Bring your attention
to the flow of
the following three breaths
image by M. Lee Freedman
“Our brains are wired in such a way there is a strong link between the bit that thinks about “me” and the bit that is responsible for the fight-or-flight response. This means that for much of the time, even if we may not be aware of it, we tend to react to any experience with anxiety about how it might endanger us. For a lot of the time, we are in defensive mode and tend to think something is wrong either with us or that which is around us.
Mindfulness meditation weakens this link over time, so that we reduce our instinctive emotional response to our fight-or-fight habits. The gradual weakening of the link means that we develop the ability to see sensations such as anxiety without responding so strongly to them, without judging them or intensifying their importance. We stop the auto-pilot every time some negative feeling arises so that it no longer means that it is the end of the world.
Thus with continued practice, we experience less stress moment to moment. This is one of the main ways that mindfulness meditation helps relieve stress, and the reason why it has been developed into therapies such as Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction that are being offered by health institutions.”
(excerpt from post How mindfulness meditation changes the brain
Please note that I will without internet access until Monday, so you will not be receiving reminders over the next 4 days.
As a mindfulness practice reminder, I invite you to consider taking 1 to 3 breaths each time you read or respond to an email.
Wishing you a mindful few days
Lee
M. Lee Freedman, MD,CM, FRCP(C)
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