Welcome to everyone. We're not going to start for a few minutes. We'll start bang on time as always, but Just to let you know that they're really looking forward to tonight's.
Work, it's as it says, and now is the time for being mindful. And so I'll come back, dead on and we'll, we'll start at, at 7 o'clock. That's great, thanks, Mike.
And just for you to, to all know, and I think, Dawn has put it into the chat box. We're obviously trying to support the profession as much as we can at this difficult time with also the help of the Royal College. So we've got our health and wellbeing content is all gonna be free for the month of April.
So, Mike's course, which he did as part of the Mind Matters initiative with, you know, obviously the help of the Royal College will be on there. Mike also did a sleep course. I know some people are struggling with sleep because of anxiety, in a way of, helping them with that.
And, you know, I, I've been looking at this over the last, A few weeks. I'm basically looking at it really from as, as much of a positive mindset as I can, you know, a lot of people worry these times and actually we worry about catching the virus and we worry about getting really ill with the virus, whereas actually, The likelihood is that you know, if we do get the virus, the likelihood is it and so sometimes we worry about things before things happen. Like I don't know if you agree or disagree just as we're about to start, but having that positive mindset of, of not really kind of getting too drawn into, you know, this until it, it happens to you, I think is, yeah, that's, that's the whole mindful stance, isn't it?
Yeah, that's the whole mindful stance, you know, being in this present moment and catching ourselves when we start worrying about what might happen, you know, it's good to plan, which is very different because it's written on purpose, but it's, it's unhelpful if we find our mind being taken to places we don't necessarily want it to stay without us having any executive control over that, really. Yeah. So obviously, what I would suggest that people do as we approach 7 o'clock and we will start, because I think we're more or less on time, is, you know, click on that link that Dawn has put in, but obviously, you know, when the webinar is finished, you can then make sure that you've joined up as, as, you need to.
But obviously, once we start, you know, and it's. Mike and I obviously giving the meditation. So Mike, I think we are virtually on 7 o'clock now, so.
I will mute myself and, and pass over to you. So thank you so much for. I think I all out.
I, yeah, I've got a couple of minutes left. Oh, have we? I'm, I'm just struggling because I've not, I've got it on the full screen, so I can't see the time.
So yeah, we've just got a couple of minutes. So I usually wait till dead on because some people sort of, the regulars zip in dead on time. Brilliant.
OK, well, let, let's not, let's not, upset the regulars, so we'll, we'll get on just on time then that's fine. Yeah, great, thanks, Anthony. Yeah, I see that now.
So I've gone into a small screen. Just while we are waiting, you know, how have you found the time, Mike? I mean, obviously you are in the NHS working.
Yeah, well, I've gone, I've been pulled back into the NHS now, because of this thing, so, . Yeah, I mean, I've designed tonight's webinar around what I'm seeing with the people that I'm working with, and I've got, I think 9 GPs I'm seeing for therapy at the moment. So lots of anxious, yeah, and, you know, people on the, and a lot of and a lot of health professionals coming through looking for extra support, and you're right, you know, one of the, the, the, the, the, the first meditation and the second meditation.
I sort of designed around tonight. And the first ones are sort of Mike Scanlon Spesh. So it's something I sort of devised to fit what's happening at the moment.
Because, you know, it is unprecedented times and our minds, if we're not careful, you know, our minds do start to wear out of control a little bit, and some of our behaviours become a little bit unhelpful, you know, and so we're just hoping that what we're doing here tonight will just be helpful to everybody, really. I'm gonna record it live, so it might not be the, that, that first one is we haven't got a, a sort of professional recording of it, but I'm gonna record it, as we do it, and then, email that over. So if people find this one useful, and I hope they will, then we'll have that as well.
Yeah, and this is obviously on, on the site as well. So if, if you found this useful, Mike and I were just talking, we'll probably make this a weekly thing at the moment. It's usually monthly, but we will make it weekly, and obviously, if you find it useful, please do pass it on to, you know, to, to, colleagues and friends, .
Well hopefully it will bring some comfort to people in, in these, you know, we won't just be doing meditating on those sessions. We'll be looking at a whole range of skills and things that we can share with you that might help us get through this period a bit scathed as well, yeah. OK, that's, 7 o'clock.
