Christine Dowding Schmitz: Creating Calm- Mindfulness and Meditation

This Way Up - Episode 6 - Christine

[00:00:00] 

Welcome. Today's guest, Christine Dowding Schmitz, is an amazing woman and expert in mindfulness and meditation. And I just walk away from a conversation with her feeling relaxed and present and actually joyful. 

Oh, absolutely. And I love that with this episode, people will walk away with concrete tools to implement in their life relatively quickly.

And, um, a process that she describes that I think really resonates with anybody that wants to achieve more mindfulness or just to say less stress in their life. 

Yeah. You know, when I think of mindfulness, It seems like this kind of like, I don't know, fluffy, cloudy, kind of woowoo. Yeah. And after she explained it today, I don't know, maybe it's my more linear thinking.

I was actually able to say, Oh, okay. It may be more woowoo, but there is actually a process to it that makes it [00:01:00] applicable and a little bit easier to explain to somebody else, but also easier to implement. 

Right. It makes a ton of sense. Yeah. I can't wait for everybody to hear what she has to say. 

Well, Emmy, let's learn a little bit more about Christine.

Christine Dowding Schmitz is a certified mindfulness meditation teacher and the founder of the Mindful Journey. For over 20 years, Christine has been serving others as a teacher, trainer, and coach for adults through various human resources roles in the corporate world. And for the last decade, Christine has practiced daily research based mindfulness and meditation techniques that she shares with her clients of all ages to help them manage stress and emotions, improve relationships, increase focus and performance, enhance well being, reduce pain symptoms, and find happiness and meaning in life.

And thank you so much for being here. What an amazing background and [00:02:00] bio, like best person ever to join us. That's so great.

Thank you so much. I mean, I just want to say it's an honor to be here with you both and I love what you're doing with this podcast. So thank you for having me. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Well, to follow up on that, gosh, there's so many places we want to go and explore through this time together. But to start off, I would love, we would love to hear a little bit about your day to day practice in walking people through mindfulness and even meditation. Sure. So, um, basically I have been practicing actually meditating.

I have a daily practice for almost a decade now. And the reason I started this is I was suffering from anxiety, have some childhood trauma. And from day one, I could see how practicing mindfulness really helped me go through this healing journey. And so [00:03:00] I just knew, I got to a point, I was working in the corporate world, and I just knew I needed to share this gift with other people.

I was seeing it, um, I was working in human resources, and working with people all the time, trying to help them, hearing how stressed they are, and how they're dealing with all these difficult emotions, and I just wanted to share these practices because I saw how they helped me. So now I I practice meditation myself.

I go on annual retreats where I practice for weeks at a time and I have this daily practice. So for me, that may look like meditating for 20 minutes in the morning. And that helps kind of set the path for the day. And then I also like to do it at night before I go to bed because meditation helps calm the body and the mind.

And so it helps me sleep. If I wake up in the middle of the night, it's a great, it's great to have these tools to help me fall back to sleep. And so now I'm offering this to, [00:04:00] as you said, people of all ages. I help children with this. Um, I've taught classes on how to deal with stress. How to manage emotions, how to improve performance.

I have a class right now, um, a tennis class for middle school and high school boys, and it's, there's so much pressure with tennis that it, it's really difficult for them to move forward and, um, really focus on the game. So it's helping kids with that. I help as well, reasons a lot of my clients tend.

Parents who are looking for tools, not only for their Children, but for themselves. And that's the wonderful thing about meditation and practicing mindfulness is it's this self healing, right? And, uh, you're both moms to I'm a mom as well. And we know this in order to be able to take care of our Children and to be [00:05:00] our best selves with them.

We need to take care of ourselves first. And so, I offer classes, I offer courses, and I also do one on one with individuals who, um, want kind of that individual attention and more support. Mm hmm. Christine, meditation and mindfulness, I think, get thrown into the same bucket. And often, I'm not exactly sure you are, they're used interchangeably.

Can you explain the difference between meditation and mindfulness and maybe give some examples? Sure. So when we're talking about mindfulness, we're talking about this nonjudgmental caring attention center. In the present moment. So there's two aspects here. We have our attention, which is just observing the here and now.

