Getting Through Difficult Moments

Hey, welcome back to your Daily Mindfulness. Today, we're going to talk about getting through difficult moments. You know, a lot of the conversations we have in these Daily Mindfulness sessions are about cultivating a quality of peace, joy, optimizing the goodness in your life, or mitigating discomfort, developing the skills to experience life a little more fully and gracefully. But there are other times in life, other experiences we might grow through when we're just in survival mode. Moments of intense pain, trauma, and grieving.

These are often experiences where we're just trying to keep our head above water and we're just trying to survive. There's not going to be much peace per se. And we might lose some of our access to our mindfulness skills or even our ability to ground ourselves cause the pain and the emotions are so overwhelming. And this is okay. It's a natural part of the human experience.

And it's helpful to remember that you come from a long lineage of humans who for thousands of years have endured great suffering and have made it through it. It's very much within your DNA and your wiring to experience these things and be able to move through to the other side. I think that's a helpful reminder. And I also think it's helpful to remember that you don't need to be super present, more peaceful or grounded or mindful in these moments. It's okay to cry, to feel, to be confused, to be angry, to wail, to just want to run away.

All of this is very much a part of processing difficult experiences. So while we may not be able to find peace in these moments, we may be able to do some things to minimize the suffering. Or at least create a container that can hold it in such a way that we're not adding another layer of suffering. I do find that the breath is a great way to do this since soft, relaxed breathing is directly related to a more settled nervous system. So if you find yourself in these moments now or in the future, perhaps place your hand on your belly and one hand on your heart.

Kind of like this. And we could do this together right now. Feeling the beating of your heart and the movement of the breath. Letting it be your reminder that you're alive. And there's still more right with you than wrong with you.

Allowing this hold, hand on the heart, the hand on the belly to be a gentle crade, cradling, a nurturing that you're offering to yourself. You can let the abdomen soften. Feeling as though you're breathing deeply down into the belly. The shoulders relaxed. The face at ease.

And on each exhale, letting some of that extra tension and gripping just soften and settle. So this won't make the pain go away, but like a warm, caring embrace, it might help soothe you. And sometimes when we're in these deeper places of despair, this kind of self kindness and compassion is one of the greatest gifts we can give to ourselves. So if you're going through something difficult in this moment, I hope this helps. If you're going through something difficult in the future.

I hope you can refer back to this. And if you know someone who's going through something difficult right now, maybe you can share this with them. I'll talk to you more about this in the meditation, and thank you for your practice. Talk soon and take care.