For those who have difficulty experiencing positive feelings, opening the heart can be very uncomfortable.
If you struggle to find something to feel grateful for, thinking of a memory to serve as a positive emotional anchor can be useful.
Shifting the body can help the brain shift, too. Researchers exploring the relationship between mood and the body have found that walking in an erect posture and skipping tends to increase subjective feelings of energy and positive emotional states. In contrast, a slouched posture may decrease feelings of energy and increase negative emotions (Peper & Lin, 2012; Nair et al, 2015).
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We think that somehow attempting to predict problems will alleviate stress. At the very least, we won’t be disappointed if things don’t work out the way we wanted. The reality is that the majority of those thoughts are fear-based stories that create an internal environment priming our brain to be stressed and anxious.
This is where mindfulness comes in. Can you become aware of the stories you are telling yourself in any given moment? Can you recognize that your thoughts are not facts? When you are unaware, you act out of habit, and old programming runs the show. When you are aware, you have a choice.
Meditation can be thought of as a form of mental training. It is a skill (or set of skills) that allow us to intentionally direct our attention in ways that challenge the automatic and habitual ways that the mind tends to engage. Just like any skill, getting good at meditation requires practice. Unfortunately, practice is hard. Unless you were lucky enough to be born with a rock-solid will it is tempting to put aside this practice when we feel stressed, pressed for time, or simply bored with doing the same thing day after day. Here are 5 tips to help you stay consistent with your practice:
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The speed of life continues to increase, and we are inundated with information and expectations that we should always be available by phone, text, or social media.
Many people use a frantic lifestyle as a distraction so they do not have to experience underlying feelings of sadness, grief, remorse, or fear. One of the most powerful practices to begin to shift out of the fast-paced stress mode is to slow down.
Do you ever feel anxious when doing relaxing activities like yoga, meditation, or getting a massage?
If you answered yes, you are one of the 15%-20% of people who experience anxiety during formal relaxation training.
When we breathe in, our heart rate increases. When we breathe out, our heart rate decreases. When we breathe at our resonant frequency, the heart and lungs synchronize. For most people, this synchronicity happens around 6 breaths per minute.
Breathing this way for 10-15 minutes causes a decrease in stress hormones (cortisol) and an increase in restoration hormones (DHEA). The brain regions involved in stress responses also begin to quiet down. Our entire system begins to change. Simply put, our breathing changes our state of consciousness
Find Relief from Ruminating Thoughts Using Focus Meditation.
If you or a client are experiencing ruminating thoughts as part of depression, relief may be found in a Focus meditation that shifts attention away from the ruminations.
Postponing unwanted thoughts gives them a time and place, helping keep them at an appropriate scale. When you find your mind ruminating on unwanted thoughts, find a 30-minute block in your calendar. Schedule a time to sit with these thoughts.
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Labeling the thoughts that arise during a Mindfulness meditation can be a helpful practice. For example, if you notice yourself thinking about what you will be doing later that day, you can label the thought “planning” and then let it go.
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There is no such thing as a “wrong” style. As all forms of exercise are beneficial, so too are all meditation styles. You will see a different result from running than weight training, and you will see a different result if you choose a Focus meditation than a Quiet Mind meditation.
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Humans are meaning-making creatures.
We are constantly involved in this process of meaning-making by creating narratives about our life, ourselves, our surroundings, and the people we interact with.
We fill in the missing details of a particular situation based on our fears, unmet needs, memories, and expectations. These stories help us feel like the world is predictable.
But the majority of the stories we create are works of fiction. And they still hold tremendous power.
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The actual object of attention in a Focus meditation practice is less important than maintaining attention on that object. In this post, we share some general guidelines that you may find helpful in selecting a focus.
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The role the environment plays in your meditation practice is important. Elements of your practice space can facilitate entering an open, loving, generous state of consciousness. You can invest in your meditation space without investing a lot - or any - money.
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Meditation is a method to shift the brain into healthier and more balanced ways of relating to and experiencing the world. There are many different styles of meditation, and they all require preparing the body and beginning our practice with a posture most conducive to directing our attention inward. Our mothers were right: posture is important!
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Many beginning meditators have the idea that it is necessary to meditate for 30 minutes to get any results. But in the beginning, very few people can sit and meditate for more than a few minutes. Beginning meditators who try to sit for long periods of time often end up chasing thoughts and memories, relaxing, or taking a nap. This time might be enjoyable and relaxing, but it isn’t meditation.
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