The Three Breath Pause

There are some practices I do as part of my daily, scheduled routine. I rotate between several, but these often include stretching, meditation, spiritual reading, journaling, or prayer. These are part of my ongoing commitment to strengthen my capacity for focus, awareness, and insight.

But there is another category of practice I call in-the-moment practices that occur spontaneously. One I have adopted recently is a three breath pause. It works like this.

I pick an ability I want to develop or an intention I want to hold for the day. For example, it might be:

• • Don’t interrupt
  • Appreciate beauty
  • Be aware of sensations in my body
  • Don’t eat unless I’m hungry
  • Open my heart

During the day, I become engrossed in thoughts or activities, as we do. But when I remember my intended focus, I stop what I’m doing and pause for three breaths, each one a little slower and deeper. I focus on my intention and let it settle with each breath into my psyche. Then I go on with my day.

Sometimes, my remembering comes at a moment when I’m nervous and distracted, and the three breaths don’t center me very much. Other times, my pause awakens me and grounds my intention more firmly. Either way, I am extending my spiritual practice to random moments throughout the day, giving it added weight and stability.

These pauses often increase my insight into the intention that I picked. “Don’t interrupt,” morphs into, “Listen.” “Be aware of your body,” becomes, “What is this tightness I feel, anxiety?” I realize that “Don’t eat unless hungry” is almost impossible, and points to my food addiction, seeking false comfort to counter old fear patterns. I roll these insights into the practice, focusing on them during my next three breath sequence.

Three breaths is long enough to shift my attention out of autopilot, but short enough to do in the moment. I find it’s an easy way to sprinkle more time and attention every day on whatever spiritual aspect I’m working on.

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash