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.

What matches

22 practices

Narrow these down

With your eyes closed, bring to mind someone who is glad to see you, and let your face receive that look. A small smile usually arrives in the eyes on its own.

It can be someone you love, someone who loved you, a teacher from years ago, or an animal. The point is not the memory but the feeling of being…

A minuteTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 20:39One line of research

Let something out of your throat. A sigh, a groan, a hum, or the word for whatever is stuck, said aloud to an empty room.

It does not have to sound nice and it will not. Most of us learned early to go quiet when upset, so the throat becomes very good at holding. If a…

A minuteTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 12:84One line of research

Closed eyes are optional. If closing them makes you anxious, or the inside of your head gets loud, open them and look around the room.

Name a few things you can see, listen for the furthest sound you can hear, notice any smell in the air. Looking outward like this is a way of…

A minuteTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 16:80One line of research

Sometimes eyes water during body work with no sad thought attached to it. Nothing has gone wrong, and there is nothing that needs explaining.

If it happens to you, let it happen. If it happens to someone you are working with, say something plain and warm: that this is common, that they do…

A minuteTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 93:10One line of research

The first time you slow a rising panic with your own breathing, something changes that no amount of reassurance could have changed. You have evidence now.

There is more about your body than the practices: the your body area has the themes and the courses too.

Panic runs on the belief that the sensations are in charge and you are not. One demonstration to the contrary is worth more than a hundred…

A minuteTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 8:11One line of research

Tap the fleshy outside edge of your hand and say something like: even though I feel this, I accept myself completely. Three times, in whatever words are actually true for you.

The shape of the sentence is the point. It names the problem and refuses to make your worth conditional on solving it, which is the exact opposite of…

A minuteTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 2:263One line of research

The first twinge often brings back every previous episode with it, and that dread is not separate from the pain. Fear tightens the muscles and turns the volume up.

Catching the moment is what helps: this is the twinge, and here comes the film of the last three weeks I lost to it. You are not talking yourself out…

A minuteTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 28:7One line of research

If several medications have failed, ask whether anyone else in the family had the same experience. A pattern of non response runs in some families.

It is a question that rarely gets asked and can save a year. If a parent or sibling went through the same list without success and then responded to…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkMedical and treatmentQur’an 21:90One line of research

Slide one hand behind your head at the base of the skull and rest the other on your forehead. Let your hands take the weight for a minute.

The bony ridge at the back is where a lot of eye and neck strain gathers, and it rarely gets touched. Do not press or twist anything: just support,…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 93:6One line of research

Add one small thing, then stop and let it filter through. A stretch, a bit of self massage, then nothing at all for a moment.

The pause is not wasted time. It is where the change actually happens. Piling technique on technique floods a system that was already overloaded, and…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 2:233One line of research

Some situations do not move, and accepting that is itself a way of coping rather than a failure to cope.

Fighting an unchangeable thing adds a second layer of suffering on top of the first. Acceptance here does not mean approval or giving up on care. It…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 28:7One line of research

You choose what to work on and how big a piece of it. A sore shoulder, a low mood, the belief that you are too much: all of them are allowed, and so is starting small.

The useful phrase is whatever is standing in the way of you being all right just now. Some days that is a headache and some days it is the thing you…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 2:233One line of research

What you started with often changes as you go. The headache becomes sadness, the irritation becomes fear. Follow the new thing rather than dragging the old one along.

Say what is there now and adjust your words to match it. A shift like that is usually the most interesting moment in the whole round, because…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 7:189One line of research

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.

This shows up most clearly with eating, drinking, and everything else people do to manage a feeling. Shame makes the feeling worse, and the behaviour…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 17:24One line of research

Instead of a diet, take one craving and stay with it: the food, the moment, the pull. Tap or breathe through it until the pull itself loosens.

Pick a single situation rather than a whole eating plan. Six in the evening, the cupboard, the third biscuit. Restriction tends to make the forbidden…

Five minutesTouch and bodyworkBody basedQur’an 2:187One 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

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