And then we bring in this sense of caring or kindness or compassion to that. [00:06:00] And so what ends up happening is rather than judging our experience in the moment or judging ourselves, we can be with whatever we're experiencing in the present moment. And what happens is we have this shift where we move from being in on autopilot and kind of in this trance going through the day to being able to respond appropriately to whatever situation we're presented with.

And so this is what mindfulness is. Now, meditation is a practice of mindfulness. When I talk about meditation, what I'm usually doing is guiding people where we're sitting on a mat, laying on a mat or sitting on a meditation cushion or in a chair or even standing. And we are focusing on one thing. So maybe we're focusing on our breath and we're practicing being with the breath and the body.

This [00:07:00] meditation, what it's doing is it's strengthening our muscle of awareness to be able to focus just on one thing. So we're not worrying about the past or worrying about the future. It helps bring us into the present moment. And so when I practice mindfulness or meditation, I can then bring this practice into everyday life.

And that's usually where you hear people saying, Oh, I'm practicing mindfulness in my daily life. So if I can, if I can bring practice, bringing focus to my breath, I can be more focused when I'm doing stuff throughout the day. And to be mindful in our day means we're bringing our attention again to that present moment.

So if I'm talking to you, if I'm mindfully talking to you, I am just in the moment, letting the words come talking to you. I'm not thinking about what I'm going to say next. I'm not worrying about what I [00:08:00] just said. So this sense of mindfulness can really apply to all areas of our lives. What are some other ways you could be practicing mindfulness in the moment?

So, I think a great The way to practice this is, you know, if we, if we go to, um, here, here's an example that comes to mind for me. I think about how before I even started practicing mindfulness, I used to drive to and from work, which was at least an hour each way and yes, and then if it snowed, it could be three hours.

Bye. Bye. What I was doing was I was getting in my car and the next thing I knew I was either at work or at home. Has that ever happened to you where, you know, you're, you're in the car, you know where you're going and somehow you get there and you're like, how did I even get here? Right? Yeah. That's a terrifying moment of realization.

Very scary. You're like, is this [00:09:00] even safe? Like, how did I get here? So basically what's happening to us when we have these experiences is we're doing just that we're, we're either stuck in something that already happened. So maybe I'm worrying about something that a conversation that happened at work, or maybe I'm focused on.

What I'm gonna do when I get home. Oh my gosh, it's late. I gotta make dinner for the family Do I even have food in the house? You know, so there's this worry and so we're stuck in our thoughts We're not even aware of what we're doing. So a way to practice mindfulness is to note When we're doing that, I'm stuck in my head again.

Okay, let me come reset my focus and come back to what I'm doing right now. I'm driving, right? Can I not maybe turn the music off? Can I just be in the act of driving? What does it feel like to drive? Can I be aware of [00:10:00] all of my surroundings? Right? Yeah. And this brings us into the moment we're in the act of what we're doing.

And that's being mindful. And so we can practice this in any areas of our lives. Like I said, with communication, am I thinking about what I'm going to say next? Or am I really listening to what that person has to say as they're talking to me? And I think a lot of us are conditioned to have 50 things going on at once.

I really appreciate the comment about maybe even driving without music in the background because, um, I do that from time to time and inevitably one of my kids gets in the car and they're going crazy if there's no music on. They just can't sit still with quiet. So I think that there's a lot to be said for that for sure.

And I could see where if you are mindful about what you're doing, it's going to bring a level of appreciation and possibly joy to things that might be very [00:11:00] minute or you feel are just tasks or responsibilities rather than opportunities to enjoy the moment. Yeah, that is such a good point. One way to practice mindfulness is to do gratitude.

Meditation or practice. And what that is is exactly that. It's it's noticing. Okay, what am I grateful for? So we all this is the nature of the mind to be stuck in thoughts all the time, right? And so what we're doing with meditation is we were just training our brain to come back into the present moment.

And so we can shift ourselves if we're having these like negative thoughts and we're ruminating a lot. And we noticed that We can help shift that by doing gratitude meditation, where we're, you know, maybe we're just picking five things we're grateful for, and we can sit for a moment and take a few deep breaths and just say to ourselves, I'm grateful for [00:12:00] my family, I'm grateful for the air, the fresh air, I have to breathe, it can be the simplest things.

