This is a little mindful practice for when we're feeling stressed out,
Annoyed,
Agitated,
Maybe even a bit angry.
It's often quite difficult to sit still when we're feeling like this,
To come into a traditional meditation practice.
So this is something that I often find quite useful in my own practice,
A thought I'd share.
So it can be really great when we're feeling this way to actually start standing,
To get the feet a little bit wider than the hips,
Maybe the knees a tiny bit bent and just bounce a little bit through the knees,
So kind of really feeling through the floor,
Pushing away from the floor,
So you get a little judder,
A little bounce up through the body,
Kind of letting that happen in a way that feels natural and comfortable and loose,
So it's not too forced or sharp a movement,
And letting that movement come up into the arms and hands,
So giving the hands maybe a bit of a shake out,
Sort of flicking,
Shaking and pushing out any of that quite physical energy that we sometimes have when we feel agitated or stressed,
Angry,
Annoyed,
Just pushing away from the floor and shaking out through the hands,
Letting the body move out a little bit,
In whatever ways feel safe and comfortable for you,
And then just coming into a bit more stillness,
And maybe placing your hands onto your belly and seeing if you can feel any of the effects of shaking there or in your hands,
Just noticing that sensation,
Sometimes creating a bit of sensation in the body can help move strong feelings and release a bit of the adrenaline that might get stuck in our muscles if we felt really,
Really angry,
So just noticing the effects of that movement,
If it's not complete and you'd like to move for a bit longer,
You can pause,
Carry on your shaking and your moving,
Just whatever feels right and complete for you,
And now we're going to do a little breath exercise,
And it goes like this,
It's two sniffs in through the nose for the in-breath,
And a sort of sigh out of the mouth,
So it's like two sniffs in through the nose and a sigh out of the mouth,
So just have a go at that,
Just your in-breath is two sniffs and your out-breath is a sigh,
Have a go at that for a moment or two,
Making sure the sniffs in are quite sort of deep and sharp,
Like you're really pulling the air in through the nose,
And then let it all out,
You might even make a little bit of noise,
Making a bit of noise on the out-breath can also be a way to let something go,
Release something tense from the body,
Just a few more like that,
Letting that breath go,
And bringing the hands up to the cheeks,
If it feels comfortable,
Placing the hands sort of onto the cheeks,
Onto the face for a moment,
Maybe even a really light a really light brush of your fingers and your palms over your forehead,
Over your eyebrows,
Nowhere that feels uncomfortable,
Not on the eyes or anywhere that's painful or sore,
But just gently sort of brushing over the face,
Touching the face softly and gently,
You might even take the pads of your fingers and really gently tap on the bony parts around the eyes,
Over the eyebrows,
Around the outside edge of the eyes and across the upper part of the cheekbone,
And even the sort of inner part of the nose,
Its sides of the nose,
The cheeks,
The forehead,
If it feels good to do so,
Just patting or tapping very lightly with the pads of the fingers around the eyes and then around the outer edges of the face,
Down the cheeks,
Maybe just under the nose,
Above the top lip and in the crease of the chin,
Patting along the jaw,
You might massage out the ears a little bit,
Just rubbing the outer edges of the ears and the earlobes,
Just whatever feels enlivening and lovely,
Not painful or uncomfortable,
Perhaps a few of those whole hand strokes across the top of the head and down the back of the neck,
And then just coming into stillness,
You might look around the space that you're in a little,
Perhaps letting the eyes glance over to the left without moving the head too much,
Without straining the eyes,
Just letting the eyes look over to the left,
Seeing what happens to your breathing or your shoulders,
Your jaw,
And just looking over to the left,
And then very slowly bringing the eyes over to the right,
And the same,
We're not moving the head or straining the muscles around the eyes,
Just looking over to the right,
Seeing if it's possible to do this without creating tension in the face or the neck,
The shoulders,
The jaw,
Maybe taking one or two more of those funny sniff and sigh breaths,
Two sniffs in and a sigh out,
A couple more like that,
I wish you well in the rest of your day,
Putting down anger or stress,
Agitation can be tricky,
Creating a little bit of movement can be a good way to start to shift that,
Start to shift our feeling state or our perception of how things are or how things should be,
Just moving out of that a little bit might be useful,
I hope it was,
I hope the rest of your day goes well and thank you for listening.
