Welcome to the final week of the 4 Week Introduction to Mindfulness. If you have done any of the meditation practices or home practice exercises, like brushing your teeth mindfully this week or the 1 minute counting the breaths exercise…Well Done!! This has given you an introduction to start noticing some of the things that are happening around us a lot of the time that we don’t notice because we are preoccupied with thoughts in the mind of the past of the future.
‘You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf’ (Kabat-Zinn, 1994)
So why are we experiencing so much stress and how can mindfulness help?
Moving our attention and awareness from the busy problem-solving mind to the anchors of the breath or body, allows us to move from the Fight or Flight response to the Rest and Digest response. Simply by becoming aware of how the body is feeling or following the natural rhythm of the breath is having an effect on the body’s sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system. This has a physiological effect on lowering the heart rate and reducing hormones like adrenalin and cortisol. Often the imagined threat we experience, whether it’s sending a work email to the wrong person, or feeling we said the wrong thing in a meeting, can have the same effect on our body as if there was a leopard chasing us and we needed to run for our lives. This imagined threat can mean we are often in a state of hyper-arousal for weeks, months and even years without being aware of this. By practicing these mindfulness techniques, we are giving the body a chance to rest and reduce the production of these potentially harmful hormones.
A helpful and short informal practice for checking in with how we are feeling during the day or during stressful periods is The 3 Step Breathing Space
Whether you’re in work or at home, no one will notice you are even practicing the Breathing Space. See how it is to play the recording of this exercise, in order to get used to it, so you can do it without needing to listen to the audio track.
Step 1: Deliberately adopting a dignified/upright position and checking in with ‘What is my experience right now? How is my body feeling? Is there any emotion I notice? Is my mind busy? past or future orientated?
Step 2: Bringing the attention to focus on the natural rhythm of the breath, noticing the inbreath and the outbreath, no need to change it any way, just following the body breathing naturally. This is allowing us to anchor ourselves in the present moment.
Step 3: Expanding from the breath out to the whole body, noticing the space the body takes up, and then moving into the next moments of your day from this widened awareness.
The ten-finger gratitude exercise
To come to a positive appreciation for the small things in your life, you can try the gratitude exercise. It simply means that once a day you bring to mind ten things which you are grateful for; counting them on your fingers. It is important to get to ten things, even when it becomes increasingly harder after three or four! This is exactly what the exercise is for — intentionally bringing into awareness the tiny, previously unnoticed elements of the day.
Remember to weave your parachute every day, rather than leave it to the time you have to jump from the plane! (Kabat-Zinn)
DAILY MEDITATION TIPS
- When you first wake up in the morning before you get out of bed, bring your attention to your breathing. Observe 5 mindful breaths.
- Throughout the day – take a few moments to bring your attention to your breathing. Observe 5 mindful breaths.
- Whenever you eat or drink something, take a minute and breathe. Look at your food and realise that the food was connected to something which nourished its growth. Can you see the sunlight, the rain, the earth, the farmer, the trucker in your food? Pay attention as you eat, consciously consuming this food for your physical health. Bring awareness to seeing your food, smelling your food, tasting your food, chewing your food, and swallowing your food.
- Bring awareness to listening and talking. When listening, can you listen without agreeing or disagreeing, liking or disliking or planning what you will say when it is your turn? When talking, can you say what you need to say without overstating or understating? Can you notice how your mind and body feel?
- Whenever you are waiting in a queue, use this time to notice standing and breathing. Feel the contact of your feet on the floor and how your body feels. Bring attention to the rising and falling of your abdomen. Are you feeling impatient?
- Before you go to sleep at night, take a few minutes and bring your attention to your breathing. Observe 5 mindful breaths.
(Adapted from Saki Santorelli, EdD, University of Massachusetts Medical School)
FOR FREE DAILY MEDITATIONS, CLICK ON THE LINKS BELOW:
For Breath and Body (10 mins)
For Body Scan (13 mins)
For Mountain Meditation (15 mins)
For Mindful Movement (30 mins)
For Three Step Breathing Space (3 mins)
For more information about 8 Week MBSR/MBCT Courses and Free Meditation Resources please visit The Mindfulness Centre
REFERENCES
Segal, Z.V., Williams, J.M.G., & Teasdale, J.D. (2013). Mindfulness–Based Cognitive Therapy for Depression: A New Approach to Preventing Relapse (Second Edition). London: The Guilford Press.
Kabat-Zinn, J. (1994). Wherever you go, there you are: Mindfulness meditation in everyday life. New York: Hyperion.