Sacred Simplicity

Some days, it all just feels like too much, doesn't it?
 

The world around us seems to keep speeding up, asking for more, and distracting us with too much. The intensity and atrocities never seem to cease, and it's easy to feel overwhelmed, disheartened, and worn down.

In all honesty, some days, it's all I can do to stay centered enough to show up in service, to my family, students, and clients.

However, I determined long ago that the most accessible, immediate things we can do are often the most powerful. That simplicity is sacred.

And, that over time, with commitment, that simplicity potentiates.
 

If everything is energy, then how I use, tend, and direct mine has both significance and influence. So I stay committed to the simple, sacred practices that keep me centered, resourced, and grounded. That, in turn, keeps me showing up in service, as a steady, positive contribution to my family, my clients, and my community.

Yes, I can also advocate, ally, and participate in causes that matter deeply to me. And I do. But I know that my ability to stay grounded in inner alignment, to embody my own resourcing, and to return to center again and again makes me more effective when I'm called to take a stand.
 

To be deeply responsive and responsible to yourself is transformative. When we tend to ourselves in this way, everything shifts. If this kind of inner homecoming was practiced the world over, I see a planet transformed.
 

So today, I want to share two simple practices with you.

These are my daily go-to's. Especially as a mama. Especially when I turn to face a world that feels like it's constantly on fire. These practices rapidly bring me back to center and realign me in presence and purpose.

✋🏼❤️ Hand to Heart
 

Simple and to the point, put your hand on your heart. Feel your heart beat. Feel your unique rhythm. Breathe in. Breathe out. Feel the weight of your hand, the pace of your breath, the thump of your heart. 

Just turning our attention to our heart has a significant capacity to help us self regulate. Add in direct contact through physical touch, and steady breaths, we begin to increase emotional clarity and physiological coherence. 

But most importantly, when I attune to my heart I seem to gently return to the moment and what matters most.

🌿🌤 Earth to Sky Breathing

If you read the Return to Center guide this practice was detailed under the "Breathe" section. The focus of this breath is to draw your awareness up from the earth along the line of the spine up to a space above your head as you inhale, and to wash your awareness down through the crown of your head through the line of the spine back to the earth. 
 

I like to start with a complete exhale to drop anything I'm holding and re-establish my sense of relationship to the ground and the foundations beneath me. From there I let the inhale rise up as if breathing up from the earth into my body through the spine. As I inhale I imagine my spine lengthening and getting more buoyant, and I let that breath draw in all the way up to a space above my head. I let that point above me be a kind of gathering place for my energy and awareness before I exhale and wash my energy and awareness back down through my body to the gathering point beneath me in the earth.  

There is no wrong way to do this. Just bringing our attention to the flow of our breath and the length of our spine can re-arrange our energy. Of course as we go deeper with it, it can ground us and align us with a felt sense of purpose.

For me in the day to day this way of breathing is a quick reset, a way of gathering myself back to myself. It immediately makes me feel grounded, present, and connected. 

These practices work in part because they are immediately accessible. Nothing extra is needed, just breath, body, and awareness.

When we keep it simple, it becomes accessible. 
When it's accessible we utilize it. 
When we actually use a practice, 
it begins to shifts us from the inside out. 

Sometimes that is the most revolutionary thing we can do: keep practicing right where we are, with what we have, trusting the capacity, coherence, and confidence it creates over time.

And the beautiful thing is, the more we practice, the more it becomes a part of us, of who, and how we are. 

What do you think? What are your simple go-to practices?
I'd love to hear.