In this post

How Meditation During Pregnancy Can Help The Expectant Mom
My Pregnancy Guided Meditation

First of all, if you’re pregnant then a major congrats is in order 🙂

Now, let’s get to the real stuff.

The stress of planning for a new baby. The anxiety of how he will even come out of you during childbirth. The pain that comes with your ever-expanding and growing body.

Not to mention the morning sickness, the lack of a good night’s sleep, and even the mental health stuff, like unexpected depression, stress and anxiety.

I know, it’s not pretty.

Don’t get me wrong, creating LIFE inside of your body is pretty spectacular. It’s one of the coolest things we can do as women and is one of the most profound experiences I have ever had.

But STILL.

Being an expectant mom comes with a whole host of icky stuff.

What really helped me get through it without spiraling into a heap of stress and anxiety was to continue to focus on my yoga practice with an extra serving of mindfulness and meditation.

Practicing meditation was like my life-vest in the choppy waters of pregnancy and even set me up for a smooth childbirth.

The best part?

Pregnancy meditation not only helped me with my mindful birthing experience but it also helped me after giving birth as well. It made breastfeeding easier, it helped me get a good night’s sleep, and it helped support my emotional well-being (which is super important in the face of postpartum depression).

So, yeah. Meditation helps, especially during pregnancy.

How Meditation During Pregnancy Can Help The Expectant Mom

Listen, I’m not going to assuage your anxiety or stress during pregnancy. I get it. It’s a little alien-versus-predator-esque as your body grows an entire life form inside of itself.

But that’s exactly the reason why meditation helps.

Women who experience stress and anxiety during their pregnancy are more likely to experience preterm birth or low birth weight, thanks to all of the stress hormones floating around your brain and body.

Not only that, but prenatal stress can also impair fetal development, leading to cognitive, emotional, and physical impairments all the way into childhood…

…not to add to your prenatal stress.

Practicing meditation every day during your pregnancy will help support your emotional well-being as well as the health and well-being of your baby. It will also help prepare you for mindful parenting, which can be super difficult when you’re in the trenches.

Kinda makes you wanna start meditating right now, doesn’t it?

Perfect, I’ve got this guided prenatal meditation that you can come to all throughout your pregnancy in each trimester.

You might also like: 6 Crazy Easy Pregnancy Meditation Tips For A Powerful Practice

My Pregnancy Guided Meditation

This class is a meditation to just ground you and connect you with your baby. It was a huge epiphany for me when I learned that labor is really a dance…

…it’s your baby working with you.

It’s not just you pushing the baby out. The baby is moving in a sort of spiral to come down through your pelvis.

When we view our labor in this way, it becomes even more important to get connected to our little one, not just because we want to connect with them now before they come out, but because they’re really our ally. Our number one partner in this dance of childbirth that is coming up.

In this video, we begin with some very brief stretches and then we’ll go right into the meditation to begin.

Just come to sit, find a tall spine. I like to sit up on a cushion to make sure that my hips are higher than my knees.

If you don’t like sitting cross legged, you can always sit up on a meditation cushion with some yoga blocks under your knees. Just support yourself however is going to be comfortable for you and then close the eyes.

Let the external world begin to fade away as we just focus on the rise and fall of your breath. See if you can sense an inhale happening for a count of three, breathing in, belly puffing out, and an exhale happening for a count of three, hugging your baby back towards your spine. Palms can be faced down on the thighs or anywhere that’s comfortable for you.

Just invite in this deep sense of drawing inward. Once you find that three-count, inhale, belly puffing out. Three-count. Exhale, navel drawing in. Just feel the sensations of the breath in the body.

Let everything around you going on in your life and the outside world to dissolve away.

You’re taking residence in the inner landscape that belongs only to you and your baby.

Keep the eyes closed and the spine tall. Just puff up the chest, fill it with breath, and then exhale, keeping the spine long. Just allow the chin to dip into the sternum. Take the left ear to the left shoulder, feeling a little stretch on the side of the neck. And then chin dips back down, taking it the other way to the right shoulder.

Just continue like this over several cycles of breath, moving your ear to one shoulder and then the other. Take some time and space to work out any kinks in the upper body and neck.

Keep moving intuitively with the head and neck. Resist the urge to open the eyes, committing to your internal landscape.

Spend some time here in a calm state of observation. See what it feels like to be practicing mindfulness at this moment. Let the thoughts come, because they will, and observe them.

Then let them go as you settle back into your calm breathing.

Bring the head directly above the sitz bones. Blink the eyes open, keeping your gaze incredibly soft. Last little stretch. Before we meditate, we’re just going to take an open hip lunge to each side.

So move your cushion, if you’re sitting on one, back for just a moment. Come to a wide leg straddle. Heal-toe the legs apart from one another and just fold forward. Feel a stretch along the back of the legs. Turn the toes in and the heels out. Allow again the hips to intuitively kind of move side to side or bend one knee, and then the other, keeping your eyes closed as much as you can.

