The Heavy Earth

Some evenings the body keeps holding itself up long after there’s any need. This working lets it stop. You give each limb permission to be heavy, one at a time, until the floor or the bed is doing all the work.

The working

1. Lie on your back, or sit well supported in a chair, and close your eyes.
2. Let your arms rest at your sides. Breathe at whatever pace the breath chooses.
3. Raise your right arm a few inches, then let it drop. Feel how heavy it is as it lands. Silently tell it, my right arm is heavy, and leave it there.
4. Do the same with your left arm, then your right leg, then your left leg. Lift a little, let it fall, name the heaviness.
5. Now feel all four at once, and the trunk between them, sinking toward the earth. You don’t have to make anything heavy. Just notice that it already is.
6. If you’d rather sit than lie, choose a posture and let it feel as solid as packed earth, so settled that moving would take a decision.

Closing

Before you get up, wiggle your fingers and toes, take a fuller breath, and stretch. Heaviness this deep deserves a slow return.