Using RAIN for Difficult Emotions and Thoughts

RAIN stands for Recognize

You can use it with any experience, make it a stand-alone meditation practice, and return to it with ease in daily life.

It is especially helpful with difficult emotions and thoughts.

Sit comfortably and begin bringing your awareness to your present-time experience.

Give yourself a minute or two after closing the eyes to notice what you hear, what you feel in the body, and what is occurring in the mind.

Bringing up a difficult experience or emotion, start with recognition.

Recognize the thoughts coming up, the sensations in the body, and the critical inner voice you often hear.

Spend a few minutes just acknowledging the presence of the difficulty, tuning in to the different ways it manifests in your experience.

Move to the next phase: allowance or acceptance.

With unpleasant emotions, the habit of the mind is to try to get rid of these experiences.

Instead, allow it to be present in you.

You may try offering this simple phrase of equanimity and acceptance:

“Right now, it’s like this.”

Continue to work with acceptance for five minutes, bringing the mind back when it starts pushing the difficulty away.

Now begin investigating more deeply.

You recognized what you were feeling in the first step of RAIN.

In investigation, allow curiosity to take over.

Ask yourself where you feel vulnerable, how this emotion serves you, and if you believe you can be free from this pain.

For the final five minutes, turn toward nourishing yourself with self-compassion.

This whole exercise has been a practice of self-compassion, as you are tending to the pain with awareness rather than denying it.

However, make a dedicated effort to offer a few phrases of compassion and open the heart.