Bend into one knee, it doesn’t matter which one you do first. Flex the opposite foot and just allow the hips to sink back, maybe feeling a little stretch on the inner groin. You can always prop yourself up to make it less intense or you can really ease back for a deeper sensation along the leg.

Take two deep breaths here.

And then to get over to the other side, really keep the weight in your hands so you can mindfully figure out where exactly you want the stretch to go.

Take two deep breaths.

Come back to center for two breaths.

Then it’s time to set up for your pregnancy meditation seat. I’m going to invite you for this meditation to come into this stance where you’re sitting on your heel with one leg out wide. This is a great seat for meditation during pregnancy because it is just a really nice way to open the hips and the pelvis.

This is inspired by a Kundalini meditation that uses this same position that’s especially good for pregnant women.

So wherever you are, you’ll just take one hand down and let your other hand just rest on the heart. You can even rest your elbow on the knee, like in the video. And then just close your eyes.

See how quickly, again, you can drop into the rise and fall of the breath to your interior landscape and just began gathering your attention at the space just between and above your eyebrows. Sense a warmth there at your third eye center.

Really use the hand that’s on the chest to hear and feel your breathing, getting quiet or dropping down, feeling the energy. Send that energy to your third eye center, that space just between and above the eyebrows. Now, send that energy, that light, down the spine, through the head and into the heart.

Then down into your womb. It’s the home of your baby.

So you feel this cord of light from the space between your eyebrows to the navel, connecting your third eye to the belly button with this energetic cord of life. See if you can become more aware of your baby and his or her movements as you focus on this by visualizing what it’s like in your baby’s home.

Maybe it’s dark, maybe beautiful, full of water, safety, warmth. Put yourself in your baby’s shoes. Just channel what it feels like to be him or her floating. So protected. So safe in this space of your body.

Keeping your eyes closed and your attention inward, allow the head to fall forward and come back into that wide straddle position we were in before with the legs are nice and wide. Really stretch out the legs as you bow forward, letting out an exhale. On the inhale, cine into a flat back, just adding a little bit of movement to the meditation.

Keep the attention inward every time you inhale and lengthen the spine here in this wide leg forward fold. Envision that light from third eye center to the belly button as you exhale and bow forward. See if you can connect to the sense of your baby’s home even more. Two more breaths like this.

Keeping your eyes closed and attention inward, let’s come back down to your meditation. See the same seat you were taking before, just switch it out to the other side.

Ask your baby now anything he or she wants to tell you, tell your baby there is time and space right now. That’s going to be several minutes of silence for him or her to tell you or send you any message that they want you to hear. You can also send some reassuring messages to your baby as well.

If you like, for example, you can tell your baby ‘you are safe, you are loved.’ Don’t be afraid, your baby wants to hear from you. Just allow the space for communication to open up without forcing it.

Just create this time and space so that any communication that needs to occur can happen. And if none is happening, then just focus on the rise and fall of the breath and wait. Commit to holding this space for your little one so they know you’re there for them. You’re really listening.

Begin to deepen your breathing. Just ask, what is it that you would like me to know? Don’t expect an answer. Just expect a feeling.

Slowly, gently move back to a neutral seat and bring the hands to the top of your belly. Rest one hand on the other hand right on top of the belly and let the shoulders drop and relax. Tell your baby you’re open to any messages they want to transmit and any advice that they have for you.

Now, bring your attention back to the beam of light from between the eyebrows, connecting to the navel point. Whether you visualize this light inside the body or outside the body, it doesn’t matter. Just know that this connection between your third eye, your intuition, and the home of your baby is very strong.

Deepen the breath, breathing into this light for three full rounds of breath, feeling the palms lift. As you breathe in, palms drop a little. As you breathe out, hands resting on the belly. And with this last breath, you affirm your connection to one another as the most important relationship during this pregnancy.

Not with anyone on the outside, but with the two of you. Connected and united as a team and this inner landscape, this more subtle space.

Bring the hands to prayer at heart center now and rub the palms together, just stimulating all the different nerve endings in the hands. And then go ahead and press the heels of the hands into the eyes so the fingertips wrap up into your hairline. Gently press the heels of the hands into the eye sockets and then drag the hands down the neck, down the torso, pressing the thumbs into the area where your torso meets your thighs and just leaning forward slightly so your fingertips wrap back on your hips.

And then rub the thighs, rub the calves.

And press the thumbs into the arches of the feet, leaning forward a little bit. Then sit up nice and tall, take a deep breath and close the eyes. Let a deep breath out, exhaling completely.

Blink the eyes open.

Welcome back, expectant mom 🙂

I would love to hear how this pregnancy meditation went for you and any messages you received from your little one. If you’re willing to share, let me know in the comments below.

I know for me, during the making of this video, my baby told me that I need to slow down. He had lots of advice for me that I need to slow down and stop worrying and that everything’s going to be okay. That I need to make more time and space for myself, so it was very comforting.

I hope you enjoyed this meditation and thanks for joining me on this journey. Namaste!