The Healthy Living Lounge

Carole’s Note: This is a guest post by Andrea Hess, Intuitive Consultant and author of Unlock Your Intuition.

Most of us have very busy minds. Our attention is often focused on the future or revisiting the past. Very rarely are we truly in the present moment.

Here is a very simple, yet effective technique to return yourself to the present moment, get out your head and back into your body in a fun way.

Andrea Hess:

How I discovered the, come home to yourself, technique:

I learned this skill quite by accident whilst working on a blog article at my favourite coffee shop. Two women occupied the table next to me. I wasn’t paying much attention, until I noticed them engaging in a very peculiar exercise.

One woman was guiding the other women through a series of steps. “Look at the ceiling. Now touch your water glass. Now close your eyes. Open them. Touch your nose. Look to the right. Crumple your napkin. Tug on your right earlobe. Look to the right again”.

Her companion happily followed her instructions, step by step. After a while, a big, bright smile came to her lips. She then took a deep breath, and the exercise was over.

I couldn’t help myself. Even if it meant admitting that I’d been eavesdropping, I just had to know what this bizarre behavoir was all about. I excused myself for interrupting, and asked what this exercise was supposed to accomplish.

The woman giving the instruction turned out to be a psychologist. She was kind enough to explain that the exercise was designed to get people out of their head, and back into their bodies. A combination of commands that involves our physical senses can bring focus and awareness back into their bodies and into the present moment.

The essence of the, come home to yourself technique:

The important thing here is not so much what we do, but that we create a succession of movements with our eyes and hands, its designed to be spontaneous. We don’t have to have someone else issue these commands for us. We can do this exercise on our own!

We can look up and down, to the left and to the right. We can touch whatever is in front of us or touch our own body.

Through a rapid succession of these small actions, our awareness comes back into our body. The result is usually a big smile - and not just because we feel slightly silly but because its a huge relief to come back to the here and now.

Being in the present moment releases us from the many things on our to-do list, even just for a little while. It relieves stress. Most of the time, the present moment is really quite pleasant. We’re just usually too busy to notice it.

Go ahead - try it:

1. Touch your elbow

2. Touch your belly button

3. Snap the fingers of your right hand

4. Pat the top of your head

5. Look to the left

6. Touch your nose with your left hand

7: Touch whatever is near your computer pen, glass, paper

9. Look at the ceiling

9. Clap your hands

Are you smiling?

Are you breathing?

Are you back in your body yet?

If you find your mind racing or feel stressed, use this simple exercise to come home to yourself. Be with your physical body, anchored in the present moment. Allow concerns over the future to melt away for just a short while. With a little practice, you may find yourself dwelling in the present moment more often!

Thanks for reading our guest post by Andrea

You can visit Andrea’s website and blog at Empowered Soul and follow her on twitter.

Andrea also has a great video post: Meditation how to get started. I can highly recommend it, she makes meditation sound so easy

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