Aware Skills
We can all do some things without really being aware of what we are doing. Quite often things like nail biting, driving a car, scrolling through our phone can be done as if we are on ‘autopilot’. When we act on autopilot, there is a good chance that we won’t really notice the consequences of what we are doing, and we will be quite influenced by short term benefit compared to longer term outcomes. For example, sometimes people try not to think about their feelings of grief by getting busy with work or other tasks. In the short term this can feel successful because the person has a sense of getting on with things and their feelings are kind of held at bay. However, in the longer term these feelings are not resolved, and they can lead to underlying stress. If we learn how to increase our awareness, we then notice what is influencing us, and we can make more effective choices about how we want to handle things. Increasing our awareness skills can also help us to ride through really intense emotional waves.
One thing to particularly become aware of is how we are talking to ourselves in our own mind. Are we being friendly and supportive to ourselves, or are we being hard on ourselves.
Each of the audio exercises below is a short type of meditation (up to about 10 minutes) that helps you to learn how to be more present and aware of what is happening and how you are dealing with grief. Give yourself time and space to have a listen and time after to think about any lessons learned. Some of these are soothing and calming, and others invite you to be more in touch with how you have been feeling, and so you might find these emotional.
Audio Exercises
Developing Awareness
Helping you to learn how to be more present and aware of what is happening and how you are dealing with grief
Self-soothing
Helping you to learn how to be more present and aware of what is happening and how you are dealing with grief
Dropping Anchor
Helping you to learn how to be more present and aware of what is happening and how you are dealing with grief
Formal and informal awareness
If you have been practicing some of the audio exercises you’ve probably noticed that they help you get into a state of mind that is more present, more in the here and now, a bit more peaceful and stable or grounded. In addition to doing these kinds of formal practices, you can bring the same kind of awareness to every day activities. Here is an exercise to try:
Pick Three Things...
Pick three activities that you do regularly, perhaps even without thinking too much about them. For example, brushing your teeth, making a cuppa, and putting away the groceries. Instead of rushing through the activity without paying attention, try to bring the same quality of being present to the activity. Your mind will wander, you’ll likely get distracted, and each time that you do, bring yourself back to the activity. By practicing at being present in this informal way, it will help you to become more aware of what is influencing you more generally, and where the choices you are making lead you. That will make it more likely that you will make wise choices around living with your grief.
The worksheets below continue developing the skill of awareness. These can either be saved on your computer and completed digitally, or printed out and completed by hand. It is a good idea to keep all the sheets in one folder so you can look back on where you have come from. If you are using a mobile phone or tablet to work through My Grief My Way, these may not look as good on your screen. If you can print them out then do that, but if not, you can just write your answers to the questions in a notebook or on a piece of paper.
Worksheets for download: