How To Manage Your Thoughts

This guided meditation is for meditators of all levels, helping to decrease the volume of thoughts, giving you space to think and breathe more clearly, making it easier to find the present moment. Starting with a short breathing exercise moving to the main practice of witnessing and labelling the distractions of the mind.

Transcript

Hello and welcome.

My name is Dali and I'm going to take you through a guided meditation today,

Creating Space to Think.

One of the many misconceptions of meditation,

I know I was guilty of thinking the same,

Is that it's about emptying the mind,

Clearing the thoughts or stopping the thoughts completely.

Now that's not the case,

That's certainly not what we're going to practice today.

The techniques I'm going to go through with you are to help you create space to think,

To breathe and allow the thoughts to happen,

But not react to them,

Not chase them,

Not allow yourself to be caught up in all of your thoughts,

But allow yourself to watch them become witness to them.

When we have an endless stream of thoughts,

It can feel like they're very close to our head,

Can feel very noisy,

And feel like we don't have any room to actually think about the things that we need to think about.

Imagine a nursery school or kindergarten teacher on their first day,

Classroom full of children,

Doing what children do,

Making lots of noise,

Running around,

And the teacher is just not able to hear themselves think.

Then the bell goes for recess or playtime,

And they all stream out into the yard or the playground,

And they're still making that same noise.

They're still running around chasing each other,

But now the teacher has space,

Space between them,

Space to breathe and to think.

And that's what this practice is going to do,

Give you that space to think.

If you can get yourself into a comfortable position,

Whatever that means to you,

If you're using a cushion,

Sitting cross-legged or kneeling on the cushion with a straight back,

Not rigid,

But straight and alert,

Your hands can rest lightly on your thighs,

On your knees,

Or with palms facing upwards,

Your fingers gently resting on top of each other.

Whatever is comfortable for you is okay.

And you can let your eyes gently close.

We're going to start with two very short breathing exercises before moving on to the main practice.

Let's start with a nice deep breath in through the nose,

Filling the stomach,

Stretching out the lower back and let it out.

And one more deep breath in through the nose and out through the mouth.

Now just let your breath settle into its natural rhythm.

Now I'd like you to bring your attention to your breath and any sounds that it might be making on the in-breath or the out-breath.

What can you hear?

And if you notice any sounds,

Try and turn the volume down.

Let's aim for silence as we breathe in and we breathe out.

As you continue to allow your breath its natural rhythm,

Pay attention to any glitches in your breath,

On your in-breath or your out-breath and see if you can smooth it out.

So we're trying to create a natural breathing pattern that is silent or quieter than it would usually be and smoother than it would usually be.

Just whatever you're comfortable with.

If that's not something you feel like you can do right now,

That's okay.

Just continue to pay attention to the natural rhythm of your breath.

Now we'll move on to the main practice.

As with every meditation your mind is going to wander and that's okay,

It's perfectly natural.

What this technique is going to do is train us to become a witness to those distracting thoughts or sounds you may hear or feelings within your body.

With practice and with time you'll find it easier to become the observer to the thoughts,

Recognizing that they are there but without chasing after them,

Getting caught up in them or embellishing them in any way.

Instead just simply watching and accepting that they exist.

So when a thought does arise we're going to give it a label or a note.

We can silently to ourselves say the word thinking,

Thinking,

So that we recognize the thought as just that,

Thinking.

And when we've labeled it we can then come back to our breath.

Let's just spend a few moments recognizing our thoughts,

Labeling them with the word thinking and then coming back to our breath.

So now let's add a second note and this one is for any distracting sounds that may come up during the meditation,

Whether that's a passing car or aeroplane or even birds or the sound of the wind,

Anything that might distract you and take you away from the moment,

We want to hear those sounds but we don't want to attach a story to them.

So when we hear a sound let's give it the label hearing,

Hearing,

And again just saying it silently to yourself and then coming back to your breath.

And we can spend a few moments practicing that.

And finally let's add a third note,

A third label.

This is for any feelings that you might get in your body during the meditation.

And we want to avoid any words that could be seen as being negative like pain or discomfort or hurting.

And we're simply going to say feeling,

Feeling and come back to our breath.

This will help us recognize that while we're sitting we may get some feelings or sensations anywhere in our body,

But we don't want to attach a story to them.

We just want to recognize that they're there and then come back to our breath.

You may also want to direct your breath to that area of your body as you breathe in.

You can imagine your breath traveling to that area of the feeling or sensation that you're experiencing in that moment and breathe into it.

We spend a few moments practicing that.

As you make your final notes of thinking or hearing or feeling,

Come back to your breath.

You're very welcome to carry on this practice for the next few minutes or take it with you and use it at any point in your day when you feel like you need some space to think or to breathe.

But for now,

You can gently open your eyes and take in your surroundings.

I hope you have a great day.

Thank you.

Reviews

I found this very calming. Thank you for your guidance.

I like the practicality of these labels and look forward to putting them into practice!

Powerful and gentle practice for self awareness and self love

Really good way to practice watching & recognising thoughts and managing them - Thanks 🙏🏽

Thank you for this. You are a calm, clear, and unobtrusive guide. Just what I needed to navigate the storm of thinking.

Great voice and teaching...love that there is no music. Thank you.

Thank you for this 3 labels 🙏 it’s really useful ☺️

It was really awesome to have this space to reflect and mark everything. I came out way more calm than when I started this meditation 💙 Thanks a lot!

Lovely, simple, clear and helpful guide thank you. An extended version (eg 40 to 60 minutes) would also be great!

Really enjoyed this. Such a useful way of meditating and well described to. Thank you 🙏

Thanks, Dali, such a helpful meditation. I love the imagery of the teacher and children 😀🙏🏼

Thank you for the recommendation. Your soothing voice takes me to a calming space. Very beautiful ❤️🙏

For anyone new to or intimidated by the idea of meditation, and not quite sure how to go about it, I would HIGHLY recommend this. Thank you ❤️

Lovely meditation, steady pace and very calming voice. Really accessible too, thank you!

Liked the simplicity of the meditation and yet the clear guidance that flowed throughout. A gentle presence guided the whole process whilst providing simple focus. Will try some of these over next few days.

Calming voice and excellent practice creating the meditative state in the middle of a hectic day.

Very nice. Simply structured. Will practice again.

Great meditation for practicing being the observer and not get carried away by thoughts or sounds.

Very good. Thank you 😊

Thank you for this peaceful calming meditation Dali. It’s a practice that can be used at any time of the day. You have the perfect voice for meditation