Category Archives: Calming

Butter Relaxing in the Sun

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.

Escaping From Thoughts – Fast

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

The Mind and the TV Sets

It’s been a busy week. One of the frequent questions that came up was about quieting the mind and how exhausting, or even impossible that can be.

This is exhausting because we are trying to quiet our experiences not our mind. We try to suppress or stop our thoughts, sensations, feelings, memories or imaginings. But those are not our mind. Those are the contents of our mind. We don’t quiet our mind by shutting down its experiences. We quiet our mind by being calm even when we are having experiences. We develop a calm presence even in the midst of chaos. Continue reading The Mind and the TV Sets