In today’s,” Yoga Snack,” I will guide listeners through a simple mindfulness meditation practice. Designed to help therapists integrate yoga into their practice and enhance self-care, this episode offers valuable insights into the benefits of mindfulness meditation, practical tips for staying present, and a guided meditation that can be easily incorporated into daily routines.

" It is the practice of bringing your attention to the present moment and bringing a sense of curiosity, of wonder into the moment without judging yourself." -Chris McDonald

Connect With Me

Instagram: @chris_mcdonald58

Facebook: Yoga In The Therapy Podcast

Join the private Facebook Group: Bringing Yoga Into the Therapy Room

TikTok: @YogaChris58

Rate, review, and subscribe to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, TuneIn, and Spotify

How To Build Competence and Confidence in Integrating Yoga Into the Therapy Room

Self-Care for the Counselor: A Companion Workbook: An Easy to Use Workbook to Support you on Your Holistic Healing and Counselor Self-Care Journey ... A Holistic Guide for Helping Professionals)

Claim your 30-Day Aura Guest Pass from Chris McDonald

Are you feeling overwhelmed or scattered? Do you need to take a break? Join me and take just a few minutes to pause and reconnect with yourself. In this Yoga Snack episode, I'll guide you through a simple mindfulness meditation practice to help you feel more grounded and present. Whether you're at the office or at home, this practice is the perfect way to reset your mind and body.

Don't miss the chance to breathe and recharge. Press play and join me on this episode of Yoga in the Therapy Room podcast. Welcome to Yoga in the Therapy Room, the non traditional therapist's guide to integrating yoga into your therapy practice. I'm Chris McDonald, licensed therapist and registered yoga teacher.

This podcast is here to empower therapists like you with the knowledge and confidence to bring yoga into their practice safely and ethically. So whether you're here to expand your skills and Enhance your self-care, or both. You are in the right place. Join me on this journey to help you be one step closer to bringing yoga into your therapy room.

Welcome to the Yoga in the Therapy Room podcast, the non-traditional therapist guide to integrating yoga into your therapy practice. I'm your host once again, Chris McDonald here. This will be a solo episode today. This is going to be a yoga snack. For those who aren't familiar, this means it's going to be a shorter episode under 15 minutes.

So I wanted to make this more accessible because I know how busy counselors and therapists schedules are and to give you a short snippet of a yoga practice that you can use for your self care or As an idea of something you could use with clients and again, you're always welcome to bring this recording to a session and do it with your client with my voice.

That's fine, too, because there's so many different ways we can bring yoga into therapy sessions. It doesn't always have to be you doing the meditation if that's not in your wheelhouse. But before we get started, I just want to do a quick review of what mindfulness meditation is. Because you might have heard that term before if you're not familiar with it.

Everybody's talking about mindfulness. That's been a big buzzword for a while. But what exactly is mindfulness meditation? I first learned about this when I did some research on Buddhism and joined a weekly Buddhist meditation group, which was really powerful. And I've gone to the Wan Buddhism temple in North Raleigh in North Carolina.

And that's been amazing too. So I've really kind of dug deep in this and learned a lot from the Buddhist tradition, but it is the practice of bringing your attention to the present moment. So bringing a sense of curiosity of wonder in the moment without judging yourself. So let's say you're coming listening to this podcast today and your mind wanders.

Oh, I hope that client shows up today after this podcast that's noticing it. We're not going to judge ourselves. Oh, I see my mind wandered. Let me bring it back. Let me just bring it back to my breath for a moment. Just going to an anchor, which could be breath, noticing maybe the rise and fall of the breath in your chest, or maybe just noticing your feet on the floor.

So picking a way to bring yourself back. in the moment. It could also be external grounding, if that feels better, just noticing maybe colors in the room that you're in, or noticing three things that you see, two things you hear. So using external, extraoception we call that, or internal. We can do more the interoception, noticing something in the body or breath.

So bringing us back to other points of awareness to cultivate that state of calm. And by gently redirecting when your thoughts do come up, and as an anchor, so that you can stay present. Now, does it mean that we never have thoughts again? No. I think that's one of the fallacies that you hear about meditation, that I can't do it, I can't clear my thoughts.