Great. Well, I will mute myself. Mike.
I really appreciate, you know, you've been a great supporter of the veterinary profession, yeah, I love all this work, so it's, it's thank you for everything you do. Oh, thank you very much, Anthony. So welcome everybody to the Sunday Meditations.
My name's Dr. Mike Scanlon. I've been working with vets now for about 3 or 4 years actually, and it's been a really interesting part of my career, and I've Learned loads from you guys and, it's been just great having this relationship with the veterinary community.
And so, as the slide says here, really big welcome to everybody that's, that's coming in tonight, and it's lovely to have so many of you. But now really is the time for, for being mindful and just to remind you all of a couple of definitions of mindfulness. So, One of the ones I really like is that sense that we have a choice whether our mind is full or whether our mindful.
And I think at the moment we are in danger of having very cluttered minds because there's such an overwhelming overload of information that's coming to us, some of it unhelpful, some of it untrue, some of its spurious. Most of it quite scary, I think at the moment, and the brain is like a sponge, isn't it? You know, it only has the capacity to take so much in before it starts to struggle and before we start to feel that sense of being overwhelmed by all of this stuff.
So the first definition, I think, is, John Cabot Zinn talks about mindfulness being about being in this present moment, paying attention deliberately and on purpose and Without judgement. And if we can find That time to just sit. And declutter our minds and to Anchor our attention to the breath.
Just a couple of times a day maybe, then it is going to be very, very useful, but within the whole gamut of the mindfulness based stress reduction programme, there is some real wonderful living skills that could have been designed actually to help us through this really difficult period. So I guess Today's, meditations or the first meditation tonight is, as I was saying to Anthony just then, is a meditation where we I'm sort of designed this really, to meet what seems to be happening to so many of the people that come to see me for therapy and so many of the people that come to the clinics in, I, I, I left the NHS for about 3 or 4 years, but, this month I've gone back in. Running clinics again and All sorts of different works.
So it's, it's, and that's been a real, you know, the NHS has changed since, since I left, you know, more corporate than ever and more form filling than you could ever believe, but, you know, we're there. And so I'm going through a period of flux at the moment, and I've really had to use my meditation skills, and it's this sense here today of, and I like this. I really thought when I saw this, I thought this really fitted where we are because it talks about our psychological immune system so that you're less vulnerable to mental imbalances of all time, and integrated meditation practise.
As it says here, it's like a, a healthy diet. We talk about our, you know, our 5 fruit and veg, and I think something equally important is about making sure we have at least 5 really positive experiences every day. And our 5 a day can be made up of a couple of meditations and some intention setting perhaps ensuring that we have a really good belly laugh at least once a day and perhaps stopping and just And focusing on what we are blessed with rather than finding our focus only taken to that which is sort of dragging us down or is difficult.
So this integrated meditation, we can look at it two ways. One is that we need to be integrating meditation into our everyday lives. So the first one I'm going to do tonight is a combination of a process called and.
Which I'll take you through in a moment, which is something you can do in about a minute and a half, in between, consultations, in between, difficult moments, in between watching one news and before we go to another. So we're going to look at and, and then I'm going to, shift and integrate another meditation into this. Process.
And this is one called structured worry time. And I've turned the structured worry time into a meditative process. And the idea of structured worry time at a time like this is that the one thing that is guaranteed to cause us Real mental imbalance is if our worry habit gets out of, out of hand because worrying can become very, very habitual.
And after a while, our brain sort of recognises that when we worry very momentarily we feel better. And if we connect to that feeling better, the brain loves that, so it just sends us another worry. The problem being is that we lose all sense of executive control, and during a time like this we can find ourselves worrying for the whole day, but worrying in a very ineffectual, unplanned way.
And what we're going to do tonight is the first meditation is a meditation where we worry wisely. And the second meditation we're going to do tonight is the sleep, my go to sleep meditation, the leaves on the stream, for which I've included the URL so that people can start using that and share it with your friends and family as well. So Let me just talk you through the and process before we actually do that meditation.
So the idea of the and process is if we find ourselves. Experiencing physical sensations of sadness, that's a sort of heavy feeling, isn't it? If we find ourselves feeling ill at ease and not quite knowing why, and my clients at the moment tell me that this is so prevalent, or if we find ourselves really struggling with the physicality of anxiety, you know, the tight chest which makes us cough, which frightens the life out of us.
