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By Andrea Lanier, Group Facilitator previous page
The evening class is stressful for her; it involves group work with other students and much discussion. The lack of control and ability to predict events require an intense focus for her to function. She knows that is important to relax and to be accepting of her own failure to make this work. The quickness of thoughts and interactions required for her to participate in the discussions causes much tension and stimulates her mind, getting her thoughts to race like wild horses that are not going to be caught. Yet it seems that there is no alternative. Staying calm in situations where she has to be intellectually productive seems to be a contradiction in itself, but a sufficiently stimulated mind is a tremendous challenge to reverse. It is somewhat like just wanting to make a small snowball, but then the snowball starts rolling down a hill, and it grows bigger and bigger, and it rolls faster and faster, and it seems impossible to slow, impossible to stop. But that is where the discipline to use her coping skills and the trust that she will be all right come in.
After class, she uses the time that she drives home to practice deep and slow breathing, thereby beginning her routine of winding down for a night's rest. Arriving at home before going to sleep, she practices meditation for twenty to thirty minutes. There again, she focuses on her breath, first to regulate it to become deep and slow, then gradually letting go of control, and then merely observing her breath with the intention to become calmer and to prepare to be able to sleep. Thoughts try to intrude over and over again, the "horses keep running wild and don't seem to want to slow down." Her mind replays the interactions of the day, the conversations, the regrets, the plans for tomorrow, the problems to be solved, and more. But just like it takes patience and kindness to calm wild horses, it takes patience and kindness for her to calm her mind full of thoughts. After formal meditation, later in bed, she focuses on her breath again, regulating it first, then gently "guarding" it, and trusting herself that she can . . . can become calm . . . can go to sleep . . . and can be ready for whatever may come tomorrow. In her sleep the horses run on, some of the time, until the new day.
1. Burns, D. (1980). Feeling Good. New York, NY: Avon
2. Kabbat-Zinn, J. (1994). Wherever you go there you are: Mindfulness meditation in everyday life. New York, NY: Hyderion.
3. Lederman, G. (2002) "Worry: How Much is Too Much?" Reporter of the Anxiety Disorder Association of America (ADAA)
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