S.T.O.P. - A Mini-Mindfulness Practice

Moments fly by, and we can so easily miss them when we get caught up in thinking and busyness. This short practice is a great way to S (stop what you're doing for a few moments), T (take a breath or two, noticing how it feels to breathe, O (open your eyes and senses and observe the world around you), P (proceed into your life with a sense of new possibility). A great way to 're-set' when caught up in overwhelm. Practice it frequently throughout the day!

Transcript

During any average day,

There can be moments when a sense of busyness or overwhelm can take over,

Causing stress and a sense of not coping to arise.

Our minds have such a tendency to create stories and develop scenarios that escalate whatever may be happening.

And soon we can find ourselves in a vortex of anxious,

Doing,

Doing,

Doing without respite.

This short practice is designed to disrupt these trains of thought and emotion that can be so overwhelming.

In a sense,

You could think of this practice as pushing the reset button so that you can find your way regularly back into a sense of this moment as it is with equanimity and perhaps new clarity on whatever is going on.

This practice can be incorporated wherever you find yourself,

Sitting,

Walking,

Standing,

Moving from meeting to meeting,

Etc.

And you will notice that as you build this practice in as regularly as you are able,

That you increase your range of mindful awareness more and more into the flow of your life and the opportunity to be fully present in it.

The simple acronym for this practice,

STOP,

Takes you through the following steps.

You could think of it as a first aid protocol for mental wellbeing.

In this moment now,

Simply stop whatever you are doing.

Let go of whatever you've been focusing on to take a few breaths with awareness.

Feel the belly rise and fall with the breath.

Notice the in breath into the chest and out again.

Sense the breath moving in through the nostrils and out again.

As you are breathing,

Open your eyes and look around you,

Noticing colors,

Shapes,

The space you're in,

Noticing any particular sense or sounds or other sensory information,

Including sensations in the body as they change from moment to moment.

Then proceed,

Returning to whatever task is at hand,

Feeling the effects of taking a little stop break in your day and the new possibility that may be here now.