And to your point, it cultivates this positivity or gratitude within you and you start realizing, oh, wow, like, I mean, it's fall here now and I'm walking my dog and I'm just, whoa, the leaves are beautiful. Oh my gosh. And I feel the joy. Come up because I'm in the present moment. Whereas if I'm not being mindful, I'm walking my dad because, oh my gosh, I have so many things to do.

Right? Like this is just another chore to do. And now I'm thinking negatively and I'm, I'm missing out on all this beauty in the world. Right? So you're making a really good point there. I feel like a lot of what you're saying too, is there's this phrase that's buzzing around social media. Have you heard people talk about [00:13:00] glimmers?

I haven't heard about glimmers yet. Oh, okay. And I'm glad you brought up social media because I, I do have some things to say about this. Oh, I bet you do. Well, these glimmers they're in, it's a new term and I followed the hashtag and it led me down this whole other interesting path, but it is sort of speaking to what you're talking about.

Yeah. Even let's just take. walking outside and appreciating the beautiful fall color in Colorado and staying present in that moment, in that one thought and allowing yourself to experience, let's say it's joy or gratitude, whatever the ensuing emotion is. I feel like maybe what it is is a social media version of mindfulness, switching the vocabulary even because just, you know, to have another way to present the same attitude and perspective.

Yeah, one of the practices I love to do what we're talking about, um, being outside, being outside. in [00:14:00] nature is a great way to support coming into the present moment. So, you know, for some people, it's hard to sit and actually meditate and you don't need, there's other ways to practice mindfulness as, as we said, it's really just having this awareness, but a great practice to do if you don't want to sit down is just taking a walk in nature and just noticing with your senses.

What am I seeing right now? What am I observing with my eyes? And again, to be mindful, we're not judging, right? We're just observing, being present with it. What am I hearing right now? Oh, I'm hearing the birds sing. What am I feeling right now? Ah, the cool air of fall against my skin. As we experience the present moment in nature, it helps, it brings us joy, like we said, and it just helps support us, nature, in coming into this moment.

Do you remember when your kids were really, really young? Like, I'm talking like [00:15:00] three. And you take them on a walk or you would go, you know, we would go down by the ocean and they would notice everything. I remember specifically my kids, I took them down to Dana point and they were just like, Oh, look at this.

Look at the crab. Look. And I remember thinking at that moment. They notice in awe of everything. Yes. So this mindfulness piece, or I guess it would be mindfulness, I guess is really the root of us, which is where we came from before life got so full of other things. I love that. Yes. so much for having me.

My pleasure. And so we are born, we are born with love in our hearts and this ability to be in the present moment. And then it does, it gets harder and harder, the more we create this busyness in our life. Right. And so. I think one of the most [00:16:00] amazing things about being a mom is to, to experience the world through our children's eyes and to be with them in that moment.

And so when, you know, being older and practicing this mindfulness, it allows me to do that with her. And I, I can remember when I was younger and I used to do this, like I practiced mindfulness. I didn't know what it was at the time. I used to go to the beach with my dad and we would float on the ocean waves.

And I would just look at the clouds passing by and just flow with the ocean. And I just have such beautiful memories of that because I was in the present moment. So, yeah, you're making such a good point. And so, it's great for us to tap into this when our children are younger. So we can give them the tools to hold on to that and to be able to deal with whatever they're confronting in life.

Because life is difficult. I mean, you [00:17:00] brought up social media. Social media is having such an impact. On our kids and teens, and there's a lot of shaming and blaming happening, you know, I've been reading a lot of this, and it's, it's so hard, it's really impacting our children's mental health, and I think it's important for our kids to be mindful of even social media, take a pause, how does this feel inside, right, how does being on social media and reading this stuff make you feel And just be with that for a moment.

And if, if it's giving you negative thoughts and giving you these negative emotions, asking yourself, why am I doing this? Why, why do I continue to follow all this? Yeah. How do you coach a young person of that age where they are so engaged with their social media? How do you [00:18:00] coach them through these moments of mindfulness or other ways to find pause?

