Mental Focus For Your Work Day

It is easy to start our day on autopilot. We get up, often mindlessly go through our morning routine and the journey to work (which might be a home office) without considering, 'How would I like my day to go?' 'How do my schedule and potential interactions affect my nervous system?' This meditation invites you to consider your day ahead, the busyness of your schedule and your interpersonal interactions. It also encourages you to observe and reflect on your nervous system's response to your thoughts and feelings about your work day. When you develop an awareness of your internal landscape, or interoception, you become more attuned to your body's messages which can offer profound shifts to your workday and how you manage stress. I wish you a positive and insightful start to the day ahead.

Transcript

Good morning.

This meditation is to help you mentally prepare for your work day ahead.

We'll begin with observing our surroundings and this might be dependent on your mode of transport this morning.

So if you're driving or walking naturally you're going to keep your eyes open and aware of your surroundings.

If you're on a bus or a train perhaps you may wish to have your eyes closed.

So let's take a moment to switch on the senses.

Take a moment to observe maybe sounds coming into your awareness.

If you're walking perhaps it might be a rustle of trees or the sounds of birds or perhaps the sound of your feet on the ground.

If you're somewhere where there's people maybe a sense of chatter.

Maybe it's quiet if you're on a quiet carriage on the train.

And if you're driving awareness of cars around you.

If your windows open the sounds of nature perhaps.

Just becoming aware of your natural surroundings such as the sky and clouds.

If you can see birds,

Trees or flowers.

And then becoming aware of your sense of touch.

If you're seated the thighs on your seat,

Your back on the chair,

Your feet on the ground.

And if you're walking that sense of space around you.

And if you've had breakfast this morning maybe there's a taste in your mouth or the freshness of toothpaste.

And are there any smells?

And if you're walking perhaps a smell of flowers or trees.

And then take a moment to notice this morning if there's any tension holding in your body.

So let's start at the top.

Start at the head.

Are you holding your teeth together?

Is your tongue stuck to the roof of your mouth?

Can you relax your tongue and open your teeth a little?

Maybe there's tension around the jawline and the neck,

The shoulders.

You take a slow breath in,

Out the mouth and just soften those tension spots.

And perhaps you're holding tension in your belly or even your hands.

So if you're driving is your,

Are your hands holding the steering wheel tight?

Or if you're sitting are your hands clenched in your lap?

Maybe thighs are feeling tense.

Really it could be anything and it's noticing in your own body where that tension resides.

And then consciously can we breathe into those spaces and encourage them to release that tension.

And the more we become aware of our own individual tension spots and that sense of how it feels to soften and release those spots,

We become more aware of them throughout the day and the difference between tension and letting go.

So as you settle your body with this kind of all these tangible things around us,

Notice how you can maybe bring some of that into your day ahead.

And when we pay attention to our senses we have less tunnel vision.

Our perspective becomes broader which is better for our nervous system because we're less switched on to just our thoughts.

We become aware of what's around us,

It allows us to,

Our perspective to open,

Our nervous system to relax a little.

And our sense of being present to become greater.

So let's just take a moment with our breathing,

Observing the in and out flow of your breath.

Notice if you do tend to hold tension in the belly or you hold your belly tight,

That it's really hard for us to bring the breath down.

So when we breathe up into the chest that's very much kind of a stress switched on response.

But when we bring our breath down into the belly we're telling our brain that we're feeling safe in this moment,

Our nervous system becomes calmer.

So just take a moment to notice your breathing,

Where it is,

Bring it down.

If it's fast or shallow can you make it slower and a little bit deeper?

And know that there's no need to pull in or push out your breath,

Allow it to adopt a gentleness,

A softness,

That gentle expansion and contraction.

And perhaps notice how it feels to simply give your breathing a little bit of extra attention.

Are there any shifts in your body?

And now let's switch our attention to your day ahead.

Take a moment to consider what it may be like,

What you've got on.

So for example,

If you have a busy day,

How does that make you feel?

Mentally you might feel jumbled or overwhelmed,

Feelings of stress may arise,

Or perhaps you feel focused and productive,

Perhaps a busy day enables you to feel more switched on in a positive way.

So there are two different types of stress we can encounter.

Eustress,

Which is positive stress,

And it allows us,

So we get a rush of adrenaline,

It can allow us to feel alert and motivated and challenged in a positive way.

It can help mobilize our body to take action,

Such as reaching targets and deadlines.

But what's important is that we work with that stress and then we return to a positive baseline,

Which is ideally a parasympathetic response,

Where we learn how to manage our stress effectively,

But also we find ways to relax and rest.

We are then able to build a resilient nervous system,

So we switch between sympathetic activation and parasympathetic.

We don't just stay in that sympathetic.

So basically eustress is able to adapt to the environment,

Where we're able to maintain stability within all of our bodily systems.

And then we have distress,

And that's when maybe stress becomes chronic.

We become overwhelmed and our baseline is feeling just slightly stressed all the time.

We're constantly in the state of high alert,

And we may struggle to truly relax.

And this is when our system becomes overloaded.

And a moment of insight can be when we observe these shifts in our nervous system.

