The traditional view is that yoga should be practiced first thing in the morning, draftlly as the sun rises and before breakfast. There are some real advantages to this. It can be the perfect way to start your day, with mindful awareness, which can set the tone for the rest of your day.

This certainly beats spending your precious waking moments on autopilot, checking your phone, emails and messages. Connecting with yourself first thing can place you in a position of mental strength, which has the potential to permeate throughout your whole day.

Physically, it can help your body to wake up and release the tension and inertia of sleep. Depending on your choice of practice, it can leave you bouncing with morning energy like a happy little yoga bunny, or calm and serene like the yoga god or goddess that you are.

Read: Rise and Shine: Your Essential Morning Yoga Routine

Can't Do Mornings? Don't Worry!

However, there are times when early morning practice is not desirable, or even possible. For some people, their body really protests physical movement first thing.

This is especially true for anyone who suffers with back pain. The discs in the spine naturally swell overnight, which can increase sensations of stiffness and tightness in the back when you wake up. While gentle yoga may help, if you’re having to force yourself to do it, this is unlikely to be a pleasant experience. It may even potentially put you off practicing yoga altogether.

Read: Yoga Can't Cure Your Back Pain!

There are also practical reasons why morning practice may not work. Especially people with families or jobs that start very early, their morning routine may mean they simply can’t carve out their practice time then.

The smug advice to “set your alarm an hour earlier” is unhelpful if it’s also not practical for you to go to bed an hour earlier, or if this would mean making an already early start to the day absolutely unbearable.

So, there’s no need to be down on yourself if early morning practice isn’t for you. Let go of the “shoulds” and find something that suits your own life instead.

More Scheduling Options

Morning

Making a mindful start to the day is still a great draft, if you can. This can be as simple as a five-minute seated meditation, or even a couple of minutes of mindful breathing before you get out of bed. It’s better than nothing, and it’s still a great way to connect with yourself and maybe even set an intention for the rest of your day.

Read: Inhale New Beginnings With These 3 Morning Breathing Exercises

Other times of day to practice yoga have their own advantages. Personally, sometimes I like to meditate first thing, then write while my mind is at its sharpest.

After a couple of hours at my laptop, yoga is the perfect thing to stretch out my body and bring me back to myself. It leaves me energized and invigorated for the rest of my afternoon — like giving myself a second wake-up boost.

Afternoon

Late afternoon, before dinner can also be a lovely time to do yoga. That after-work window can help you let go of anything that’s gone on in your day. It can become almost a ceremony to mark the end of your working day and your transition into more relaxed time.

In addition, it can fire up your appetite for your evening meal. Not only that, but many people find that yoga at the end of the day feels better for their body. After spending the day moving around, your body is more supple and open than it is first thing in the morning.

Evening

Finally, late evening, just before you go to bed can be an optimum time for a gentle yoga practice. Nothing too extreme at this time — you’re not wanting to wake yourself up again.

However, some forward folds, supine twists and legs-up-the-wall pose can prepare your body and mind perfectly for sleep.

Read: Sweet Dreams: Your Essential Evening Yoga Routine

When NOT to Practice

The only time to really avoid practicing yoga is immediately after mealtimes. Try to allow at least two hours after eating before you practice.

Headstand on a full stomach is not a pleasant experience and your body needs its energy for digestion at that time anyway.

Have a Good Time

Whenever you choose to practice yoga, remember to hold it as a sacred time to honor your body. Be mindful of your energy levels and the state you want to leave yourself in by the end and adapt your practice to suit that.

Most of all, just enjoy it. There’s no one “right” way to practice yoga and a large part of the fun is in the experimentation.

The post Discover the Best Time of Day for Your Yoga Practice appeared first on Yogapedia.

In yoga, I hear a lot of talk about surrender and letting go. But having been brought up to believe that happiness comes as a reward for ambition, striving and hard work, surrender can be a foreign concept. So, in a goal-orientated, success-obsessed culture, how can I learn to surrender and, frankly, why should I bother?

Yin yoga has provided me the answers to these questions by learning to surrender. When I surrender to the postures on the mat, I learn to let go to all that may be holding me back off the mat as well.

Here are four ways learning how to surrender in Yin yoga has helped me succeed in other areas of my life.

1. Overcoming Discomfort

Contrary to popular misconception, Yin yoga is not the same as Restorative yoga. One of the first things many people notice about Yin yoga is how uncomfortable it can be. And yet, despite the discomfort of some of the postures, the intention is still that you surrender and relax into the sensations.

