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How to Meditate: Meditation 101 for Beginners
10 Science-Backed Benefits of Meditation
What is Meditation?
How to Meditate: Meditation 101 for Beginners
10 Science-Backed Benefits of Meditation
What is Meditation?
Benefits of Mindfulness: Mindful Living Can Change Your Life
Mindfulness 101: A Beginner's Guide
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In this meditation, we'll practice becoming a more patient parent and partner.
Hi, in this session, we're going to
discuss and practice the art of patience.
As a parent, your patience is
tested not only on a daily basis,
but on a moment-to-moment basis.
So if you feel like you
struggle with patience, just
know you're in good company.
Let's start by looking
at what impatience is.
On the most granular level it
is a refusal or inability to
be with the moment as it is.
Something is uncomfortable, triggering, it
activates your nervous system in some way.
And then something in you says,
I need to react immediately.
And usually that happens
unconsciously on autopilot, which
is why you might say something or
do something that later you regret.
But in the moment it didn't feel
like there was much of a choice.
So at the heart of training patience,
we're really building our nervous
system's capacity to be with something
that feels uncomfortable in the moment.
The better able we are to feel
what is present with a quality of
spaciousness and grounded-ness,
the better we'll be able to respond
intentionally rather than reactive.
There's that famous quote often attributed
to Victor Frankl that says, "Between
stimulus and response, there is a space.
In that space is our power
to choose our response.
And in our response lies
our growth and our freedom."
So we need to train ourselves to be
aware and present when there is a stimuli
so that we can respond intentionally
rather than reactively on autopilot.
So in today's meditation, that's
what we're going to practice doing.
So if you haven't already done so,
you can find a comfortable posture.
One that will enable you to
sit more still than you might
typically sit in meditation.
In other words, just make
sure you're comfortable.
If it feels okay to do so,
you can close your eyes.
And we'll take one deep breath together.
In through the nose.
Slowly out through the mouth.
Inviting the jaw to soften.
The shoulders.
And the belly.
So we're going to explore something
I call statue meditation, which
is the commitment to be perfectly
still in our meditation posture.
The way this trains patience is by asking
you to be with discomforts that arise
without immediately getting rid of them,
turning away from them, or reacting.
When you make the commitment to
stillness, you're asking yourself
to be with what arises without
following your normal impulses.
If there's an itch, you're
practicing relaxing into the
itch rather than scratching it.
If there's a little discomfort in
the knee, you're practicing being
with that for a period of time,
rather than immediately getting up.
And if you feel bored, you're
practicing being with the energy
of boredom, rather than trying to
find something more stimulating.
Although this might not be as significant
of a stimulus as something that might
arise during your parenting, you're
training yourself on small levels to
be with discomfort, which is like a
psychological vaccination for your mind.
So in a moment, I'll
count down from three.
It will give you an opportunity
to find a posture that you want to
commit to for about five minutes.
And then once I count down to one,
you're just going to stay perfectly
still like a statue and I'll guide
you through it once we're there.
Okay.
Starting in three, two, and one.
All right.
So whatever posture you're in
right now, this is going to be
your statue meditation posture.
Not moving any fingers, not wiggling
the toes, not even adjusting the tongue.
There will, of course, still be
movement in the belly that you notice.
So let your breathing be easy.
And instead of tensing your muscles
in order to be still, you can
relax your body into stillness.
So this is not a forceful
kind of stillness.
It's a relaxed awareness.
And while you're here, you
can bring your attention to a
focus point such as the breath.
Letting your attention rest there.
Now the key thing here is that
it's almost inevitable that some
bit of discomfort will arise.
It might not be extreme.
But it could be the impulse to stand up,
the impulse to maybe go to the bathroom.
Maybe you do notice an itch or a slight
discomfort that you want to adjust.
Even the impulse to swallow.
You can explore not
immediately reacting to that.
It will feel quite uncomfortable.
In fact, your brain might
even say, you need to do this.
So see how long you can be
in that moment of discomfort.
Not gritting your teeth through it,
but relaxing into the discomfort.
This is how you train your nervous
system to be with sensation, intense
sensation, in a grounded embodied way.
So when you notice these things arise,
just take a breath, relax into them.
And then when the intensity softens,
just come back to your breath.
Letting that be your anchor point.
I'll give you a little bit of
time in silence to practice.
Just continue to monitor if
you're creating tension for
yourself by forcing stillness.
And instead keep dropping back into
relaxed awareness around whatever
the discomfort is or the impulse.
It's one thing to apply willpower,
which tends to be less sustainable.
It's another thing to learn to be with
the intensity of the sensation and
for the rest of your being to relax
into that, that's sustainable, that
allows you to respond intentionally.
So we have about 30 more seconds.
For these 30 seconds, see if
you can be as still as possible.
As if you were a statue.
Okay.
So in 3, 2, 1, you can
let yourself move again.
But instead of doing a big impulsive
movement to get all the energy out,
see if you can do it intentionally, so
that again, you're not reacting to the
buildup, you're meeting it and responding.
Let's take one more deep breath together.
In through the nose.
And slowly out.
And if you're ready, you
can let your eyes open.
All right.
So this was our training impatience.
At the end of the day, this
is what it comes down to.
Your nervous system's capacity to be
with something that is uncomfortable.
It doesn't mean you don't
respond by putting up a boundary.
It doesn't mean that you don't
say something in an assertive way.
It's just giving you the ability to be
in an uncomfortable moment and respond
intentionally rather than reactively.
All of that is happening at the
level of the nervous system.
So, if you found this
useful, keep trying it out.
It's something you can do each day.
And if you stick with it, you will
see this start to impact your ability
to respond more intentionally in the
moments where you need that the most.
So thanks for practicing.
Thanks for training your nervous system.
This is big work and it's important.
I look forward to talking
to you again soon.
And until then, take care.
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