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Areas › Your body › Touch and bodywork
Timing by the clock turns the practice into another task to be completed. Waiting for a signal teaches you what your own signs of release actually look like, which is worth more in the long run than the technique itself. Some days the sigh comes in twenty seconds, some days not at all, and both tell you something true about today.
'eat and drink until the white thread of dawn becomes distinct from the black' (Quran 2:187). The instruction is to watch for a real sign rather than to count, which is the same discipline this asks of you.
البقرة
أُحِلَّ لَكُمۡ لَيۡلَةَ ٱلصِّيَامِ ٱلرَّفَثُ إِلَىٰ نِسَآئِكُمۡۚ هُنَّ لِبَاسࣱ لَّكُمۡ وَأَنتُمۡ لِبَاسࣱ لَّهُنَّۗ عَلِمَ ٱللَّهُ أَنَّكُمۡ كُنتُمۡ تَخۡتَانُونَ أَنفُسَكُمۡ فَتَابَ عَلَيۡكُمۡ وَعَفَا عَنكُمۡۖ فَٱلۡـَٰٔنَ بَٰشِرُوهُنَّ وَٱبۡتَغُواْ مَا كَتَبَ ٱللَّهُ لَكُمۡۚ وَكُلُواْ وَٱشۡرَبُواْ حَتَّىٰ يَتَبَيَّنَ لَكُمُ ٱلۡخَيۡطُ ٱلۡأَبۡيَضُ مِنَ ٱلۡخَيۡطِ ٱلۡأَسۡوَدِ مِنَ ٱلۡفَجۡرِۖ ثُمَّ أَتِمُّواْ ٱلصِّيَامَ إِلَى ٱلَّيۡلِۚ وَلَا تُبَٰشِرُوهُنَّ وَأَنتُمۡ عَٰكِفُونَ فِي ٱلۡمَسَٰجِدِۗ تِلۡكَ حُدُودُ ٱللَّهِ فَلَا تَقۡرَبُوهَاۗ كَذَٰلِكَ يُبَيِّنُ ٱللَّهُ ءَايَٰتِهِۦ لِلنَّاسِ لَعَلَّهُمۡ يَتَّقُونَ
You [believers] are permitted to lie with your wives during the night of the fast: they are [close] as garments to you, as you are to them. God was aware that you were betraying yourselves, so He turned to you in mercy and pardoned you: now you can lie with them- seek what God has ordained for you- eat and drink until the white thread of dawn becomes distinct from the black. Then fast until nightfall. Do not lie with them during the nights of your devotional retreat in the mosques: these are the bounds set by God, so do not go near them. In this way God makes His messages clear to people, that they may guard themselves against doing wrong
Qur’an 2:187read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
A meta analysis of randomised trials of non drug approaches in fibromyalgia found that different features of the condition responded to different degrees, and that no single approach improved everything. People vary that much, which is an argument for following the response in front of you rather than a fixed dose. Those trials looked at pain, sleep and mood, not at how long to hold a stretch.
Kundakci B, Kaur J, Goh SL, Hall M, Doherty M, Zhang W, Abhishek A. (2022). Efficacy of nonpharmacological interventions for individual features of fibromyalgia: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials.. Pain doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
The breath that arrives by itself is the body reporting a change rather than you performing one.
Deep change tends to follow self acceptance rather than the other way round. Waiting until you have fixed the thing before you are allowed to be kind to yourself usually keeps the thing exactly where it is.
Rest both hands on your chest, feel it lift and fall, and let the breath go low enough that your belly moves too. If someone you love turns up in your mind while you do it, let them stay.
The study most often quoted for magnetic stimulation in attention difficulties had eight people in it, and half of those on the dummy treatment improved too.