Not to Worry

This is a hard time of year for me, always has been. Christmas fever is over, New Year has started and lots of expectations, plans came with it. It would be perfect if they all came true, wouldn’t it? I’m good in talking about plans but not in bringing them to life. Because what’s coming with all the great plans I have is usually lots of fear and doubts. So at some point I start procrastinating, postponing the actions, finding excuses, distractions for the mind.

BE A WARRIOR NOT A WORRIER….. I read it once printed on a yoga top.

You could say easier said than done. And it’s true, it feels so hard sometimes to be strong, we worry so much about so many things, about our health, our family, our job or about not having it. Mass media feeding us regularly with bad news (who wants to listen to the good news, right?), local or global, economic, political, national or religious conflicts. All this slowly sinking into out mind which is then analysing all the data and creating certain conclusions.

And we are also bombarded with the solutions to our problems, lots of informations about how this medicine or that equipment can help us achieve what we want or help us with a problem we have. Don’t you think it would be wise first to use the tools and techniques that are free and we all have access to? To see if it makes any difference in the quality of our lives, to see if we can learn how to control our fears and insecurities and eventually to live a peaceful life. I don’t see why it shouldn’t be possible, it is possible. But it requires some work from us. So if you have enough of being a worrier give it a go.

It all comes down to controlling our mind to use it the way we want it. Our mind is just one of our tools as a human beings, we want to be able to use it wisely and not letting it control us.

We also have to stop running away from what we think and say, how we act and react to the world around us. Once you start noticing your thinking process, then ( and this is the hard part ? you need to reprogram your mind and stop judging and rating everything. Have you actually noticed that we put labels on everything and everyone? Including ourselves, our looks, our thoughts and actions. If you want a peaceful mind you simply need to stop. So see if you can notice what your mind is doing but not giving it any comment or judgement. There is no right or wrong, it just is and you decide if it’s serving you or not.

Once you have all the above in mind find a spot where you can comfortably sit, in a chair or on a floor, mat or blanket in a cross-legged position. Make sure your lower back is supported and neck and shoulders relaxed, you may need a wall.

If you’re busy it may take as little as 5-10min. But to be honest if you think you don’t have even these 5 min to spend, you probably need more ?

Rest your hands on your knees, gently lengthen the spine up creating a bit more space in your ribcage.

Close your eyes and bring your attention to your breath. Let your breath be as natural as possible, don’t force it, don’t manipulate, just let the air come in and out in the rhythm comfortable for your body.

After one or two breaths your mind may start creating a story or comment or picture. And you may not notice it for a while, letting it take you somewhere as usual. But at some point you will notice and then without any judgement bring your attention back to your breath. Don’t force your mind to do anything, it won’t work. Just acknowledge what your mind is doing and come back to your breath.

Your mind will be wandering many times and every time you realise you’re not fully present bring your attention back to your breath.

This is one of the simplest ways to start meditating. And why am I linking it to being warrior not a worrier you may ask? Well, once you start using this quick technique regularly you will see that your mind is mostly analysing the past or projecting the future. Being constantly in the past is not going to change it, the past is gone. Worrying so much about the future doesn’t make much sense either as nobody knows what will happen, we may predict but we don’t know.

Practising awareness and being in the present moment helps to take all the chatter in the head away. And once there’s no noise in the head, we don’t worry so much and have space to start living the present moment fully. This is the only thing we have… the present moment.

It may be a long way, boring process of repetitions, but I don’t want to be terrorised by my own mind. Do you?