Reflect on How Fortunate You Are, that usually lightens things up. When we are feeling heavy, we are normally thinking about what we don't have. We are often worried about the future, sometimes we can get a little bit lighter if we don't carry the future around on our backs, and just come back into the present, into the body, and just feel the touch of the feet on the ground. This is getting a little bit lighter. Remembering how to reflect on joyful aspects of meditation is lightening it up, especially reflecting on the 3rd and the 4th Noble Truths instead of focusing simply on the first two, which often makes one heavy, "Dukkha, Dukkha and Dukkha, and I am the cause of it." That can really make it heavy.
It is also good to think about the way out of Dukkha so that we don't have to keep believing that we are always in it. Balancing the Compassion/Lovingkindness is very important. When we focus too much on the Compassion side, it can be too heavy. Lovingkindness is reflecting on the potential to end it, which includes the 3rd and the 4th Noble Truths.
Sometimes people sit too much in their normal practice in daily life. They forget about walking meditation, which can slow the mind down before they sit - getting out and walking and just feeling the touch of the feet on the ground, as I said, body awareness. These are a few ways to get more lightness into our normal daily life practice. And also to consider how fortunate we are that we have the Dhamma.
Sometimes we think that the practice is heavy, but consider what it might be like if we didn't have the practice, how heavy is that?
How many people get tired just by going around and around in their lives and there is no hope, no purpose, no direction, that is pretty heavy. Perhaps in the West we have good working conditions, but it is also helpful to think of other people in the world who just scrape by just to survive, and actually don't have any spiritual practice, or don't have the time for it. And to remind ourselves that the efforts we put in the practice return to us and these efforts are good Kamma. So we are adding to our good Kamma bank account that we can depend on. Often people only consider the material bank account, but that is not something we can really depend upon.