Day 5: Breathing Meditation

Drukpa Rinpoche taught us:

“Seize the moment! Do not escape into illusions in the past or the future. Collect your mind where you are, with a sharpened consciousness for the present moment. There is no other space to be but here.”

Here, you will learn to change self-destructive patterns you have grown accustomed to into the direction of genuine self-compassion and self-care. Nature strives for balance. We are part of that nature. Thus, caring for our inner strength and balance is critical for our own survival. It’s important that we care for ourselves – for example, by taking short breaks, by eating things that provide us with strength, and by drinking enough fluids.

Unfortunately, many of us have learned that what makes people “good” is what they do. Since we were young, we listened to sentences such as: “Never serve yourself first”, or “Stop hanging around, do something productive!”, or “First work, then play.” We learned self-punishment and guilt from these sentences, which often lead us into self-sabotage: we don’t allow ourselves to get sufficient rest and time to ourselves. In fact, giving ourselves rest and time could quickly become a stress factor, because we would feel inappropriate by doing so, and we might even earn less value as a person.

Doing something gives us the feeling to be in control. It makes us feel valued, and purposeful. It makes us look favorable in front of others. In sum, it gives us a rock-solid justification for – our existence.

When I had a stroke last year, I suddenly went from an A-grade to an F-grade student in this sense. Within seconds, I went from a highly efficient and productive existence to a life without such a justification anymore. I was no longer in control, nor was I able to “do” anything that would make me valuable or purposeful as a person. I was left with only one core question: What was I worth now as a human? Who was “I” left, with nothing to justify my existence?

As long as we live our lives hunting for justifications that essentially “earn” the right for our existence, we live in self-sabotage. As soon as we recognize that we no longer live inferior to parents who judge us poorly if we don’t do things according to their expectation – then we are deliberated! We recognize that we may now care for ourselves and treat ourselves kindly! We need intermittent breaks – for your body and mind, to recover and refuel strength. Allowing ourselves sufficient time to meet this existential need is an explicit act of self-compassion. By doing so, we ensure our natural balance that we need for our health and survival. By doing so, we allow others who have been resting on our performance to take charge of their own responsibilities again. It will be deliberating to them as well, because in the end, we will give their freedom and self-determination back into their hands. Thus, doing so allows us and everyone else around us to change unhealthy life patterns into a healing way of life.

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Mindfulness teaches us simply to be. Purely, to be! It gives us our autonomy back, and our natural dignity to exist. Our justification to live then is given to us by our birth, not by our performance or earnings. It is our birth right to live and to be! We no longer need to justify or rationalize our existence with performances or proofs of usability. We don’t need to prove that we are worthy to live. We have a right to exist, because we were born to exist.

Now is the time that we can claim time and space for ourselves, in midst and despite of what others around us may need from us. Now is the time to familiarize ourselves with who we are – without our titles or roles, but in our natural core existence as one of many humans on this planet Earth.

Through the next mindfulness exercise we are doing here on this blog, we will now learn to use our breathing to center ourselves and to allow ourselves to become still. To stay with us. To relax in that fact of our pure existence. We will realize: our planet keeps rotating. We will not stop it from turning. But we can stop running to keep up with it.

Others may not like it when we suddenly stop serving their needs. But in the end, our mindfulness practice will have a healing effect on them as well. Because we will be balanced, our balancing ourselves will push everything around us back into their natural balance as well.

What is Meditation?

Meditation is a conscious process of making ourselves familiar with our life as it is currently transpiring in this present moment.

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When we meditate, we show dignity to ourselves.

To support that purpose, we should treat our meditations as special moments.

We will now learn to use our breath to come into the sensation that we are no longer exposed to external circumstances, but regulated by ourselves. We will learn to free ourselves from destructive thought processes and a drifting mind. We will learn to no longer follow our old thought patterns, but to experience autonomy in the way we steer our attentiveness to things that are healing for us.

Our breath is our anchor. It is always here with us, in the present moment – from the day we are born until the moment we die. We can always call on it for help.

Connecting with our Breath

There is no need to force our breathing to work in a certain way – e.g. for it to be “right”, “deep” or “even”. The way in which our breath is “performing” is irrelevant. Our breathing meditation is simply about being with what we are in the present moment – observing what our breathing feels like, what it is doing in this moment. We just let our body breathe. It knows how. Simply observe our breath mindfully. Each breath is a moment in the “here and now.” If you are truly one with your breath, i.e. completely connected with it, then you are present in the moment.

We will now practice this with the breathing meditation – our next mindfulness exercise.

If you’d like to, you can combine the breathing meditation with the body scan. In that case, do it either before or after the body scan. You can also run these two exercises separately on different days if you prefer it that way.

Sit upright with a posture of dignity. Both your feet should be flat on the ground, connected to the Earth beneath you. Try to keep your eyes open during the entire meditation. If that’s too difficult for you to maintain, you may close them intermittently to relax your eyes.

Remember: The more often you have to bring yourself back to the present moment, the more you will train your ability to remain present in the here and now! So there is no reason to get frustrated, even if it feels as if you have to bring yourself back a million times.

The meditation takes 11 minutes. Make sure you are in a quiet environment and undisturbed for this time.  

When you’re ready, push the play button now to begin the meditation.

Our Exercises for Today

Consciously pay attention to where your mind is during the day. How often is it anchored in the presence, or in the future or the past? Do you notice when it dramatizes or downplays what is going on around you?

Draft yourself a small cheat sheet to remind yourself on the eight maxims of mindful self-compassion (we talked about that on Day 3). Use this list to accompany you through the day as an inspiration – look at it briefly during some of your breaks. 

Get yourself used to practicing a quick body scan spontaneously during the day, whenever you have a brief window of time. It could even be while you’re driving up an escalator or waiting in line. Start trying to do this without my instruction, whenever you have the opportunity to connect your mind with your body. You can only “scan” one section or part of your body, and it can be brief. Doing this will train your mindfulness several times during the day and in a sustainable way.

Finally, choose one activity in your everyday routine – it can be brushing your teeth, taking a shower, or making coffee. Pick one of these activities. For an entire day, perform that one activity with complete mindfulness.

Annegret Hannawa