Summer Meditation Retreat: 6 Mindfulness Practices for Self-Care
It’s time to slow down, be present, and appreciate the world around you. Explore these tips and practices from Barry Boyce, Sharon Salzberg, Sebene Selassie, and Jessica Morey that will help you get started. The post Summer Meditation Retreat:...
The word “savoring” crops up a lot in instructions for mindful eating, but why stop there? Inspired by that notion, I decided to challenge myself to a week of savoring things. As I started out, I began to see that I was automatically leaving lots of things out—things that were, well, unsavory—so the challenge had to undergo some immediate reengineering. It would have to become about savoring everything. Yikes.
If I was going to savor the unsavory I would have to be thankful somehow for whatever came my way.
That immediately led me to the understanding that if I was going to savor the unsavory I would have to be thankful somehow for whatever came my way. I would have to embrace the artificially sweetened (but still valuable) “attitude of gratitude.” It was a bit of a revelation. What I was prepared for was taking time to really enjoy things, in the present moment. What I wasn’t prepared for was how much it would challenge underlying attitudes and assumptions. When the week was over, I came to some conclusions about how savoring can reach into every area of life.
6 Ways to Savor the Moment
By Barry Boyce
1) When things are good…savor the joy
When things are good, it should be easy to savor them. But it took more effort to savor something I already appreciated than I would have imagined. Joy came in the sudden realization that the body is always in the present, no matter where my thoughts take me, and I can always return to that.
2) When it’s every kind of bad…savor the resilience
I can glimpse the fact that pain, whether physical or emotional, is something that lets us know we are alive. And as we try to manage it as best we can, we are humbled, we are vulnerable, we seek help. We find a way. We bounce back. And, as we savor the equanimity, we learn to take the good and the bad.
3) When it’s boring…savor the freedom
As we all keep discovering in meditation, we don’t really need to keep ourselves occupied with extra thoughts. It’s peaceful to take a break from that. My savoring challenge helped me learn (once again) to savor the freedom from the need to entertain myself every minute of the day.
4) When it’s unwieldy…savor the laughter
When things go haywire, the same tendency we have with hassles—to indulge in some “why me?” time—can easily take over. But, I’m starting to really appreciate the antidote that a meditation teacher friend of mine told me about: Just say “Why not me?”
5) When you’re alone…savor the space
In the right doses, being by ourselves can be deeply restorative. It can help us discover a deep reservoir of contentment that does not need to be chased after. That kind of space—a space of awe and wonder and simplicity—is well worth savoring. It may be the most savory treat of all.
6) When you’re with others…savor the companionship
The sheer joy of a shared laugh. The moments of listening when you need to be heard. The shoulder to cry on. Someone to share ups and downs, without caring which it is. I’m blessed with friends all over the world, people I can connect with within minutes no matter how long it’s been. Other human beings…what’s not to savor?
Summer Meditation Retreat: 6 Mindfulness Practices for Self-Care
Day 1: Connect With Presence
By Sharon Salzberg
If we can practice savoring the present moment when we’re sitting in formal meditation, we can also practice while standing in line at the grocery store, sitting anxiously in a doctor’s waiting room, or sitting down for a meal in good company. A portable exercise in meditation is focusing on the sensations of the in- and out-breath. If the breath is not a comfortable place for you, choose another object of attention like the sensation of your hands touching your knees.
A 10-Minute Breathing Meditation
This variation of breath meditation can be especially supportive if you feel restless or bored. Savor the freedom to simply let your mind be. It doesn’t matter how many times your attention wanders or how long you may dwell in distraction. The practice is gently letting go and, with kindness toward yourself, beginning again.
A 10-Minute Breathing Meditation
A 7-Minute Meditation to Rest Your Attention
Our habitual tendency is to grasp a thought or a feeling, to build an entire world around it, or push it away and struggle against it. It can be helpful to instead note what is painful, pleasant, or otherwise. Here we stay even, balanced, and calm, as we recognize what arises and bring our attention back, one breath at a time.
A 7-Minute Meditation to Rest Your Attention
Day 2: Connect With Yourself
By Sebene Selassie
Belonging is the sense of ease and joy we can savor when we are truly present. Often we don’t feel like we belong because we’re caught in feelings of loneliness, anxiety, and doubt. Feelings of not belonging are learned over time and lead us to think that there’s something wrong with us, that we’re not enough, that we don’t belong—but we do. By the very nature of our existence, we belong. Mindfulness helps us remember this by allowing us to experience belonging in any moment.
A 9-Minute Meditation to Listen to Your Body
Meditation can help us be more present to life, and mindfulness of body and breath help ground that presence. It’s only when we’re present with each moment that we can savor our experience. You can try grounding yourself throughout the day, feeling the body and using the inquiry, “What’s happening in my body right now?”
A 9-Minute Meditation to Listen to Your Body
A 7-Minute Meditation to Welcome Open Awareness
Open awareness meditation is often associated with the metaphor of the mind being like an open sky. We can observe thoughts, sensations, sounds, but they simply pass like clouds in the sky, or they can flow like a river savor the space between you and what drifts past. The sky is not bothered, the river is not changed, everything is carried by the current of awareness.
A 7-Minute Meditation to Welcome Open Awareness
Day 3: Connect With Everything
By Jessica Morey
We tend to focus our minds on what is wrong or threatening or what could harm us so that we might be better protected through the vagaries of life. But if we allow that bias to run rampant, we risk missing out on what’s beautiful, joyful, and nourishing in our lives. Not to mention, we grow less equipped to cultivate beauty and joy and nourishment in ourselves.
A 14-Minute Meditation to Appreciate Joy
Perhaps it seems strange to investigate what we consider to be a positive emotion, but we often miss joy. We don’t pay a lot of attention to it and let it slip by without much notice. The good news is, there are practices to cultivate joy. It can be sparked by something enjoyable, or we can attend to and support joy in our felt experience. One of the great ways to do that is to savor—really stop and savor—what’s beautiful and good in life.
A 14-Minute Meditation to Appreciate Joy
A 14-Minute Meditation to Explore What’s True
Longing is a vulnerable emotion, but it’s also very important. It directs us toward what we want in the world—where we want to go, what we value, what we want to create. When we can stay with the emotion and get to know it on a deeper level, there’s a great deal of wisdom at our disposal. If we can feel into it, be with it, and notice what’s underneath and inside of it, we can then better decide how we want to respond next.
A 14-Minute Meditation to Explore What’s True
A 12-Minute Meditation to Let Curiosity Lead the Way
When we allow what is to simply be, we relieve ourselves of the suffering that can get heaped on top of our moments of difficulty. That extra suffering is optional, even if the difficult causes and conditions are not. Read More
Frank Ostaseski May 19, 2022