Areas › Your body
Your body
You cannot think your way out of a body that is braced. This area starts there: the breath, the ground under you, moving, eating, resting, and the small physical things that change how the rest of the day lands.
What works for this
Working from the body first
A body that has not slept, eaten or moved has less left over for holding itself steady. Changing the state you are in is often faster than changing the thoughts you are having, and it is more reliable when you are already worn out.
One move, today
A long slow out breath, longer than the in breath, three times. The out breath is the part that does the work.
What matches
9 practicesThe fast forceful practices are not for everyone. With high blood pressure, heart trouble or glaucoma, leave them out and use the slow ones, which carry no such warning.
Rapid breathing with effort behind it raises pressure inside the chest, the head and the eyes for as long as you keep it going. The gentler lift,…
Any breathing instruction that reaches you through a screen or a book comes from someone who cannot see you. Keep the final say over what your body does.
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Around seven in ten people who use herbal products never mention it to their doctor. Not out of secrecy, mostly because a tea or a gummy does not feel like it belongs on a list of medications.
The useful move is to answer a wider question than the one you were asked. When someone asks what medication you take, tell them what else you take…
Before inviting anyone to turn attention to their body, ask first. How do you feel about trying this now, and would you like to?
The asking is part of the practice, not the preamble to it. Someone whose body was once not theirs to control needs the choice handed back in small…
You do not need a diagnosis to be worth teaching this to. Something that takes seconds, costs nothing and travels with you is worth having before you need it.
Practise it on an ordinary day, sitting on the bus or waiting for the kettle, so your hands already know it when the day is not ordinary. That is…
When you sit down to breathe, notice your pelvis. Tucked hard under or tipped hard forward both squeeze the breath; somewhere in the middle lets the diaphragm move.
Rock gently forward and back a few times and stop where the breath feels easiest, rather than aiming for a posture that looks correct. You will…
If the word exercise makes you flinch, drop it. Say moving about, or getting out, and see whether a plan turns up.
For a lot of people that word carries school changing rooms and years of not keeping things up. Swap it and the list of things that count grows:…
