Hello, and welcome to mindfulness for everyday living. My name is Padma Gordon. And I'm really excited to share these practices, really simple practices that you can use in your life that will support you and having healthier relationships with yourself and with everyone in your world. So, before I even go in to what we're going to do and how we're going to do it, I just would like to invite you to take a deep breath. So let's just take a deep breath together. We'll start with including Close your eyes if you like.

Just feel how circulating breath deep breaths actually brings you in to yourself. So just letting yourself settle so you can really receive what I'm about to share and receive yourself because this relationship with yourself is a very dynamic relationship and breath in my experience is the foundation of mindfulness practice. So I also would like to let you know that I have been practicing mindfulness for over 35 years, as well as somatic or body based practices for over 35 years. There's. And what we're going to do here is we are going to bridge mindfulness practice with embodiment, practice with just being in your body, learning how to be in your body, being yourself, and just really be relaxed. Drop in, so that you can enjoy your life.

Now, it's really about enjoying your life. Because the more present you are, the more you can enjoy whatever is happening. So even as you're listening to this introduction to me starting to just, you know, sketch out the route that we're going to take on this journey. Just feel how you might be starting to drop into yourself, just by listening to my voice, just by feeling yourself and what I want Also say is you don't have to remember this. So if you're listening to this live, then I really want to say please feel free to chat in any questions. There's a little chat function down on your, on the bottom of your barn, you can just chat in question.

And if you're listening to this recorded, just know you don't have to remember any of it. Really, because the part of you that I'm talking to is deeper than your mind. So really, in this practice, the practice of mindfulness takes us from our mind, into our hearts into our bodies. So again, invite you, even though we're just in the introduction, to take another breath and feel how you can go In and down. And the great thing about mindfulness is that you can practice it anywhere and everywhere. And nobody needs to know.

It can be your a little kind of private or secret practice. And for me, mindfulness is, is key is the key to living it is the key to thriving. Because when you practice mindfulness, you notice things. Notice what's needed. You notice that you're hungry or thirsty, you notice that you're hot, you notice that you're cold, so you can actually take care of yourself, because you're getting these signals from your body because you're aware, you might also know Notice that your shoulders are up to your ears. So maybe just begin by pointing your shoulders up to your ears.

That's good. scrunch your shoulders, and then just let them drop. And maybe make a sound. Because very often, we carry so much tension in these bodies, and many of us with all of this computer work and such, and sitting, you know, leading more and more sedentary lives, our shoulders are up by our ears. So we want to just relax. And yes, if at any point and you can see that as I'm here with you, I'm moving.

I'm not static, I'm not fixed. So please, throughout this whole course throughout this whole program, please let yourself just move. Let yourself move and breathe. So movement and breath are the foundations to the flavor of mindfulness that I'm going to share with you. And just to say, mindfulness has been practice, thousands of years, we've gone into a moment in time, where thankfully, miraculously, mindfulness is pretty cutting edge. It dovetails with neuroscience, which I'll talk about later.

And it's really, it's something that's really very alive, at least in our culture here in the United States, I'm presently in California. So maybe it's even more available here. And really, it's a worldwide phenomena. So wherever you're watching this, just know that you're participating in a practice that is ancient, tried and true. As a tried and true Practice, I did not make it up. I'm going to give you my version, my flavor, my iteration of this practice of mindfulness.

And it goes way, way, way back. So know that you're in good company with all kinds of wise and very peaceful thing beings. For me, this is a key to sanity. And I know that His Holiness Dalai Lama said something about if we taught mindfulness to all the children in elementary school, there would be world peace. So by participating in this course, you're actually making your contribution to world peace starting with yourself and I know World Peace is huge and lofty and yet true is starts with you. It starts with us starts with me.

So, we will journey into eight practical applications for mindfulness. And I'll share with you as we go and you'll have opportunities to practice. So thank you for listening