Everyday Mindfulness Tips

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A Personal Healing Ritual:

  • Replace those “shoulds, have tos, always, nevers” by inviting yourself to consider what is truly meaningful to you - what brings you strength and self-compassion.
  • Identify some simple object (a written word, ornament, nature item, picture) that represents your truth and place it in an easy to spy location.
  • During times of stress or sadness, allow that object to invite to once again access your innate wellbeing.  

Mindfulness Bells:

  • Identify a sound that typically happens daily beyond your control (phone ringing, dog barking, wind chimes).
  • When you notice the sound, invite yourself to pause for a moment and open to the experience of breathing, body in contact with floor and/or furniture and sensations (taste, touch, smelling, hearing and vision).

Consider adding mindfulness to your stress reduction strategy:

  • Begin to notice your tell-tale signs of increasing stress and anxiety (your typical thoughts, sensations, emotions and behaviors)
  • Also take notice of the well practiced ways you typically distract and deny your thoughts, sensations and emotions.
  • When you notice the above reactions, for a moment, invite your focus to shift to body breathing (the experience of expansion and release in belly and chest).
  • Consider committing to staying with your breath for three full cycles of inhale and exhale, each one a little more slowly and longer on the exhale
  • Over time, practice with a longer series of breaths.
  • At any time, remember you can return to the old strategies of distraction and denial. This is not an either/or approach. Practice and play with the old and the new to develop a broader response to stress and anxiety.

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