6-Step B.R.E.A.T.H.
Mindfulness doesn’t have to be hard, it doesn’t have to be about meditation and it certainly doesn’t need to involved doing more things to clear your mind.
Honestly, there’s a ton of misinformation about mindfulness.
Meditation has been something “busy professionals” have sought out in recent years to help relieve stress and anxiety … yet, the problem is when meditating you feel good and clear … although when stress and anxiety hits during the workday all that work to clear the mind earlier in meditation is lost!
It’s About Presence
Here’s the thing, it’s about moment to moment awareness, it’s not about feeling good just when you’re practicing self care and/or mindful practices.
Mindfulness is about carrying that feeling throughout your day and the way to carry that feeling with you is simply through realizing that emotions are energy in motion.
When we experience an emotion, our bodies have a 90 second physiological response to that emotion (or energy). Now, what happens for most of us is we don’t want to feel that emotion (stress, anxiety etc), so we distract ourselves from feeling it. Unfortunately it’s in this process that the emotions (energy) gets stuck in the body and our day goes from great to sh*t.
SO, what can we do about?
The 6-Step B.R.E.A.T.H. Process
This is from the new book I’m writing, “Overcome The Overwhelm”, in which we’re utilizing a framework to transform these denser emotions in real time so that we can move through our day with a clear mind to be more productive and overall just plain happier and joyful!
Sounds good, right?! Here are the steps outlined …
B = BREATHE to Slow Down
R = RELAX to Feel
E = Energy to Reveal
A = Accept to Surrender
T = Transform into Empowering Beliefs
H = Habits to Integrate
Applying The B.R.E.A.T.H. Process
Imagine you just received some news that brought about Stress … What do you do?
Rather than avoiding the feeling, utilize the 6-Step B.R.E.A.T.H. Process to allow yourself to feel the emotion so that it doesn’t get stuck in your body and linger throughout the day.
The aim of the B.R.E.A.T.H. Process is to create a system to process emotions in real time so that you can shift to inner peace without needing to find extra time in your day to do more.
While meditation, journaling, breathwork and similar mindful practices are great and highly effective; unfortunately they don’t always leave you feeling that way throughout your day with that same clarity as you felt when you are partaking in the specific exercise.
Whereas the 6-Step B.R.E.A.T.H. Process allows you to feel more fulfillment throughout the day around the clock and this is how …
#1 BREATH to Slow Down
When you feel a heavier emotion, notice that and allow yourself the time to breathe into it. Deep inhales and longer and slower exhales.
#2 RELAX to Feel
Emotions are energy in motion, so allow yourself to relax into the energy knowing that it will move through your body in 90 seconds if you accept it rather than deny it.
#3 ENERGY to Reveal
Get curious, what is the energy that is moving through you here to teach you? .
#4 ACCEPT to Surrender
This is the hardest part, many of us don’t want to accept what may come to the surface when you see the lesson of what’s being revealed to you … come back to your breath to help you accept and move through these heavy emotions.
#5 TRANSFORM into Empowering Beliefs
Positive affirmations alone don’t work because they disregard the deeper underlying issues. The first 4 steps are all centered around getting the to the root of an underlying emotion and now at this stage it’s time to transform the heavy emotions into an empowering positive “I AM” statement (or belief)..
#6 HABITS to Integrate
We get stuck like a hamster on a wheel when we don’t take action and make positive changes. Reflect on what came through to you in the past couple minutes of running through the previous 5 steps and find a new habit and/or action to take to evoke positive change into your life.
WHAT’S NEXT?
If you’re resonating with this, check out this short video where I’m teaching you a simple breathwork practice that you can use to kickstart the 6-Step B.R.E.A.T.H. Process for when you feel these emotions that normally you’d avoid.
Just Breathe,
Sam
