Body Awareness: A Guided Meditation

Close your eyes and assume a comfortable position. Maybe fold your hands in your lap. Whatever feels right for you. Once you’re settled, take deep breaths, in through the nose and out through the mouth. And slowly bring your awareness to the breath.

Now move your awareness from the breath and into your left arm. Are there any aches or pains? No need to judge in any way, just notice. Feel the weight, the presence of the arm. And now imagine what it would feel like to not have an arm there at all. Notice the shift in weight. And now imagine you have been compensated $169,000 for the loss of your arm. Bring your awareness to that money. How does it feel to be so rich and so armless?

And now bring awareness to your right thumb. Reflect on its approximate value of $42,000. Shift your focus to the index finger, and imagine the 24,000 you would be paid if it were chopped off in an industrial accident. Allow this awareness to spread through each finger and its respective monetary value: the middle finger, at 20,000; the ring finger, at 14,000; and finally the pinky, at 11,000. If you find your mind wandering, bring your focus back to that original 169,000. Picture it in neat stacks of cash or perhaps fluttering in the wind.

Now bring awareness into the eyes. We hold so much tension in our eyes, don’t we? Loosen those little muscles that work so hard to keep them in place. And now imagine those muscles not having to work at all, because instead of eyes, you now have $192,000. Notice how this implies two eyes are worth about one arm. Again, no need to judge in any way, just notice.

And now bring awareness to your internal organs. The stomach, for 508. The small intestine, for 2,500. And then spread your awareness across the surface of your skin, selling at $10 per square inch. Release the tension from your body, every organ floating away, to be replaced with thousands of dollars in your checking account.

(slower again) And finally, focus your awareness on your brain. How lovely it is to have such a powerful brain that can think up all these numbers. How lucky we are to have such brains! And as you open your eyes and awaken your body, use that wonderful number-generating brain to think up yet another number, and bring awareness to the mouth, so you can say it out loud when you hear the word CURTAIN.

Originally performed on March 29, 2019 as part of The Infinite Wrench and produced by the San Francisco Neo-Futurists.