Happiness Break: Six Minutes to Connect with Your Body, with Dacher Keltner

The Science of Happiness

PRX and Greater Good Science Center

Science, Social Sciences

4.4 • 1.9K Ratings

🗓️ 22 September 2022

⏱️ 7 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Dedicating a little time to tune into your body fortifies you to better handle the stresses of daily life.

How to Do This Practice:

Find a quiet place where you feel safe and comfortable.You can be standing, sitting, or lying down. Make sure that you feel relaxed.
Close your eyes, and take a few deep, long breaths.
Move your attention through your body slowly, part by part. Focus on your feet, then your calves, knees, and so on, until you get to the top of your head. Without judgment, notice what sensations you can identify in each part of the body.
When your mind wanders, gently and with self-kindness, guide your attention back to the part of the body you’re focusing on in the present moment.

Find the full Body Scan Meditation practice at our Greater Good in Action website: https://ggia.berkeley.edu/practice/body_scan_meditation

More resources from The Greater Good Science Center:

Listen to a Science of Happiness episode on the body scan meditation with Daniel Wu: https://tinyurl.com/hn6vhx4b
How a Body Scan Can Help With Strong Emotions: https://tinyurl.com/57sdek76
How Tuning In to Your Body Can Make You More Resilient: https://tinyurl.com/328scfjj
What Self-Compassion Feels Like in Your Body: https://tinyurl.com/426hfnjj
Compassionate Mind, Healthy Body: https://tinyurl.com/5n79ary9
Your Anxiety Might Be Coming From Your Body: https://tinyurl.com/4j9ynwr9
Why Yoga Is Good for Your Body and Brain, According to Science: https://tinyurl.com/ynja9f22

We love hearing from you! Tell us about your experience with the body scan meditation. Email us at [email protected] or using the hashtag #happinesspod.

Find us on Apple Podcast: https://tinyurl.com/2p9h5aap

Help us share Happiness Break!

Leave us a 5-star review and copy and share this link: https://tinyurl.com/2p9h5aap

We're living through a mental health crisis. Between the stress, anxiety, depression, loneliness, burnout — we all could use a break to feel better. That's where Happiness Break comes in. In each biweekly podcast episode, instructors guide you through research-backed practices and meditations that you can do in real-time. These relaxing and uplifting practices have been shown in a lab to help you cultivate calm, compassion, connection, mindfulness, and more — what the latest science says will directly support your well-being. All in less than ten minutes. A little break in your day.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Wherever you are, whatever you're doing, stop now and take a deep breath.
0:13.4	Notice the feeling of your belly expanding and chest falling as you exhale.
0:19.3	And on the next inhale, notice the temperature of the air moving through your nostrils and
0:25.0	then the temperature of the exhale.
0:29.8	Our bodies experience so many sensations, whether we notice them or not, when we make
0:34.4	it a point to tune into them, we can actually train our minds to focus, like strengthening
0:39.6	a muscle.
0:42.6	I'm Dacker Keltner, welcome to Happiness Break.
0:46.9	Today I'm going to lead you through one of my favorite practices, the body scan meditation.
0:52.1	The body scan involves paying attention to momentary physical sensations, beginning
0:56.7	with the feet and ending at the head, slowly moving your awareness all throughout the body.
1:03.5	Scientific studies show that doing the body scan daily for just one week can help curb
1:08.3	rheumatative thinking when you just can't seem to stop going back to the same thought
1:12.6	over and over.
1:14.8	It's also associated with lower depression and anxiety.
1:17.7	It can help mitigate chronic pain, support better sleep.
1:21.9	It can improve focus and self-awareness.
1:25.1	In recent studies show that it helps the prefrontal cortex regulate the amygdala and what
1:29.7	that means psychologically is you can handle your daily life with a little bit more calm.
1:36.0	So when you're ready, settle in somewhere comfortable, you could be sitting, lying down,
1:41.2	or standing, and we'll get started.
1:54.9	It's a nice place where you feel safe and comfortable and where there is quiet.
	...

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