Meditation & Coffee - Stress + Overwhelm

Overwhelm and stress can show up in our body, and cause a physical response to our mental spirals. Try this simple meditation technique to soothe stress, beat overwhelm, and come back to a place of calm and rational thinking, so you can move ahead in your day with intention and focus and a little bit more peace.

Transcript

Hello!

You are listening to Meditation and Coffee,

The weekday meditation podcast that helps you start your day off calm,

Aware,

Intentional,

Focused and most importantly,

Awake.

Because did you know that the word Buddha actually means awakened one?

I'm Hannah,

Your host and founder of the online meditation community Breathe Like a Badass,

And I am obsessed with starting the day with good coffee and seriously simple meditation.

As a trained meditation teacher and a female entrepreneur,

My mission is to help anxious yet ambitious women cut through overwhelm,

Negative self-talk,

Constant comparison and fear so they can get the calm,

Clarity and focus that they need to build happy,

Fulfilling,

Freedom-filled businesses and lives.

Meditation is not magic,

But it's a pretty good place to start.

So whether your coffee is a shot of espresso,

A latte decaf or even a tea or a chai,

I invite you to join me every weekday to start your day off right.

FYI,

These sessions are recorded live on my Instagram page,

At BreatheLikeABadass,

So if you'd prefer to join in and watch them live,

You can do so there every weekday morning between 8 and 8.

30am London time.

The videos are also available after the lives on my IGTV page.

Now,

On to the meditation and coffee.

Hello,

Hello,

Hello friends,

We are back live after a week away from me anyway.

So this is my first meditation and coffee session with you guys for a week,

I've been away.

Finally,

It was my first holiday,

It was a staycation,

We didn't go anywhere,

We stayed in the UK,

We went to visit some friends and family,

Taking all the precautions of course,

Lots of masks,

Social distancing,

Hand sanitising,

It was all going on.

But we had a really great time and yeah,

So now I'm back,

Which is great,

Got my coffee with me,

My bright red mug that I've got with me today,

Cooled out at me from the cupboard.

So we're back and it feels good to be back into the routine and starting the day with meditation and coffee as always.

But today's meditation is going to be a technique to deal with stress and overwhelm and the reason for that is,

Very honestly,

Coming back to the week,

The rest of the year,

After having spent a week away,

Can feel quite a lot,

Quite stressful.

And I was feeling that this morning when I woke up,

I was feeling like,

Oh god,

I've got so much to do,

I've had a week off,

A week away from thinking about anything,

A week away from work and deadlines and responsibilities and a week away from all of that stuff that normally keeps our lives sort of ticking over.

And I've come back and now it's all got to happen.

And every time I was in the shower this morning and I was thinking,

As you do when you're in the shower,

I was thinking of all the things that I need to do,

Oh yeah,

This,

This,

This,

This,

This,

Oh yeah,

I've got that this week,

Oh I need to figure that out,

I need to confirm that and before you know it,

You are overwhelmed basically.

Stressed,

Overwhelmed and this technique is a really wonderful technique that can just help you to get out of your head honestly and to process all of that emotion,

That overwhelm and that stress in a healthier,

Happier way so that you can get out of that spiral of stress and get out of that spiral of just starting the day feeling a bit sick and a bit horrible,

Which stress can do to us because it can really provoke a very physical reaction,

Right?

And find relief.

So that's what we're doing today.

Good morning,

Thanks for being here.

So I invite you to come into position and we're really going to be super aware of our,

Just going to move the camera slightly before I begin,

Sorry about this.

You can tell that I've been away because my setup is different,

Right?

Nice.

Okay,

So my camera is now not wobbling,

Which is always good for camera work.

So,

So yeah,

So and we are going to get into position and really the key technique for this meditation is to practice on the mind body connection.

That's what we're really doing here.

And there's a phrase that I always use,

Which is,

You can't think your way out of thinking.

So if you find that you're getting very stressed in your head because of your thoughts and your emotions and the voice in your head,

Like mine this morning in the shower telling me of all the thousands of things that I've got to do today all at once,

You know,

You can use the mind body connection to recognize how those thoughts are having an impact on your body and your mood and your physical sensations and your physical reaction.

Anxiety can be very physical.

Anyone that has anxiety or stress will tell you that it's not just a mental thing,

It might start in the mind,

But it's physical.

It can cause us to have racing heart or sweaty palms or feel hot or tense chest or feel like we want to curl up or start to cry or there's many,

Many,

Many physical manifestations of anxiety.

