EMBODIED PRESENCE
IN THIS LESSON
There’s a reason why they say breakfast is the most important meal of the day: We can feel the residue of our first meal well into the day. If I have a stack of chocolate chip pancakes drowned in syrup for breakfast, it’s going to be a different day than if I had chosen the veggie omelet. Same thing with the mental impressions we take in. Mental impressions are a form of nutrition as well, and they matter. What you mentally consume first thing in the morning can alter the rest of your day, and the 5-3-1-1 practice is my favorite way of meeting that truth with intention.
Week 5 Meditation:
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5-3-1-1- Meditation
What you mentally consume first thing in the morning can alter the rest of your day, and the 5-3-1-1 practice is my favorite way of meeting that truth with intention.Stay in bed for an extra five minutes. Or, if you know you’ll pass out again if you stay there, endure the nanosecond of pain it takes to swing your legs out of the bed and sit up for this. If you normally hit the snooze three times, hit it twice. You’ll thank me later. Either way:
5—Take five big, deep breaths.
3—Think of three things you’re grateful for. Feel them. Linger in the feeling.
1—Set one intention for how you want to live today.
1—Invoke one very fake smile. Just pretend you’re Jim Carrey. No one will know.
That’s it: a few minutes out of your day to thoroughly set the tone. Science estimates that this practice is about one million times better than checking your phone first thing in the morning.
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JOURNAL PROMPT: WEEK 5
Think of a time in your life when something went wrong or felt impossible, but then you got through it and came out on the other side better for having had the experience. It could have been finals season in grad school, or a tough breakup, or something more significant. Please don’t pick a situation you’re in now that you’re not already to the other side of, but rather a real life example where you experienced your own resilience (even if it didn’t necessarily feel like it at the time), or where you learned and grew through facing a difficult time, or where an unexpected opportunity came out of situation where things fell apart, or where an adverse experience drove you towards cultivating something positive in your life.
Identify such an experience in memory (it can be large or small — it doesn’t have to be a time you had an earth-shattering realization or rose triumphantly like the phoenix), and write about as many of the most important details as you can remember, paying special attention to the good that came of it all.