Find Your Calm Technique

Author: Alyice Edrich

Ever since I experienced a bout of Bell's Palsy—back in December of 2007, I've been told to learn to relax more. While it's not a proven fact, many believe that Bell's Palsy can come from stress overload and between you and I, I had a lot of stress and was way past overload when Bell's Palsy paid a visit to my body. But relaxation techniques don't work for me, nor does meditating. I just can't sit still. So I decided to find a book on relaxing and meditating without all the hype and mystical or magical or religious aftermaths. Honestly, I didn't think such a book existed, until I read The Calm Technique by Paul Wilson. It talked about taking time to “just breathe” and meditate and how important it is for our minds, our bodies, and our souls.

The Calm Technique is about learning to live in the present—not the past, not the future—and free of regrets and concerns. You still plan your days, you still work on short-term and life-long goals, but you learn to enjoy life, right here, right now.

A few key things stood out:

“The Calm Technique is more than just meditation and breathing exercises. You learn to stop multi-tasking and start living in the moment. No more eating dinner while watching television. No more talking on the telephone while cleaning the house, no more worrying about the future while trying to get a handle on the here and now.”
"Attempting to do several things at once creates anxiety, limits your effectiveness, and seldom seems to help deadlines."
"Stress causes impatience, illnesses, ailments, and produces nervous conditions including fatigue and lack of concentration."
“All that matters is your ability to escape the demands of everyday life and let your mind rest in the moment.”

Honestly, I had become such a multi-tasker that I often felt like an octopus with eight legs and each one performing a different task. It even got to the point that I no longer enjoyed one of my greatest passions—reading and writing. I had become a skimmer of words and the thought of actually sitting down to write something, anything had become a burden. And everything I did seemed rushed. I often caught myself saying, "I've got to hurry up and get through this task, this magazine, this event because I have so much to do and so little time to do it in."

By reading The Calm Technique, I discovered that relaxation doesn't just happen; you have to work at making it happen. You have to make time for it and you have to retrain your brain to think differently. I really love his thoughts on living more in the moment because that's how I lived my life ten years ago and reflecting back I see a much happier, calmer, invigorated, and fun person and it's reminded me how to find my way back.

Wilson's message is about really learning to enjoy the here and now by becoming absorbed in a single moment in time—an activity. And I have begun taking it to heart. His technique for "Meditation Without Mysticism" is simple and can be applied to other areas of your life besides breathing. For example, I use the same technique—minus the candles and dim lights—when crocheting a blanket or scrapbooking.

Here's Wilson's technique, simplified for the everyday person:

Find a quiet, warm, private place to relax.
Dim the lights.
Turn off the phone.
Sit in a comfortable chair.
Set the timer to go off in twenty minutes.
Burn an incense or candle.
Turn on soft, relaxing music.
Keep your head back and chin up.
Close your eyes.
Concentrate on your breathing.
When the timer goes off open your eyes.
Stay seated for another two minutes.

To concentrate on your breathing, hear only the sound of your breathing. Breath slowly as your nostrils fill up with air then exhale through your lips. Concentrate on counting your number of breaths.