[Kelly West]

Urge Surfing Practice:
I found this practice to be just what I needed today. I am going through some difficult and exciting transitions in my life which is creating a fair amount of anxiety for me. Although this is not maybe the typical “craving” that someone may be experiencing who is in this midst of an addiction I was able to use this feeling during this practice today and experience a shift in my physical state. It helped me identify some feeling states that I am avoiding because they are difficult and rather than pushing them away I just tried to notice and get curious about them. The focus on breathing also helped me to bring awareness to a probable lack of breathing as a result of my anxiety. I really liked how the facilitator at one point made the statement to “experiment” with how much focus the practitioner (me) was placing on breath vs the craving. I was already having that experience of going from on to the other and him bringing attention to that experience made it plain that my focus is in large part a choice that I have some control over.

Mind: Thought Diffusion:
The main benefit of this exercise for me today in my current situation was that it allowed me to increase compassion for myself with what I am going through. It allowed the space between myself and my thoughts and physical sensations to generate a feeling of empathy for myself. It helped me realize that the anxious way my body feels makes sense and to stop judging as wrong; it allowed me to soften a bit towards my physical state because I was able to see that the thoughts I was having were a part in creating the state. That feeling of self-compassion allowed me to stop putting so much pressure on myself and to relax, take a step back and try to find the moments of joy. Don’t push so hard that you forget to enjoy along the way.

Mindfulness of Emotions:
I found the direction of finding the emotion in your body and then “breathing it out” to be pretty powerful and effective for me today. Just the awareness that emotions do live in and effect your physical body state is helpful because sometimes when you are in the midst of a powerful emotion it is hard to slow down enough to notice where you are feeling it physically. This is empowering as it gives a concrete way to shift an emotion and/or physical feeling state.

Loving Kindness:
I liked the circles of connection in this exercise; ie going from self, to people you know well or not to beings around the world. Highlighted the many connections that we have has human beings not just to our immediate supports but to all and the struggles that all humans have at one point or another. It created loving feelings a sense of stability and connection and calm that I am not alone in my struggles.

Somehow, I missed the part where we were supposed to choose two exercises to do today 😊. However, I will count that as a happy accident because I benefitted from all four in a real way today. When I started today’s lesson, I was in a state of anxiety about some things going on in my life and the time I spent trying these practices today really helped me shift and feel better; calmer mind and body and a bit more of a healthy perspective. My belly has less burning, my mind is not so racy and I am more present.
In reflecting back over the four weeks I want to deepen this practice in a real way. I am currently taking a professional break and I don’t really know what I will do next. I know that I want to make the practice a regular part of my life personally and depending on what I do next professionally, I know it will be a part of that as well. I think I really need more confidence in my personal practice and possibly further training and experience in order to effectively bring this into a professional practice. I want to experience the full benefit myself to help inform and fully bring the benefit to others. I have experiences first hand of the benefits of mindfulness both in this training and in the brief encounters I have had with it before this training. There are so many forces in the world today pulling us away from being present, grateful, loving, empowered, compassionate and this is a practice to bringing us back that I think is essential for everyone.

[Kelly West]

Soft Belly Meditation:
I found this meditation to be effective at relaxing my body. Previous to sitting down to complete this weeks training, I had been doing errands and in general doing a lot of thinking and planning around the things I needed to do with a busy mind. This meditation caused me to notice that my body was tense from rushing around so much and helped to relax my body which in turn helped my mind to stop racing. I really like the phrase “soft belly” just repeating hit seems to induce a more relaxed calm state.

May I accept myself completely, as I am right now meditation:
This meditation I found a bit more challenging because it seemed to result in some judgmental thinking; my thoughts wandered to the things that I may have trouble accepting about myself. However, as I started repeating the phrase I started to have a bit more empathy and compassion for myself. The things that came to mind that fell into the “hard to accept” category are just things that make me human and I know other’s struggle with as well and I would not judge others as harshly as I am judging myself. I think this thought process was important to go through and by the end I was more present focused and accepting of the way things are and seeing the futility of wishing for anything different.

