Mindfulness is both the easiest and hardest thing to do. It seems so simple yet for some reason many of us find it difficult to allocate time to practice. The more you practice the stronger your mind will become and the more you’ll find that you are able to use mindfulness to control your ups, downs and other moods/emotions.
Bipolar minds often find it hard to concentrate so I’m going to show you some mindfulness exercises to get started and then how to strengthen your practice so that you are able to use it in your everyday life. In order to remember to practice it may be worth while to set alarms or reminders in your phone, calendar events or to leave some sticky notes around, whatever works best for you.
If you can not manage all the practice sessions don’t worry but try to do at the very least one a day as some practice, no matter how short, is better than none.
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Week 1:
Aim:
Begin to train your mind to focus on the present.
Method:
– Stop what you are doing and take a couple of deep breaths.
– Bring yourself to the present by asking yourself where you are and what you are doing. Be as specific as you can, for example, “I’m sitting on my couch. I have my feet on the floor and my hands at my side. I can see a painting of a mountain on my wall and can notice various colours in it including blue, white, purple.” etc.
– Try to identify any sounds that you can hear both nearby and far away.
– Keep your focus and if your mind wonders, gently bring it back. It doesn’t matter how many times it wonders, the fact that you noticed it has wondered is the essence of mindfulness.
Notes:
You can take as long or short as you like but try to do at least 1-2 minutes each time.
Homework:
Practice this 3-5 times a day for a week.
Week 2:
Aim:
Learn to identify your thoughts, feelings and bodily sensations so that you can notice more easily when you’re in an undesired state.
Method:
– Stop what you are doing, take a couple of deep breaths and then ask yourself:
– What was I thinking about just before this practice?
– What or how am I feeling right now? (Calm, excited, happy, full of ideas, upset, sad, lack of feeling, angry, anxious, frustrated etc.) Try to be as specific as possible.
– What body sensations can I feel? (heat, cold, pain or aches anywhere, tightness of chest or in stomach, headache etc. ) If you don’t feel any that’s fine too
Notes:
This normally doesn’t take more than a couple of minutes but in the beginning can take a bit longer to keep your thoughts stable. Try not to let your mind wonder onto any other topics. Sometimes it can be easier to close your eyes as it cuts out external distractions and allows better focus.
Homework:
Practice this 3-5 times a day for a week.
Week 3:
Aim:
Practice focusing on the present for a bit longer
Method:
Find a place where you will not be disturbed. If possible sit on an upright chair so that your feet are on the ground, your back is straight and your shoulders are back (not slouched). Close your eyes if possible.
– Take a couple of deep breaths
– Bring yourself to the present by asking yourself where you are and what you are doing
– Now focus on the sensation of the breath moving in and out of your body. You don’t need to breath in any special way but sometimes it can help to take slightly deeper breaths than normal to aid the focus. As you breath in feel the air move from your nose or mouth and into your lungs. Feel the sensation of your diaphragm expanding and contracting.
– Keep your focus on the breath and if your mind wonders, gently bring it back. It doesn’t matter how many times it wonders, the fact that you noticed and are able to bring it back is the important thing.
Notes:
Take 5 minutes to complete this meditation. Set an alarm to let you know when your time is up. I chose a nice gentle alarm on my phone so it doesn’t feel like too much of a shock.
Since I have kids I found sometimes that locking myself in the bathroom was the only time I could get peace and quiet. Find your quiet space at home, work, public transport or outside and experiment with times that you can complete this, try to do this at the same time every day if possible to build a routine.
Homework:
– Practice this once a day for a week
– Practice the exercise from week 2 twice a day.
Week 4
Aim:
Practice being present with acknowledgement of thoughts and feelings.
Method:
Find a place where you will not be disturbed. If possible sit on an upright chair so that your feet are on the ground, your back is straight and your shoulders are back (not slouched). Close your eyes if possible.
– Take a couple of deep breaths
– Bring yourself to the present by asking yourself where you are and what you are doing.
– Listen for any sounds that you can hear both nearby and far away.
– Ask yourself what or how you are feeling right now? (Calm, excited, happy, full of ideas, upset, sad, lack of feeling, angry, anxious, frustrated etc.) Try to be as specific as possible. Think why you may be feeling these things.
– What body sensations can you feel? (heat, cold, pain or aches anywhere etc. If you don’t feel any that’s fine too)
– Now focus on the sensation of the breath moving in and out of your body as you did in week 3. If your mind wonders gently bring yourself to the present. Do this for about another 2 or 3 minutes.
