Being present

I am following the 21 day meditation challenge by the Chopra centre and last week one of the meditations was on healing the heart. The four needs of the heart are: attention, affection, appreciation and acceptance.

The order of these needs is important because without attention I don't think the others can follow. Being present with ourself or others is essentially paying attention. Leonard Jacobson wrote a lovely piece on substitute needs and talked about presence as our true need. Paying attention, particularly when we're in pain or because it feels really difficult not to want to run away, is loving ourself. Try these set up statements and tap on whatever feels right:

Even though it's hard to pay attention when ... I completely accept my reasons

Even though I can't stay present with ... it is completely ok

Even though I want to run away from ... I completely accept myself anyway