Oversharing - Calm TF Down Guided Meditation: Politics

Episode Date: November 6, 2024

In the wake of this week's news, we're sharing one of last month's guided meditations from the subscription feed. With this meditation, Jordana and Dr. Naomi are here to help you mitigate the stress that politics and elections can trigger, and breathe into the feeling of love and care for the world around you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello and welcome back to calm the fuck down. I'm Jordana Abraham. And I'm Dr. Naomi Bernstein. And today's meditation is about something that used to be pretty taboo. Now it's everywhere. You'll see it on social media. You can't really avoid it. The election is in, I think, like five weeks or something like that. Crazy. And it is a tense time to be an American. Totally. And I think it's really, really. hard to keep consuming all the media and getting your mind going and churning and then feeling like, okay, and now I want to turn it off like I'm done. But it's almost like there's still all this imagery and, you know, dialogue and your mind around it. So it is really hard to get in there and care and think about all these things and then step back.

when you feel like it's getting to be too much or it's affecting your ability to stay present in your regular life. Right. Because it can be totally all consuming and I think it's pretty easy, especially now with social media, just to be kind of down a rabbit hole and just unable to live the rest of your life because you're so consumed with like all the different things going on. And the stakes feel so intense and heavy and everything feels very dire. And I think it's, can be very overwhelming and I'm I'm kind of excited that the election is going to be so soon because I'm hoping that once it's over everyone can like take a deep breath. Yeah totally. I probably won't happen. Yes. Maybe. I might get a little bit less intense because it won't it's like the whole

thing we talk about. There's something I can do about it right now. So it feels like I need to do everything that I can do. And then after it's over, it's kind of like, all right, that's it. Not, you know, not saying you can't do anything, but like at least that piece that you feel like is still up for grabs. It depends on the reaction. Yeah. Sometimes people don't accept the results. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Totally. Very true. But yeah, I think a lot of this activates that fight or flight mode. It really gets your body activated because it feels like your safety is threatened and the safety of other people that you care about is threatened. And so it really activates that part, that primal part of you that feels like I can't just sit

with this. Like, I need to do something about this. So hopefully this meditation will help you kind of have a new perspective on that activation that you have in your body and how to, you know, I think the intention for this meditation is to come into your heart space and see the beauty behind the care and kind of preventing it from turning into something that feels more hateful or angry and just sitting in a place where this is just like coming from my love, my heart, my care, my wanting to protect, you know, the people and things that I care about.

So should we get into it? Let's do it. All right. Okay. So let's start by settling into your seat wherever you are and finding an alert and intentional posture. So sitting up nice and tall and on your in breath, breathing in and embodying a nice tall, straight posture, and then breathing out and just relaxing down the shoulders and face on the out breath. So breathing in, sitting up tall, breathing out and relaxing down the muscles in the

face, dropping the shoulders. You're here because you're feeling overwhelmed at the state of politics. The feeling that you're having right now is your body trying to inform you that there's something bigger and deeper being triggered inside of you. This something is coming from a place of heart and love. Coming back to your breath here, breathing in, sitting up tall, breathing out and relaxing down your face and shoulders. In the next few moments,

we will explore and allow this feeling to rise to the surface and will greet ourselves with compassion and gratitude. moving into our hearts and away from anger. Breathing in, sitting up tall, breathing out, relaxing down. Scanning the body now, paying special attention to the midline of your body. Your face, throat, your chest, heart, and belly.

And as you scan through your body with your mind, noticing any sensations of fullness, tightness, or even subtle movement, this is the emotional energy being activated inside your body. Take a moment to watch this now. Allow it to rise up to your body. consciousness. This feeling that's there every time you consume media, every time you think about how it's all going to turn out, what it all means, this feeling is there. We're going to pay attention to it and allow it to exist right now. This feeling is your body's sense of connectedness and care for the world. Overwhelming sometimes, but it belongs. Allow it. Staying here now,

trying not to push it away, trying not to let your mind turn it to anger and blame and hate. Be aware of your mind's urge to turn your love and care. into divisiveness. Stay here now. In the place of love and care. Breathing in, sitting up tall, breathing out, relaxing down, becoming conscious as you move through your day,

when your thoughts take over and pull you away from this heart space, return here. You'll embody the change you want to see in the world. When you're ready, open your eyes and come back to our space. We should play this before the debates. That would be great. Right.

I wonder if it would change the way people spoke to each other. They should just make it a requirement. Like even if someone just listens to it and like rolls their eyes, like you just have to listen to something that connects you to your deeper reason. You'd like to believe people go into politics or, you know, because they care and they feel passionate. And I think they do. It just gets twisted and turned and divisive.

So I think that would be amazing if you just, they had, everyone had to put their headphones on for four minutes before the debate. And I'd love to see it filmed. Yeah. And just listen to this. It would just be a good social experiment. I think it would do wonders. Yeah.

If only. If only. One day maybe. Yeah. We'll get there. I think we will. All right. That's our time.

Great work today. Betches.