Guided Mindfulness Exercise To Improve Emotional Regulation

This guided mindfulness exercise will help you improve your emotional regulation and facilitate healing and change.

Many of us feel that overwhelming emotions hit so fast that we don't have time to put in place all those tools we've been learning.

So know that if you sometimes jump from 0 to 100 with an emotion,

You are definitely not alone and it is absolutely possible to change.

By increasing our awareness of how our thoughts connect with our physical and emotional feelings,

We can slow down our reactivity.

We become aware of the very initial moment that our mood or physiology has shifted and this dramatically increases our ability to calm those emotions,

Separate from our thoughts and it prevents us from spiraling into anxiety,

Depression,

Rage or freeze state.

So let's begin.

Take a comfortable seat.

If you have a regular meditation posture,

That works great and if not,

Simply sit in a chair with your spine straight.

You can pull up through the crown of your head,

Your feet flat on the floor and take a nice deep breath.

Bring your attention and awareness to this very moment right here,

Right now.

Notice how you feel emotionally.

Notice how you feel physically.

See if you can just be aware without judging yourself.

Just becoming very aware of how you're feeling right here,

Right now.

Now let's take a nice deep diaphragmatic breath,

Really breathing into the bottom of your lungs so your stomach expands as you breathe in and then take a nice long,

Slow exhale.

And now I'd like to invite you to bring to mind a beautiful place that you love to be.

This can be a real place,

It can be imaginary,

It can be a place you go to regularly now or it can be a place from your past.

But just bring this beautiful place to mind as clearly as you can.

Notice what you see.

Notice what you smell in this beautiful place.

Notice any sounds you hear in this beautiful place.

Really breathe in the beauty of this place.

Take a nice deep breath,

Breathing in the beauty of this place.

Imagine the time of day,

The weather,

Where you are,

What you feel on your skin.

As you are doing this,

Notice what's shifting for you physically.

What has shifted in your body as you are bringing to mind this beautiful place?

Notice what's shifting for you emotionally as you're bringing to mind this beautiful place.

Take another deep breath as you continue to think about being in this beautiful place.

And now I'd like you to come back to this very moment,

Sitting here on your cushion or chair,

And just notice how you feel now,

How you feel physically and how you feel emotionally.

Notice if anything shifted for you.

And see if you can be non-judgmental towards yourself as you're noticing right now,

Whether something shifted for you or didn't shift,

It's all okay.

Just notice.

Now we're going to move into another piece of this mindfulness visualization.

And this exercise is really designed to strengthen your awareness of how powerful our imaginations are.

Our thoughts are so powerful that when we combine thinking about something with the sensory input of what we're thinking about,

We shift our entire physical being.

So now I'd like to ask you to bring to mind something that is not going so well in your life.

And maybe just even as I said those words,

You felt a physical shift or a resistance.

But bring to mind it could be a problem that you're thinking about or a conflict you've had recently.

So something not the most upsetting thing,

But just something upsetting that's happening for you right now.

And now take a minute and really let yourself think about this problem and this difficult thing.

This is the opposite of what we usually do in meditation,

But it's designed for a particular reason.

So really bring to mind this difficult situation,

The sights,

The sounds,

If there's any smells that go with it,

Any physical feeling in the atmosphere.

Really picture it.

And notice what you're feeling in your body.

Notice if you have tension in your muscles,

And if so,

Where?

Maybe butterflies in your stomach or stress somewhere in your physical symptom that wasn't there a moment ago while we were doing the beautiful place exercise.

And once again,

See if you can just notice without huge self-judgment.

Noticing with no self-judgment would be wonderful,

But that takes some time to develop.

So now I invite you to take a deep breath and come back once again to this very moment with your seat in the chair or your seat on the cushion.

Notice your feet,

If they're on the floor,

Or if you're cross-legged,

How your legs feel.

Notice what you can hear right now in this moment.

Notice if there are any smells right here,

Right now in this moment.

And take a minute to scan how you feel physically.

Just being aware.

Now see if you can take a nice,

Deep diaphragmatic breath and a nice,

Long,

Slow exhale.

And see if you can reset to where you were before we brought in the difficult situation.

You might still be thinking of it,

But just see if you can have your body reflect this very moment.

This very moment of simply sitting here,

Breathing.

This might be challenging.

It might be easy for you.

Just notice this whole exercise is about that noticing.

If you still feel agitated,

Know this is part of the process.

As you practice this,

You will gradually be able to reset more quickly.

Becoming intimately aware of that very first moment you're feeling shifted when we moved from the beautiful place exercise to the more difficult one.

That will help increase your awareness of how the slightest changes in our environment or in our thoughts or in our bodies can impact our entire mood and our entire physiology.

So let's take a moment and scan our bodies for any tension.

Take a deep breath into any spot,

Directed to any spot that feels tension.

And as you exhale,

Feel that spot soften.

And again,

Nice deep breath,

Directed to any spot of tension.

And as you exhale,

See if that spot can soften.

Now taking another deep breath with awareness of your seat here on your cushion or chair.

Notice what thoughts you're having right now,

Having gone through this exercise.

Notice if any self-criticism came up about what you should be feeling or what you should be noticing.

If you can practice this meditation exercise daily for one week,

I believe you will see your ability to reset happen quicker and quicker.

And I believe your awareness of that very first moment that your feelings,

Physical and emotional feelings,

Shifted into more tension and stress,

That awareness will increase.

And as in our lives we become aware and intimately aware of that initial moment,

We can bring in those tools that can be used if we haven't yet gone from zero to a hundred.

We have more agency or more ability to bring in those other emotional regulation tools.

We can use our observer brain to calm ourselves and say,

Okay,

This might not be a good situation,

But I can feel more calm right now because it is not happening right at this immediate moment.

So just to end today,

Let's do one more exercise that will increase the relaxation that our body feels.

So bring to mind something pleasant that happened recently,

Something small but pleasant,

As simple as seeing a beautiful flower,

Walking your dog,

Stretching,

Just a very simple,

Pleasant moment.

And bring that moment to mind right now as clearly as you can.

Really breathe it in.

Notice the sights,

The sounds,

Any smells.

Breathe in this mini pleasant moment.

And as you exhale,

Feel the feelings of that moment.

Move through your entire physical being.

Take a deep breath,

Sinking into the pleasantness of that mini moment.

And now bring your attention back to your seat in the chair or on the cushion.

Bringing your attention right here,

Right now,

Noticing how you feel.

And bring in your bravery for doing this practice.

Bring in your commitment to yourself,

Your emotional well-being.

And truly your bravery.

Thank you for doing this practice with me.