Use this short, structured mindfulness exercise to stop for a moment and disengage attention from the internal narrative to give your nervous system a rest. It has three distinct stages, which introduce some key themes in mindfulness practice:

• self-awareness and self-acceptance

• focusing attention on sensations of breathing to reduce mental activity

• grounding awareness in the body.

Use this recording to practice stopping and starting again several times a day. When you've got an idea of how it goes, just use it without the recording frequently during the day.