Have you ever caught yourself holding your breath during the day?
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Mindfulness Bell: This Android app is available for download on Google Play. The Mindfulness Bell. Mindful Mynah stays out of your way. On the Mac, the app lives in your menu bar. On iOS, the app can run in the background as you go about your day. Mindful Mynah comes with a selection of reminder sounds, all kinds: sharp, soft, dry, resonant. Mindful Mynah for Mac是一款音乐定时提醒工具。. Modern + Mindful. Modern + Mindful will be Calgary's first modern meditation studio. According to Vietnamese Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, the ringing of a bell every 15 minutes is an effective way to cultivate the mindfulness practice and connect back with the body. The Mindfulness Bell and Mindful Mynah applications simulate the bell on the user's personal device. Mindful Mynah有各种提示音，可以提醒你定期休息、该办事项、生活琐事等等，从此让您的生活井井有条。Macdown网站为大家提供Mindful Mynah for Mac(定时声音提醒软件) v2.0.4免激活版下载资源，绿色安全无广告，有需要的朋友请放心下载！ Mindful Mynah for Mac安装教程.
Take a moment right now, and notice your breathing, your posture, the tension in your shoulders.
What do you smell?
What is sitting in front of you?
Are there sounds in the room?
How many devices do you have sending notifications while you’re reading this post? (Yes, I saw you just sneak a peek at your phone.)
In this go-go stressed out world, we all need resources that will help us zero back in on this moment. After all, that’s all we have. A series of moments strung together to make a day, month, year, life.
In the immortal words of Ferris Bueller, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”
Here are some apps that will support your efforts to stop and look around once in a while.
5 Apps That Support Mindfulness
1. Breathe for Apple Watch
It’s not good to hold your breath, according to experts. It’s a sign of stress, and can lead to problems. If you have an Apple Watch, you now have a breathing buddy. I scoffed at this one when I first saw it, but after using it steadily for a week, I noticed a difference in my general state. Here’s a great article that goes in-depth on how Breathe works. The animated graphic, along with the haptic feedback, give you an oasis of calm whenever they appear. You can set the frequency and length as well. The beautiful simplicity of this one makes it a winner.
2. Calm
I’ll admit to being a meditation newbie, and the Calm app was a good entry point for me. It comes with some free mediation sessions, and then offers additional paid sessions. They have a beautiful desktop app in addition to the mobile and watch apps, so you can get centered no matter where you are. If you’re using an iPhone with the Apple Health app, your Calm meditation sessions will integrate and count toward your “mindful minutes” each day.
3. Mindful Mynah
It doesn’t get much simpler than the Mindful Mynah app, which plays a brief sound on a schedule you set. The idea is that hearing the sound (which you choose) will remind you to refocus on the task at hand, or get aware of your present moment. You can use it for any purpose, including remembering to take a brief break and stretch! It’s only 99 cents in the app store; there’s a desktop and a mobile app available.
4. Headspace
The Headspace app is more like a personal trainer for meditation. The application will take you through meditation sessions you choose based on your mood or lifestyle. They have a user community on the website, so you can connect with other Headspace fans and get support. There is a free 10 day trial, with paid plans thereafter, starting at $6.40 per month.
5. Buddhify
If playfulness is your thing, Buddhify will appeal to you. Its colorful wheel-style selector will help you choose the appropriate guided meditation for where you are and what you’re doing. Can’t sleep? In pain? There’s a session for you in the Buddhify app. The app provides stats and charts to track your progress, and has both guided and solo timed options, in case you want to just go it alone. It’s $4.99 in the app store (not free, but won’t break the bank either).
BONUS: I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention a member of our GeniusShared family, Bija Bennett, who has amazing wellness resources on her website, including this great video on breathing awareness.
Have you tried any of these apps yet? Did I miss any good ones you’d like to share?
I pause to breathe in the aroma of sweet citrus as I step outside for my morning walk. No sooner, a Mynah bird hops across the dew-covered lawn, with branches sticking out from her beak, before flying off to her nest.
How do the signs of spring greet you in your part of the world?
As you observe nature waking up around you, I invite you to consider if there are certain habits, practices or lifestyle choices that you want to prioritize or recommit to. For example, is it time to create a new morning routine now that the sun comes up earlier? How about recommitting to a more organized or simple way of living? Or, maybe you’d like to apply mindfulness more intentionally to a specific part of your life, such as your financial well-being or community connection and service.
For now, how about enjoying a short mindfulness practice to help you observe and connect with your environment, including any signs of spring that enter into your awareness.
A Mindfulness Practice
Step – or look – outside and connect to the environment through your senses. You might begin with your visual sense, noticing 2-3 things you see. If it’s helpful, name them. For instance, I see a dove flying over a power line, a yellow hibiscus bathing in the warm sun, and a palm tree draped over my neighbor’s roof. Take your time looking around and letting the eyes go where they’d like to go.
Next, explore your auditory sense. Without trying too hard to tune in (or out), trust that your body and mind know how to listen. Which sounds come to you naturally? Does it have any effect on you as you register various sounds or sights?
If there’s any part of your experience you enjoy, by all means, enjoy it!
Next, and only if you have time, begin to add-in some spontaneous movement. As much as possible, allow the movements to emerge from a place of curiosity and playfulness, trusting that your body is wise and will begin to move in a way that feels interesting or good.
For example, you may notice an impulse to sway like the tree branches or step forward slowly and softly, just as a flower bud gently opens to the world as it receives more sun. You can play with faster or more vigorous movement if that appeals to you as well!
Move in this way for as long as you enjoy, perhaps 5-15 minutes. Exploring what it’s like to not control your movements or force your body to do anything that doesn’t feel helpful or good.
As you do this, allow the senses to continue connecting with your environment, enjoying the way your mind and body interact with nature in its many forms and gifts.
Did You Know? You Don’t Have to Push Yourself All the Time
Have you noticed that gentleness and stillness sometimes get a bad rap? What if we didn’t think we had to push ourselves to the nth degree in order to reap the benefits of what we’re up to? Has it ever felt deeply nourishing to slow down and not do? Perhaps nature has something to teach us about slow, cyclical growth and learning?
As Lao Tzu said, “Nature doesn’t hurry, yet everything is accomplished.”
What would it be like to let nature inform the way you move about your day? Pausing for moments of stillness, breathing and being to let the nervous system deactivate between work cycles. On the one hand, it sounds radical given our social conditioning to get as much done as possible, but on the other, we are nature and the cycles of nature are a more apt reflection of our true rhythm and capacity.
Let nature be your ally as you play with finding a work – or life – rhythm that is a reflection of your true needs. It’s always there waiting to connect with you. Look. Listen. Feel. Let your body move in unison with it. Experience the reverberations of spring in your mind, body, and heart.
Need to Add More Movement to Your Routine? Join Us for Getting Active!
Mindful Management Courses
Moving your body is not only important for physical wellbeing – it can help calm your mind, too. Finding an exercise routine that’s both enjoyable and sustainable as a long-term habit can take a lot of trial and error, and it can be easy to get discouraged along the way. Our new on-demand Getting Active program on eM Life can help you explore movement as a natural way to awaken your body and mind, and create a new healthy habit one step at a time.
Written by Breon Michel