Growing Your Window Of Tolerance

Our "window of tolerance" is our capacity to be with whatever is happening in this present moment. Trauma, social injustice and life challenges narrow our window of tolerance. We can grow our "window" and our resilience by attending to our deep body and heart wisdom about our level of activation and presence at any given moment. We will practice growing our "window" through work with posture and anchors.

Transcript

Growing your window of tolerance practice.

Welcome,

I'm really glad you're here with me today.

In this meditation,

We will be exploring how to grow our window of tolerance.

So what is this thing called our window of tolerance?

I like to define it as our optimal level of arousal,

Energy,

Or presence for whatever is happening in any given moment.

Another name for our window of tolerance is resilience.

When we are living in our optimum window,

We can have ups and downs,

But it doesn't throw us into dysregulation.

Goldilocks in the fairy tale story of the three bears really understood the window of tolerance.

She knew when the porridge was too hot,

Too cold,

Or just right.

To find our own window of tolerance,

We are looking for that just right place within us,

Just like Goldilocks.

Finding this zone can be more difficult if you have experienced any kind of trauma or societal injustice or oppression,

As these experiences narrow our window of tolerance and decrease our ability to trust our own bodies.

You may be used to living in your fight,

Flight,

Or freeze zone,

And may have disconnected from your internal wisdom and your body.

You can use the skills we learned today to help you find your window of tolerance around common daily experiences,

Like how much news should I watch today,

Or what type of movement or food does my body want right now,

Or when is it time to get off my screens,

Or how long should I meditate today?

We know that we're out of our window when we have overdone something.

Exercise leading to really sore muscles,

Oversleep leading to grogginess,

Too much news causing worry,

And so on.

We can feel out of sorts,

Uncomfortable,

Edgy,

Or disconnected.

The challenge is that we have to learn how to feel what we're feeling as we feel it.

Then we can assess if what we're doing is contributing to our regulation and steadiness or not.

The body will always give us answers if we slow down enough to listen.

This is a skill that takes time to develop,

So be kind to yourself in this process.

Working with your window of tolerance can be difficult at first as you really have to check in with yourself and your body.

So take this practice slowly and just do a bit at a time,

Even giving yourself permission to end your practice before I'm finished.

So let's begin.

First,

Ask yourself,

What is the best posture for me for this practice for today?

You may wish to sit on a chair,

A cushion,

Or couch.

Your body may want to lie down or stand up for this practice.

As you ask this question to yourself,

Listen for your internal cues that can help you make this decision.

Your cues may come in the form of images or body sensations,

Perhaps an uprising of energy or a settling of energy,

A thought,

An intuition,

Or a feeling of,

This just feels right.

Pay attention to this and assume the posture your body wants for today.

Over time,

You will grow in your understanding of your own personal,

Unique cues or vocabulary of your body.

Now,

Do you want to keep your eyes open or closed?

Again,

Ask yourself,

What will best support my practice right now?

Listen again for your internal cues.

Open or closed eyes?

If you don't know,

Try a few minutes of open eyes and try a few minutes of closed eyes.

What works best for you in this moment?

If you're feeling some overwhelm right now or notice too many sensations or perhaps sense that you're checking out and disconnecting,

You may wish to end the practice for today.

Pacing yourself is very important and you are noticing valuable information from your body,

Mind,

And emotions right now.

This means you're having a successful mindfulness practice.

It's not helpful to push hard through your discomfort.

Rather,

Honor where you are today and try again another time.

If you do want to continue,

Let's work with a mindful anchor right now.

An anchor is a present moment sensation that we can return to when we notice our mind wandering.

What mindfulness anchor is appropriate for you today?

Following the sensations of the breath is a common anchor for mindful attention and focus,

But it's not right for everyone,

Especially if you have lung or breathing challenges or anxiety.

So again,

Check in with yourself.

Giving yourself options for a different anchor is a really good practice.

Do you want to track your breath today?

Or perhaps you might want to feel your hands on your thighs.

Or notice the sensations as you hold an object.

Perhaps you want to keep eyes open and look at an image in your environment.