I think both of these meditations could be helpful in work with clients. Soft belly reminds me a bit of the focusing on one object meditation in that the phrase is very simple and it seems like this could be done in a moment of difficulty to support more awareness of sensation and thought.
The second one I think could be helpful in creating a less critical inner voice. I can see how knowing a person’s avoidance responses would be important because for me my inner critic was very present at the outset but did get quieter as I progressed through the mediation. I think this one would take practice and processing as well to know what is coming up for the client while practicing this meditation; it could give greater insight for both the therapist and the client into their avoidance patterns as well.

[Kelly West]

Reaction to Body Scan:

As the guide went to different parts of the body, I noticed that I reflexively wanted to move or adjust that part of my body so I really had to focus on not “fixing” or trying to make something better but just noticing without judgement. I found it relaxing, not sure if this was just the act of lying down and doing nothing or if focusing on sensation was what helped relax me. I also noticed that when the practice started, I had trouble noticing sensation but this improved as it went along; ie I noted more sensation towards the end than at the beginning. I did find that the voice of the person guiding was very fast and that bothered me a bit.

Reaction to Focusing on a Single Object:
I liked that this practice gave a point of focus. It was outside of your body and mind but still had the effect of grounding and quieting my mind. I felt that this practice helped maintain my focus and concentration longer and I got really curious about the object I was focusing on. My mind really did not wander during this exercise. I wished I had done this practice without the voice guiding because every thing that he said I then noticed and I felt this got in the way of my own focused attention.

The Focusing on a Single Object practice seems like it could be something that is easily adapted to being used in a time of specific need for a client; ie if they are having a difficult moment it would be realistic to think that a person could take a few minutes and focus on an object to help ground themselves in the present. I like that in that way it could be a tool someone could take and use immediately.
For connecting mind and body and to develop clarity around feelings and sensations I think the body scan would be useful. I have done body scan exercises before and I feel that they sometimes help to bring focus to feelings/sensations which then can lead to more clarity around needs.

[Kelly West]

1/21/22

Concentration Meditation Observations:

I found the pointers on posture on the link (wildmind.org) very helpful. When I have meditated/practiced mindfulness in the past posture has been a distraction for me; the pointers were very helpful to find a more comfortable and less distracting position for me. Some things that I noticed were that it was hard to “settle in” until the person guiding started the counting portion of the practice, then I felt more focused and calmer, I found that when he asked us to “let go” of the counting I was at 7 and I didn’t want to stop until I got to 10. I am a novice at this, and I found this particular practice very useful to help calm the noise in my head and body which is something that I struggle with.

Mindfulness Meditation Observations:

I found this meditation practice to be more exercise for my mind, if that makes sense. The practice of bringing your attention back from wandering almost felt like doing repetitions of an exercise you might do for your body. Since I had done the concentration meditation just before this one I wondered when I was done how it would have gone had I done this one without the other one previous. I will try it on another day. For me this meditation seemed to bring awareness to the wandering of my mind and how I generally do not notice the wandering in my everyday tasks; makes me think about how many things my mind may be doing while I am physically doing something else.

Both of these could be useful in practice with clients. I think there is self-reflection and learning to be had in each one as well as the benefit of facilitating and practicing a calmness of mind and thought through differing avenues. If I were my own client, I may ask myself to reflect on how not being able to “let go” of the counting in the concentration meditation plays out in other ways of my life or how does my mind and body not being in the same place play out for me in work, relationships etc.

[Kelly West]

Hello,
My name is Kelly West I am an LCSW and I currently work for a CAP agency in western Maine managing a team of home visiting social workers. I am on the verge of many transitions in my life one of which is that the program I manage has lost funding and is slated to end in the next few weeks. I am looking forward to a change but it has also come with some challenges as well. Seems the perfect time to dive into some mindfulness!

[Author]

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