Practicing Pelvic Floor Meditation

We rarely acknowledge the pelvic floor…It’s like a dark room no one wants to talk about…and yet, it is a foundational element of the body.

Pelvic floor meditation is meant to bring you emotionally, physically and spiritually into this oft overlooked area.

Imagine Jizo, the Earth Womb Bodhisattva, holding this part of your body with kindness and patience, waiting to be activated with each stretch, each conscious breath.

Start by sitting on a cushion or  pillow, and taking a few deep breaths. Settle into your normal, natural breathing pattern; in and out; in and out.

Slowly lie down until the pillow is beneath your coccyx (tailbone) and giving your body a gentle stretch…notice your breathing, your thoughts.

Bring your attention to your breath and the sensations permeating from the triangle of your lower back, hips, pelvis, and stomach…from your skin to the smallest cell of your bones.

After twenty breaths, remove your cushion and lie flat.

Gather your internal muscles into a kegel, lifting your pelvic floor upward toward your waist, and hold it for a couple of breaths before releasing.  Repeat this ten times, holding the kegel for as long as you can. Notice the sensations inside and out. Let thoughts pass through your mind but don’t grasp them with your conscious.

With kindness, ask your Jizo-nature to hold you safely as you open up these tense muscles.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Gently, bring your knees to your chest, holding them with your arms. Give your lower back and gluteal muscles a deep stretch for 20 breaths.

Again, notice the sensations inside and out. Let thoughts pass through your mind but don’t latch onto them. Are you judging yourself? Are you “thinking”? Let it go. Center on your breathing.

Lie flat and rest again for 10 breaths.

Now, still lying flat, bring your knees up as if you were sitting on a chair and press down on the tops of your legs. Engage the muscles of your pelvic floor for two breaths and then a pause, two more breaths and then a pause.  Tensing and relaxing, tensing and relaxing.

With patience, notice when your mind wanders and what it says.

Gently turn your thoughts back to the force within you, an Earth Mother, Earth Womb, a bodhisattva who has committed to staying on Earth until everyone is finished suffering.

Roll onto your belly and gradually press into cobra or up-facing dog. Stretch out your abdominal muscles without straining. Maintain your relaxation. Let your belly hang as you continue breathing. Notice your thoughts, sensations, and judgments without judgment.

Return to lying on your back and pull your legs into a deep stretch of the pelvic floor.

(You can also do this by standing and lowering yourself into a yin yoga squat, as if you were going to be giving birth to a baby out in a field.)

Feel the stretch in the muscles you rarely acknowledge. Are they tense? Do they have something to tell you?

Then, lie flat again and drift into savasana, corpse pose.  Let your dead weight sink into the floor from the top of your head all the way to the bottom of your feet.

You can now successfully practice pelvic floor meditation.