Because I think that's part of the battle is them recognizing and then hitting a pause button. Yeah. And that's where I feel meditation can be so supportive. So if I'm working one on one with someone, I do a lot of guided meditation. In our society. And this is, you know, especially Children, but also adults.

We're constantly distracted, right? Technology is everywhere. We're either watching movies. What's on Netflix? You know? Oh, my gosh, I got to get on my phone. So we're not used to taking this pause. It's almost like we're training ourselves to be still and and that requires some work, right? So it's practicing training.

These meditations where they can see what happens when they do come into the moment. And what's happening when we do these practices is they're able to calm their bodies and calm their [00:19:00] minds. What's happening is If we're, we're beginning with these deep breaths and pausing our parasympathetic nervous system is being activated, which means it's calming our sympathetic nervous system.

And that sympathetic nervous system is that fight, flight, or freeze response. that we all have and it's ingrained in us, right? Because we, this is since homeo sapiens existed, right? The world was a crazy place. It was wild. And we needed this mechanism to survive in the world, but now we don't need to have this response all and yet.

You know, these kids are are constantly triggering it with with all this intake, so it's really working with them to see how it feels when you do pause and come into the present moment. And the more we sit and [00:20:00] meditate or practice mindfulness, the more we see the benefits and how it has a positive impact in our lives.

And honestly, that's why I've had this daily practice. Once I started, I didn't want to stop because I realized how much healthier my life is. as a result of this. And so that's what I'm trying to share with these children. It's, it's doing these practices so that they can too can say, Oh, this feels much better than this stimulation I'm constantly grasping for.

And we can make a healthy choice not to do that. And it takes practice. And that's where I guide them through. So as a parent who, um, actually, this is a two part question. So forgive me. Sure. The first one is, When I was first introduced to meditation and one of the reasons why I couldn't grasp onto it or didn't grasp on I could I didn't was because I thought I had to be perfect and my mind did not shut up.

It [00:21:00] just kept going. I've since learned. That you don't have, well, trying to learn that you don't have to be perfect.

Can you explain, um, kind of that perfection piece and how you don't have to be perfect with meditation, um, in order for it to be effective? Yes. And this, just so you know, this completely resonates with me. I had perfectionism tendencies, um, as well, and this is, this is human nature. So. What we learn through the classes I teach and my one on ones is that all of this is human nature.

This is how the brain works. So the more we practice this and actually meditate, the more we understand the brain, and We're able to kind of shift and work through that. I think the most important thing to know is that, you know, when people say, [00:22:00] I can't do this because I have too many thoughts. Yes, me too.

That's why I do it. So yes, our brain is constantly thinking what we're doing is we're practicing again, bringing our attention back to whatever we're focusing on. So if we're practicing mindfulness of breath, I'll focus back on the breath. And so we're training our brain just like we would for any kind of sport or something, right?

Like if I'm Running a marathon. I can't just run a marathon tomorrow. Right. I need to train and work up to that. I need to train my body. That's what we're doing here. This we're training this muscle of awareness so that we call it the monkey brain. So we have less monkey brain and we can be a little bit calmer.

We also through meditation and practicing mindfulness, we learn to accept ourselves for as we are. We start to realize, Oh, I'm not alone in this. [00:23:00] I'm not alone in this behavior. I'm not alone in thinking negative thoughts, having difficult emotions. We all experience this. And there's some There's some empowerment in, in knowing that, right?

Oh, okay, I'm not alone in this and it's okay to feel this way. We can welcome whatever emotions are coming up around it. Any thoughts that are coming up around this perfectionism or whatever's going on and we can work through it and we do that through practice. This is super interesting because, you know, Andrew and I talk about this a lot, just surrounding, um, some of the struggles kids have been through in terms of anxiety.

And it, we all know it can get to a very clinical, critical level where you're feeling it physically, right? It's not just thoughts swirling and panic and ruminating thoughts. And I want to ask this because I feel like somebody will listen [00:24:00] to this and might be thinking the same thing. But if you're a parent and you've got a child of any age that is really going through this rapid thinking and negative thought pattern.

