I came across this simple grounding technique after following a live email series, led by Brian Draper.
It’s been niggling me for a few months, and so I’ve put together the quick visual above.
Pause, Breathe, Relax, Smile…
Compiled by Jules P Richards. Visuals: mitchmartinez.com and vidsplay.com
Pause, Breathe, Relax, Smile – It’s a simple but powerful mantra, that we might use to refocus on our place in things, and notice silences underneath the noise.
(i) Pause…Whatever you are doing, in your head… pause… pause… truly pause…
(ii) Breathe… notice your breathing… feel yourself breathing… (close your eyes and feel…)
(iii) Relax… relax your breathing… relax your muscles… feel your breathing – you are alive!
(iv) Smile…
It’s a smile thing but can be quite powerful.
The layers of our lives are underpinned by silence, sometimes uneasy silence; tense, expectant, anxious, deep, joyful or supreme silence. Silences beyond language; beyond bustle and busy, beyond the habits and tasks, beyond the joy and sorrow, beyond the urge to impress or the impulse to fear.
Communication implies sound. Communion might be something else. Perhaps we can notice how we might commune with other people, as well as merely communicating with them. We might communicate in a way that goes far beyond speaking. Intuition, intimacy, presence… communion.
Noticing ‘our place’ among things is not easy; the bustle and busy, the habits and tasks, and the joy and sorrow around us, can often overwhelm. The distractions of the immediate digital and omniwise infotainment media can be hard to tame. The mechanisms of automation and individualism are not a great help.
How we ‘commune’ with our world can be far more alive than the constant, communicative chatter of our culture might pretend. We’re reminded that ‘life’ at it’s simplest and quietest can be so rich and full that it is almost unspeakable. “Cease striving and know…”
The songwriter writes “A wise person draws from the well within,” Proverbs 20
Jules P Richards 