Re: What Are You Thinking About?
Toxocyarnglare, I hear you!
Thal's advice is very sound. I am in the recovery phase after suffering a bout of quite serious anxiety. Looking back, I'd been experiencing high anxiety for a while but it becomes such a normal part of your life that you don't really notice it until it gets too much and manifests as health conditions (panic attacks and heart palpitations in my case). Once I was alerted by the problem following a frightening panic attack on a bus, I attempted to tackle it head on, using various cognitive therapy and spiritual techniques. It just overwhelmed me though, because I was trying to pack in even more into my time, and my anxiety didn't ease as a result. I ended up living my life to the clock (I'm still a bit like this, but it's manageable now), and feeling guilty if I didn't have time to all the things I wanted to. Meditation wasn't helping me either, nor were the breathing techniques. The only thing that helped was a mindfulness technique I did on my way home from work; which was the only technique I didn't need to make time for, because walking home from work was something I'd be doing anyway.
Then one day I started reading back over my BoS, which spans 4 volumes, the first started in 1997, the fourth yet incomplete. I found so much forgotten wisdom in those pages. Techniques I'd tried, tested and found sound, but had stopped using along the way. I decided to scrap most of the techniques I'd been trying, and replaced them with things from my BoS. There were two in particular. One was a little ritual said while making your first cup of tea/hot beverage of your choice, when you get up in the morning. It seemed like a good way to combine daily devotionals with an action I'd be doing anyway. But I also told myself that I don't have to remember to do it, making my first cuppa will be a subliminal devotional anyway. This helped ease the anxiety around it.
The other thing is exactly as Thalassa suggested; I found a cleansing visualisation and chant I'd written while at Uni, that was done while taking a shower. Besides the mindfulness excersise I do on my way home from work; the only technique that seemed to have any affect on me, this was all I was doing for a few weeks. I found that using home made herbal hair rinses (nettle and/or rosemary in particular), That took little more effort than pouring boiling water over the herbs and letting it cool on the side of the shower until needed, helped make the showers feel more 'witchy' too. Again, I made it optional, not essential!
I then discovered that when it comes to deep breathing, it isn't the speed or depth that has the biggest impact on heart rate, it's the rhythm. So when I was anxious and trying to breath deeply, I was probably breathing in for 4, out for 5, in for 5, out for 6, in for 4... and so on. I use a breath pacer I found on youtube, and sit with that for just a few minutes if I am feeling anxious. I'm so used to it now that just by recalling the image in my mind, I can use this to pace my breath even if I can't get to a PC. Breathing finally works for me thanks to this!
After a while, I even found a mediation routine that works for me too, again, using a visualisation from my BoS, that I used many years ago. I'd had the opposite problem to you. I had to stop doing it in bed, because I would lose concentration, or even fall asleep. So I started sitting on the floor in the bay windows. I try not to demand too much from myself though. I keep a little 'positive thinking' notebook, where I write 4 positive things from the previous 24 hours, and then 4 positive things I'd like to do to enhance myself over the next 24 hours. I include writing this as part of my 20 minute meditation. That way, I can mediate on giving thanks for the good things in my life, and then visualise my day going well.
I wish you all the best in finding the techniques that work for you. It has taken me quite a while to find mine, but I already feel so much more grounded and in control of my life. Although ironically, now that I'm more secure and grounded, I'm doing a lot more woowoo.. helping an ancient deity, healing my ancestral line, speaking to faeries and spirits of all kinds.. so I probably don't seem particularly grounded from the outside ^^.
- - - Updated - - -
Also.. finally changed my religion on my profile. It was about time.
Toxocyarnglare, I hear you!
Thal's advice is very sound. I am in the recovery phase after suffering a bout of quite serious anxiety. Looking back, I'd been experiencing high anxiety for a while but it becomes such a normal part of your life that you don't really notice it until it gets too much and manifests as health conditions (panic attacks and heart palpitations in my case). Once I was alerted by the problem following a frightening panic attack on a bus, I attempted to tackle it head on, using various cognitive therapy and spiritual techniques. It just overwhelmed me though, because I was trying to pack in even more into my time, and my anxiety didn't ease as a result. I ended up living my life to the clock (I'm still a bit like this, but it's manageable now), and feeling guilty if I didn't have time to all the things I wanted to. Meditation wasn't helping me either, nor were the breathing techniques. The only thing that helped was a mindfulness technique I did on my way home from work; which was the only technique I didn't need to make time for, because walking home from work was something I'd be doing anyway.
Then one day I started reading back over my BoS, which spans 4 volumes, the first started in 1997, the fourth yet incomplete. I found so much forgotten wisdom in those pages. Techniques I'd tried, tested and found sound, but had stopped using along the way. I decided to scrap most of the techniques I'd been trying, and replaced them with things from my BoS. There were two in particular. One was a little ritual said while making your first cup of tea/hot beverage of your choice, when you get up in the morning. It seemed like a good way to combine daily devotionals with an action I'd be doing anyway. But I also told myself that I don't have to remember to do it, making my first cuppa will be a subliminal devotional anyway. This helped ease the anxiety around it.
The other thing is exactly as Thalassa suggested; I found a cleansing visualisation and chant I'd written while at Uni, that was done while taking a shower. Besides the mindfulness excersise I do on my way home from work; the only technique that seemed to have any affect on me, this was all I was doing for a few weeks. I found that using home made herbal hair rinses (nettle and/or rosemary in particular), That took little more effort than pouring boiling water over the herbs and letting it cool on the side of the shower until needed, helped make the showers feel more 'witchy' too. Again, I made it optional, not essential!
I then discovered that when it comes to deep breathing, it isn't the speed or depth that has the biggest impact on heart rate, it's the rhythm. So when I was anxious and trying to breath deeply, I was probably breathing in for 4, out for 5, in for 5, out for 6, in for 4... and so on. I use a breath pacer I found on youtube, and sit with that for just a few minutes if I am feeling anxious. I'm so used to it now that just by recalling the image in my mind, I can use this to pace my breath even if I can't get to a PC. Breathing finally works for me thanks to this!
After a while, I even found a mediation routine that works for me too, again, using a visualisation from my BoS, that I used many years ago. I'd had the opposite problem to you. I had to stop doing it in bed, because I would lose concentration, or even fall asleep. So I started sitting on the floor in the bay windows. I try not to demand too much from myself though. I keep a little 'positive thinking' notebook, where I write 4 positive things from the previous 24 hours, and then 4 positive things I'd like to do to enhance myself over the next 24 hours. I include writing this as part of my 20 minute meditation. That way, I can mediate on giving thanks for the good things in my life, and then visualise my day going well.
I wish you all the best in finding the techniques that work for you. It has taken me quite a while to find mine, but I already feel so much more grounded and in control of my life. Although ironically, now that I'm more secure and grounded, I'm doing a lot more woowoo.. helping an ancient deity, healing my ancestral line, speaking to faeries and spirits of all kinds.. so I probably don't seem particularly grounded from the outside ^^.
- - - Updated - - -
Also.. finally changed my religion on my profile. It was about time.
most young people at least try it. Here, they usually drink out their brains on a regular basis from they're about 14 
so half a cup sounds pretty harmless
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