Contrary to what the phrase "a drop in the ocean" suggests, a simple drop of water can have a positive effect on us, as this little micro-exercise proves.
The exercise "Drop by drop" uses the power of mental images for this purpose.
For most of us, water stands for life, for purification and freshness. When we think of water, these qualities automatically resonate in most people's subconscious.
And you can use this to relax and defuse stressful situations a bit.
And this is how it works:
- Make sure you're in a safe place and won't be disturbed for a few minutes. Breathe in and out a few times in a relaxed manner. If you want, close your eyes for this exercise.
- Now think of a situation that triggers stress in you. Where in your body do you feel this stress? Maybe you feel pressure on your shoulders or you notice your stomach contracting.
- Feel into this body perception and describe it for yourself in your thoughts. Accept them as an indicator of your stress perception. In this exercise, we do not want to "get rid of" the feeling of stress, but to transform it. But for this it is important to accept what is there.
- Now hold one of your two hands with the palm facing up and imagine how a drop of water sits on the palm of your hand.
- Feel the feeling that the drop of water creates on the palm of your hand, feel the freshness and coolness that emanates from it. Imagine how the sun's rays are reflected in the water droplet.
- You may also want to imagine yourself moving the drop of water in the palm of your hand back and forth a bit. Feel how this movement feels on your hand.
- Now carefully place the drop of water in your mind on the upper part of your body perception, which you felt into earlier when you imagined your stressful situation.
- Now let the drop of water in your mind slowly run down this body awareness. Feel how the drop of water cleanses the body's perception and takes everything disturbing and tension with it and washes it away.
- When the drop of water has reached the bottom of your body awareness, drop it into an imaginary lake in your abdomen.
- Watch as all the tension that the drop of water has carried with it on its way through body perception dissolves in the lake in your belly.
- Also pay attention to how the drop of water when you fall into the lake creates waves in this lake, which are allowed to spread through your whole body like relaxation waves.
- Stay in this feeling for a little longer and then open your eyes if you had closed them for the exercise.
How does the situation feel for you now? You will probably find that you feel lighter and clearer about the situation.
Of course, the problem has not gone away with the exercise. That's not what it's about.
But this little exercise can change your (subconscious) evaluation of the situation in such a way that you can deal with it in a more creative and relaxed way.
This way you are more likely to find ways and solutions to be able to deal with the situation better in the future.
The exercise is also ideal for simply getting a clear head in between. To do this, simply place the drop of water on top of your head in your mind and let it run down through the parts of the head that feel overworked.
The better you succeed in imagining the water drop and the freshness and coolness associated with it, the more effective the exercise will be.
By the way: You can of course also do the exercise several times in a row with the same problem or body awareness.
Because as the saying goes: "Constant dripping wears away the stone".