You know, the headache, the clenched jaw, the, biting of the fingernails, the GI disturbance that we get when we're anxious, and the and process is about making sense of that and leaning into it rather than trying not to have it. And the moment we lean into physical sensation, what we're almost saying to the brain is, look, I'm in charge, you know, and I'm going to deal with this and explore this mindfully, calmly and with compassion for self. So the and process, the way, the way we use it is, let me use a real example.
So last week I was in my clinic and 2 or 3 people had come and I could hear them coughing outside my clinic door and I really experienced for the first time in many years actually, a real tightening of the chest and a real sort of fear sensation. And so I used the and process. So the A is, I acknowledged what's going on, what's the physical sensation.
So it's the moment I acknowledge that, right, there's tightness in the chest. Yeah, there's there's that uncomfortableness in the tummy, OK. Yeah, so I acknowledge it and then I name it.
So this is, this is butterflies in the stomach and a tight chest. So I've acknowledged it, I've named it, and then I describe how it's actually making me feel. And this physical sensation is making me feel a real sense of trepidation and worry.
And then I sit and I give myself two choices. And the first choice I look at is I can sit here and become panicked about it, or the second choice I have is to very gently just open the door and speak to the people outside and Just quietly say, you know, if that cough, has been there for, for a couple of days or any of those symptoms, we, we can do this next session over the telephone, which is what I did. In fact, we used, video, a video call, which worked really, really well.
But it was the and that gave me the opportunity. So it's a, acknowledge, N is name, what shows up, what emotion shows up. And then D is describe how this is making me feel and then notice that I always have at least 2 choices, but we just want to.
One will be a panicky choice, but the other one will be something that takes me towards the person I want to be. So our meditation today includes the and process. So with no more ado, let's get into our first meditation.
So when we're meditating, those of you who have meditated with me for a couple of years now know that I'm not one of these people that insists that we all get into the lotus position or lie down. We can, we can meditate just sitting comfortably. But the rule really is, is just be sure that you're looking dignified.
So if you were looking in a mirror, would your, would your stance, would your posture, would your face, would your smile be that of a dignified human being? So let's just find that sense of dignity. And when we're ready.
We'll start. So this first meditation is a meditation of worrying well. With wisdom.
So we begin this meditation. By just taking our attention outside of the room that we're in. And Just getting a sense of the sound.
And the temperature Outside Any sounds that we might hear. And then bringing our attention in and What are the sounds that we can connect with in this room? And then centering our attention right in.
And perhaps placing a hand. Just gently on your tummy. And just connecting with the breath.
Just noticing that with each breath. We start a brand new moment. And this is our way of being mindfully in each new moment by just anchoring our attention to the breath.
And what I'm going to ask you to do now. Is to just think about A situation It's been difficult for you. In the past couple of days.
And just gently Allow your mind to find a situation that's caused you struggle. And Bringing awareness to whatever comes up physically. Then acknowledge it.
So we acknowledge our. There's tightness in the chest. There's discomfort of some sort.
And we lean in And we accept that that is there without trying to get rid of it. Just allowing And then we name The emotion that accompanies that. Physical feeling.
That's a sort of fear. That's a sadness, whatever the emotion that shows up. Just name it.
And as soon as we name something, We make sense of it and we take some of the fear. Out of it. Then we describe How this makes us feel.
Yeah, it makes me feel uncomfortable, makes me feel worried. And then we noticed that There's always choices. And one choice is to make whatever shows up go away quickly.
And that will work in the short term. But there's another choice, and that's to lean into whatever shows up in life. With this mindful curiosity.
And perhaps even a half mindful smile. As we say, so what's going on? Why is this making me feel like this?
So we can use that and process. At any time of the day. And we just bring our attention back.
And we breathe once more. Following the in breath in. Noticing our chest and our tummy rise.
And as we breathe out, noticing that everything softens. And relaxes. In place.
Just breathing. Not changing our breath in any way. Just being with the breath.
Now as we Anchor our attention to this present moment. Just like you to just roll your shoulders back a bit and Smile and just allow in. The worries.
