An Anti-Anxiety Gratitude Practice
Anti-Anxiety Gratitude Practice. Gratitude negates anxiety by opening our awareness to everything that’s going well in the present moment. To counter anxiety with gratitude, try the following mindfulness exercise:
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Meditation
Find a comfortable position in which you can be still and quiet in your body
Close your eyes, or keep them open and softening your focus
Breathe slowly and patiently in and out through your nose
Intentionally place your attention on your breath
Take three deep cycles of breath
And let yourself be fully present with each one
Stay with breath as it moves in and out through the nose
Or feel the sensation of breath is it moves the body
Or notice how the body is breathing itself
Three full in breaths, and three full out breaths
(pause for 3 breaths)
And now as you notice your breath,
As you look upon your breath with wonder and awe
Notice also a warm sensation of gratitude arising in your heart
Continue to watch the breath
As you let this warmth or this light of gratitude
Grow and expand
(pause for 2 breaths)
And as this gratitude grows,
Feel it embracing or enveloping the heart itself
And intentionally draw awareness to your heart and your heartbeat
Feel or hear your heartbeat
Or just visualize, imagine, trust that it’s there
And look upon the heart with the same sense of wonder and awe
With which you recognize the breath
(pause 2 breaths)
Recognize how special and precious your heartbeat is
Now feel the warm sensation of gratitude within your heart
Grow and expand throughout your whole body
Let this light of gratitude fill your whole torso, your legs and arms, your head
As you look upon the entire body with wonder and awe
Grateful for breath
Grateful for the heartbeat
And grateful for this wonderful, functioning, protective, and useful shell
Through which you can experience all the joy, beauty and amazement in this world
(pause 2 breaths)
Feel now your entire body, filled with warmth and light
Full of gratitude and thankfulness
Appreciative of all the small joys, and perhaps the big ones as well
Rest for as long as you’d like to
In awe of this one precious moment
And all the gifts you’ve been given
Let yourself feel full and complete
Full of gratitude
Full of awe
There’s nothing else you need right now
Except to remain open, and aware
end
