Relaxation Technique Five: Get into Centre

Modern life struggles challenge our centre every day. Losing our centre can create an inability to manage stress successfully.

This technique will enable you to tap into the power that’s inside you. I refer to this as “the centre”. This power within you can dramatically change anything in your life – literally in a moment. All you have to do is start to use it.  Centreing is a method of getting your body and mind into peak state and therefore generating peak performance in everything you do.

‘To be “on edge,” you are literally not centered – not being in your spiritual center’ ~ Carrie Latet

We all have the ability to get ourselves into peak state. It is the time when we perform at our very best.  When we are in this peak state, in the zone, we feel brilliant; everything we do feels effortless; everything is perfect! Centreing allows your mind and body to work together to let you get into the groove, to perform at peak state..

When you are centred you will experience:

• An inner clarity
• A feeling of being in the moment and focused on the present
• A sense of serenity with no anxiety
• No sense of effort – it just happened

The way you use your physiology – the way you breathe and hold your body, your posture, your facial expressions, the nature and quality of your movements – actually determines what state you’re in. The state you’re in then will determine the range and quality of the behaviours you’re able to produce.

When a stressful event arises in your life use centreing to put your state of mind into a positive setting. By focusing on your body and getting it centred, creates the strength within you to deal with almost anything. It feels like you could run through a wall.

When you can live at centre, or can turn it on when needed, you will generate a new impetus in your life, the ability to take immense, unswerving, and intelligent action to create the results you truly desire in your life.

Most people take very little conscious action to direct their states of being. They wake up depressed or they wake up energized. Good breaks lift them up, bad ones bring them down.

This method gives you a way to alter your state of mind by changing your body and its movement. When you get your whole body to say: ‘I’m at my best!’ by getting it strong and powerful, you feel as you do when everything seems to be working for you, the feeling that you can do no wrong. It is in this state that you can change things and achieve excellence. It is surely the way you want to feel always, in a peak physical and mental state.

The Centreing Technique Method

• Choose a quiet place where you will have a minimum amount of disturbance.
• Stand up straight positioning your feet about shoulder width apart, with your arms hanging lose by your side keeping your back straight and upright.
• Shake down your body from your shoulders down to your toes. Your body should be comfortable and relaxed.
• Partially close your eyes, leaving them only slightly open to allow enough light in to keep your brain alert in order to avoid sleep mode to set in.
• Turn your entire attention and focus to your breathing. Allow yourself to breathe naturally. Don’t try to adjust your breathing. Don’t consciously try to make any changes. Just let yourself breath. Keep observing your breath.
• Notice your breath coming in and out of your body. Does it come in your mouth and out your nose? Notice your chest and tummy rising as you breathe. Just sit still and pay attention to your breathing. If your thoughts turn away from your breath, simply bring them back.
• Now breathe in deeply through your nose, deep down within you from your abdomen, notice your stomach expand. Concentrate on the movement of your breath. Follow it from entering your body through your nose, its path through your body, then its exit out through your mouth. Do this for one minute.
• Pay attention to your body now. Notice any tension you feel in your body, your head, face, neck, chest, shoulders, legs, arms, back. Now return your awareness back to your breathing, continue following its path, and now envision that each breath is magically dissolving any tension or knotted places within your body. Every breath you exhale, imagine all that tightness you revealed being expelled from your body. Do this for two minutes.
• Return your attention to the movement of your breath. Simply focus on your breathing and note its spontaneous nature, how it takes place naturally and  unconsciously. Inhale naturally through your nose; exhale through your mouth. Keep following its path throughout your body. . Notice how each breath in expands your tummy out and each breath out makes your tummy recede Now start to notice where the breath path stops. This point at which you feel your breath stops, where it has reached the end of its path, is your point of centre (normally just between your chest and below your neck). Do this for one minute.
• Now go back to just giving your centred attention to your breathing. Maintain your attention on your point of Centre. No need to do anything else—just pay attention to your breath. Let your breathing be natural, deep, quiet, and regular. Do this for one minute.
• Now breathe in deeply through your nose, deep down within you from your abdomen, notice your stomach expand. Breathe out through your mouth, while putting your tongue between your teeth so that the tip of your tongue is touching the tips of your top teeth, then making a hissing sound, while squeezing your abdominal muscles tightly, and contracting your buttock muscles. Repeat this for 2 minutes.
• Stop using the abdomen to breathe and start to breathe in slowly using your chest and the expansion of your rib cage. This is Thoracic breathing achieved by the movement of the rib cage as a whole. Thoracic breathing uses the middle lobes of your lungs through the expansion and contraction of the rib cage. Feel your ribs moving outward and upward, while they draw air into your lungs.  Push your chest out as much as you can.
• Breathe in slowly and deeply through your chest. Do not use the diaphragm. Breathe out by relaxing your chest muscles, and feel your rib cage contracting, forcing the air out of your lungs. Continue thoracic breathing for one minute.
• Breathe powerfully in through your nose. Feel the air moving up from your waist filling your lungs reaching and ending at a point just between your chest and below your neck, your point of Centre.
• Straighten your head. Lift your shoulders. Make your body powerful. Charge yourself. Feel the strength rippling through it, so much so that you could walk through a wall. Think of a time when you excelled, when you were at your very best.
• Bring the fingers of both hands into your palms, and just exert a little pressure, squeeze your clenched hands, by your side.
• Return to inhaling deeply from your abdomen and continue to breathe calmly and deeply maintaining your focus on your body.
• Bring your body upright, become more aligned, feet flat on the floor, your upper body upright; imagine you are being suspended from a thick cord attached to the top of your head, pulling you up. See in your mind’s eye that gravity is flowing through you, where you are weightless, yet grounded.
• With eyes closed, gently rock from side to side, from one foot to the other. Use this pendulum motion to help find just the right point of balance for your body. Allow the head to rock until it finds a balance, too. Gradually slow the motion until the body is still, feeling the balance of the head on top of your spine. Concentrate on the pelvis acting as an anchor for the body, with the legs grounding the body to the earth, and the spine resting on top of the pelvis. Feel the spine in alignment, and the head resting on top of the spine. Focus on the shoulder blades and feel them like a crossbar, balanced off the spine. There is no need to hold the shoulders; they are balanced from the spine, and the arms fall in relaxation from the shoulders. How does it feel to find your Centre this way?
• After a few minutes, you can consciously allow your  breathing to slow down and deepen, and become more quiet and more regular. To support this, you can use an image of an ocean gently flowing onto a sandy beach (inhalation) and gently receding back to itself (exhalation). Let the breath, like an ocean, take its time, and notice the easy, slow transition between exhaling and inhaling.
• Now concentrate on your body. Feel how strong and powerful it feels. You feel fully charged, totally energised, and ready for a fantastic day ahead.
• Take an explosive action .Pump your fists by your side a couple of times and know your engine is started, fully revved and ready to take action.

When you are aligned, when you are centered, everything else is balanced, your body and mind are in harmony. This is one of the most awesome techniques for you to use in your life. It makes you strong, and able to deal with anything. It does take much practice to perfect, but the time is worth it I assure you.

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