Sitting in silence, my world is far from silent.<\/p>\n
Ears hum. Stomach gurgles.
\nJoints – my knees? the chapel? – creak.
\nBird calls, the wind in the trees,
\nThe rattling of the rain,
\nCars sweeping past,
\nThe warning horn of a distant train.
\nTell me to remember … we are here.
\nIn you.
\nAs you are in us.
\nThe thoughts that I sat down with
\nAre still chattering in my head.<\/p>\n
(time passes … attention shifts)<\/p>\n
Breathing in, I know I\u2019m breathing in.<\/em> Breathing in, my breath grows deep.<\/em> Breathing in, I\u2019m aware of my body.<\/em> Breathing in, I smile.<\/em> Breathing in, I dwell in the present moment.<\/em> The meditation instructions in italics were written by Vietnamese monk, teacher, author, and peace activist, Thich Nhat Hanh. You can read his instructions together with a short excerpt from his book, Silence: The Power of Quiet in a World Full of Noise<\/em> (HarperOne, 2014) at Fear of Silence<\/strong><\/a> (Tricycle blog).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sitting in silence, my world is far from silent. Ears hum. Stomach gurgles. Joints – my knees? the chapel? – creak. Bird calls, the wind in the trees, The rattling of the rain, Cars sweeping past, The warning horn of a distant train. Tell me to remember … we are here. In you. As you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=443"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":446,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443\/revisions\/446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/meditation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nBreathing out, I know I\u2019m breathing out.<\/em>
\n(In. Out.)<\/em><\/p>\n
\nBreathing out, my breath grows slow.<\/em>
\n(Deep. Slow.)<\/em><\/p>\n
\nBreathing out, I calm my body.<\/em>
\n(Aware of body. Calming.)<\/em><\/p>\n
\nBreathing out, I release.<\/em>
\n(Smile. Release.)<\/em><\/p>\n
\nBreathing out, I enjoy the present moment.<\/em>
\n(Present moment. Enjoy.)<\/em><\/p>\n