So for example,

If we constantly feel maybe that we're under a lot of stress,

You may notice that the breath is up in your chest,

It's slightly quicker,

It maybe feels a little erratic.

And there's a big difference between that and the easing out of tension,

Which we just did in the body,

The slowing down of the breath,

The bringing it into the belly,

And that's more parasympathetic in nature.

So that is when we're resting and digesting,

All of our systems are functioning in a positive manner.

So it's perhaps noticing whether you're more in the eustress or the distress.

And that can be a real moment of insight.

And now let's switch our attention to what interactions you might expect from your day ahead.

Maybe you have a presentation to deliver,

Maybe there are meetings,

Perhaps you're giving interviews or taking interviews.

You might have some difficult conversations today.

Or perhaps your day is chocker with never-ending deadlines,

To-do lists,

Phone calls.

Equally,

You may have a quiet day ahead,

You may feel you have some breathing space today.

And this might feel welcome to you,

It might give you some time to integrate stuff that's going on at work.

Or maybe you feel a bit underwhelmed by having a quiet day,

You prefer to be busy,

You don't necessarily like being at a loose end,

Maybe a busy day helps you feel more proactive.

So with those different kind of days or options in mind of what you might have going on,

How has your nervous system responded to that?

Perhaps it's tightened,

Become tense,

Perhaps you're holding your breath.

Or perhaps you're excited about your day ahead and your system feels lifted in a kind of adrenaline focus positive way,

Slightly nervous but feeling good about the day ahead.

So take a moment to check in with your own response to these interactions in your day.

And invite you to welcome whatever response is coming in.

It's very easy for us to push away what we find challenging,

But then we can end up feeling a bit more stuck.

Perhaps we find it hard to shift out of different nervous system responses,

Which would be normal.

But the moment of insight can be really paying attention to that,

To come out of our default patterns of behavior or thinking.

And can we do this with compassionate observation?

Because from awareness comes growth.

And then we may find that we are more able to interrupt unhelpful thoughts or patterns.

And perhaps we feel less stuck.

So really being aware of our nervous system responses can really be a gateway to all of that.

So take a moment to focus on your breathing.

Whether you had a strong nervous system response to that,

Whether it was felt positive or negative,

Can we simply pay attention to our breath?

How does it feel at your nostrils?

Does it feel gentle or as though it's being pulled in and pushed out?

And I encourage you to see if you can soften the intake of your breath.

Very gently expand your belly.

And then feel the exhale breath release.

Feel the belly gently soften,

But equally at the same time,

There's a gentle contraction there.

And now we're going to move into the final observation.

And it's a bit more about the interaction with others.

It's not necessarily what's on your to-do list,

What your schedule is like,

But actually who you're going to be interacting with.

Who are you going to be dealing with today?

Perhaps you have a job where interacting with others is a big part of what you do.

Or maybe your interaction with others is minimal.

But either way,

The people that you deal with,

That you interact with in the workplace,

Or in whatever type of job you have,

You may find you forge close relationships.

It's likely that you find some people challenging.

Perhaps you don't click with everyone,

But you have a huge amount of respect for them.

So I'd like you to consider your interactions with people today,

Those interpersonal connections that you have.

Just observe what's happening in your body,

Especially if there are some challenges around that for you.

We know that those nervous system shifts can be signs of stress,

A faster heart,

A faster respiratory rate,

Maybe tightening or tensing in the body.

Or maybe there's a person that you're going to interact today that makes you feel warm and comfortable and at ease.

And perhaps observe the difference between the two.

And before we continue,

Let's take a moment to regulate by using awareness of our breathing.

That gentle,

Soft inhale,

Filling up gently in the belly.

And a gentle release.

And now I invite you to take a moment to consider how you wish your interactions to go.

And I think it's important to remember that we can only consider this really from our side,

Because we can't control the other person or the team.

All we can control is our response,

Our reaction,

Our words,

Our delivery,

Which can feel very challenging in a moment that feels difficult.

And this is where I invite you to come back to those things that we can use to settle our body.

So if you have windows,

Awareness of nature around you.

If you're sitting,

Your body on the chair,

Your feet on the ground.

Observing if any of those tension spots start to arise.

And observing the quality of your breath.

And perhaps observing all of this before those interactions begin.

I appreciate it's harder during those interactions.

And certainly observing perhaps after the interaction has ended,

How your body and your mind is responding.

To just take a moment to consider the day ahead.

And what would be your ideal way for that to go?

Maybe it's simply that you wish to stay calm and grounded.

You wish to react in a calm and steady manner.

Perhaps considering that sense of letting go of what you cannot control.

And being mindful of your own inner critic,

Which can be complex.

There can be a lot of dialogue going on.

And ways to regulate that are breathwork,

Grounding,

Settling your body,

Being aware of those nervous system shifts,

And being kind to yourself.

And also being aware of your own boundaries and what's important to you.

So let's take a moment to close this meditation.

So sitting up tall or walking tall,

Shoulders relaxed,

Space between your teeth,

Tongue soft.

Just following your breath in and out,

Easy,

Gentle.

And I wish you well on your day ahead.

Thank you for listening.