How do you as the parent try to interject these mindfulness moments or meditation to where they can actually realize some pause or other experience? Because I think it's really hard to explain that to a kid. Yeah, this is a really good question and it may be helpful for me to share kind of One of the practices that I do for this and when we're thinking about from a parent's perspective, it's, it's helpful for the parent to understand and practice this as well so that they can support their child and practicing it.

And we want to create a habit with it, right? Just like we brush our teeth in the morning. If we practice, even if it's not sitting down and [00:25:00] doing a long meditation, even if it's just following the flow. of the breath in and out of the body. So while you're brushing your teeth, just brush your teeth. When you're done, maybe just sit down and notice the air flowing in and out of your body.

So there's these little ways to incorporate practice with me without making it this formal, okay, I'm going to sit for 20 minutes and meditate. And I do feel like When parents embrace these tools and techniques, it helps them and their kids and their kids see them as a role model. And so I'd like to just kind of get into an example of how I work with anxiety.

Now, you mentioned with anxiety, it's, you know, you're not just having thoughts, but you're feeling it in your body. And that's actually the case with all emotion and a great way to work through this is how is practicing [00:26:00] mindfulness of emotions. And so what we do in that situation is there's an acronym called RAIN, R A I N, and you may have heard of it.

Um, it was coined by Tara Brock, who's a well known meditation teacher and was actually one of my, she was one of my teachers in my certification program. And so I've heard of her. Yeah, and she's great. And so this, this technique, RAINN is an acronym for Recognize, Acknowledge, Investigate, and Nurture. And so what we're doing is we may just come, settle, sit down, we may close our eyes for a moment, just begin with a few deep breaths.

And then we recognize what is going on in my body. And Usually, like for me, I, I struggle with anxiety. I've now since been able to manage it using this exact tool, but for me, I know when it's coming up. I recognize it. Oh, [00:27:00] this is anxiety. I'm feeling anxiety right now. And so I can then just allow it to be, I can allow it to be in my body.

And so what is that? What does that feel like for me? What does anxiety feel like? It feels like a clenching in my chest, maybe a rapid heartbeat. I do have trouble breathing. I tend to feel my breath, um, the shortness of breath where it's just going to my chest. I find it hard to bring it all the way down to belly breathing to really calm myself.

I may have all those thoughts in my head and, and I'm having trouble clearing them. And so I can just allow all of this and be with this. If we try to resist it, that which we resist persists. So it's just going to make things worse. And we, we end up suffering even more. And so, as I allow and I, and I [00:28:00] open and welcome My experience.

I can feel it. I can even ask myself, Where am I feeling this in my body? And I bring my attention to that and just be with the experience. And then I move on to the nurturing piece. And this is where self compassion is so important when we're dealing with, you know, Children dealing with struggling with mental health.

And this self compassion of just, we can ask ourselves in that moment, what is it that I need? What do I need in this moment? And sometimes it's an act, such as just placing my hands on my heart. This is almost like giving yourself a hug, right? And this can actually help the body feels this and can actually calm a little bit when we, when we put our hands on our heart, or you can put your hands wherever you feel like you need it in the moment.

And then we [00:29:00] may even ask ourselves, what is it that I need to hear right now? And maybe I tell myself, Oh, this too shall pass. Or I care about this suffering. And as we bring this compassion to ourselves. We can notice this opening, this less intensity, so maybe a softening of our muscles, or that capability to breathe fully again, and this lightening to the intensity we were feeling.

And so we can go through this whole process anytime we notice this arising for us. And it works for all emotions. So, uh, not just anxiety, depression, but anger, sadness, anything, anything that's really difficult, grief, anything difficult to be with, we can go through this process. And what we're doing is we're processing our emotions so that we're then able to move [00:30:00] forward.

You know, you asked the question about the child, but I remember when my kids were younger, I'd read a, I don't know, it was probably on social media, but don't I know there's good to social media too. I post on social media too. I'm calling out myself here, , but like, don't meet your child's emotions. with those with the same intensity or, you know, I can't remember it all that well because it was a while ago.

