Emotional Management has multiple benefits because angry , anxious and worried people are not able to achieve anything due to their distracted efforts.
Leaves on a stream exercise is “Psychological calming exercise” that includes easy steps based on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.
(1) Sit in a comfortable position and close your eyes or allow them to focus gently on a fixed spot in the room.
(2) Picture yourself sitting next to a gently flowing stream (river or sea) with leaves floating along the surface of the water.
Pause and calm down for 10 seconds and watch the leaves move over the surface of the water and slowly move away from you
(3) In the next few minutes, take every thought that enters your mind and put it on a piece of paper – let it float. Do this with every thought — pleasant, painful, or neutral.
Even if you have happy or excited thoughts, put them on a piece of paper and let them float.
(4) If your thoughts stop for a moment, keep watching the stream. Sooner or later, your thoughts will start popping up again. Pause 20 seconds.
(5) Allow current to flow at its own pace.
Don’t try to rush it and rush you don’t try to rush off papers or “get rid” of your thoughts.
You practice allowing them and any idea to come and leave and go naturally.
You are watching the thoughts come out and flow away from you .
You are simply a spectator, a contemplator and a good observer
(6) If your mind is distracted ,all you have to do is breathe deeply and return to watching the leaves flow away if you feel sounds like “What dumb it is,” “I’m bored,” or “I don’t really like to do this.”
Put those thoughts on the leaves, too, and let them pass. Pause 20 seconds.
(7) If there is any resistance from an idea you do not want to leave and you find it on a piece of paper, all you have to do is allow it to exist and hang around until it is ready to swim away. If the idea pops up again, watch it float at another time. Pause 20 seconds.
(8) If a difficult or painful feeling arises, simply admit it. Say to yourself, “I noticed myself feeling bored/impatient/frustrated.” Put those thoughts on the sheets and let them float along.
(9) From time to time, your thoughts may or may not become fully present in the process. this is normal.
Once we realize that you have become defocused, gently bring your attention to the practice of visualization, breathing deeply again, noticing your breathing and following the movement of air as it enters and exits and the temperature of the air as it passes through the nose and exits.
Doing this exercise helps you a lot while developing a resilient personality as well as a more positive and constructive maneuvers of responding to good and bad stimuli in this uncertain world.
