Hello everyone and welcome to Therapy in a Nutshell. I'm Emma McAdam, a licensed marriage and family therapist.

And this is the podcast where I condense mental health skills into bite-sized nuggets of health.

By the end of this video, you're going to know how to use mindfulness in your life.

You're going to experience mindfulness with two quick activities,

and you're going to learn how mindfulness can help you calm your body and your mind.

The skill of mindfulness shifts your perspective on emotions.

You'll learn how to get better at soothing anxiety,

you'll learn to process sad feelings, and you'll learn to quiet negative self-talk.

Mindfulness combined with CBT has been shown to work as well as medication at treating depression and anxiety,

but without the side effects, and it's more effective in the long term.

Mindfulness actually helps rewire your brain. It helps improve connectivity between neurons and the part of your

brain that processes emotions. In skill number five, we looked at how avoidance and struggle with our

emotions tends to make us miserable, or at the very least, keeps us from

living the life we dream of. So what's the alternative? Is it just suffering? No, today we'll look

at mindful acceptance as a step toward resolving emotions. When we're mindful, deeply in touch

with the present moment, our understanding of what is going

on deepens, and we begin to be filled with acceptance, joy, peace, and love.

Have you ever had an experience where you were intensely aware of the moment?

Maybe it was a beautiful sunrise or even a frightening experience.

And suddenly you started noticing the tiny details of each thing

around you. Perhaps you noticed the way the light was hitting the trees or the feel of the dirt

beneath your feet. Maybe you heard the sound of the birds or maybe even of your own breath.

...