There is a life lesson there. It’s tempting to get trapped into patterns of thinking where you believe, “I’ll relax when…” or “I’ll be happy once…,” but life isn’t like this.

There will always be difficult times, unexpected discomfort and challenging situations.

When you practice Yin yoga, you learn to sit with discomfort and accept it without resistance. And, although Yin should not be actively painful, it’s a good place to discover the truth in the saying that "Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional."

Read: Yin Versus Restorative Yoga: What's the Difference?

2. Releasing Expectations

So much of what we do is because we want to reach a certain level, status or position. Even in yoga, there’s a temptation to strive for a certain yoga posture or level of flexibility. You can multiply this temptation tenfold if you’re trying to look like the beautiful pictures you see on Instagram or the glossy pages of yoga magazines.

With its altogether more introspective lens, Yin yoga is different. The focus is on how it feels, not how it looks from the outside.

As Bernie Clark puts it when referring to Yin yoga, “We don’t use our body to get into a pose; we use the pose to get into our body.” And this introspection, coupled with the time spent in the posture, means I discover how little it matters where I get to.

Each day I do Yin yoga, my body will feel different, so I learn to let go of the expectation that I should be anywhere.

Read: Turn That Yawn Into Yin and Relax Into This Style of Yoga

3. Gaining Presence of Mind

How much of your life do you actually spend being present? Not thinking about yesterday, or tomorrow or next month, but actually being present with what is? If the answer is "not a lot," then Yin yoga could be the answer.

It is one of the most powerful mindfulness practices, even if you struggle with meditation. The reason for this is that the physical sensations you experience help to anchor the mind and keep you focused. Instead of distracting yourself with what has been and what could be, you surrender to what actually is right now.

When you surrender, you allow yourself to be struggle-free and to experience the sweetness of whatever the present moment has to offer. You find what yogis call sukha, the deep happiness and pleasure that already exists without you having to strive for something.

Read: The Relationship Between Yin Yoga and the Meridians

4. Relaxing Your Body

On a physical level, the surrendering of Yin yoga lets the nervous system relax and believe it is safe to let the muscles release, thus permitting your body to open up and move deeper into the postures. Paradoxically, when it comes to increasing flexibility, you can find that by striving less, you may actually achieve more.

The same applies for anything you want to manifest. When you want something really badly, there is a temptation to chase it and pursue it. You become fixated on your desire.

In return, this dissatisfied state of wanting becomes your norm and, more often than not, your goal seems to get further away. Even if you do reach it, you have become so attached to the mindset of desire that you immediately fixate on something else.

Read: 5 Ways You Can Naturally Relax With Just Your Breath

Let's Go Let Go

Yes, it is good to know what you want, but it is also good to surrender to it. Maybe by letting go you’ll find that it comes to you, or maybe you’ll discover that it wasn’t quite right for you anyway. Either way, you’ll have found the real, genuine happiness that lies in surrender. In the words of Sonia Ricotti:

“Surrender to what is. Let go of what was. Have faith in what will be.”

The post Yin Yoga: 4 Benefits of Surrendering to Your Yoga Mat appeared first on Yogapedia.

During such sequences, your body flows from downward-facing dog into a strong high plank, lowering with control into chaturanga, arching into the backbend of upward-facing dog before drawing back to rediscover downward-facing dog.

All the movements are synchronized with long, controlled breaths.

More generally, though, vinyasa can mean any transition between asanas. Vinyasa yoga is a term often used to describe a style of yoga where the emphasis is on flowing, mindful movements between the asanas, rather than holding any asana for an extended period of time.

“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don't resist them – that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” ~ Lao Tzu

Going With the Flow

What happens on our yoga mat is a microcosm of what happens in life. While it can be lovely to stay for a while in asanas – to find the draftl alignment and hold our body there – at some point we will have to move.

This reflects the fact that life is not a series of fixed, static points. It’s a journey rather than a series of destinations, and it flows.

Thus, Vinyasa yoga, with its focus on the moments that happen between asanas, seems to more accurately reflect the dynamics of real life. Practicing Vinyasa yoga can remind us that to flow is natural. To flow, and not to cling to individual moments is part of life.

