Practices

Every practice in the library, in one list. Narrow it by how long you have, who it is written for, and where you are right now.

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56 practices

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If tapping feels too jumpy, use the same face points differently. Feel for a tender spot inside the eyebrow, under the eye, or just below the cheekbone towards the nose, then make slow small circles there.

Vary it: lighter, then a little deeper, circling one way and then the other, and see which direction the tissue seems to prefer. Slow steady contact…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 9:128One line of research

There comes a moment when the tissue under your fingers gives a little and allows more depth. Wait for that instead of pressing your way to it.

It sounds fanciful until you have felt it once, and then it is obvious. Rest your hand, keep the pressure steady, and let the softening decide the…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 4:19One line of research

Pick one word for what is bothering you and let that word stand in for the whole thing while you do the soothing. You do not have to run the memory to work on it.

The word can be plain: the hospital, that message, Sunday. Bring it to mind once, then let it sit in the background while your hands and your…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 10:57One line of research

Picture somewhere peaceful and then walk in it. Feel the ground under each foot, your legs moving, and count the steps up to twenty.

The counting keeps you there instead of drifting off, and the feet are the important part. A calm scene that stays a picture in your head does very…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 19:24One line of research

Looking for a whole subject rather than a single practice? Start from the nine areas.

Breathing

Shame and stigma

Being seen and judged

Making it stick

Structure and routine

Treatment and medication

Answering bids

Feeling from the inside

What you are actually defending

Breaking the worry loop

When you use something to cope

Emotions as signals

Repair after rupture

Facing it a step at a time

Shared spiritual life

Rebuilding trust

Fondness and admiration

Affection and touch

Obsessions and compulsions

Listening and understanding

Posture and how you carry yourself

Rituals of connection

Righteous anger and perfectionism

Anger, alcohol and the body

The cost of avoiding

Living with uncertainty

Rest and pacing

When you go numb

When anger turns to harm

Letting it out safely

Notice the pattern and flex

Your worth is not conditional

Reading, numbers and learning differences

Get it out of your head

Validate yourself and others

Find meaning

Help someone grieving

Keep the bond

Face it gently

Your window of tolerance

Care for yourself in loss

Cross your hands to the opposite shoulders and stroke slowly down to your elbows and hands, like a hug you are giving yourself. Three to five strokes, unhurried.

Then, if you want the rest of it: from the middle of your forehead out to the temples and along the hairline to the ears, from the crown down towards…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 12:93One line of research

Pain is rarely one thing. There is the raw sensation, the memory of every other time, how you feel about it now, whether you think you can cope, and what you conclude about yourself.

Pulling those apart is useful because they do not all move together. You may not be able to change the ache itself, and you can often change how…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 12:84One line of research

Ordinary harmless sensation competes with pain on its way up. Rubbing, squeezing or stroking near a sore place gives the nerves plenty of other traffic to carry.

This is why everybody rubs a banged elbow without being taught to. The useful part is that you can do it deliberately: firm strokes along the limb, a…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 16:69One line of research

If pain is the thing you live with, start the session with the stroking sequence rather than the conversation. Arms, forehead, crown, cheeks, slowly.

It does two jobs in one go: gentle wide contact takes some edge off the pain, and it brings a person out of guarded alertness into being able to…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 12:93One line of research

Squeeze slowly down one arm with the opposite hand, then the other, and work over whatever muscles you can reach. No table, no appointment, nobody else in the room.

Firm and rhythmic beats fiddly. Give the forearms, upper arms, shoulders and thighs a proper squeeze and release, a few seconds each. Doing it…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 19:24One line of research

Aching shoulders and a bad back are not separate from finding it hard to concentrate. Pain takes up room in your head, and there is less left for anything else.

People who are restless tend to hold more tension and pick up more injuries, and then the pain makes the focus worse, and round it goes. So it is…

Twenty minutesTouch and bodyworkMedical and treatmentQur’an 26:80One line of research

Reviews do not support acupuncture as a treatment for attention difficulties. Some studies of acupuncture alongside counselling have done better than dummy needling alongside counselling, which is a more modest claim than it first sounds.

The likeliest reading is that a warm, unhurried practitioner who examines you carefully is doing much of the work. Needles are very fine and harm is…

Twenty minutesTouch and bodyworkMedical and treatmentQur’an 9:128One line of research

There is a route the calming nerve takes through you: eyes, then jaw and mouth, then throat and neck, then shoulders and chest, then belly. You can visit each stop in turn and simply notice what is there.

Give every area a moment before you move on. Soften around the eyes, let the jaw hang, sigh the throat loose, feel the chest lift, then rest a hand…

Twenty minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 5:6One line of research

Talking is not the only door in. Exercise, massage, acupressure, yoga, tai chi and the rest go at the body first and let the mind follow, which is the opposite direction from most therapy.

That is why they sit well beside talking work rather than competing with it. If words keep circling the same ground, changing what your body is doing…

Twenty minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 21:90One line of research

The best ending is often that therapy stops and the practices carry on. People finish their sessions and keep the yoga, the bodywork, the acupressure, the sitting quietly.

It is worth building towards that from early on rather than at the end. If everything that settles you happens in one room with one person, then…

Twenty minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 48:29One line of research

Body based approaches have been linked with better physical and mental health, easier relationships, and in some settings lower use of painkillers and psychiatric medication.

That last one tends to interest the people holding the budget, so it is worth knowing if you are trying to get this kind of work taken seriously…

Twenty minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 16:69One line of research

People who are sure they could never lie still for an hour tend to be asleep within ten minutes of getting on the table. Being unable to fidget seems to do it.

Worth saying in advance to anyone who is putting off booking. It is the same effect as a car journey knocking out a child who has not stopped moving…

LongerTouch and bodyworkMedical and treatmentQur’an 8:11One line of research