Hello and welcome to today's meditation which is going to focus on a technique of breathing in times of anxiousness.
So the first thing I would like you to do is to find a comfortable position for yourself at this time.
Whether you're choosing to sit on a chair with your back straight but not stiff,
Having a position which is a sense of dignity and your feet firmly flat on the ground.
Perhaps today your body requires you to lie down on a mat or on a bed.
You choosing whatever is comfortable for you today.
And we're now just going to really connect with the breath.
Just noticing the rise and fall of the body as you breathe in and out.
Bringing an awareness to the different parts of the body.
The movement of the different parts of your body as you breathe in and you breathe out.
For instance noticing how the shoulders come up as you inhale and how they fall as you exhale.
And today we're going to be practicing some techniques that you can use in times when perhaps you might be feeling a bit anxious,
You might be worried about something.
In those sorts of times we can really look after ourselves by simply reconnecting with the breath.
By slowing down and connecting with the breath we can really look after ourselves and detach ourselves from the situation that we face.
So if you find yourself in a situation where you are having unpleasant feelings or thoughts then if possible taking yourself away from that situation by going into another room or another space or perhaps you're unable to to do that and that's okay.
First thing to do is just notice your breath and try to slow down the pace of your breathing.
We can do that by having deep breaths so have a nice deep inhale and hold it and then exhale.
And repeating inhale hold and exhale.
And you may want to actually really connect with the breath and the body by placing one hand on your chest and the other hand on your stomach and really noticing the rise and fall of the body as you breathe in and out.
So let's now repeat breathing in deeply with our hand on our chest and our stomach.
Taking a nice inhale holding and exhaling and you can repeat this technique as much as you like to really ground you and to calm you down.
You may start to notice that your body starts to relax and you feel slightly better,
Less anxious just from simply connecting with the breath.
And you can take your hand and your from your stomach and your chest and just lightly place it on your knees.
Another technique that you can use when you're feeling a bit anxious is to repeat some words to yourself that you may find you useful such as relax relax relax.
So as you're inhaling and exhaling you can just be repeating words calm soothing words.
You can repeat the word calm calm calm calm calm.
Or you could even say breathe breathe breathe breathe breathe.
Finding a word which sits well with you and then just repeating that word for the next few moments.
And just remembering to ensure that there is no tension being held in the body.
Perhaps you might notice that your shoulders have actually raised.
Sometimes when you feel a bit anxious you might have hold the stress the feelings in that part of your body just relaxing them letting them drop.
Perhaps there might be some tension in the leg or in the hands.
Just gently bring an awareness and allowing those parts of the body to relax.
One technique is to feel as if you're breathing into those parts of the body.
Just holding that part of your body in awareness and just imagining this if you were breathing from that part of the body can really help to relax and to ease the tension that may be held there.
Another technique to use is to breathe in and breathe out and just counting slowly through your breath can really help to relax in times of discomfort and unpleasantness.
So we're just going to breathe in slowly counting.
So I'm going to breathe in and count one two three and then holding your breath and then breathing out counting slowly one two three and repeating one two three hold your breath one two three releasing and giving you some time to practice breathing in counting slowly and breathing out counting.
And now just making a note of how you're feeling at this point.
Bringing awareness to the body as a whole.
How reconnecting with the breath can really help to calm the body and is a really good technique for self-care.
And I invite you to practice these techniques whenever you can just so you're really developing these skills so that when you are in the situation of anxiety or worry stress that you can call upon these techniques so you would have practiced them before hand before the situation which has been stressful and that will really help you.
So finding times within your day whilst you're doing your daily routines perhaps when you're having a cup of tea or you're tidying or reading just taking a moment to just connect with your breath by slowing down your breath placing a hand on your stomach and your chest and breathing in repeating a calm word to yourself or counting slowly as you breathe in and breathe out just practicing one of those techniques seeing which one is most comfortable for you.
And then when you're in a challenging situation then you'll be able to use one of those strategies to help calm you down.
Thank you very much for joining me today for this meditation I hope you found it useful.
Have a great day.
