The Space in the Pot
Read slowly, aloud; twelve to fifteen minutes.
Before you begin. This practice invites you to feel the body as a container of space. Do not use it unsupervised if you live with depersonalisation, an eating disorder, severe body-image distress, a dissociative disorder or psychosis, or if you are in the first months of a bereavement; use it with a clinician. Do not practise while driving or operating anything. Sit upright, feet on the floor. You may stop at any time: open your eyes, press your feet down, and touch something solid.
Sit, and let the breath settle.
Feel the spaces inside the body. The space in the mouth. The space in the chest as it fills and empties. The space in the belly.
Now picture the aerial man's first home: a castle in open sky. Notice what you have claimed as yours to guard. Let it be whatever it is.
Watch the castle thin and blow away, like an autumn cloud. Let the feeling of loss rise. Give it a name. You need not do anything with it.
Breathe out.
Now the smaller shelters, one by one. A cave dug in the air. A pot. A tub. A cottage open to the sky. A hut in a field. Each holds you for a while. Each falls away in its turn.
Notice which of them feels most like your present body, or your present life. Rest a moment in that one.
And now let it, too, fall away, gently.
When the last shelter is gone, notice the space that was inside it. It has not gone anywhere. It never could.
Rest as that space, wider than any container. Inwardly, slowly: the pot breaks; the space remains.
(Silence: one to two minutes.)
Now come back into the body, as into a dwelling you are glad of: temporary, and cherished. Feel its warmth, its weight, the breath moving in it.
One: the breath deepens. Two: feel the feet and hands. Three: hear the room. Four: a full breath in, stretch. Five: eyes open, alert, at home.
Say your name, the day and the place. Name three things you can see, and touch one solid thing. Sit a moment before you stand.