That are out there in your world at the moment. And it's like a guest house. We opened the door.
And we accept that what comes in is like a guest. And we welcome them all in. Allowing them to come in.
And then we notice. And we deliberately and on purpose. Just allow these worries in.
And we start to look at them. Leaning into them. And as we name our worries, we acknowledge them are.
I know you. And then we name it. That's, that's my mom worry.
That's my worry about my mom. Yeah. And we describe that worry, yeah, that's a difficult one.
Yeah that makes me sad. And then we wait and we. Go find another of our worries, and we acknowledge it.
No, hello. Yeah, I know you. And you're one of my, you're my daughter, Warri.
You're my work. Your mind. What if, why?
Yeah, and we name. Name not worry. The emotion that shows up.
Yeah, that's an uncomfortable emotion. That's a sort of Sort of out of control feeling. Let me describe how it makes me feel.
Yeah, that makes me feel kind of a bit useless, that one. And we just start Acknowledging Feeling, naming the emotion. And describing how these worries make us feel.
Just for the next minute or so, I'm just gonna ask you to continue. Just sifting through your worries. Relaxedly with a smile.
Just going into them, leaning into them. Acknowledging him. Naming the emotion that accompanies them.
And describing how they make you feel. Noticing that they are just worries. And these worries are made of words and pictures.
Male. Cultivated Procured and sent. By that part of our brain that wants us vigilant.
And the During this time of difficulty. We thank our brain. Thank you, Brian.
We're sending this stuff because our brain is trying to keep us safe. We thank the brain for that. Let me take a gentle breath in.
And we let go. And we move into choice. We find the psychological flexibility to choose just one.
Of those worries. One of those worries that we named. And we take that worry.
And we hold it. And they hold it lightly the way one holds a hedgehog. Holding it lightly because if we tense and tighten.
It's uncomfortable for everybody. You hold that worry. And we choose.
To do one thing about that worry. Today. Just one thing.
Not to solve it. Just the impact on it. Let me sit with that.
And then we Just visualise. What action is it that I'm going to take? Is it simply a phone call?
Offering reassurance. Is it A troll through an email. Is it to sit down with someone and talk to them?
Is it to go for a run? And we find What it is that we are choosing to do. We make a commitment, yeah.
I'm going to do that. We choose a time to do it. And as we do, We moved to the end of this process.
We let go of the wars. And we bring our attention back. And we find our.
Breath again. As we breathe, we scan. Our bodies to see whether That worry process has led to a tightening.
Or a discomfort anywhere in our bodies. We sit with that, and we allow it. And we breathe into wherever that discomfort is, taking our in breath into that area.
And as we breathe out, just letting go of any of the discomfort. For the last Minute of this meditation. Just to ask you to sit.
And breathe And smile. I find a sense of being. Pleased with yourself that you've leant in to your fears and worries.
And you've chosen to do one thing. Every day just to impact. Just to make a dent.
Notice the That makes us. The executive controller. All right, right.
How does that feel? Well done. And That meditation that I sort of devised over the last couple of weeks there is the one that I've been using a lot during this difficult time because it combines the and process which is Something that we can do very, very quickly at any time during the day.
And the and process is the absolute, best way I find to just lean into difficulties. And you know that thing that once we name something and once we make sense of it, it stops feeling nearly so insurmountable. And then to really start to use that, structured.
Worry time, meditation. To very gently. Sit with our worries, make a choice, and impact.
And I'm hoping people found that, useful and always, yeah. Oh, that's lovely. So yeah, that's really nice.
Thank you, Kat has just come back and to share that, . Just jumped out of. The main thing there.
So thank you very much for that. Just feeling warm. Yeah, and just meditating can make such a difference, can't it, to, to our brains almost, yeah.
So I'm just gonna get this one back onto slideshow, there we are. And so, The obvious way. Move on from that meditation is then once, if we're going to use that meditation perhaps once or twice in the day or the and process, maybe 15 times in the day, it doesn't matter how many days it takes a minute.
And what that's going to do is it's going to make a difference to our sleep because we usually find that during times of difficulty we don't sleep because we haven't processed any of the stuff of the day and we try to go to sleep, but the moment we lay our ourselves down and try to relax, it comes in. So we are going to go slightly over the 30 minutes tonight and I'm going to slide into our next meditation. And this is our sleep meditation.
