REPLAY: Breathing into Tension

Discover the transformative power of mindful breathing with this episode of the podcast, where Don Thompson leads you through the art of "Breathing into Tension." What if you could unlock a simple technique to alleviate the burden of daily stress? Join us as we explore how the pressures of modern life manifest physically and mentally, and learn to harness the breath to release stored tension. Don offers an insightful journey into mindfulness, perfect for both seasoned practitioners and those new to the world of mindful breathing.

Settle into a comfortable position, perhaps lying down or seated, and prepare to immerse yourself in an exercise designed to target tension points in the body through visualization and focused breathing. Imagine a radiant white light bringing nourishment and release to areas of discomfort, as you learn to hold your entire body in awareness. This episode doesn't just provide a calming exercise but encourages reflection, with an invitation to note any shifts or changes in your body's response. Grab a pen and paper to capture thoughts or questions that arise, and let's walk together toward a more peaceful, relaxed state of mind and body.

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Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:21

Hi Don Thompson, here with another podcast for you today. Hi, don Thompson, here with another podcast for you today, and today's topic will be called Breathing into Tension. And in going through this material, I think that you'll find it very useful to reduce stress and a lot of mindfulness practitioners are interested in this in order to reduce our day-to-day stress. I mean, life is full of a lot of stresses, modern life is full of a lot of stresses, we know, and in today's society, with today's issues, it can be particularly stressful. So, really, the physical body becomes a storage place for stress, you might say, and even while we all have our unique habits and constitutions of physical makeup and personalities, we still hold stress in our body, even though it will vary, of course, from person to person. The idea with this exercise is that, by engaging in the power of the breath, that we can relieve some of this tightness and tension in the body that we experience. And what I'm going to do is go over a practice that we can work through together and then, at the end, we'll go through some considerations and, you know, questions we can, we can ask ourselves, so we can use this mindfulness practice alongside whatever other therapies or techniques we might be using to help to nurture, to heal and to and to support ourselves with our mind and body practices that we use to maintain our own sense of wellness. And you want to be aware, of course, that if detention is a cause for medical concern, that you need to see a doctor. You don't want to rely on mindfulness to deal with what could be a physical issue. You want to be mindful of that. You want to be able to go to the doctor when necessary.

Speaker 2: 2:37

So, at any rate, let's step through this practice to begin mindfully breathing into and softening the stress points in our body. So you can come to a lying down position, or just comfortably seated is fine as well. You might close your eyes or gently gaze downward. It's probably you know. If you can lay down, it would be a good idea, and you can just use some cushions if necessary and lay down flat on your back would be a good thing, but if not, the chair would be fine.

Speaker 2: 3:18

So I invite you to close your eyes and to begin to take a few slow and steady breaths to ground yourself. Then you might notice if there are any areas within the body that feel tense or tight and you can hold these areas in your awareness for just a few more breaths. So just sense any areas that feel tense or tight and breathe into it. Breathe Ease easily with calm and sense of peace. So I invite you to continue to breathe into these areas and then to focus your attention on one particular part of the body that really, you might say is calling out for release or for support. Maybe it's a pain in your knee or in your thigh, in your neck. So I would let your next inhalation be a long inhalation and, as you breathe in, imagine a radiant white light enters your body through your nostrils and moves toward the place that calls for attention. Now I invite you to hold this nourishing light on this area of tension for a brief second or two and then, as you exhale, envision some of that tension being released and just moving out of the body with the breath, and you can repeat this with this particular body part in question until the tightness or discomfort is lessened or perhaps has even disappeared altogether.

Speaker 2: 5:33

If you have more than one area of tightness, just go ahead and repeat this exercise in the same way. That's the invitation. Go ahead and repeat it. Go ahead and use this exercise to relieve that tension, to breathe with those areas of tension, to release it. And again envision a pure white light filling your lungs. So as you inhale, you're moving that white light into those areas of tension. And then imagine, as you exhale, all of that tension leaves. Just repeat this again, repeat it again until the tension is observed to soften or be absent. When you're finished, I invite you to hold the entire body in your awareness, make note of what is present for you and what has shifted, what is different.

Speaker 2: 6:51

To conclude, I'd like to go through some questions or considerations, things to think about related to this exercise. If you want to grab a pen or pencil, a piece of paper and jot down some notes, that might be a good idea, or you can just mentally note your answers. So, how did you feel at the start of the exercise and how did you feel at the end? Was there a shift? So, if no shift was observed, do you have any sense of why this might have been? And if a shift was observed, what might have been? This a result of? Why was there a shift? Or why wasn't there a shift? And finally, I'd like you to think about what other ways you might be able to mindfully release any tension or tightness you experience in the body. So hopefully that was helpful for you.

Speaker 2: 8:19

I think these kinds of exercises are very useful to release stress and to allow us to focus on a particular area of the body that's problematic and then to breathe into it and to release the pain of that through the breath. Through the breath. Also, the power of visualization has been documented to be very, very potent in terms of its ability to help you. So visualizing the white light is very, very powerful, very, very important and can really help. So thanks for listening and I do hope again that you got something out of this meditation. I certainly enjoyed speaking, that you got something out of this meditation. I certainly enjoyed speaking to you about it and until the next time, talk to you soon. Thanks a lot, bye-bye, thank you, thank you.