Mindful Mondays|Week 19: Support

Author Note: If you prefer to listen or watch instead of or along with -
 Check out the YouTube video and/or the Podcast audio.

Mindfulness is a great support to trauma recovery. The art of learning to support yourself, allowing the universe to support your healing, and bringing in safe people to add to your team of winning support — these are all highly important in sustaining wellness as you walk your recovery journey. Today, we’ll focus on some of these internal and external supports. Let’s get started.

Choose a meditation spot today that brings your body a good amount of support. A favorite chair, laying on the floor or ground with your knees bent or a bolster under them, or maybe sitting on a meditation pillow but with a support wall behind your back. We want today to be a couple minutes where your body can wholeheartedly feel braced so it can really hunker down and also hold up but without much effort needed. Take a cleansing breath to allow your nervous system to relax. Close your eyes if that feels safe.

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As you start to move away from outside noise and distractions and become absent from internal thoughts and worries — can you get a solid sense for the ground supporting you from below? At the same time, think for a moment about how the gravity of the atmosphere and the weight of your body is holding you down.

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Now take a moment to concentrate on the immune system inside you that is supporting your overall health, the heart that is beating to keep you alive, and the breath that works effortlessly on your behalf.

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Imagine a few things or people in your day-to-day life that support your life, health, or well-being. This maybe is a pet, a nice co-worker, a neighbor who is friendly, a community you belong to, your favorite walking trail by your house, a steady income, healthy meals, your morning shower, or anything that brings you a feeling of content and connection to the good parts of life.

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Now dig a bit deeper by expanding out to the universal goodness that supports your well-being. Perhaps imagine a morning commute with very little traffic, the crisp autumn air in the mountains, the sunshine beaming down on you for warmth, or anything that Mother Nature provides serendipitously to make your life have moments of pleasure and calm.

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Finally, look deeply inward to yourself for all the ways you are a support to you. All the ways you assist in thriving especially in the dark times of your trauma recovery. Self-compassion, self-care, self-love, journaling, mindfulness, a good night sleep, healthy choices, utilizing boundaries, following your gut instincts, learning to trust in a new relationship, and all the ways that you commit to your healing, devote yourself to this trauma work, and accomplish inner peace.

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Before you come back fully to the room and your surroundings, take a snapshot of all these people, places, and things that come together to support your recovery. Breathe in the goodness of these concepts and trust you are well supported. Maybe you realize there are some areas that were harder to contemplate support than others. Maybe you think you are ready for professional support. Maybe you can rest in having thought about massive support and take a moment of gratitude. Wherever you are today, release your mind back to the space you’re in and allow your eyes to flutter open. With a sense of thankfulness, move carefully back into your well-supported day.

Mindful Mondays|Week 14: Nature

Author Note: If you prefer to listen or watch instead of or along with -
 Check out the YouTube video and/or the Podcast audio.

Today we are going to work on a visualization technique. I’ve chosen the background track to my vocals to mimic nature sounds, but if you are able to get outside and perhaps sit by a brook, the shore of the ocean, or on a log in the forest — this would be ideal. Today we are going to use the healing power of nature to calm our spirit and reconnect to the world around us.

Find a comfortable spot, whether in nature or in your usual meditation space. Settle down and feel the ground supporting you like a foundation. Give yourself a moment to acclimate into the setting. Look around for something beautiful, familiar, or appealing.

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If you are out in nature, keep your eyes open so you can use the place you found as a visual anchor for today’s meditation. Find a solace in this natural setting that you’ve found and visually explore without moving around. If you are inside, close your eyes and take a minute to conjure up a beautiful scene of nature that you’ve been to, a place you want to visit, or use creativity to imagine one you’ve never even seen before.

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Your mind is playing with all the textures and colors of the nature scene that you are in or visualizing. Pay close attention to those colors, the shapes, and the textures. Notice as much detail about the objects around you as you can.

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Now let’s shift the focus to listening to the sounds around you or that you hear playing on this meditation guide. Listen to each intonation of my voice, the animal or insect sounds, the water flowing, or the silence that may be surrounding you in your special space.

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Now let’s breathe in the smells of this real or imaginary world you’re sitting in. The pine, the salt water, the fresh mud, the cool air. Take some slow, long, deep breaths — not to focus on the breathing but to breathe in the smells that come into your nostrils as you inhale.

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Finally, hone in on the feeling that this place gives you. Maybe you feel your worries melting away, a sense of adventure calling you, or the ease of life as the air, creatures, or water pass by. Really ground into your heart space and find several moments of pleasure here in this safe environment. Notice that you are a vital part of this earth, that the dirt around you is life-giving, and that every living thing you can see if here because of the elements.

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Nature is a place that holds a lot of balance. It does this not by being perfectly harmonious by happenchance. It is aligned with itself despite the ebb and flow of weather conditions, climates changing, seasons shifting, the life cycle of birth and death all around, threats of predators, sometimes sparse and sometimes plentiful food availability, factors of human interruption, and many other challenges it faces. Nature isn’t just naturally balanced; it becomes balanced even in the rocking of the world and finds the stillness inside of the storm. What doesn’t kill it makes it stronger. Its viability comes from its vulnerability. It stays flexible, moving with the wind, shifting with the seasons, becoming wild or calm based on the days weather. It needs both sunshine and rain to be nourished. It doesn’t fret when a harsh winter comes; it just wriggles back into its winter form and waits. It celebrates the warm months with flowers, freshness, popping colors, and melodies of birdsongs. Nature knows not the future, but panics about it none. It is willing to adapt to conditions, to wait out the sometimes cruelty of the Mother, and to bud when it is safe to do so. It accepts its surroundings and makes peace with the living things around it. We can take these lessons and store them in our hearts. We learn harmony, glory, and vivacity from nature. Let’s take a moment to thank this living space or imagined creation in our mind. Be truly grateful for its wisdom and its ability to connect us with our inner being by disconnecting us from the crazy world we live in. We can utilize nature whenever we need space to just watch the reality of harmony and admire its imperfect perfections.

Come to a close now by giving this gratitude back to nature, reconnecting to your own body, and coming back to the space around you. Take a deep breath, and move lovingly back into your day.