It's entitled Leaves on a stream, and that's the URL there. I'll send the meditation we've just done to Dawn at the webinar there the wonderful Dawn and Anthony, and perhaps they can send that out. So our second meditation of the evening is our one to help you guys sleep during these difficult times.
So we just close our eyes. And We very gently. Just imagine in our mind's eye.
That string. And it's a gurgling, beautiful stream, and it runs from the top right-hand corner of our consciousness. Down across, and disappears off towards the left.
And if we look at our stream. It just runs, it runs and yeah, and it'll run for years and years. And we just look at that stream and we notice at the top of the stream there's a great oak.
And every now and then, The oak sheds a leaf and the leaf falls. In a see-saw pattern down. And we watch that leaf fall, and it lands on the stream.
And a stream just carries it. And it disappears. And with each leaf that falls, we follow that leaf.
As the stream carries it away. So we lie here. And we smile, and we stop trying to get to sleep.
We just choose to watch Leeds for a while. And watched thoughts for a while. So we sit back on the lush green bank.
In a beautiful sunny day. And another leaf falls. It too lands on the stream.
And we watch it And the leaf is carried away. And disappears. And we smile, it's nice, it's good.
And we wait. We just watch leaves, another one falls. Man's on the string.
And we sit back on our lush green bank. And we watched as the stream. Carries the leaf Until it disappears.
One more. Yep, there it comes, leaf falls, seesaws down. Wow.
We sit back, and we watch. As a gurgling stream. Carries on And it disappears again.
Then we stop and we just quietly say to our brain. OK, Brian, what worries, what thoughts are bubbling around in there? Send me one of the thoughts that has got a bit.
That's sitting in there. And your brain will send you a thought, and that thought might be, I can't find a thought. Which is a thought.
And we take that thought. And we noticed that it's made of Letters Of the alphabet that joined together to make words and the words joined to make a sentence, which is our thought. And we jumble the letters up.
And we wait. As the leaf falls from the tree. And lands on the stream.
We popped that jumble of letters in an envelope. And we reach forward and we just toss the envelope, it lands on the link. And our thought is carried.
And we watch it. And it goes. And it disappears.
Just a thought. A thought we don't need now, because it's time to sleep. We can have it back tomorrow if we need it.
And we looked to our mind and asked for another thought, please. And it sends another thought. Whether it's a worry or an innocuous bumble of words, we smile, we accept it.
Another leaf Trolls from that tree. Lands on the string. And we take our thoughts.
And we pop our thoughts on the leaf. We sit back again. And before we know it, we're into a routine of watching.
As our thoughts come. And they go. And we get good at thought watching.
And we're letting go of things. As we let go, our brain realises that it's safe. And that we don't need to process this stuff now.
And after a while, Another thought comes. You pop it on the leave. And before it even disappeared.
Very often. Where? And when you're ready, once again, very gently.
Just come back to the room. And That's my absolute favourite sleep meditation that I sometimes do a whole sleep course and at the end of it, someone says, oh, the best part about the whole course, Mike was the leaves on a stream. You sort of find yourself wondering what was the point and all the rest of it, but it seems to help an awful lot of people.
And that brings us slightly late, and I'm usually dead on, but I'm just, it was really important tonight to share that first meditation with you and the and process, because I think we need strategies now during this difficult, difficult time. So at this point, normally on a Sunday, we just see if anyone's got any questions, any, any concerns, and we open up just for a few moments so we've got those to answer. And I hope people enjoyed that.
That's great, Mike. Thank you so much for that. Obviously, just again to reiterate, because I know if you came in late, we are making all of the, Mind Matters initiative stuff free to access the, the Mind Matters course, the sleep course.
So you will find The the leaves on the stream and the sleep course plus also the positive mindset stuff, as well we did that we did that work we did that one didn't we? We did and you know, so there's some really amazing stuff on the site, some amazing material, and you know, Mike. It is a difficult time, but I think if we can turn it around and, you know, I was walking at the beach just before this webinar.