I don't think anyone can unless you're the Buddha. I'm not really sure that's possible as a human, so maybe if you get to enlightenment, I'm not sure, I've not gotten there yet, but just know that being a human means we have thoughts. So we're going to have thoughts even during meditation. So as we do this meditation today, just be gentle with yourself.

If you notice your mind wandering, just come back to your breath and notice. And I'm going to teach you a practice today that can also help you to stay more present and what to do with those thoughts and to release them. So you can use some visual imagery to help release the thought. That sometimes that can be powerful for a lot of people just to stay more present.

But just know the benefits of this are just phenomenal. That you can really reduce your stress, get that deeper connection to yourself and the world around you, and just feel overall more balanced in the nervous system. And again, it's, it sounds simple, of course, but it's not. So I always love these practices because it is just like, Oh, just notice your breath.

Wow. That sounds simple. Not always, right? Because we have lots of wandering thoughts or sensations, other things that get our attention, or just being in the external world, we might notice some things outside of where we are, or people, voices, so that can bring us out as well. But that's okay, we can notice those things, bring awareness, we can even label those, I notice sounds of voices outside of the room.

Or I notice my stomach is grumbling, or I notice that my thoughts are going back to that difficult session I had earlier today, I'm going to notice and then come back to my anchor, even if you have to come back 100 times. It's okay. The important thing is that you're developing that awareness and are aware that you might have gone on a distraction.

That's okay. Just giving yourself that grace, that self compassion. I hope all this is making sense. And just know that these are all helpful tools to help clients in session as well. I have brought meditation to many clients in session, and they've been really appreciative of that, and also encourage them to practice outside of session too.

But in this episode, I'm going to guide you through one of my favorite short mindfulness meditation practices. This is something that you could do to start your day or even to end your day. and just to get yourself more grounded, centering your thoughts, creating that sense of calm in the present moment.

Next task, next task. So what I did when I'm in this yoga teacher training right now, and what I did in between that and coming back to doing some work, I took, just took five and I did a meditation. That's really hard for me. That doesn't sound hard, but for me, that's challenging because I'm always ready.

Okay, I got this much time. What can I get done? Task oriented, task oriented. But that leads to exhaustion. So that's my challenge to you too. How can you bring more of these practices for yourself? Not just your clients. How can you take care of you more and bring these practices in more? So let's take a moment to get settled, maybe noticing feet on the floor.

If you're driving, pause this and please come back to another time to this meditation. This is not something to be meditating while we're driving. And just kind of notice your spine reaching up towards the sky, maybe noticing breath for a moment, feeling that rise and fall of the breath in the belly, inhaling, rising, exhale, coming back down.

The flow of our breath, being aware with that, feeling the air in your lungs as you inhale and exhale. And once you're in your space for this meditation, the invitation is to close your eyes. Notice if that feels right for you in your practice. If that's not in your practice, you're welcome to leave your eyes open.

Look at a place on the floor in front of you with soft eyes, soft gaze, and just know that whatever comes up today, you can always come back to your anchor, to your breath, noticing the breath rising and falling. I invite you to go in that space behind your eyes, that space that feels a little calmer, taking yourself out of the external.

And guiding yourself into the internal, letting go of what's to come the rest of your day, giving yourself this gift of meditation, this gift of present moment awareness. We're going to take an imaginary journey. Come along with me. I want you to imagine that you're walking in the woods, it's a warm spring day, you feel the sun on your skin warming you up.

You see the trees blowing in the breeze, the sun lighting them up. You notice the blue sky above, seeing the clouds filter in and out across the sun. You look down, looking at the path in front of you through the woods, feeling your feet as they walk on this path, tapping the earth each step along the way, maybe noticing Sensations in your hip as you step forward and push back.

Walking mindfully. And it's just you and the forest. You notice some birds flying above. Maybe you hear some sounds of animals or birds. Singing, always bringing you back to this present moment. And as you're walking, you notice the sound of water. And it's faint right now, but as you keep walking up this hill, It gets louder and louder, and you notice it's a little bit off the path, but there's a path to the right, so you decide to follow this path to the right, following the sound of water, and you notice your arms swaying with you as you're walking.

Curiosity is in your mind and heart. Wondering what's above, what's ahead, what will you find on this path? And as it gets louder and louder, the soothing sounds of a waterfall come into your attention. And then as you turn a path and go left, you notice a waterfall above. The most beautiful waterfall you've seen.