But you know, meeting it only intensifies that emotion. Yeah. So I'm looking back at it. Okay. So here you've given this tool to your child, but you said also that it's so important that the parent role models this and to be able in that moment, I'm not, for instance, I'm

When my kids were going through whatever they were going through, I felt [00:31:00] anxiety. Sure. And to be able to recognize that and then use this process of rain would've been, I mean, that, that to me seems like something I can hold onto. Okay. Recog. Okay. I need to recognize what I'm feeling. I need to acknowledge that I am feeling anxiety.

which then may turn into something else if I don't manage it. That, you know, right, you turn into anger. Yes. And then be able to investigate it and then allow myself to say this is a natural response to this. Of course you're feeling anxiety, your child is suffering, whatever. But that, that is something you could process fairly quickly.

To be able to then be present for your child in a healthier way, I think, yeah, I am so glad you said that because absolutely. Um, so there's this formal practice of sitting with it and doing more of a meditation on it and then it's being mindful in the moment, [00:32:00] right? My child's yelling at me. Like you said, if I yell back, it's just going to keep escalating, right?

And you know what happens? Neither one of our needs are met, right? So what we're doing here in the moment is exactly what you said. Recognize, Oh, what my child just said triggered something in me. And we can feel that as a physical response. It's not only that I'm thinking, Oh no, you didn't just say that.

I'm also feeling it and experiencing it in my body. So if I can take a moment to, like you said, recognize that and acknowledge it and meet my own needs. It's okay that I'm angry right now. I don't have to say something mean back, right? By taking that pause and just having that awareness and turning inward to the experience within my, myself, I'm able to respond more appropriately.

And maybe I can say, [00:33:00] I can see that you're angry right now. And maybe it's that we just both need a moment, right? Yeah. I can see that you're angry. I'm feeling anger too right now. Let's just take a breath. Let's take a moment and we can work through this. Yeah, the other thing that I think, um, cause I know even one or two of my kids might hear the word mindfulness and think it's a little woo woo and kind of check out.

But one thing that you guys are talking about in terms of rain and observing and naming a thought, feeling or emotion, what's really important that stands out to me in that is call it whatever you want. At the base of it all, you're making one observation about feeling anxious or other. And I always believe that if you can observe and name something, then you are not it, you know, you've created some separation between you and that.

And that's the first step to making some progress because you've taken it, you know, [00:34:00] one inch away from your being. So you can walk around it, name it, look at it, call it something else. So now it's not. It's not exactly me and my, and meshed in my being. And I think that that is like the first step to making progress is the naming and observing.

Absolutely. And this is a thing with emotions. I think sometimes our society has this misconception that it's bad to have feelings. Like we shouldn't have feelings. And that's not the case at all. Not the bad ones anyway. Well, well, the thing is, is that there are no bad emotions if you think about it. What emotions are, they're really just messengers.

It's our body telling us that a need's not being met. So if I'm feeling angry, clearly something's not right. Right. And maybe I can reflect on that. What is causing this anger to and maybe it takes action and I need to do something about it. And maybe I need to set [00:35:00] boundaries. Right. So it's really realizing that it is healthy for us to feel these emotions and express these emotions.

And we really should be normalizing that for our kids to, to have these emotions and know that It's not the emotions themselves that cause suffering. It's when we get stuck in the emotions. And to your point, Emmy, when we over identify with them, right? I mean, you even, you'll hear people say, I am sad.

Well, I'm not sad. That's not who I am, right? I am feeling sad in this moment is really what's happening. And the more we practice mindfulness and we can be with our emotions, the more we recognize that our emotions are constantly flowing through us, just like the breath. So they come and go. And so I start to realize, ah, the impermanence of emotions.[00:36:00] 

So, if I can sit with them and process them, eventually they fade, right? And that can be empowering, too. Especially, for example, me, who deals with anxiety. When it comes again, I now know, it's not here forever, it's not who I am. It, too, will pass. And I can move on. So if you feel anxious, what's your first response?