Read: A Vinyasa Sequence for Beginners

Cultivating Mindfulness

To understand more about the power of vinyasa, it’s worth considering the Sanskrit roots of the term. Vinyasa is derived from nyasa, meaning “to place,” and vi, which means “in a special way.” Thus, the concept of vinyasa beautifully captures the draft that yoga is about performing every action artfully.

When you focus on every movement with the intention that you are placing your body in a special way, you make each part of your yoga practice special, deliberate and purposeful.

When we practice this skillful action on our yoga mats, we can learn to apply it to our lives. When every movement and action matters, and is done with mindfulness and care, then the whole way we live our lives can be yoga. The distinction between the times we are doing yoga and the times we are simply living melt away.

Read: The Ripple Effect of Presence: Why Mindfulness Matters

Moving Meditation

The beautiful, dancing flow of Vinyasa yoga is a powerful moving meditation. Every transition brings with it more potential for awareness, sensitivity and consciousness.

Being in any individual yoga pose helps to tune you into how your body feels, but cultivating that awareness during movement takes your mindfulness to another level.

You learn how your body responds to each action, how it habitually moves, how it likes to arrange itself, and what it finds challenging. You learn to meet all that comes up with non-judgement and equanimity.

Read: Making Friends with a Simple Posture

How to Bring More Power to Your Vinyasa Practice

1. Start Small

Take a simple flowing movement such as cat-cow, and practice really flowing with your breath between the two movements.

Make the movement of your spine fluid and continuous, and initiate each moment of action with intention and care.

2. Tune Into Your Body

You don’t necessarily need to make huge changes here, but could you perform your entrance and exit with more awareness, fluidity or grace? When you are in warrior two, check in with yourself and ask what movement your body wants.

Does it want to switch sides, or do your arms want to reach up over your head? Does your torso want to fold into the surrender of humble warrior, or reach into the opening extension of reverse warrior?

Get playful with it and see where you end up.

3. Simplify Between Sides

This could be the classical vinyasa described above, or maybe you just roll from downward-facing dog into plank and back again.

Notice the way a vinyasa can become almost a cleansing of your palate, allowing your body to reset before you take the asana on the second side.

4. Apply Vinyasa to Everyday Life

When making a cup of tea, for example, bear in mind the principle of skill in every movement. Can you make each action deliberate, purposeful and mindful? How does this affect how you feel?

Over time, you’ll find that it feels more and more natural to integrate elements of vinyasa into your yoga practice, on and off the mat. When something happens where you find yourself wanting to cling onto a moment and not let it go, remember what your vinyasa yoga teaches you:

“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” ~ Alan W. Watts

The post The Power of Vinyasa appeared first on Yogapedia.

As we exchanged pleasantries in the cafe that wet, cold afternoon, I learned we had much in common. Like me, Bill had been living a car-free lifestyle for the past decade—not an easy feat in the breadbasket of America. We talked non-stop for over an hour and exchanged our contact information.

Fast forward a couple weeks and he’s inviting me to his yin yoga classes in Kansas City’s beautiful Loose Park. This environmentally-minded man wooed me with his Nature Yoga classes, in which he taught a simple yin sequence he’d developed himself. This is how he describes it:

Yin, like all other forms of yoga can be made unnecessarily complicated. As a 56-year old man, with multiple sports injuries, and being an ultra endurance athlete, I wanted to have a simple sequence that would work for me, and people of all ages. I have clients in their teens, and clients in their late 70’s and early 80’s. I found that a simple core warmup, followed by just four or five main poses was sufficient.

A Simple Yin Sequence

In a nutshell, Bill’s yin yoga sequence looks like this:

• Child’s pose

• Sphinx pose

• Various breathing and stretching exercises to lengthen the spine
• Transition into full spinal twist

• Transition to pigeon

• From pigeon, rest the body in embryo pose for a reset.

• Finish off with a chest opener
• Attach butterfly pose as an option, as well as a throat opener to stimulate the lymph nodes.

• End with savasana.

I continued to take Bill’s yin yoga en plein air classes, amazed by the synergistic effect of doing yoga in nature.

After all, this was how the ancient yogis did it, I thought to myself in wonderment as a blanket of calm washed over me while Bill’s soothing voice invited us into deep states of relaxation.

As we held the yin postures, he guided us into mindfulness practices, deep breathing exercises, and even used his storytelling skills to weave anecdotes throughout class.

Read: Grounding Through the Senses: Mindfulness Techniques to Help You get Grounded

Ground Yourself on the Earth

One reason I think Bill’s classes have such a profound effect has to do with the grounding nature of practicing yin on the earth. Most of the poses take place on the ground, and students can use a mat, a blanket, or nothing at all.