I mean,

Even when we're young,

We get told,

Oh,

Butterflies in the stomach when you go on stage,

Right?

Or whatever it is,

You know,

Butterflies in your stomach when you have to stand up in front of your class or when you have to do a presentation at work or people understand that it's normal to feel physical sensations when we are dealing with a stressful environment.

But it's odd that we know that and yet we don't always learn how to use those physical sensations and to use that mind body connection in a positive way as something that can help us to find relief from that anxiety.

And today's technique is about that and helping us to do that.

So again,

I invite you to get into position as normal with my meditations.

You don't have to sit in any particular one way.

I invite you to get into a position that feels most comfortable for you.

It may help you however,

If you sit in a cross-legged position or with your feet on the floor and you can feel yourself getting balanced and grounded with your back supported but slightly away from the chair or wherever it is that you're sitting so that you can get into an alert,

Balanced grounded position.

And I invite you to as normal,

Begin your meditation with a few good deep breaths in through the nose.

And as you breathe in,

Allowing yourself to open your shoulders and allow your spine to grow slightly taller.

And as you breathe out,

Allowing yourself to relax the muscles to soften and to melt into this space,

Giving yourself permission to be here,

To be doing this,

To be breathing exactly as you are right now.

Let's do a few more deep breaths again,

Practicing that opening as you breathe in,

That opening out,

That unfolding.

And as you breathe out,

Allowing the muscles to relax,

Relaxing the skin of your face,

Skin around your eyes,

Your cheek,

Your jaw and your neck.

And allowing yourself to notice how it feels to be sitting here today breathing.

If you like you can close your eyes or you can keep them open,

Slightly glazed over,

Looking just ahead of you,

Whatever feels better,

Whatever feels safe.

And now I invite you to notice any stressful thoughts or any ideas or emotions that might be causing you stress or overwhelm.

It might be a thought of what you've got to get done today or this week or this month.

And I invite you to notice what that source of stress,

Whatever it may be,

Big or small,

Does to your body.

What is the physical sensation or sensations that that provokes in your body,

Noticing it?

For me it makes me feel as if I'm rushed.

I feel a little bit hot as if I'm running,

If I've got to escape.

I notice that my hands tighten and tense,

Almost as if my hands are trying to kind of make a fist.

And I notice that my rational thoughts slow down and instead are replaced by this feeling of panic,

Overwhelm,

Stress.

And we're practicing noticing those reactions with curiosity.

We're practicing noticing them from a distance almost,

Not because we're disassociated from them,

But because we are practicing what we call in meditation a sense of detachment.

So you're able to notice reactions and feelings and other thoughts without necessarily being swept away by them.

So trying to notice these reactions to your stress,

Just as a curious kind of interested observer,

As if you were almost noticing them in someone else,

Perhaps.

Getting curious about those physical sensations.

When you think of something stressful or you notice a stressed thought,

You notice that you maybe start to get a little overwhelmed.

How does that show up in your body?

And remembering throughout this that you are safe and that sometimes being asked to feel these things can feel kind of scary and overwhelming in themselves.

But again,

Reminding you that you are safe and that this is an exercise that we're doing to practice our response in stressful times.

If at any point you don't feel safe,

If at any point it starts to get too much,

Come back to that position that we took at the beginning of feeling grounded and taking some good deep breaths.

That can help you to feel more at ease and safe and secure in your body if the stress gets too much at any point.

So continuing to notice and be curious of any physical sensations that show up in your body when you notice your stress or you allow overwhelming thoughts to come in.

And along with the curiosity,

The key is to notice these feelings without judgement.

You're not trying to shame yourself for how you feel.

There's no right or wrong way to feel.

We're just noticing it.

Curiosity,

But no judgement.

Now I invite you to notice those areas of tension or those physical reactions that are caused when you think of stressful thoughts or you're feeling overwhelmed.

And I invite you to bring your attention to your body even more and breathe very gently and allow yourself to send that breath as you breathe in and out to those areas of tension that you noticed or those physical sensations.

So for example,

When I feel stress sometimes I notice that my back kind of gets tense.

My hands get tense,

Like I said,

And I feel sort of quite hunched over and small.

In this exercise I'm going to practice breathing just gently and as deeply as I feel comfortable and allowing my breath to go to those places that feels tight.

And very gently allowing my breath to almost unlock that tension.

