Arrive: Creating Concentration And Focus

Throughout the day, we send our attention in countless directions. To prepare for a new task, especially one requiring creativity, it can help to pause and re-collect ourselves. This practice begins with box breathing to help the nervous system relax and then uses the body as a home base to reel the attention back in and let it settle. Use this practice to end your day as well. Your family and friends will thank you for it!

Transcript

So box breathing will start here. We will inhale to the count of four. We'll hold the breath for four counts. We'll exhale to the count of four and then we'll again hold for four counts. You can follow along with me the first time but you should feel free to change the length of the breath and how you hold it for your own pace. So there's nothing magic about the count of four. Part of the box breathing is just seeing if you can regulate the intervals at the same pace. So inhaling for four. Hold for four. Exhale four. Hold for four. Inhale. Exhale. Hold. Inhale. Exhale. And we'll do this two more cycles. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Hold. And then let that go. Allow your breath to return to normal. And then as we begin to notice our posture sitting here, Just see if that box breathing had an impact on your mood, Your sense of presence, Your capacity to arrive. Again, No wrong or right. You're just checking in to see how that practice impacted you. And then beginning to feel the weight of gravity as we bring our awareness into the whole body in this posture to help yourself have a felt sense of gravity, Just really noticing where you're in contact with whatever is supporting you. You might find on the exhalation that you could give a little bit more over to gravity. Throughout the day, You've done a lot of work holding yourself up, Striving, Moving through the day to accomplish things. All good energy work. Now we're shifting gears. I'm trying to move from that striving energy to this receptivity. And the body can be a place to make that transition as the weight goes into whatever it is that's supporting us. You might notice where your hands landed. If it feels good, You could experiment with changing the posture of the hands. There's a subtle difference between palms up, Palms down, And the fingers interlaced. They all seem to offer our attention a different kind of flavor. One of the other things we're doing with the body as anchor is we're pulling our attention back from all the different places it's been throughout the day. And even in our mind now, We might find ourselves still racing ahead to whatever's next or to tomorrow, Or perhaps the mind is pulling us back to something that happened earlier. So as we settle into the body, We're withdrawing our attention from those places and really rooting them back into the body. For some of you, It might help to find a particular place in the body where you can let your attention settle. So maybe the belly. You could kind of imagine if your body is a glass of water and there's some dirt that's been stirred up, Just letting that dirt settle now to the bottom of the glass. So the thighs can work for this. The feet can work for this. Another image that sometimes helps with this settling is a snow globe. All those little flurries when we shake the globe up. Parts of our attention that are now beginning to settle into the body. And as we sit here, There'll be times the attention gets tossed back out, Maybe like a fishing line. When you notice and see and sense what it snagged, What it caught on, Just gently labeling that. And when you feel ready, Bringing the attention back down through the body, Really rooting it in the feet or the thighs or the belly, Using the breath if it helps to settle, Especially on the exhalation. For me, At least, I really feel that downward sensation on exhaling. Checking where your attention is now. And as you bring the awareness back into the body, Opening to sound now. Sounds that have been here all along, Now you're attuning to them. Not to necessarily label them, As much as just to begin to bring back in the outside world. Really honoring and acknowledging the continuation of the outside world, Even as we sit here in our practice, Taking our seat in the middle of it all. This dynamic world, Our dynamic lives. And in a moment, I'll ring the bell. As the bell begins to fade, You can start to move your body in a way that feels good. These slow motions of wiggling fingers or lifting the heels from the floor. Move into bigger stretches, Working out any kinks. And then as the eyes open, Scanning your space around you for forms and colors, Light, Even temperature, As a way of letting the nervous system know that you're back. Thank you for your practice.