself until we meet again. Thank you.

Announcer (19:54):
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