To allow my breath to unwind.

To slowly seep into those areas that feel tight and tense.

Very gently as I continue to breathe,

Allowing the air to diffuse that tension,

To soften it.

Almost imagining that your body is a hollow balloon and you're breathing in air and the air is almost cleansing it.

It's almost cleansing those areas in your body.

Noticing,

As usual,

What the breathing does to those areas of physical sensation.

Does it change them?

What do you notice?

Bringing your attention even more to any other areas.

And again,

Imagining your body is a hollow balloon.

That you can inflate and deflate at will,

Very gently.

Whenever you feel any areas of tension,

Sending your body,

Sending your breath,

Sorry,

To that area of the body.

Almost like opening a door on a stuffy room,

Letting the air in,

Letting the air kind of diffuse and spread through any areas of tension that need a little airing out.

And now I invite you to extend that awareness,

That sense of sending breath to your body.

I invite you to extend it to include your whole body.

So it sounds like a lot,

But really just bringing your awareness to your whole body as you're sitting there now and being very aware of your feet,

Your sit bones,

Your arms,

Your shoulders,

Your back,

Chest,

Neck and face and head.

And holding yourself with love and kindness and gentleness,

Of course,

Always.

And holding yourself in your awareness,

Noticing how it feels to be here,

Sitting,

Breathing.

And allowing yourself to breathe deeply and evenly as you maintain your awareness to your whole body.

And each time that you maybe have an anxious thought or a feeling of overwhelm,

You can notice it,

Acknowledge it and come back to this feeling of body breathing.

It's a phrase that I use a lot.

I love it.

Allowing the body to breathe itself.

Allowing the body to inflate and deflate.

And using that as your anchor to bring you back into the present moment and to allow you to feel safe and secure even as overwhelming or stressful thoughts come over you.

It's a reminder to yourself that you're in control,

You're in the present moment and we only have this moment.

And all you can do is what you can do in this moment.

And that can be helpful because we can take those overwhelming thoughts or that stress and we can break it down into manageable pieces.

So maybe we do have a huge amount to do today.

That's okay.

All we can do is break it down into each individual moment and take it moment by moment,

Day by day.

And each time you feel stressed or you notice any more of those physical stress response sensations in your body,

Allowing yourself to drop down into this sense of full body awareness and holding yourself in ease and safety as you allow yourself to breathe,

Bringing your attention to your whole body.

In this way we're practicing coming out of our heads,

Coming out of that feeling of kind of tightness perhaps that we might get when we think about something that's getting us caught in a negative spiral.

And we practice coming out of our heads and noticing our body and using our body as a tool to diffuse the tension and stress and allow ourselves to get back into the present moment and realize that we're safe and that we've got this and that each moment is all we have.

And if we just figure out how to live through and manage each moment one by one,

Bit by bit we'll do it.

Bit by bit we'll win the day.

So inviting you to take one last breath,

Deep or shallow,

Whatever feels good,

Allowing your body to inflate and deflate.

And when you're ready,

Dropping your shoulders even more and opening your eyes,

Coming back into the room,

Maybe taking a sip of your coffee as I always do and noticing the taste and sensations,

Not rushing back into my life,

Just allowing the practice to sit.

Noticing how I feel now compared to the beginning of the practice.

Thanks so much for being here.

One thing that I did want to mention at the end of today's practice is that sometimes people say to me,

Yeah meditation is great but it feels like only the first step because it's just like sitting and breathing.

I mean people that know me will know that I don't think meditation is just sitting and breathing.

But I think some very kind of ambitious people that have a lot they want to get done,

They see meditation as a great mindset tool,

Like a great kind of mindset hack or a way of diffusing stress in the way that we just did.

But they sometimes think,

Okay well cool but what do I do next?

How can I use this kind of easy stress free state of mind that I've just cultivated during my meditation?

How can I use that and take it into the rest of my day?

And there are some tips that I would use.

You are so welcome,

Thank you for being here.

There are some tips that I would use.

I sometimes like to dump all of the things I've got to do on one big list.

So I'll recognize that I'm stressed.

I might do a stress meditation in the way that we've just done now or even just take a few deep breaths you know.

You don't always have to go into formal meditation.

Sometimes a few good deep breaths can be enough.

Especially when you practice.

You can kind of get back to that state of ease easily.

So I would maybe do that and then once I'm in that state of mind like right now,

I think okay cool well I've recognized that I'm overwhelmed and stressed so what can I do about it?