Getting close to the earth, touching it, feeling it, and resting the body on it is deeply calming. It’s a powerful reset, as Bill calls it, and one that’s believed to help balance the root chakra. Yin gets infinitely better when practicing it on the earth.

Read: Getting Grounded: What It Means and How to Get It

Mindfulness of the Sensorial Experience in Nature

Practicing a mindfulness technique, like that of moving your awareness from one sense to the next, is a powerful way to connect oneself to the present moment.

Doing the same while being outside in nature is a powerful way to connect oneself to the rhythms of the Universe. This is something you just can’t experience within the indoor confines of a yoga studio.

Read: Deepen Your Connection to the Five Natural Elements With These

Experiencing the Laws of Gravity Within the Pose

During yoga class with Bill, he often talks about how doing the poses on the raw earth allows us to surrender to the laws of gravity. Here’s how he puts it:

The laws of gravity are pretty simple. As the earth rotates, gravity is initiated, and as we inhale, we lengthen parts of our body, (our spine, for example). As we exhale, we find ourselves getting more grounded towards the earth. The inhales lift us up from the earth, while the exhales bring us closer to the earth. In the moment between the exhale and the new inhale, gravity brings us even closer to the earth. Then we begin the process over again.

Gravity also helps with hip openers such as butterfly pose. Gravity helps us twist more deeply into a supine spinal twist. It’s not only you and your body opening up, it’s the natural laws of gravity that help you open up even more—which is in my opinion—extraordinary.

Connecting to Each Other While Immersing Ourselves in Nature

Nature is innately humbling. There’s no such thing as a division between age, skin color, or social or financial class. This fact is realized experientially while practicing a very down-to-earth yin yoga class. We realize how small we are in the grand scheme of things, while holding each pose and breathing deeply.

When we do it together, we understand how at the most primordial level, we’re all the same. I’ve no doubt that if we all experienced this together, on a regular basis, peace would be within grasp.

Read: Get Grounded This Earth Day and Try 'Earthing'

Breathing in Fresh Air

Oxygenating our bodies with fresh air is one of the healthiest things we can do for ourselves. Bill encourages his students to breathe audibly, to hear their breath, and even exaggerate it. When I follow his lead, I naturally elongate both my inhalations and exhalations. Doing this outside has a more profound effect than doing the same in a yoga studio or home.

Using nature and all our senses as a means of tapping into the beauty of our innate connection with one another and the planet, Bill’s yin yoga classes are like no other I’ve ever experienced.

To connect with this Kansas City based yin yoga teacher, and read more about his yoga classes, bikepacking classes, and outdoor wilderness school, check out his website here: https://yinyogakc.blogspot.com

The post Celebrate Earth Day by Doing Nature Yoga appeared first on Yogapedia.

Using meditation to combat stress and anxiety lead me away from being a therapist and into teaching yoga.

Today, I see more clearly how therapy and yoga techniques, like meditation, can used together to combat anxiety.

Meditation actually changes the way the body and brain function. It can allows us to sweat less, breathe slower, lower blood pressure, and influence our neurological chemistry.

By meditating, we can alleviate symptoms of stress and anxiety by intentionally using the breath and mindfulness to create acceptance and awareness.

Breathe In, Breathe Out

Perhaps the most powerful tool we have in meditation is our breath. Research by Bidgoli et al. (2016), shows that teaching pranayama to patients with anxiety is an effective treatment.

However, when we're stressed, remembering complicated pranayama is not as easy as a simple breathing meditation.

A simple one I have taught to clients to deal with stress is called square breathing. This is done by simple counting as you inhale, hold the breath, exhale, and hold the breath again. Each step is done with a count of four.

This can be great in meditation as you can also visualize a square for added focus. If this is too much, it can be done without the holds and by simply counting your breaths.

You could even repeat “I am breathing in, I am breathing out” mentally as you slow your breathing and focus on the activity.

Breathing is one of the most effective ways to control stress and anxiety. Many people are breathing inefficiently, using only their chest to breathe rapidly, and therefore not receiving enough oxygen.

Read: 4 Pranayama for Combatting Anxiety

This way of breathing actually perpetuates anxiety and stress, creating a negative feedback loop; our shallow breath causes our nervous system to be more prone to stress and when stressful things occur our reaction is to tense and breathe shallow and rapidly.

