I posted this at the request of a patient who thought it would help her relax.
For those who are not my patient the instructions are to imagine your body is like a lump of butter sitting in the sun soaking up the warmth of the sun’s rays and gradually softening.
It may be the most boring video on the Web.
I did not have time to edit it much but I will add a suitably boring, I mean relaxing, audio accompaniment soon.
Another short post:
I learned a very simple rule years ago about giving advice, whether to friends, relatives or children. It is amazingly simple, incredibly effective, and really hard to stick to. The rule is:
Get permission before giving advice or offering suggestions.
My experience, and the reports I get from the people I have shared this with, is that when we have permission to give advice then we are much more likely to be listened to. And if we are not given permission then by graciously keeping quiet we avoid wasting a lot of energy and annoying the listener.
This is a very hard rule to follow so the damage-control rule is:
If you gave advice without permission, apologize.
Regarding when to start doing this with children. Once when my daughter was 3 she was having difficulty putting her shoes on. I asked her if she wanted some help and she replied “I do it myself!!”
I got some very positive feedback this week on way of handling a common parent-child interaction. So thought I’d share it.
General case
Example
One common complaint I hear is the sense that the person is trapped in their thoughts, especially worried thoughts. This is a technique to train your mind to shift attention away from thoughts into your body, without trying to stop thoughts. It teaches you to get out of your head. The more skill you have shifting your attention away from thoughts to sensations the easier it will be to ignore worried or other unhelpful thoughts without having to stop them or change them. Continue reading Escaping From Thoughts – Fast
I have had a few people with questions about how to use their imagination to evoke beneficial physical or emotional changes. There were a couple of points that they were struggling with. One was whether what they were imagining needed to look similar to what was going on in their body. Another was a tendency to get concerned if their image changed as they continued to practice.
To address these I will use a metaphor of a computer. Continue reading Imagination and Healing: A Few Points
