The Quickie Meditation, Supercharged!

 I would like to introduce you to an easy yet effective meditation technique, quite provocatively named, “The Quickie”. No, no, it's not what you think! I first learned about the exercise from one of my favourite teachers, Dr Aviva Romm, and have found it to be a powerful, on-the-go technique that is easy to learn and practice. I've then taken it to the next level by adding acupressure to it, to supercharge this technique for maximum impact.
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So, are you ready to learn more?

There are three parts to this exercise. It might seem complicated at first, but it's really very simple. I will break it down into the separate parts first to make it very clear what we are doing and why.

Part One

In it's essence, "The Quickie" is a breathing exercise. The foundation to this approach is changing the rhythm of your breath, so that you are breathing in for the count of 4, and out for the count of 6. It's fundamental to this technique that the out-breath is longer than the in-breath, and I’ll explain why in a moment.

Part Two

The second part of this technique is using an affirmation. Aviva suggests using the affirmation – “I am at peace”, but you could adapt this to a different affirmation that holds special meaning for you. What you'll be doing is silently saying to yourself “I am” with the in-breath, and “at peace” with the outbreath.

Part Three

The third part is my Chinese Medicine twist! I like to incorporate this with either the acupressure point, “Yin Tang”, and/or CV-17, sometimes called “The Sea of Tranquility”. Either point is wonderful. You can choose either point, whichever feels most comfortable, or you can use both points together.

Yin Tang is located in between your eyebrows, at the third eye point, and is a powerful anti-anxiety, calming and grounding point. There have been some recent clinical studies into the use of this single point in preoperative patients, showing that this point significantly lowered their anxiety levels.

The location of acupressure point "Yin Tang"

​CV-17 is located in the centre of the chest,  four finger-widths up from the tip of your sternum, and is said to open up the chest and calm the heart. It is a great emotional balancing point.
​CV 17 corresponds to the heart chakra, which represents our ability to open up our heart and love deeply.  

Find CV-17 located in the centre of your chest.

​Putting it all together

Breathe in to the count of 4, thinking “I am”, and breathe out to the count of 6, thinking “at peace”. At the same time, put a gentle yet firm pressure on one or both of these acupressure points. That’s it!

How long for?

Now – this technique is called the quickie, and so 4 – 6 rounds of this breath is really all that is needed to feel a great effect. That is something you can do pretty much anytime. You don't need to worry about putting aside a lot of time, sitting in lotus position and lighting a candle (although you can do that if you like).
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You almost always have time to just take a few breath cycles to do this. But if you are enjoying it, please feel welcome to continue on in this way for as long as feels comfortable.

Why does it work?

You might know that our nervous system has many parts, including the opposing yet complementary sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system.

The sympathetic nervous system is the branch that is associated with the stress response, commonly known as ‘fight or flight’. This is triggered by anything from being chased by the proverbial sabre toothed tiger, to having a tight deadline at work. Our bodies don't discriminate between actual physical threats (e.g. being eaten by a tiger), or perceived threats (e.g. worrying about what other people think of us).

Whilst this is a really useful system for helping us to get away from an immediate threat, when this system gets turned on all the time, it starts to have very negative effects on all systems of our body. We all know that too much stress is not a good thing and contributes to the vast majority of our health problems.

When you are in this mode, you will find that your breath is shallow, and your inhalation is longer than your exhalation.

The parasympathetic nervous system is the opposite. It is the 'rest and digest' system associated with the relaxation response. This is the aspect of the nervous system that we want to be spending the majority of our time. When this nervous system is activated, our bodies energy can be dedicated to activities like digestion, fertility and healing – all things that are shut down in the sympathetic nervous mode.

When you are in this mode, your breath will be deeper and more relaxed, with more emphasis on the exhalation.

Our inhalation subtly activates the sympathetic nervous system, and our exhalation subtly activates the parasympathetic nervous system. So by purposely focusing on extending our exhalation, we are resetting our bodies and helping to get ourselves back into the relaxation response. As a lovely side effect, doing full exhalations also helps us to get rid of accumulated toxins and carbon dioxide in our lungs, and allows us to take in more fresh air on the inbreath.

Combining the effect of lengthening the exhalation, with the calming effect of these specific acupressure points makes for an even more powerful technique to really bring your stress levels right down in just a few minutes.

So are you ready to give it a go?

I invite you to take a few moments now to give this a try and see how it feels. It might take some practice, but once you get the hang of it you will have an easy and effective tool in your toolkit, to draw on when your stress levels start to rise.

Enjoy! And have a beautiful day.