Freeze Frame Meditation

I am lucky enough to work at an organization that promotes work and home life balance. They bring in experts on topics such as time management, conflict and respectful workplace. I recently attended a session on Relaxation Techniques. He started the session talking about stress and how we can deal with it. Don’t deny it but don’t take it all on. We often carry not only our own problems but everyone else’s around us. His line was “only own what you own”. I love it as it is simple and direct. Also it gets back to what do we have control of (ourselves). We can ask ourselves “how am I responsible?” and are we willing to change the story. We have to let negativity and ruminating go – not let them take us down. Acknowledge it, own what you own, can I change the story/change my way of thinking and doing? Can I learn from this situation? Is it an opportunity? Throughout the session he also guided us through relaxation techniques starting with deep breathing meditation. I thought I’d include the one I had not heard of before for you to try. Meditation and concentrating on the breath gives our mind and body a pause in our stressful lives. A chance to recoup and maybe change our way of thinking. We only have this moment in time.

Freeze Frame Technique

This is a one-minute relaxation technique that combines mental and physical activities to help reach a state of greater relaxation. It was developed, researched and tested, by the HeartMath Institute in California.

Make sure you are comfortable seated and breathing slowly and deeply. Your eyes can be open or closed during this exercise.

Step 1: Imagine that you have a TV remote in your hands, and you press the “pause” button, in effect bringing the present moment to a standstill.

Step 2: Shift your awareness to your heart, imagining that you are “breathing through your heart” for 10 seconds or more.

Step 3: Try to recall a positive, fun feeling or time you’ve had. Attempt to re-experience it by letting every cell in your body, from your toes to the top of your scalp, revisit this happy feeling or time. For the next 30 seconds you can relax and enjoy this positive state.

Step 4: (After 30 seconds), please bring your awareness back to the room, release the “pause” bottom on your imaginary remote, and return to the present moment.