Body Awareness Meditations for Cultivating Calm and Insight.

Mindfulness of Body is a foundational meditation practice in modern, evidence-based mindfulness programs like MBSR and MBCT, with a history rooted in ancient systems of mental and spiritual development.

Mindfulness of Body helps to disrupt and weaken painful mind states like anger, anxiety, fear, and depression. And within the mental clarity cultivated by Mindfulness of Body, we can begin to see how these painful mental states obtain the momentum to overtake us. With this awareness we can begin to dismantle these states and work with them more skillfully.

Physical restlessness and mental resistance—frustration, for example, and boredom—are common, unpleasant reactions to Mindfulness of Body training. These reactions will weaken over time, but they can be difficult to tolerate in the beginning. This is natural, so please be patient with yourself and with the process, the best you can. Best wishes in your practice. Take heart. You can do it.

Mindfulness of Body Intro: Sensations

Body Scan: Part by Part and Whole Body

Survey: Top to Bottom

Body Awareness: Center Moving Outward

Playing w/ Body Awareness: Water Imagery

Mindfulness of Body: Periphery to Center

Whole-Body Sponge Breathing

Heart Breathing

Web of Awareness

Broad but Centered Breath Awareness: Candle in the Room

Midline Shining Outward

10-Minute Body Scan

Home Base Meditation

Allowing Experience to Come to You

Drop In

3-Anchor Meditation

3-Anchor Meditation: Extended Practice

3-Anchor Meditation: 10-Minute Practice

Feeling the Face

Sleep Series: Deepening Presence

Sleep Series: Fully Held

Sleep Series: Blanket of Awareness

Relationships: Being Right Vs Being Curious

Sleep Series: Space for Listening

The Listening Space

Finding Ground and Space in Difficult Times

Deanna Burkett

Meditation Coach

Moving from top to bottom is a systematic way to connect with the experience of the body. In frenetic or anxious times, going from top to bottom can be grounding, too. I've heard "top to bottom" scanning described as "combing" through the body, like gently combing tangles from hair.

"Top to bottom" scanning is a grounding technique that helps connect with the body; it is described as gently combing through the body.