Now that I've got into this frame of mind where I can think a bit more clearly and I realize that the stress is causing me kind of a bit of harm.

Okay so what can I do?

And again I would recommend doing a kind of brain dump writing down everything that you've got to do on a piece of paper and getting kind of very clear eyed about the specific tasks and specific topics that are maybe causing you stress.

And then I would allocate a time to each of those tasks.

First of all you could maybe see kind of what's reasonable.

Like are these real things that I'm getting stressed about?

Are they real tasks or are they just kind of worries,

Unhelpful rumination,

That sort of thing.

And then once you've kind of eliminated anything that isn't helpful,

You can break down your worries into really kind of tangible tasks.

And then you can assign a time that you're going to do them.

And that can be really helpful.

Sometimes I'll brain dump everything I've got to do in one week at the beginning of the week and then I'll assign a day or a time throughout the rest of the week when I'm going to get all of that stuff done.

And at the end of that you kind of have a list where you're like oh okay all of this stuff was really stressing me out when it was just in my head earlier.

But now I've been able to take it out of my head,

Figure it out,

Let it sit,

Realise that I'm safe and that I'm good enough just as I am and then approach each of these things that were overwhelming me before with a sense of clarity and kind of planning rather than letting them just stay in your head and kind of swirling,

Swirling,

Swirling.

So that's a really good technique.

Another one is journaling.

If you find that you're stressed about something that isn't like a to-do list but that is more kind of emotional perhaps,

Journaling can be a really great one.

I've historically had a lot of resistance to journaling.

I've kind of been like oh I'm not a teenage girl like writing in my diary,

What am I going to journal about right?

But obviously journaling is huge and I just like to get a piece of paper or a diary or a journal and literally just like free write.

Sometimes I set a 15 minute timer on my phone and I just sit and free write and talk about whatever's worrying me.

That can be a really good one as well.

And again as you do these things I encourage you to be mindful of your physical reaction to them and to employ the techniques that we used in today's meditation such as breathing,

Noticing your body so that even as you are doing things like journaling or making a list or getting your worries out on paper you remind yourself to come back to the present moment and that you are safe.

So in this way kind of meditation,

Journaling,

Planning can actually be really great tools that work together,

That work in tandem.

So I would highly recommend those.

I would also recommend at the end of each day writing a two done list.

I really love this idea.

At the end of each day you write down what you have done,

What you have achieved rather than what you've still got to do and that can be a really great way of showing your progress and also reminding yourself that you maybe have got more done in the day than you thought you did.

That's another really great one.

So yeah,

Thanks so much for joining me on this Monday morning and even if you're watching or listening and it's not Monday I hope that this has helped you maybe deal with some stress that you're dealing with throughout the week or the day.

Let me know how it went,

Give me some feedback if you have any constructive criticism or let me know what you're dealing with,

What you've got to get done this week and allow me to wish you well and I hope that some of these techniques can help you bring you back into the present and remind yourself that you are safe,

That we are safe in our bodies and our minds and that as I say all we have is this moment and so all we can do is live life moment by moment and take each job,

Task,

Overwhelming situation bit by bit.

It's that phrase,

How do you eat an elephant,

You know,

One bite at a time and it's the same with this.

So thanks so much for being here,

From me and my very fancy,

Colourful red mug,

I wish you a wonderful rest of the day and I'll be back here bright and early tomorrow morning for another session of meditation and coffee.

Thanks so much,

Speak soon.

That's it for today,

Thanks so much for listening and spending your morning with me.

If you like this podcast and you are as obsessed with coffee and maybe meditation as I am,

Please go ahead and leave a rating and a review on Apple podcasts or wherever you normally listen as it helps spread the word and get the message out to more brilliant women just like us who need it.

You can also share with your friends on Instagram tagging me at Breathe Like a Badass,

I always love to see you there.

If you like this and you'd like to hear more from me and Breathe Like a Badass on how to use meditation to get the calm,

Clarity and focus you need to build a happy,

Fulfilling,

Freedom filled business and life,

Head on over to my other full length interview style podcast,

Just search Breathe Like a Badass anywhere that you normally listen to podcasts.

Thank you so much for listening and I will see you for the next one.

Reviews

Instagram is the only account I look at periodically these days! I’m excited to check out her page and your podcasts! Just found you on Insight Timer and this much needed discussion on overwhelm is truly appreciated.