Jane Lodato: Pause

Tune Into Your Body's Intelligence

Your body is intelligent.  It can show you when feelings of anger, anxiety, a sense of being overwhlemed or frustrated are being initiated.  If we pay attention to how we are feeling in our body we can catch these feelings at the onset,  insert a few breaths to try to find some ease or create some room for the feelings as opposed to becoming reactive.  This practice teaches you how to pay attention to what your body is telling you.  Once you are onto this, you will have a new source of intelligence to turn to.

Simply Being vs Always Doing

Mindfulness teacher Jon Kabat-Zinn has many words of wisdom, amongst them:  "Often our lives become so driven that we are moving through our moments to get to better ones at some later point.  We live to check things off our to do list, then fall into bed exhausted..."  We do this again and again don't we?  We can shift from doing mode to being mode by simply applying our attention and honing our awareness.  When our "doing" comes out of our simply "being", we are more effective, less exhausted and can enjoy the only moments we have:  the present moment.

One Thing at a Time

In a world where we often feel we can never get everything done, we try to do more and more by constantly multitasking.  Peter Drucker, a business and leadership scholar and teacher, wrote a book titled "The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done".  In that book he points out that those who are most effective at getting things done do one thing at a time.  This priciple is aligned with mindfulness which cultivates our ability to be fully aware in the present.   Letting go of multitasking will not only help to get more done, but will diminsh the accompanying feelings of being overwhlemed and undelying anxiety that comes along with that.

Insert a Pause

A foundational practice of Mindfulness is becoming aware of our thoughts, emotions and reactivity.  When something happens that triggers anger, anxiety or any emotionally loaded auto-pilot resonse, we react.  If, instead of reacting, we can insert a pause, we have an opportunity to use that moment to choose how we want to respond.  Our chosen response in turn creates the opportunity to free ourselves from the auto-pilot reactions that can cause us more problems.   This Pause gives you the tools to practice witnessing your thoughts instead of being caught up in therm

Strategies for Working with Fear

Anxiety is at all time high in our culture and seemingly everywhere in the world.  We are living in challenging times.  Anxiety can create fear.  This Pause presents three practices that we can use to temporarily calm ourselves.  Practice when you are not feeling anxious or fearful, as well as when fear does arise.  Discover one or more that will help you to find ease.