I saw Anglesey for the first time from my house, and I think that's probably something to do with the amount of atmospheric pollution that's dropped away because of course we're not driving and we're not rushing around. And maybe this can be a time and I saw a little reflection from a Chinese person who's obviously come out the other side. This may be 2 or 3 months where we can really reflect on lives where we, the life, you know, speed slows down, we've got the ability maybe to pick up a skill like meditation or playing the guitar or learning Spanish.
I think if we can look at it in a positive way like that, it probably will help us mentally as well, won't it? Yeah, I think so, yeah. Yeah, I think, I think, I think that that's very much that sense of that, you know, bringing mindfulness to that which is difficult, but also bringing mindfulness to the stuff that brings us joy and pleasure and, and, and, and there's going to be both, you know, that won't go away and, and I think it's mindfulness is just such a great tool to allow us to do that.
So you know, if you, if you can access the recording of the mindfulness course, it's gonna be, it's gonna be, really useful for lots of people, I think. And Jessica's just come back to say she really needed a sleep meditation last week. Well, you've got it this week, and it's a beauty.
Hopefully you can sleep more soundly tonight, Jessica. Yeah, lots of people saying thank you to you as well, Antony, for opening this stuff up. Yeah, well, you know, I think it's so, it is so important, you know, the webinar that we're all about love and serve, and we're here and I know Royal College obviously have helped with all of this.
So one, all of that material's free for the whole month of April, so do make use of it. But Mike and I also chatted before the webinar and, and we've said that is this a good time for you to do it each week at at sort of 7 o'clock, Mike? Yeah, yeah, it works well for me.
So Mike, you know, Mike, don't want to blow your trumpet too much because I got a big head, but, you know, those of you who maybe aren't as familiar, that the courses that we've done on mindfulness with Mike and with Mind Matters initiative have been the best things that we've done in the 10 years we've been doing we in our best because You know, we try to do really good clinical CPD, but actually, and people will thank us for that. But actually with Mike's stuff, and obviously it's not for everyone, not everybody, you know, falls in love with Mike, in the way that, you know, people like myself have done, but. I think when, when we get the, the testimonials back about Mike, they are things like.
I went on holiday. I was able to relax for the first time in years. I'm not shouting at my nurses, you know, I'm just more, they've been life changing things that have happened, so do make use of them.
Obviously they're not for everybody, but. You know, Mike, you've done so much good for the profession, and I want to thank you for that you're doing, because, you know, if we save one person from going through stress, obviously this isn't for, if somebody's got a clinical problem, you need to, to seek help, but I think all of this is. Is preventive, isn't it?
It, you know, in these difficult times, just having, you know, that soothing voice, giving some good advice, mentoring us and how we'll cope with this, I think is really important. So. So we're gonna do another one next week, aren't we?
We'll do another one this time next week. Please do keep the time this time. Yeah, tell your friends about it, share the link.
You know, we want this to be a blessing for as many people as possible. And good luck to, Laura who's just come in from Milan. Well, yeah, you know, really thinking of you there as well.
Fabulous that you can get into this, Laura, and please do offer our, you know, thoughts and, and prayers to all those people in, in Milan, where I know you're in a, a really tricky situation at the moment. So, please do feel free to pass this to other colleagues if you think it will be a help. And, and thank you to, to, to Dawn, because I know she's very dedicated to this and, and thinks you're amazing, Mike.
Oh, thank you. And we think you're amazing too, Dawn. Yes, Dawn's happy.
She's been an amazing member of my team and I'm so grateful, that, you know, that she works with us. So listen everyone, take care, look after yourselves, don't work too hard and do give yourself time to. To smile and have fun because it, it, it, it's really important.
And I, I have emailed over already the, the first meditation we did tonight with the, the and and the and the worry, the worrying wisely. It's not of the quality of the other ones that are, are, are on my YouTube site, but I, it'll be pretty good because, you know, it'll be fine. So and the YouTube site.
You can have it. I clicked on, the YouTube site, obviously it's another resource of mics as well as all the stuff that we're giving, all done, you know, free of charge. So do make use of all of that.
Listen, we'll let you all get back to your loved ones and, or if you're on your own, hopefully this has been a help and, you know, keep in touch. Thanks everyone. Good night.
Thanks everyone. Yeah, good night. Bye bye.