The house is quiet. It's never quiet like this. I had the luxury of going to the gym this afternoon and Brian and Gavin both took late naps and are still asleep! The "shoulds" are running through my mind like a scrolling sign, but I really don't want to clean or fold laundry or work on business stuff. You'd think I'd be well-rested after my action plan for last week, but I had a really hard time actually going to sleep that early. I tossed and turned every night this week. :( Which makes me think I need to take my own advice, the advice I give all of my clients, and do some daily breathing exercises to relax.
...
And then Gavin woke up. Where was I? Oh yah. Breathing exercises.
Here's a simple one that I like a lot. Place one hand on your chest and the other hand on your belly. Close your eyes and just breathe for a minute. Notice which hand is moving more. If the hand on your chest is moving more, you are chest-breathing, which is not a full breath. It suggests anxiety and/or stress. If the hand on your belly is moving more, you are taking full belly breaths, meaning that you are more relaxed. This is a nice check-in, or you can do it for longer than a minute and meditate.
I attended a mindfulness training last fall where I learned that you can actually change your brain through meditation. A study at UCLA (I think) showed that the minimum threshold for changing your brain, also known as neuroplasticity, is a series of 4 minutes of meditation 4 times a day. I was very motivated after this workshop and I ended up setting the alarms on my cell phone to go off 4x/day so that I would actually practice four 4 minute meditation sessions. Then life threw us a huge curve ball in December and I had to turn off the alarms. I haven't gotten back to it... until now. There. Alarms set.
Week 28
Mantra | Connect to Your Breath
Action | Stop & Breathe 4x/day for 4 minutes
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