Meaning, what do I do from a mindfulness perspective? Yeah, like in the moment. Yeah. I pause, I pause, and I recognize it. I go through this RAIN practice, and that's why I wanted to share it with you, um, because it has been so helpful. Really just pause. Oh, this is anxiety. It's that. And now I'm at the point where I can just say, Hey, welcome, anxiety, here you are again.

And then, you know, I feel it within my body. What do I need right now? And then I will practice [00:37:00] deep breaths as well to help me work through it. And this is a practice. Mindfulness is a practice. So it's not as easy as saying, I'm going to do this once and I'm okay, right? So both of my kids have some form of anxiety, and I know that their brain is just all over the place.

I mean, they're, you know, it's, as my daughter will say, there is nothing rational about it. That it's just, and it's just talking. And so did you notice when you started with meditation that that allowed or allowed you to quiet your brain beyond just the meditation practice, whereas you were able to filter out things later during the day?

It really takes time. The first time I did it, I wasn't like, Oh, I have no thought. Sure. Right now I'm going through the day and that's what I mean about it being a practice. But the more I did it, the more I started to see that showing up in my life, [00:38:00] the mindful journey with Christine that I've created.

The exact point is this to be able to practice these tools and techniques, call it meditation, call it whatever you want. But using these techniques and then seeing how you're better able to tap into that throughout your day so you can be mindful throughout your day. So yes, with time. Yes. And I'll go back to this piece of self compassion.

How important that is because it is difficult at first. We need to know. Oh, okay. I thought that whole time my mind didn't quiet at all. I felt this anxiousness in my body that didn't really work this time around and it's okay. I can try this again tomorrow. So it's bringing that, that self compassion of it's okay.

This is what I'm experiencing right now. And if I keep practicing these tools can help me with this. So maybe my mind wandered a little bit [00:39:00] here, but I want to come back. I want to come back because I'm not tying the two. So you've got mindfulness and you've got meditation. Meditation is a tool to help you be better at mindfulness.

Mindfulness is something that you can do all day long when situations occur or when you really, you should be doing all day long. But the practice of meditating daily helps strengthen your ability to be mindful and be more present throughout the day. Correct? Yes. Yes. Correct. Yeah. Okay. I didn't, I did not space out in the middle of all of that.

I was trying really hard. I think Christine too, is this kind of what you're saying when you're working with a young person? If you were to take 'em aside in your [00:40:00] coaching session and teach 'em how to meditate or run 'em through guided meditation, it sounds like part of it is just the exposure of another way to think or feel for them 'cause they, they don't know.

And then by giving them that experience of another way to be, that gives them a roadmap in the midst of a anxious moment or unwanted emotion. Well. Let me explain it this way. There's not this goal necessarily of Changing how we're feeling. So really what we're practicing is being with what we're feeling It's just it's just letting it be Okay Can I be with this and then what naturally happens with the mind and body is that it comes And it opens and in and the intensity of all of this lessons, and then they [00:41:00] experience a different way of being.

So it's more, okay, let's be with the intensity, the difficulty and see what happens. And then they start to see, oh, I can work through this. This is impermanent and yes, it will come back again. However, now I have the tools for when it does arrive. Does that make sense? I think so. I think I'm being really literal.

I'm imagining how I'm going to sell this to my child. So having these tools helps you get from point A to point B. Yeah. And it's one of those things where you need to, you need to practice to see the benefit. And I can say that. You know, I am living proof of this and neuroscience, all these studies that are coming out has have proven this, that yes, practicing mindfulness can help with [00:42:00] stress, anxiety, depression, dealing with any difficult emotions, helping us get unstuck from following these stories and these thoughts in our head.

And that's all been shown. Yeah, I would agree. When we talk about mental health, the CDC has. Excellent resources for, um, people that are struggling with mental health. And it actually lists, um, practicing mindfulness as a tool to, to work through that. So, yeah, sell away.

How do we know when we're meditating if we're really doing it right? Other than I know it's a practice and like, is there a timeline? Should we be five minutes, 10 minutes? Should we have less interrupted thoughts to a degree? How do we know if it's working? So there's not necessarily a right or wrong way to meditate.