Or you may wish to notice ambient sounds in the room as your anchor.

Any of these anchors will work really well for continuing to bring your attention back to the present moment.

If you're finding it hard to decide about an anchor,

Just choose one and notice how it feels.

Do you have comfort or some discomfort with it?

Then you can try another anchor and see which one feels just right for today.

Having an anchor outside of your body can be very helpful if attending to internal body sensations is challenging for you.

Let's now attend to the sensations of your anchor.

Perhaps you're noticing the temperature of your inhale or the rising and falling of your ribs or the texture of the object you may be holding or the weight and warmth of your hands on your thighs.

When your mind wanders to another thought or story,

That's okay.

It happens all the time.

Is this anchor supporting you today?

Would you like to try another one?

How would you know that something is not okay or just right for you?

Perhaps it's an uncomfortable sensation or maybe a thought saying this doesn't feel right.

Or perhaps feeling more checked out or more restless.

These cues are also very important messages to pay attention to from your body and your inner self.

So again,

You can choose an anchor,

The same or a different one.

You can check in with your body and notice if you need to shift your posture a bit to come back into your just right zone.

You may need to open or close your eyes.

Just try this as you check in with your internal cues.

This is how we grow our window of tolerance,

Having an experience,

Noticing our reaction and shifting to a more just right place.

Come back again and again to your anchor when your mind wanders or disconnects.

Be curious to see if you feel even just a little bit of that just right feeling in your body,

Your heart or your mind.

In these last few minutes of our practice together,

Send yourself some kind acknowledgement for being curious about your window of tolerance and your willingness to attend to these deep inner cues of regulation.

Over time,

We can gradually widen our window of tolerance through noticing and attending to our nervous system,

Knowing when we're out of our window and finding that just right place.

We come back into our window.

And this information and trust in our body and our heart will gradually fill into more experiences in our life.

Thank you so much for practicing with me and have fun exploring your window of tolerance.

Reviews

So appreciated the level of sensitivity in this meditation, to where the edge of capacity lives in that moment and to give oneself permission for that to be ok. I had a profound insight into how I’ve been trained / socialized to give more importance to the outside stimuli - even if that’s the anchor. So, if I get uncomfortable I’ve learned then to prioritize the anchor over my own internal experience and so check out / dissociate / go into my head as an escape from the discomfort. This meditation was a wonderful invitation to spot that edge and to stab with my experience and prioritize that.

Really interesting and useful practice. Much to learn here, for me. I'm going to work on doing this meditation every day for a while and see how it goes. Thanks for the gift.

i love the concept of a window of tolerance. and the Goldilocks analogy. and explaining there are many ways to anchor myself was game changing. the breath doesn’t work for me. but noticing my feet firmly planted on the ground was very anchoring. 🙏💙🙏

Helpful guidance in finding one’s WOT - will use again and recommend to patients! Thank you 😊

Excellent!

Thanks for helping me get right here, right now.

Thank you 🙏

Thank you so much 🌺🌺🌺🌺for this wonderful practice and the inspirational words 🗺 stay safe and happy 🙏Namaste

What a pleasure to be able to practice Somatic Experiencing with your tracks here on Insight Timer! This is lovely. Beautiful kind pace and gentle nourishing tone. Thank you so much 💚

Anchoring and calming, went from anxious to mostly peaceful, really helpful practice, thank you!

I am so glad I found this!!! Over a year later recovering from a TBI I was always wanting to find a meditation that talked about pacing and helping to become aware of what my body says is helpful or not. Since that’s all I’ve been doing finding the “just right” spot to not aggravate and make my condition worse and also not under doing making it worse. This is what I’ve been searching for so grateful to have found it now🙏

I really appreciate this clear explanation of attending to different sensations, and not always the breath. Thanks for sharing your knowledge!

A really helpful, gentle and beautiful meditation.

Many thanks to you for sharing your gentle, wise and simple practice.

I really like your gentleness and how you help me connect with my body's window. Thank you.

These guided meditations are so helpful for trauma based practice that assists in bringing me back into my body.