My FAVORITE FREE Mind-Body Resources
- Morgan Heisey
- May 14, 2020
- 8 min read
So now that you know just how meditation can change your physiology, I'm sure you're wondering, where do I start?...
Meditation:
Insight Timer Meditation App:
Meditation apps are all the rage right now, but many of them limit the time spent before you have to pay for them, only offer three free meditations, or require some form of membership. This is why the Insight Timer app is hands down my favorite on the market; it's free and it doesn't limit your choices by any means. With over 45,000 free meditations ranging from 2 minutes to 2 hours, the options on this app are endless. I personally enjoy the gratitude meditations the most, but this app also highlights meditations to raise your self-esteem, help you become mindful of your racing thoughts, and relax into sleep - among many others. Even better, some of the most well-known, critically acclaimed meditation teachers offer free talks or guided practices on Insight. Tara Brach, davidji, Jack Kornfield, Sharon Salzberg, Thich Nhat Hanh...the list goes on. Aside from access to world-renowned teachers, this app also stands above others as you can choose between guided meditations, where the teacher leads you through the practice, music meditations with no talking, or simply timed silent meditations. It's truly customizable, you can personalize it to your preferences - and you should know by now that I'm all about individuality in all aspects of life.
Boho Beautiful Youtube Meditations:
I have to thank my best friend for this one, she first introduced me to Boho Beautiful's yoga videos and I quickly fell in love. I am personally a fan of guided meditations, and this woman's voice is just so soothing, it's the perfect match for me. Boho Beautiful posts relatively short 10-20 minute guided meditations spanning the topics of presence, gratitude, and loving-kindness. During these videos, she gives you a mantra - a word or sound repeated to aid in concentration in meditation - which quickly removes you from the days worries, allowing you to focus on the present moment in front of you. For me, these meditations are the ones that trigger a physiological feeling of peace, happiness, and gratitude in me the most, and I am a firm believer that meditation is not truly working for you if it's not causing you to feel something. We can repeat to ourselves day in and day out three things that make us happy, but if we are feeling resentful and angry while reciting these thoughts in our heads, we will not receive the positive biological benefits from them. You have to truly immerse yourself in the experience.
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Cold Showers:
Studies have shown that, aside from the physiological benefits in terms of boosting the immune system and banishing inflammation, 2-3 minute cold showers in 68F water relieve depressive symptoms rather effectively. How? Cold exposure in this way activates the sympathetic nervous system, the fight or flight response as you know. Except unlike work stress, this short, acute activation of the fight or flight response is advantageous as it increases blood levels of endorphins, specifically beta-endorphins, and noradrenaline. Similar to the "runner's high" you may get after a long-distance run, these endorphins are the "feel good" chemicals that elicit a feeling of wellbeing in your brain. But, here's the catch - to get the most benefit out of cold exposure, you must make sure that this water comes in contact with your chest and head as there's a high density of cold receptors in the skin covering these areas. This is why I prefer cold showers to ice baths, you're impacting the areas most affected by changes in temperature (and yes, this is why your mom told you to wear a hat in the winter - you lose a large majority of your body heat through your exposed head due to the density of these receptors in this area). In doing so, the cold water also sends an overwhelming amount of electrical impulses from the nerve endings in this area to your brain, further contributing to this anti-depressive effect.
All science aside, cold showers are my favorite form of meditation. Unlike when you sit on your floor and turn on a guided video, the mind-quieting quality of this time spent freezing in your ass off in the shower isn't up to chance or your ability to "control" your own mind. Because it is so easy for you to start hyperventilating when exposed to such cold temperatures, you are forced to focus on controlled breathing. In doing so, you forget the days troubles or looming to-do list, even if just for a few minutes. By developing the ability to control your breathing in this way, while getting exposed to a stressor like cold temperatures, you are effectively gaining the able to stimulate vagal nervous tone. This nerve, your vagus nerve, is what triggers your parasympathetic or "involuntary" nervous system - that which controls your heart rate and blood pressure, especially in times of performance anxiety. If you saw my Instagram stories two Mondays ago, you already know that this part of our nervous system really isn't involuntary - we have the ability to control it, but many of us choose not to gain the techniques to do so.
Well, lucky for you, this is where cold showers come in. Cold water adaptation, and the controlled breathing that comes with it, grants us the ability to to more properly deal with stress - to lessen the spike in heart rate and blood pressure that many of us feel in times of anxiety, often leading us to make poor decisions. Bottom line: 2-3 minutes of stress in the form of freezing cold water every day, over time, can help you gain the ability to better control how you perceive and feel stress when it really matters the most. Trust me, after feeling like you're completely naked in the middle of a northern blizzard for a few minutes every morning, you realize that that backhanded comment from your coworker really isn't worth stressing out over.