Notes:
Take about 5 minutes to complete this meditation. If you are feeling calm and peaceful you can continue as long as you like.
Homework:
– Practice this once a day for a week
– Practice the exercise from week 2 twice a day if possible.
Week 5
Aim:
Practice acceptance of thoughts, feelings and sensations. This meditation is similar to the one in week 4 with one big difference, you will learn to accept your thoughts, feelings and sensations as they are. By learning to accept them you will disempower them and they often seem to disappear on their own after a while or lessen in intensity.
Method:
– Do the meditation as you did in week 4
– After you have focused on your breath for 2-3 minutes think back to the thoughts, feelings or body sensations you are experiencing.
– If there are any that are not in line with being stable then simply say to yourself, “It’s OK to feel like this”. If you are having racing thoughts or feeling low or anxious etc. just say, for example, “It’s OK to feel anxious”.
– Now take a few more deep breaths and say it again and try your best to feel relaxed about whatever state you are in.
Notes: If nothing feels amiss then just practice being present.
Homework:
– Practice this once a day for a week
– In addition, twice a day, stop what you are doing, take a few deep breaths and ask yourself how and what you’re feeling. Then simply say to yourself, “It’s OK to feel like this”
Week 6
Aim:
To accept your thoughts and feelings but then also make a choice about doing something about them if needed. Sometimes some small actions will go a long way to helping you feel better about a situation in addition to accepting it.
Method:
– Complete the meditation as you did in week five.
– After you have finished ask yourself if the better thing to do would be just accept the way you feel or if there is some action you could take to improve the situation. For instance if you are feeling anxious because you have not done enough work that day then think whether you could do anything now to make that better, like work a bit quicker or longer to catch up some of it. If you have had an argument with someone and are feeling hurt or angry, ask yourself if you should just accept that it has happened or if you think that it was partly your fault could you say something to the other person to make the situation a bit better? If you are feeling low would it help to chat to a friend, go out and be around people or do some exercise? If you are having racing thoughts would it help to try not to think about any new ideas and try to just focus on the present?
Notes: You may not always feel like anything is out of place, if not then just skip the last step.
Homework:
– Practice this once a day for a week
– In addition, twice a day, stop what you are doing, take a few deep breaths and ask yourself how and what you’re feeling. Then simply say to yourself, “It’s OK to feel like this” and consider if it’s best to just leave it as accepted or if there is anything that might help further.
Ongoing Practice
You now have the basic skills to make mindfulness work for you. It doesn’t stop here though, it takes time and practice to get to the stage where you are able to use it in every day situations. You should bank on continuing to practice for at least several years to get to the point where your thoughts do not control you. Whatever stage you get to you will find that you have made huge improvements on how you were before.
Try to catch yourself when you are thinking about non-important issues and bring yourself back to the present. I’ve found that even though I can only manage to stay in the present for a minute or two at most it is enough to break damaging thought cycles.
I would suggest reading as much as you can about the topic and keep on trying new mindfulness techniques.
– Definitely buy the book Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Bipolar Disorder
– Take part in an 8 week MBCT (Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy) course. Search online for a course near you.
– Read up on mindfulness websites and sign up to email newsletters.
Melli O’ Brien’s 7 Day Introduction to Mindfulness is a fantastic place to start and it’s FREE. She’ll email you with a link to an audio meditation every day. Sign up at her homepage
Real World Practice
I have found mindfulness to be very effective in helping to prevent my mind from slipping into an undesired state. It’s a prevention aid in that if you can avoid letting your thoughts and emotions get the better of you then you are much better equipped to deal with any situations that arise. The idea is that you recognise when emotions are first arising by monitoring your thoughts and your body. For instance I find that when I’m starting to get frustrated or angry I can feel a tightness across my chest, my thoughts become more negative and I become more abrupt. If I’m able to recognise these in time I can take a few breaths and accept that something is occurring and then take the necessary steps. When I’m getting angry often the best thing is for me to leave the situation and give myself some time to calm down.
However, I still find it very difficult to stop myself if an emotion has crept up on me and I haven’t noticed it. If this happens I find that while an outburst or reaction still occurs I’m now able to recover much quicker than I did in the past and take the right steps to sort it out as soon as possible rather than let it get even further out of hand.
As I practice more I am able to prevent more and more over reactions from occurring. I spend more time thinking about how to solve an issue rather than fighting the fires as the result of an untamed emotion. I’m far from perfect but way better than I was, this is all part of the journey to recovery. Stick with it and you will start noticing your mind more able to deal with day to day situations.