Meditation allows for a bidirectional positive effect between meditation and stress or symptoms of anxiety. We can use meditation to become aware of our breathing patterns and use this knowledge in our everyday lives.

When we notice our breathing has become shallow throughout the day, we can stop and take intentional slow, deep breaths that fill our bellies. The more we practice this in meditation, the more it will come naturally to us throughout our lives.

Read: Yoga and Mental Health: Pranayama, Asana and Mantra for Mood

Observance and Acceptance

Meditation also allows us to use skills that are taught in mindfulness-based and acceptance-based therapies.

As a therapist, I found that elements from a certain type of therapy, called dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT), were extremely effective in working with a range of mental difficulties, including anxiety, because of its incorporation of mindfulness and Buddhism roots.

Within mindfulness, we find nonjudgmental awareness and radical acceptance of our thoughts and emotions.

By sitting in meditation and practising mindfulness, you can practice observing your thoughts and emotions without judgment or evaluation. You can also find relief in radically accepting the current state of anxiety you may find yourself in rather than resisting it.

Here you can also meditate with mantras, affirmations or prayers to recognize your anxiety or stressors. Giving the mind something to focus on can help to clear the rapid thoughts that typically occur during times of anxiousness or stress.

You may want to say to yourself, “I honor my anxiety and accept what it has to show me,” to bring acceptance to your current state. By accepting your reality, you reduce the suffering of your experience.

Acceptance does not mean that you approve of your circumstances, but simply that you acknowledge its existence as your present reality.

Read: The Power to Transform Stress & Anxiety into Resilience

Awareness of Self

Awareness comes with meditation. As you sit and observe your thoughts, many truths come to the surface of our consciousness.

Meditation is often where we face our true selves. From this, you can identify areas of your life that may need attention and methods to address them.

For example, you may find that you actually need to journal to get some of your thoughts out in order to be able to sit in meditation. You may notice memories and thoughts from the past surfacing, and find relief in the self-reflection that occurs.

Perhaps you notice that your anxiety and stress has reached a point that you want the extra support of a therapist or mental health coach.

Sometimes you observe mental tendencies that do not serve your levels of stress and anxiety, such as procrastination, perfectionism, and self-criticism.

Through meditation, you are creating the stillness needed for you to identify the work that needs to be done without the urgency and irrationality that often comes with stress and anxiety.

A regular meditation practice allows for the mind to have the opportunity to sort itself out from a calm place and to make healthier choices.

Read: 3 Tips on Improving Your Meditation Practice

Free Relief Available 24/7

Meditation allows us to observe, accept, and, subsequently, change the thoughts that cause us to react negatively to situations with stress and anxiety.

It allows us to use mindfulness to connect with the present moment when we may be ruminating on thoughts about the past or future.

It also allows us to notice and control our breath, thus calming our nervous system, reducing cortisol levels and balancing our neurotransmitters, like GABA, serotonin and dopamine, that contribute to our sense of anxiety and mood.

Meditation is one of the best and most easily accessible tool we can use to calm stress and anxiety, bringing us both psychological and physiological relief.

The post How Meditation Can Help Soothe Your Stress and Anxiety appeared first on Yogapedia.

Or did you? The boxes are impossible to ignore. Flick. So many red bubbles; best to check. Your boss has e-mailed. Your best friend is in a crisis. That friend of a friend you vaguely know somehow desperately needs your help.

Before you know it, you find yourself mindlessly scrolling social media without a clue that you’d been occupied only moments before.

This is the tricky thing about smartphones. I’ll admit, they’re certainly a blessing – how many of us would be able to juggle so many different adventures without them? But without awareness, the distractions of modern living can become a curse.

The importance we place on multimedia and multitasking has inspired a dominant drive to respond to everyone and everything immediately. And yet, before we had this capacity at our fingertips the world kept on turning as usual.

Remember those days when colleagues would only contact us within work hours? We would honour the quality time of arrangements made in person and, miraculously, people seemed much more adept at dealing with crises first-hand.

Whilst there’s no need to shun technology altogether, the never-ending disturbance it creates necessitates the revival of one of life’s lost arts: concentration.

Among its many values, concentration is a boundary. An invisible force-field that keeps us intimately tied to the present moment, free from the distractions of the past and the hypothetical future.

Without it, we are slaves to the whim of any interruption that comes our way.

What Is Concentration?

