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Areas › Your body › Grounding and settling
There is nothing to do beyond holding the position and waiting. Most people find a long breath arrives on its own after a while, sometimes a slight settling in the shoulders. Give it two or three minutes in silence rather than talking through it. If you feel nothing at all, that is still a result, and you can try the hands somewhere else another day.
It is God who has given you a place of rest in your homes (Quran 16:80). Your own arms can be a small version of that when nowhere else is available.
النحل
وَٱللَّهُ جَعَلَ لَكُم مِّنۢ بُيُوتِكُمۡ سَكَنࣰ ا وَجَعَلَ لَكُم مِّن جُلُودِ ٱلۡأَنۡعَٰمِ بُيُوتࣰ ا تَسۡتَخِفُّونَهَا يَوۡمَ ظَعۡنِكُمۡ وَيَوۡمَ إِقَامَتِكُمۡ وَمِنۡ أَصۡوَافِهَا وَأَوۡبَارِهَا وَأَشۡعَارِهَآ أَثَٰثࣰ ا وَمَتَٰعًا إِلَىٰ حِينࣲ
It is God who has given you a place of rest in your homes and from the skins of animals made you homes that you find light [to handle] when you travel and when you set up camp; furnishings and comfort for a while from their wool, fur, and hair
Qur’an 16:80read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
A controlled imaging study found that even a brief focused-attention induction in complete novices engaged the brain's attention control networks, so a first short practice already changes how attention is being used. That is the part of this worth trusting: attending to the space between your hands is doing something, even in the first minute. The study looked at attention rather than at touch.
Dickenson J, Berkman ET, Arch J, Lieberman MD. (2013). Neural correlates of focused attention during a brief mindfulness induction.. Social cognitive and affective neuroscience doi
Strength of evidence: long taught, never tested. Widely used and long taught. No trial has established that it works.
Steady pressure across the chest gives the body a boundary to feel and usually brings the breath down with it.
Say it plainly whenever you teach anything: the way I am showing you this is not the way it has to be done. Change it until it works for you.
Posture does not only show what you feel, it decides what you can feel. Anger is very hard to reach with a collapsed chest, and grief is hard to reach when you are held rigidly upright.
Instead of breathing deeply in general, pick the place that feels tight, the front of the ribs, the chest, one shoulder, and send the breath there.