Embodied check-in script for Module 2

Here is the script (thoughtfully written & led by Abby) for the embodied check-in during the second synchronous session:

1. Begin by settling in to a comfortable posture: you can lie down, stand up, sit down—whatever feels like a comfortable resting position for you. Close your eyes, and start breathing deeply.
2. As you inhale, notice the sensation of the air moving into your body.
3. As you exhale, send all of the tension in your muscles out with the breath. Release the tension from your shoulders, and from your stomach, and from your lower back, and from your neck, and from between your eyes. Trust the surface you rest on to hold you up, and trust gravity to keep you in place. Continue breathing deeply.
4. Over the next three deep breaths, slowly adjust your body so that it takes up as little space as possible. Move slowly, and notice the sensation of curling in on your self. How compact can you make yourself as you continue to breathe?
5. Spend a few breaths here, and notice the inner sensations of your body. Can you feel your torso expanding and contracting with your breath? Can you feel your heart beating? Has any tension returned to your muscles? Notice these sensations, but don’t worry about them. Take another deep breath.
6. Over the next several breaths, as slowly and deliberately as you can move, expand your body to take up as much room as possible. As you unfurl, inhale to note the feeling of your clothes and the air moving on your skin, and exhale to send the tension and strain out of your expanding limbs, torso, and awareness.
7. Come to stillness at your most spacious self. I invite you now to send your awareness into the space around you—what can you hear? What can you feel? What can you smell, as the breath continues to pass between you and your surroundings? Stay here, expansive and noticing, breathing deeply.
8. I invite you now to slowly return to the comfortable position you found at the beginning of this exercise. Continue breathing as you move, and invite the other participants of this learning community into your awareness.
9. Take one final deep, deliberate breath, expelling any remaining tension in your body. When you are ready, I invite you to turn your camera back on, relaxed and ready to to engage with this community that we have created by bringing ourselves to this virtual space together.