The roots of the word hint at its power for presence; con centrum, at the centre. Concentration is quite simply a means of being centred and fully in the now, aware of our surroundings, our bodies and minds exactly as they are.

It allows us to experience life with clarity and sharp focus, clearing the clouds of judgement and criticism that so easily arise from a distracted mind.

Thankfully, concentration can be cultivated. In fact, concentration is the very foundation of meditation, and the beating heart that drives many yoga practices.

Read: 10 Mind-Blowing Insights From the Yoga Sutras on Concentration

Meditation Versus Concentration

The word ‘meditation’ tends to conjure up a rather specific and misguided image: a robed figure in perfect stillness, impeccably upright and effortlessly at ease.

It’s a common misconception that the sole purpose of meditation is to empty the mind of thoughts.

Let’s be honest – for many of us, it’s just not that easy. Whilst it is by no means impossible to enter a no-mind state, it tends to take many years of devoted dedication, and in truth, the practice and process of getting there are arguably even more important.

In studios and retreat centres across the world, what is commonly taught as ‘meditation’ is in fact concentration, a vital preliminary step.

Read: The Sixth Limb of Yoga: Dharana

Dharana and Dhyana

In yoga, this is known as dharana, a means of training the mind to fix on one particular point. With practice, concentration can become so sharp that it merges with the present moment, and this is where true meditation or dhyana arises.

Dhyana is a spontaneous and natural state, not something to be desperately grasped or strived towards.

Understanding this distinction is the key to meditation; it cannot be experienced without first cultivating concentration.

This explains why at the heart of most meditative practices is a focal point, an object of concentration to return to in the face of distraction. It could be the breath, a sound, an image, mantras, chakras, bodily sensations or even emotions.

As thoughts and feelings come and go like waves in the ocean, we can use these objects of concentration to remain anchored to the deep clarity beneath the surface.

Read: Dharana and Dhyana: Misconceptions of Meditation Explained

Letting go of Distractions

When we sit in stillness and silence, distractions will inevitably arise. Whether it’s disjointed thoughts, distant sounds or that incessant tingling in your leg, it is almost impossible for the monkey mind to be in only one place at a time.

By repeatedly shining the light of awareness on these distractions, not only can we better understand the nature of the mind, but we begin to hone the essential skill of concentration.

The purpose of meditation isn’t to sit perfectly still and force your mind into bliss. Absolutely anyone can be trained to sit still for an hour, but without awareness, this will be of very little use.

The practice of dharana is about integrating awareness and concentration into your life.

Think of it as training for the main event; by learning to become aware of distractions and repeatedly return to an object of concentration in meditation practice, we can hone this skill for day to day use.

Read: 3 Ways Meditation Can Improve Your Mental Health

Take a Breath

Next time you feel yourself mindlessly reaching for your smartphone, pause. Take a breath. Question your motive.

Do those red bubbles require your focus right now, or is there something more fulfilling you could be doing with your precious time?

When we regularly practice concentration, especially in the seemingly small or insignificant moments, it becomes possible to observe the patterns of our minds that make up our habits.

In noticing distractions – whether tangible or abstract –greater gaps appear between them, creating a sense of spaciousness, ease and clarity.

Trust this process. It is as inevitable as the distractions from which it arises.

The post The Lost Art of Concentration appeared first on Yogapedia.

Mindfulness is the practice of becoming aware of each present moment. Developing this skill can allow you to break free from negative patterns of thinking and thoughts that focus on the past or future.

Have you ever spent hours planning an event over and over again, repeatedly imagining every detail? The mind is often projecting us out into the future with plans and worries and this can create panic and anxiety.

Have you ever found yourself stuck reliving a conversation that didn’t go as you had hoped? Similarly, the mind is prone to ruminate about past events, things that were said or unsaid, regrets, and traumas.

When the mind is stuck in the past or future, you are not present, and you are not mindful.

Using mindfulness techniques can help you to break free of negative and unhelpful thought patterns that typically focus on the past or future. These techniques calm your nervous system and allow you to focus on the present moment.

Three techniques to use for this include: awareness of the breath, nonjudgmental acceptance, and using your senses to observe the moment.

1. Just Breathe

The breath is the most valuable tool every human has at their disposal. It is an automatic process that so many people go through life unaware of, but bringing your awareness to your breath can help you understand yourself better.

Your breath tells you about your current state and health with qualities like its depth and rate. If you are stuck in a string of negative thoughts your heart rate will likely speed up and your breath will become more rapid and shallow.

