THE INNER SMILE

Smile through the organs in the following order:
1. heart (red)
2. lungs (white)
3. liver (green)

5. spleen & pancreas

Follow these four cues to practice a simplified version of THE INNER SMILE :

1) RELAX AND ALIGN POSTURE (Same as Seated Meditation #1):
-Arrange your environment to be quiet, comfortable, and free from distraction.
-Sit forward on the front edge of a chair or bed.
-Feel your feet firmly on the ground, with your weight evenly spread across the surface of both feet.
-Rest your hands, palms down on your thighs. Relax and soften your hands.
-Let your elbows feel heavy, so your shoulders relax and sink down.
-Imagine a string attached to the top of your head pulling you gently upright. Feel as if your body is filled with helium. This opens and expand the space in all joints.
-Roll the tip of your tongue to lightly touch the roof of your mouth.

2) SMILE AND BREATHE CONSCIOUSLY (Same as Seated Meditation #1):
-Adjust your emotional attitude with a subtle smile. Let the feeling of smiling relax your face, eyes, and forehead. Smile down through your whole body, letting your whole body soften and relax.
-Focus into your lower abdomen and become aware of your breathing there. As you inhale feel as if your lower abdomen and lower back fill with your breath. Exhale and allow your abdomen to relax back toward your spine. Let your breathing become slow, quiet, and soft.

3) VISUALIZE THE QI PATHWAY: (See illustration above)
-The Core Energy Pattern for the Inner Smile includes your forehead and eyes, your face, the front of your throat, your heart, your lungs, your liver, your kidneys, your spleen and pancreas, your navel and your lower abdomen.

4) IMAGINE AND FEEL UNIVERSAL QI FLOWING SMOOTHLY ALONG ITS PATH:
-Begin the energy flow of the Inner Smile meditation by smiling into your forehead and eyes. Imagine a radiant light warming your forehead and eyes and combining with the feeling of smiling. Allow that warm smiling energy to wash down over your face, down the front of your throat, into your heart.

-Smile into your heart. Combine the feeling of smiling with the color ruby red, a brilliant ruby red. Spend 1-2 minutes smiling into your heart, then

-Allow the warm smiling energy to flow out to the left and to the right into your lungs. Smile into your lungs. Combine the feeling of smiling with the color pearl white, a radiant pearl white. Spend 1-2 minutes smiling into your lungs, then

-Allow the warm smiling energy to flow down on your right side, just beneath your ribs, into your liver. Smile into your liver. Combine the feeling of smiling with the color emerald green, a sparkling emerald green. Spend 1-2 minutes smiling into your liver, then

-Allow the warm smiling energy to flow around your ribs on your right side, to your back, on either side of your spine, beneath your ribs, into your kidneys. Smile into your kidneys. Combine the feeling of smiling with the color sapphire blue, a shimmering sapphire blue. Spend 1-2 minutes smiling into your kidneys, then

-Allow the warm smiling energy to flow around your ribs on the left side to your spleen and pancreas, to the left and behind your stomach. Smile into your spleen and pancreas. Combine the feeling of smiling with the color solar yellow, a brilliant solar yellow. Spend 1-2 minutes smiling into your spleen and pancreas, then

-Allow the warm smiling energy to collect at your navel and then let it flow into your lower abdomen to store there.

-The path of The Inner Smile should take at least 15 MINUTES. If you arrive at the lower abdomen before 15 minutes are up, focus your mind by smiling into your lower abdomen for the remaining time. Whenever your mind wanders at any point in the meditation, gently bring it back to the last organ that you remember smiling into and continue from there. Return to the path of The Inner Smile as many times as your mind is distracted.

CONCLUSION:
-To finish this practice, feel your body as a whole from the inside. Allow a feeling of relaxation to fill every cell. Rest your mind in that feeling.

-At the end of your practice, stand up and do the following STRETCHES:

1. Reach both arms overhead. Interlace your fingers and turn your palms up. Inhale through your nose and press your palms as high as you can overhead. Exhale through your mouth and lean to one side, feeling the stretch on the opposite side of your body. Inhale and return to center. Exhale and lean to the other side. Repeat each side three times.

2. Bring your hands down in front of your chest, with fingers still interlaced, and palms facing you as if you are holding a large beach ball at chest level. Inhale through your nose. Exhale through your mouth and rotate as far as you can to one side, staying upright. Inhale and return to center. Exhale and turn to the opposite side. Inhale as you return to center. Repeat three times to each side.

3. Shake out your arms and legs. Shake your legs one at a time from the hip, letting your foot hang loosely. Shake your hands from your shoulders, letting your hands hang loosely.

4. Finish your practice by placing your hands on your lower abdomen and taking three deep breathes in through your nose and out completely through your mouth. Collect core energy in your lower dantian. Carry that energy into your day.