The rhythm of the ocean reflects the basis of our being

I was lucky enough this year not only to go on a holiday abroad with my family, but also to spend some precious moments every day either self-healing with Reiki or meditating (or both) in the great outdoors. The place I found myself most frequently drawn to for my meditations was the beach.

For my seated meditations, I sat on the highest point of the dry sand before it dipped down towards the wet sand and the beautiful aquamarine waters. This allowed me not only the best view of the ocean, but also a very comfortable spot to sit with my spine straight and tall and my legs angled downwards and crossed. What is fabulous about the sand is that you can shape it to fit around your feet, legs and bottom to be perfectly supported and positioned and connected to the Earth.

As I breathed slowly in and slowly out, I quickly realised that the rhythm of my breath easily matched the rising and falling (or indeed crashing, in the case of Cape Verde!) of the waves. And it dawned on me that, since we are made up of approximately 70% water, we naturally carry the rhythm of the water on this planet within our bodies. Of course we should breathe in a wave-like motion.

I noticed that, just like our breath, the pace and rhythm of the waves is rarely completely even. Both internal and external forces in and around the ocean (temperature, currents, sea life, wind and weather factors, human activity and machinery) as well as in and around ourselves (situations, relationships, exercise, responses, emotions, hormones) influence the rhythm, the pace and the vigour of the waves. In those moments of reflection and realisation, I honestly felt completely connected with the element of water. I was awed by how obvious these realisations are and how profoundly we can and should resonate with the waters of our beautiful planet. Consequently, if we do, then why would we not live in flow and experience whatever it is that life brings to our shores?

I made the focus of many of the meditations I practised on holiday a simple connecting with the rhythm of the ocean through my breath, for anywhere between 5 and 30 minutes. These were therefore predominantly eyes-open meditations and they touched me in a very unique way compared to my usual eyes-closed meditations or movement meditations. The sense of interacting with the 'object of focus' (the ocean) through my vision, and combining it with all five senses and the energy of the moment and the space, was calming, uplifting, expansive, and brought a sense of wholeness and oneness in a very special way. Interestingly, when I did close my eyes, the power of the sound became quite extreme, to the point where, frequently, I felt the need to open my eyes just a little to check that the waves hadn't come up the beach to draw me back to the ocean itself. (At this point I might add that the Cape Verdean seas do have a tendency to do just that, so some of this need was driven from experience. I nearly lost my flip flops and my camera a couple of times when I was engrossed in the marvellous seascape and oceanic activity!) That kind of becoming one with the ocean wasn't quite what I had in mind.

For all of the above reasons and many more, I highly recommend a breathing practice or a meditation when taking a trip to the sea. It is a reminder of why so many of my guided meditations and shamanic healing practices involve visualisations, journeys and invocations of the water element.

So, to sign off, all there is left to say is: remember, you are mostly water, so let yourself flow.