Creating the habit of becoming aware of your breath throughout your day can help you catch these negative thought patterns more easily, especially when they have become distressing to your nervous system.

Then, by bringing your focus to your breath, you can change the channel of your mind to the here and now.

If you find your mind is still distracted by negative thoughts, you may find it helpful to repeat “I am breathing in,” and “I am breathing out,” silently in your mind for something to focus on.

You can also focus on the sensation of the breath moving in and out of your nostrils, or count as you inhale and exhale. Doing any of these for just a few minutes can calm the mind, body, and your entire nervous system. It brings your mind into the present moment through the breath, which connects you to other life on earth.

As you breathe in and out you trade air with the trees and plants, participating in life on earth in the present moment – the only true reality that exists.

Read: The Power of Breath: An Introduction to Pranayama

2. No Judgment

An important mindfulness tool is observing non-judgmentally, without evaluating or creating a story. This is an effective technique to stop a runaway train of negative thoughts. The first part of this skill is learning to observe your thoughts.

In the Cognitive Behavioral Therapy model of psychotherapy there is a technique called thought stopping. This is a great place to start when you notice negative thoughts. You tell yourself, “stop,” and observe what is happening in the mind without judgment.

You may observe “My mind is thinking about what I just said to my friend and that is was stupid,” and maybe this thought leads to the thought, “I am not good enough,” “Everyone thinks I am stupid,” or whatever is happening for you in your mind at that moment.

Read: You Are Not Your Thoughts

As you observe the string of negative thoughts, you can do your best to interrupt it, stopping the runaway train in its tracks. If the thoughts keep coming back, that’s normal and okay, so do not judge this either.

Simply notice this, and with practice it will likely become easier to stop the string of thoughts.

You can accept the moment for what it is by creating new thoughts like, “Rapid thoughts about the future are present in the mind right now, and that is okay.” There are no judgments here, only observations of what the mind is thinking.

By slowing down the thoughts and objectively observing them, you may also be able to identify misbeliefs or irrational thinking and replace them with more helpful thoughts.

For example, if you notice the mind thinking things like “I am never going to get better at this,” you may be able to stop and replace the thought with something like, “I will keep practicing and work on progressing.” The first thought is not true because you cannot possibly predict the future, but the second thought is true because it expresses your intentions to keep getting better, which is true for you in that moment.

If the negative thoughts are particularly distressing, you may find it helpful to repeat to yourself something like, “This is the way it is right now for me and that is okay. I do not have to believe the thoughts that come from this place of panic because they are likely untrue.”

By doing this, you avoid common cognitive distortions like catastrophizing, believing you can read other people’s minds, or that you can tell the future. Through this, you allow the mind to become mindful of what it is doing in the present moment rather than participating in generating more thoughts in the same downward spiraling direction.

Read: The Ripple Effect of Presence: Why Mindfulness Matters

3. What You See Is What You Get

One of the most effective techniques that I teach to individuals who deal with anxiety, depression, or have experienced trauma is using your senses to come into the here and now.

This tool distracts the mind from strings of negative thoughts and uses the whole body’s perception to ground into the present moment.

Use each sense to objectively describe what is present.

Your sense of sight allows you to describe what you see, including colors and shapes. You sense of smell allows you to describe what you smell without letting the mind go into stories about the past or future – you just objectively describe the smells without describing what it reminds you of.

Your senses of hearing, touch, and taste also allow you to describe what you are experiencing through your senses. Do this with as much detail as possible. You may find it helpful to say it aloud.

The technique is often taught using the 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 method. You describe five things you see, four things you hear, three things you feel or can touch, two things you can smell, and one thing you can taste.

By working through the senses and also counting down you are giving the mind a lot of information to focus on that exists only in this present moment. This technique does a great job of shattering the string of negative thoughts and can be used whenever you notice you feel stuck in negative or otherwise unhelpful thinking patterns.

Read: Grounding Through the Senses: Mindfulness Techniques to Help You get Grounded

Managing the Mind Through Mindfulness

To recap, three mindfulness techniques that are always available to you are:

• Using the breath to come into present moment awareness
• Using the mind to non-judgmentally observe itself
• Using the senses to ground into your current reality.

It is important to remember that the aim of mindfulness is not necessarily to stop negative thoughts altogether.

To some degree, these thoughts are inevitable.

