Listen now
The three centers of belly, heart, and head are often the locus of strong emotions. We experience powerful sensations in these areas, both unpleasant and pleasant. With mindfulness, we can practice feeling whatever we feel in these areas, while softening labels of good or bad, right or wrong.
In this guided meditation, Sean Fargo of Mindfulness Exercises presents a mindful body scan with a particular focus on the three centers of belly, heart and head. The practice encourages a tender presence and a graceful acceptance of all that arises in our experience.
Please listen in a safe, quiet place where you can be relatively free from distraction. Practice with eyes opened or closed, in a posture that balances comfort with alertness. May this meditation be of benefit to you in your mindfulness journey.
Find hundreds more guided audio meditations or download 200 meditation scripts to expand your personal practice, or to share with others.
The wisdom and emotional intelligence of the body does not merely exist in the brain, but throughout the entirety of our being. The three centers of the belly, heart and head are often home to our strongest sensations.
The belly aches and the heart hurts, for example, when experiencing unpleasant emotions. And when joy or pleasantness arises, we might feel more spaciousness in the head, a sparkle in the heart, or warmth in the belly.
When bringing mindfulness to these areas, our task is to simply feel what we feel in the body, versus thinking about it or conceptually analyzing it. This entails allowing for all that we observe and applying an open, gentle curiosity that pushes nothing away and is free from expectation.
In the belly, we might observe movement. In the heart, chest, and lungs, we might notice temperature or the presence or absence of constriction. As we bring mindfulness to the head, we take care to stay with the field of sensation, versus getting caught up in thoughts and content.
Practicing presence with these three powerful centers can help minimize resistance in the body, reduce emotional reactivity, and may improve emotional intelligence and compassion.
In this Three Centers body scan meditation, we move from the feet toward the head, pausing to explore sensations in the belly, heart, and head. We are reminded that there’s nothing we need to do, other than bring our presence to what is felt in the body.
With practice, we can sustain this caring presence, from moment to moment throughout our day.
Learn more about body scan meditations and how to sense emotions in the body with these additional free mindfulness resources:
About Sean Fargo:
Sean Fargo is a former Buddhist monk and the founder of Mindfulness Exercises. The online platform, which has shared free and premium mindfulness resources with over 3 million people worldwide, has now certified over 500 Mindfulness Teachers.
Sean is the lead instructor for the teacher training program, a unique self-paced approach which invites world-renowned mindfulness teachers to share their insights and experiences. Sean has taught mindfulness and meditation for corporations including Facebook, Google and Tesla and for health and government organizations, prisons and hospitals around the world.
