5 fingers, 5 weeks, Part 2

 We beckon with our index finger, calling what we desire to come closer to us.  I'm beckoning you, right now, to take 5 or 10 minutes to bring your focus to your hands and actively participate in this week's practice.

We use our index fingers and thumbs together to touch and hold what we desire, both with gentleness....

....and with a firm, strong grip.

Take a moment now to become aware of your hands, and especially your index fingers.  Feel the skin at the tips of the fingers and where they are situated in relation to the other fingers on your hands.  Close your eyes for a moment and sense the space around the fingers, or where your fingers might be in connection with another surface.

Sense your index fingers as long extensions of the heart cradled in your chest, safe behind your ribs and breastbone.  Imagine the flame of your heart, its heat and fire and brightness running down the length of your arms and extending right past the physical limit of your skin.  Maybe that warmth and fire drips off, maybe it shoots off like a stream of light...keep sensing the heart as the source of that warmth and let the index fingers lengthen and extend, without necessarily moving muscle, this can be an energetic sensation.  It's like the sensation of flexibility, the sense of energy moving out along the bones.

Take a moment to breathe while sensing the heart's warmth and the arms lengthening through the forefingers.

Now join your fingers and thumbs together to create a triangle, as the woman in black is doing below.

Sense the space created by your hands.  You could close your eyes and let your inner vision fill that space with an intention for your day, or imagine using that space to project loving kindness to another being.  Let the forefingers continue to be the physical extensions of the warmth of the heart.

You can also use this to direct your energy to create a boundary, creating a sense of your own personal space.

Whenever you are ready, let go of that shape and let your hands rest gently and comfortably, laying with palms up.  Sense how the hands naturally curl and cup.

Now bring the thumb and forefinger of each hand together gently and losely, so that you could be holding a silken thread in each hand, while they rest comfortably.  Feel the skin of your thumbs, while also sensing the skin of your fingers, equal attention to both sides of the connection.

Call to mind something that you are grateful for, and hold it there in the space between the thumb and forefinger of each hand. 

The inviation is there to recall this moment of gratitude at any time that you bring your thumb and forefinger into contact throughout this week.  Notice when your thumb and forefinger come into contact - maybe when your hand wraps around a coffee mug, or your steering wheel, the hand of someone you love, and take a moment to sense the circle created by that connection, and to remember what you want to express gratitude for.

Carry the sense that the forefingers are extensions of your true heart, and let them direct your attention to what you desire, inviting it closer.

carlos rosas - nia co-founder