Thundering down with the water as it comes down from the waterfall onto the rocks below. Feeling the soothing energy of the waterfall. Feeling the mist on your face. Feeling the coolness of the water. This is a place that you want to be. And as you look where the water goes, gently coming down the mountain, You feel this overall sense of calm, grounded energy, noticing your feet on the ground on the earth, absorbing earth's energy, feeling rooted, feeling right here, right now.

You take a breath in, breathing in. And then breathing out, noticing how it feels to be right here, right now, giving yourself this gift. And as you watch the water flowing along from the waterfall, noticing how the water comes across rocks. It looks better bigger than it, yet it finds a way around. It doesn't find the obstacles, it looks for ways around.

And you realize, this is something that you can learn from. How can you find your way around the obstacles? Do you may need to make a different path? What could that look like for you? And you take a seat just absorbing all of it. All around you, noticing the sense in the air. And if a thought comes up, imagine it written on the leaf from one of the trees above, you see it, the leaf floating down to the water, going down the mountain and letting it go, releasing goodbye.

And then come back to your anchor. Maybe that's your breath, breath awareness, noticing in your belly, the rise and fall. Or maybe noticing your shoulders, or something in your external environment. A beautiful picture, a crystal, coming back to the anchor. And as you sit here absorbing the scene, you feel like you've released so much just being here in this presence of nature.

And as you notice another thought arising, You do the same thing. Imagine that thought, written on one of those leaves above, floating on down into the stream, letting go. And you watch it delicately landing in the water, floating down the mountain, until you can't see it anymore. You realize how much of life is letting go.

Releasing. Come back to your anchor for a moment. Just noticing. Noticing how that settles in your system. The process of letting go. Is there something that you need to let go of? That you've been holding on to? What would help you to let that go? And reflect on that. Taking a breath in, breathing in, and exhale, breathing out.

And you stand up and take another look around the space at this beautiful waterfall, feeling the mist once again, feeling the sun on your skin, feeling the wind through your hair. And you remember this place and know that you can always come back to here when you need that mindful break, when you need it.

You need to give yourself that moment of rest, of self compassion and presence, when you need to let go of something. So you turn around and come down the path, walking back, a little slower, absorbing all of that positive energy. Feeling different somehow. Feeling more here. You're not used to this feeling, but you're really loving it.

Feeling that smile upon your face. Embracing the present moment. And you walk down the path until you find yourself back in the room you're in and checking yourself, noticing how your body's feeling, noticing your breath, maybe giving your fingers a little bit of movement as you come back to the room.

Checking in with your anchor, and when you're ready, blinking your eyes open, just take a look around your room, welcoming yourself back, bringing that sense of calm and peace with you. How does that feel? Take this moment for you and know that you can always come back to this meditation to give yourself that space and to give yourself the gift of the present moment.

I hope that was helpful for you. That wraps up another episode. Thanks for being here and part of this community. And just know your support helps grow this community of therapists blending yoga and therapy. Are you wanting to feel more confident in bringing yoga into your therapy room? Building confidence and competence and integrating yoga into therapy sessions is something I've created for you.

This can help guide you to best practices and feel empowered as you bring together yoga and therapy. This free guide is packed with tools to help you stay ethical, feel more confident, and fully present with your clients. Take the first step towards transforming your therapy practice by signing up.

You'll also get access to more tips and insights delivered straight to your inbox to support your journey. Don't wait start integrating yoga into therapy with confidence today. Go to hcpodcast. org build confidence that's hcpodcast. org forward slash build confidence And once again, this is Chris McDonald sending each one of you much light and love.

Till next time, take care. Thanks for listening to today's episode. The information in this podcast is for general informational and educational purposes only. It is given with the understanding that neither the host, the publisher, or the guests are giving legal, medical, psychological, or any other kind of professional advice.

We are not responsible for any losses, damages, or liabilities that may arise from the use of this podcast. Yoga is not recommended for everyone. Everyone and is not safe under certain medical conditions. Always check with your doctor to see if it's safe for you. If you need a professional, please find the right one for you.

The yoga and the Therapy room podcast is proudly part of the Site Craft network.