Autumn Meditation: Letting Go

Today let's take a lesson from the changing trees: Embrace life deeply rooted with faith in the ground below us, with the ability to easily let go of the things that no longer serve us.

Begin meditation 

Find a comfortable seat. Connect your sitting bones + tailbone to the earth, while keeping lifted in the upper body with a tall spine. Relax your eyes, jaw, and neck. Close your eyes and take your breath a hundred times deeper. Focus on the breath expanding the body softly as your breathe in, and relaxing, releasing everything as you breathe out. Imagine sending your breath down through your body, then allow the exhale to rise up and out. Feel your breath move down your back, hips and legs like roots growing into the Earth. Allow it to move back upward, up through the back and the top of the head, as if branches begin to sprout upward toward the sun. Focus only on your breath.

Imagine a tree outside right now, leaves changing with the season. From golden yellow to candy apple red, fiery orange and deep brown.

Beside the tree is a stream of water, reflecting the warm autumn sun. Something that worries you, pick up a leaf, any color you want, and set it on the stream. Let it go and watch it float away.
Someone who angers you. Something that keeps you up at night. Continue setting your troubles downstream.

Picture yourself as this tree. Deeply rooted to the earth beneath you, free of dead weight, able to let go of what no longer serves you so effortlessly. Breathe in feeling grounded and secure. Let your breath go. Breathe in with balance and ease. Release again.

Move forward with the wisdom of the trees--how beautiful it can be to let the dead things go.