Exercise to help develop your concentration
Counting the Breath – Developing Mindfulness
1. Settle yourself into your preferred meditation posture and then take three deep breaths, releasing tensions and allowing yourself to feel present and ready for meditation. Then allow your breath to become rhythmic and regular. Attain physical comfort and control making a deliberate effort to relax the physical body, including the jaw and tongue. Having settled yourself, forget about your breathing and your body.
2. Once you’ve taken a tour of your whole body, begin to focus on the physical sensations of your breath. Let yourself become absorbed in the sensations of the breath flowing in and out of your body. Notice how the sensations are always changing.
3. Then begin counting (internally) after every out-breath:
Breathe in – breathe out – 1
Breathe in – breathe out – 2
Breathe in – breathe out – 3
Breathe in – breathe out – 4
Breathe in – breathe out – 5
… and so on until you reach ten. Once you get to ten, start again at one.
4. Keep following the breath, and counting, for at least five minutes.
5. If your mind wanders, just come back to experiencing the physical sensations of the breath, and begin counting again.
Exercise Instructions
This exercise helps to develop mindfulness, the counting gives the mind a focus and stops it from wandering by giving it something to do. It gives the mind a circumference and says ‘this and no more”
This exercise can be done one or more times a day. After a period you can increase the duration from 5 to 10 minutes, you could also count backwards from 10 to 1, then to stretch your concentration ability even further; you could count breaths in another language, a language other than your first; you could make each number a different colour.
Having practiced this mindfulness exercise for a period you might want to try the daily meditation
Counting the Breath – Developing Mindfulness
1. Settle yourself into your preferred meditation posture and then take three deep breaths, releasing tensions and allowing yourself to feel present and ready for meditation. Then allow your breath to become rhythmic and regular. Attain physical comfort and control making a deliberate effort to relax the physical body, including the jaw and tongue. Having settled yourself, forget about your breathing and your body.
2. Once you’ve taken a tour of your whole body, begin to focus on the physical sensations of your breath. Let yourself become absorbed in the sensations of the breath flowing in and out of your body. Notice how the sensations are always changing.
3. Then begin counting (internally) after every out-breath:
Breathe in – breathe out – 1
Breathe in – breathe out – 2
Breathe in – breathe out – 3
Breathe in – breathe out – 4
Breathe in – breathe out – 5
… and so on until you reach ten. Once you get to ten, start again at one.
4. Keep following the breath, and counting, for at least five minutes.
5. If your mind wanders, just come back to experiencing the physical sensations of the breath, and begin counting again.
Exercise Instructions
This exercise helps to develop mindfulness, the counting gives the mind a focus and stops it from wandering by giving it something to do. It gives the mind a circumference and says ‘this and no more”
This exercise can be done one or more times a day. After a period you can increase the duration from 5 to 10 minutes, you could also count backwards from 10 to 1, then to stretch your concentration ability even further; you could count breaths in another language, a language other than your first; you could make each number a different colour.
Having practiced this mindfulness exercise for a period you might want to try the daily meditation