Watch These first:
Gratitude:
Time to get trippy for a second. Like the famous saying - reality truly is not what it seems. What is considered reality to you, even at the most fundamental levels, is not reality to me. If you're a fan of quantum physics like me, you might have heard of a phenomenon called the observer effect. In layman's terms, the observer effect, sometimes referred to as observation bias, is the idea that the simple act of observing a phenomenon inevitably alters the phenomenon itself. Just like you may alter what you're doing when you know someone is watching you, this bias applies to even the most basic concepts of reality. In quantum mechanics, when passively measuring the way a quantum particle acts using an electronic detector, the physical act of measuring or observing it changed the way it moved. Applying this to our perception of reality, we observe the world around us through a filter of our past experiences, current emotions, and conditioned beliefs. An individual who experienced a tragic injury from a dog bite in childhood may perceive the idea of going to a dog park as a moment to be feared, meanwhile someone who is an avid animal lover may view this same exact phenomenon with excitement and joy. Physiologically this mental perception of fear manifests itself as a heightened stress response, with cortisol pumping through your blood stream and a racing heart. Looking at the biology of the avid animal lover, on the other hand, they're most likely experiencing joy in the form of serotonin surges and smiles plastered on their face. Bottom line: How we chose to view the world determines both our inner and outer experience. That being said, the practice of gratitude can be used to hack or train your perception, thus hacking both your inner (biological) and outer (experiential) worlds. Feel free to check out my previous post to learn a little bit more about the physical benefits gratitude brings, but for now, let's look at a few of my favorite ways to practice it...
Gratitude Journals
A quick Amazon search of "gratitude journals" will conjure up hundreds and hundreds of results, many following the simple structure of "I am grateful for...". If you're interested in buying a pre-made gratitude journal, check out my personal favorite, The Five Minute Planner. But, if you're like me, you may not need a fancy journal. I simply use a regular, blank notebook gifted to me by my best friend and I start each day thinking of and recording three things I am grateful for. While it can be all too easy to write "my family, my friends, and food" everyday, I like to get specific. I've found that the more specific and minuscule I can get, the more profound the change in my perception is.
If you're more of tech person, don't worry there's an app for that. Download the Gratitude Journal App and you can keep track of the things that make your life great directly on your phone.
Gratitude Instagram Template
Taking it one step further, sharing the things you are grateful for with the people closest to you can not only change your perception, but their's as well. Along with recording three general things I am thankful for in my life, I like to make a conscious effort to remind those special people in my life why I value their presence so much. Not only does it strengthen your relationships as the other person feels properly appreciated, but it will honestly bring you a level of joy incomparable to most knowing that you may have made someone else's day. So feel free to use my free gratitude Instagram template pictured below, tagging those you wish to express gratitude for on this day. Show love, spread love.
FREE Gratitude Instagram Template
Breathwork
Breathing is one hell of a tool. It's free, we all do it, and it's known to create massive changes in a person's biology in a short few minutes. Quick anatomy lesson: the dome shaped muscle at the base of your lungs that plays a vital role in breathing is called the diaphragm. When you inhale, your diaphragm tightens and moves downward, creating more space in your chest cavity which allows the lungs to expand. When you exhale, the opposite happens. While we are all born with the innate knowledge on how to fully engage the muscle to take deep, rejuvenating breaths, we often tend to shift more towards shallow, what's referred to as "chest breathing", as we age due to stress, the habit of sucking in our bellies, etc. This more shallow way of breathing is not optimal in terms of oxygen exchange. We don't absorb all of the oxygen we possibly can with each breath, as we are not expanding our lungs to the necessary capacity. This is why breathwork that trains you to breath diaphragmatically can change your physiology in a way that optimizing oxygen exchange, lowers the heart rate, and stabilizes blood pressure. These types of breathing exercises are especially advantageous in stressful situations; we can literally use a change in breathing patterns to turn off our fight or flight stress response, instead switching to the rest and digest relaxation response, allowing us to better react in such heightened circumstances. How can you tell if you're chest breathing or diaphragm breathing? Breathe normally in front of a mirror. If you notice your tummy bulging out during your in-breath and sucking in during your out-breath, congratulations - you're breathing with your diaphragm! If you see your chest and shoulders rise and fall, you're chest breathing. This is the state that the majority of us operate from in everyday life. Don't worry though, two of my favorite ways of reconnecting with the diaphragm and maximizing oxygen exchange are through the 4-7-8 breathing technique and box breathing. You can find detailed video tutorials of these two breathwork practices below, but essentially, taking the 4-7-8 breath for example, you breathe in for four seconds, hold for 7, and exhale for 8. For box breathing, you inhale, hold, and exhale for the same amount of time - typically 4-6 seconds. Easy as that!
Begin Here:
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