IF WE can agree on one thing, it’s that this holiday season is especially stressful.
This year it’s not just about the crush of shopping, decorating, cooking and travelling, but the whirl of emotions about getting together with friends and family, some of whom may disagree with you on matters more weighty than whose holiday sweater is ugliest.
It may be the year to spike the eggnog. Better yet, it may be the year to try meditation. We spoke to Tara Brach, a psychologist, teacher and founder of the Insight Meditation Community of Washington, DC, about how mindfulness and meditation can help you cope with this special brand of holiday stress.
How can meditation help with stress, holiday-related and otherwise?
There’s a real power to just pausing. Meditation helps us to get out of our thoughts about the future and really be in the present moment. It helps us gain the capacity to relax, to connect with what is going on right here and right now, to connect with other people, to re-access our resourcefulness, our clarity and our ability to focus and keep an open heart. There’s research showing the positive effect of meditation on parts of the brain that control emotion.
What do you say to doubters?
The resistance is typically, “I will never have the time for 45 minutes a day.” But just start with three minutes each day. Just come into stillness. Have your intention be to relax with the breath. That will begin to set in motion a habit that will start to train the mind.
Can you offer some motivation to give it a try?
Start by saying to yourself, “Okay, I am going to sit still each day.” Find a comfortable way of sitting. First scan through the body and relax obvious areas of tension like the shoulders. Place your hand on your belly as a way of focusing attention and finding breath. Then when the mind wanders you just say, “Okay, come back” with no judgement. In time, you will develop the capacity to calm yourself.
Do I need to do a full meditation to get into this frame of mind?
No. You can just do it at the dinner table. Take an internal time out. Offer a message to yourself that is kind and take three breaths.
Tell us about these breaths.
With the first out breath, you are releasing worries, plans, mental tensions. With the second out breath, you are releasing physical tightness and tension. With the third out breath, you are releasing difficult emotions.
How can you use mindful techniques to defuse a tense conversation?
Offer complimentary words, like “I love the way you ask those questions” – something that’s honest. If you let someone know you appreciate him or her, it gets that person’s defences down. Just remember that everyone is struggling. People don’t behave in angry ways unless they are feeling stressed.
What are some other stress-relieving exercises?
Offer some gesture of kindness to yourself. Sometimes it’s just a message, to say: “It’s okay… We’ve been through this before.” The intention is reassurance, that you can do this. It is the most powerful way to come out of what I call the “trance of unworthiness.”
Underneath the stress is fear, and the biggest is our own personal fear of failure. Become a witness to your thoughts. When caught in conflict and blame, shift your attention from blaming thoughts to what’s going on emotionally in your body.
This would allow me to find out what’s buried under the anger. Making a U-turn from our thoughts to our feelings re-connects us to our own inner experience and creates the grounds for connecting with others in a more authentic way. Take moments to savour what is beautiful and good. Extend an act of kindness each day. – Washington Post