And, and again, we're just kind of being open and nonjudgmental, right? Like that piece [00:43:00] is hard, right? We've been taught to be judgmental in life. So that in itself is a practice. So really, you want to do what works for you. It's really hard for me to say, you need to practice. You know, this much every day because we all have different schedules on different capacity for it.

I do believe that, you know, if you're starting practicing mindfulness, begin maybe by meditating each morning for five minutes and then maybe add a minute when you can and see what you can get up to. There's not like this magic number, really. I like to do 20 minutes. That's what works for me. I get up early before my family so that I have the time for this self care and I'm able to do it.

And like I said, it sets my path for the day. I also, as I said, like to do it at night to help me fall asleep. So it's finding a time in your schedule where you can just kind of [00:44:00] stick to it. What works for you? How much time works for you? And then you'll start to notice, Oh, you know, here I am. I'm practicing focusing on one thing, whether that be my breath, my emotions, my thoughts.

And then you'll notice, you know, if I, if I'm practicing, okay, I'm going to go away from my thoughts and come to my breath. I start realizing I can do that during the day. Yeah. And you do, you're strengthening, again, the muscle of awareness. And so I might have this whole conversation in my head with a friend that already took place and I'm like reliving it and what I should have said and what I should have done.

And I can say, Oh my gosh, there I am. I'm doing that again. And when I do that, that creates emotion in my body, right? I get all riled up again as if I'm in that moment. But if I have this awareness, Oh, wait, maybe I'll just pause and come back to my breath. Oh, there goes [00:45:00] those thoughts. Yeah. Yeah. Christine, can you take us through an, um, a short practice as an example for us?

Sure. I'm happy to do that. So when we practice mindfulness of breath, um, if I'm guiding a meditation, I invite everybody and I do want to say, if anybody who's listening is driving right now, please don't practice this right now, please wait till you're home and you're safe, um, before doing this. But if you're just hanging out.

You can find whatever positions comfortable for you, so we can meditate any way we want to. I have meditation cushions, but you don't have to have a meditation cushion. You can easily sit in a chair, you can stand up, you can lie down on a yoga mat or on your bed, and just finding a comfortable position where your body is symmetrical, it's alert, yet comfortable and relaxed.[00:46:00] 

And so we begin here, I invite you to just close your eyes for a moment, and if it feels too much to close your eyes, you can just lower your gaze, and let's start here with a few deep breaths, just letting the breath flow in and out of your nostrils, and when we're taking these deep breaths. Let's breathe all the way down into our belly and then relax on the exhale.

Breathing in calm, breathing out ease, breathing in calm, and just breathing out anything that doesn't serve you in this moment. Now [00:47:00] let's gently guide our attention to our breath. in its natural flow. So we're going to let go of controlling the breath in any way. Just pay attention to it as it flows in and out of the body.

And if you notice your mind wandering, that's okay. That's what the mind does. We can still redirect our attention back to the breath. back to the present moment. And if you notice any discomfort or distractions arising, we can redirect our attention again back to the breath. And when you're ready, [00:48:00] you can open your eyes.

How did that feel? Amazing. Absolutely amazing. Just want it to keep going. And your voice too is really very well suited for that calming experience. Thank you. Yeah. And so this was a really short meditation. So you can imagine as we do longer ones and guide in different ways, the impact it can have. And so, you know, even, even if the thought is I want to meditate to find calm, you don't have to have that goal.

You can just do it and it happens. Christine, if anybody wanted to find you to get some extra help, where would they go to find you? Yeah, they can, they can reach me on my website, www. TheMindfulJourneyWithChristine. com. And I have a lot of offerings on there. So one on ones, [00:49:00] um, as I mentioned, I do different, I do a monthly class.

It's called everyday mindful class. I offer courses that could be up to six weeks long. And really, if there's a group of individuals that has a need, I can also customize courses for that group of individuals. Oh, that's amazing. And it's all virtual. So I actually do both. I, um, you know, if there's people here in Colorado, um, that are local.

I do in person as well. Oh, great. That's amazing. Thank you so much, Christine. This was really valuable, valuable information. Yeah. Thank you. I love having a nugget to put into play right away. Like slow breathing. Thank you both for having me. This was a pleasure.

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