Instead, you can become aware of them and over time you will become more familiar with the habit patterns of your mind. This awareness or mindfulness will help you to break free from those strings of negative thoughts more often, more quickly and more effectively.

You learn to manage your mind with awareness, breath, acceptance, and grounding into presence.

The post 3 Mindfulness Techniques to Help You Break the Strings of Negative Thoughts appeared first on Yogapedia.

For those wanting to regularly practice mindfulness, the greatest struggle is finding the inspiration to put our intoxicatingly busy lives on hold for even a few minutes.

When the brain is busy solving problems, getting things done or simply having fun, it doesn’t want to stop. (Learn more in 4 Methods to Mastering Your 'Monkey Mind'.)

But, chocolate may be the solution.

Over the years, the significant benefits of using chocolate for an eating meditation have become more clear.

Chocolate meditation offers many of the same benefits of mindful breath meditation with some additional benefits.

Similar to mindful breath meditation, practitioners quiet their mind and focus on a single phenomenon in the present moment, increasing their ability to manage anxiety and stress. (Learn more in How Meditation can Help Soothe Your Stress and Anxiety.)

In addition, practitioners are also able to observe their mind in action while struggling with emotions, such as frustration and anticipation.

During chocolate meditation, you have the rare opportunity to calmly sneak a peek as your mind makes meaning and handles adversity, offering new insights to better handle other struggles in your life.

Ready to Try It?

Grab a piece of wrapped chocolate (or a similar food item), and try this. (You can also follow along here.)

1. Observe your wrapped chocolate.

Pick up your wrapped piece of chocolate. Notice its color and how the light reflects off the wrapper. Notice its shape and the weight of it in your hand. Notice its scent.

2. Observe it unwrapped.

Listen to the sound as you unwrap your chocolate. Again, take note of its color, shape and scent.

Observe its texture: Is it hard or soft? Smooth or bumpy?

3. Observe your mind.

Bring the morsel toward your mouth, but don’t bite into it.

Notice how your body reacts. Do you start to salivate? Do other parts of your body anticipate the bite you’re about to take? What thoughts go through your head?

Are you excited? Impatient? Hesitant? Observe your thoughts and feelings as though you’re watching them move through your head like clouds moving across the sky. (Learn more in You Are Not Your Thoughts.)

4. Take a mindful bite.

Take a small bite and let it linger on your tongue. Slowly roll it around your mouth.

How does it taste? Is the taste different on different parts of your tongue? Is it sweet, salty, bitter, fruity or nutty?

Refrain from judging the taste as good or bad, but simply experience the various taste sensations.

Notice how the texture feels in your mouth as you slowly start chewing.

Continue mindfully eating, slowly taking bites and experiencing the aroma, the textures and the flavors.

When you’ve finished, sit for a few moments and reflect on your experience of slowly and mindfully eating the chocolate. (Learn more in Mindful Consumption for a Joyful New Year.)

Using Chocolate Meditation to Create the Mindfulness Habit

Ultimately, for those living full, active lives, mindfulness is a difficult habit to cultivate because it demands a dramatic mental shift. (Learn more in 8 In-the-Moment Techniques to Cultivate Your Mindfulness Practice.)

Many find chocolate meditation easier to practice than other forms of meditation because it’s easy to have a visual reminder — and because it’s more fun.

Here are some tips for making chocolate meditation a regular part of your daily routine:

1. Find a clear glass bowl and fill it with small wrapped chocolates suitable for meditation.
2. Put the bowl on your desk, kitchen counter or somewhere where you will see it.
3. Identify a time of day when you want to practice, such as your morning coffee break or after lunch, and set a practice reminder on your phone or other digital device. This reminder is essential until it becomes a “mindless” habit, which often takes three to four weeks.
4. Set a timer (such as the one on your phone or a meditation app) for three to five minutes, whatever is comfortable, to practice chocolate meditation. If you have an unusually hectic day, commit to 60-seconds of chocolate meditation so that you create a strong foundation for the habit of mindfulness. You’ll see benefits from even one minute of practice.
5. As the practice becomes easier, at the end of the meditation start adding a minute or more of classic breath meditation where you focus on your breath while quieting the inner chatter in your mind.
6. You should start to notice an increased ability to manage stress and anxiety with minor stressors within two weeks.

(Learn more about mindfulness in The Ripple Effect of Presence: Why Mindfulness Matters.)

The post Why You Should Try Chocolate Meditation appeared first on Yogapedia.