Meditation and Breathwork

Mindfulness Meditation

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Mindfulness meditation is a mental training practice that teaches you how to become aware of your thoughts and feelings. Becoming aware allows you to slow down racing thoughts, and let go of negative or repetitive thoughts, and can really help to stop the spiraling thoughts that can lead to feeling upset, unbalanced, and unhappy.

 

Mindfulness meditation training can calm both the mind and the body as it encourages a mental state that is fully focused on the “now” allowing the non-judgemental acceptance of your thoughts, feelings, and sensations. Becoming aware of the patterns and changeability of our thoughts and feelings can help lessen the fear, anxiety, and stress of our thoughts. Particularly as we tend to take our thoughts and feelings as facts when they really are not.

 

Mindfulness meditation does not require props or a particular position or location, it can be practiced sitting, lying down or even standing. We are not practicing to stop our minds or our thoughts we are training ourselves to be aware of our experiences and our thoughts so that we can live a more calm, less anxious life. 

 

In essence, we are training ourselves to respond rather than just react or be triggered into a response. Techniques can vary depending on the teacher but I encourage a comfortable, quiet spot that you can stay undisturbed for up to 20 minutes. The focus can be on slightly deeper than regular breathing, making your out-breath longer than your in-breath, focusing on the mind and the body and just allowing yourself to be.

 

 

Breathwork

 

Breathwork can refer to any breathing technique or exercise. The practices used focus on your conscious awareness of your in-breath and out-breath for a specific amount of time. During breathwork, we intentionally change our breathing patterns to improve mental, physical, and spiritual well-being. Oftentimes breathwork can mean that we are breathing in a conscious and systematic way in order to feel deeply relaxed or more focused and energised.

 

I tend to use breathwork in my wellness programs for people that are feeling the need to be more focused and motivated in their work lives and for people that due to high levels of stress and anxiety need to learn techniques to quickly and effectively relieve their physical and mental symptoms.

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Some of the practices I use are:

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• Pursed lip breathing

• 4-7-8 breathing

• Box breathing

• Diaphragm breathing

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As with all breathing techniques they suit some people and not others because of this,  before beginning a breathwork session I like to talk through your general physical and mental health beforehand.

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Meditation and breathwork sessions are a wonderful way for people to learn to meditate and are a powerful form of self-care that is accessible to most people and can be done everywhere.

 

There is endless evidence and research to support the fact that the use of 10 minutes of mindful meditation every day is a protective barrier against all levels of stress, anxiety, depression, burnout as well as physical illness brought on by these feelings and emotions.