To date,
In this challenge,
We've done techniques that are meant to appreciate experience that's already present.
We've looked at see,
Hear,
Feel sensations and explored them just as they are.
We're moving to a different category of practice now that Unified Mindfulness calls Nurture Positive.
In these practices,
We intentionally cultivate positive qualities and use mindful awareness to focus on them.
The technique we'll learn today is called Feel Good.
Many people have heard of or practiced loving-kindness meditation.
Feel Good is similar,
But generalized.
Instead of cultivating one positive emotion,
We can cultivate any positive feelings.
You can do this with love,
Sure,
But you can do it with anything that feels good.
So for this technique,
We'll either find positive emotion as it shows up in body sensations,
Or we'll intentionally create it.
Then we'll focus on it with concentration,
Sensory clarity,
And equanimity,
Meaning with mindfulness.
We have a mnemonic device for the different ways you can create positive emotion in order to focus mindfully on it.
It's called Find the Spark or Reach for the Stars.
Find the Spark means that if a positive emotional body sensation is already present,
Just find it and focus on it.
Then Reach for the Stars,
The first S is Smile.
Just smiling is an easy way to generate some positive body emotion.
Try it and see what you feel.
The T in stars is Think.
You can use the mind to generate positive emotion.
By thinking of an image or word or phrase,
It causes you to feel good in some way.
One example is thinking about a good friend you haven't seen in a while suddenly walking into the room.
Does that idea create some positive feeling?
The A in stars is Activate.
Some people can simply decide to turn on a feeling.
If you're one of these people,
Then just activate it.
The R in stars is Respond.
We can use an external sensation of some kind to generate a positive emotional response.
This could be music that makes you feel good,
A video or picture,
Or some kind of sensory experience that generates a positive emotional response.
And the last S in stars is Support.
Simply getting into a calm,
Restful state or other positive responses to sitting in meditation can induce a positive emotional sensation in your body.
So you can support it by letting that happen.
So let's dive into this technique now.
Take a moment to stretch up your spine and relax your shoulders.
Let go of any tension you can.
You can let your eyes close or keep them open.
Bring your attention to emotional sensation in your body.
Looking for any positive emotion you might already detect.
If there isn't something there already,
Reach for the stars.
Smile.
Think of something to generate a positive feeling.
Activate it directly if you can do that.
Look,
Listen,
Or touch something external that creates a positive emotional response.
Or support it by just relaxing into meditation and noticing any good feelings that arise due to that.
Once you've found or generated a positive emotional sensation,
Focus on it.
Really feel it.
Allow it to be there and explore the sensations.
It will likely fade in time,
So just bring it back again using whatever strategy you choose.
This is similar to ringing a bell.
You strike the bell and it sounds.
The sound fades,
So you strike the bell again.
Continue to strike the bell of generating positive emotion using one of the STARS acronym strategies.
In this practice we don't use any labels.
Just focus attention on the emotional sensations.
We typically have not been trained to notice emotions in our bodies,
So this may be new for you.
You might not be able to detect any bodily sensations that feel emotional.
That's okay.
Just do the best you can and try to notice any subtle sensations that seem to be associated with emotions.
Over time you will develop a greater ability to detect these as your sensory clarity increases and you practice noticing emotional body sensations.
You may also be noticing emotional peace,
The absence of any emotional activation.
That's a valid sensory experience as well.
If you're using a mental image or something else to generate your positive feeling,
You only focus on that thing until you have your positive emotional sensation.
Then you drop the image or other strategy and just focus purely on the feel.
And you may need to repeat this several times.
Just keep going about that process.
If you notice negative emotions or any other sensations in your awareness other than what you're intending to focus on,
Have background equanimity with these.
That means you don't try to suppress them or remove them.
You just let them be,
But in the background of your attention.
You'll keep positive body emotion in the foreground as much as you can.
Create work.
You've practiced cultivating and exploring positive emotion.
This is a useful technique to both develop your mindfulness skills and cultivate positivity,
Which can benefit you as well as everyone you come into contact with.
Continue to practice if you wish,
Or end here.
Try to keep some contact with your positive feeling and let it buoy you as you go about your day.
Thank you for your practice.
