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Although I exercise for an hour and occasionally ride a bike for an hour after work, and I only need about 6 hours of sleep every day, I consider myself an expert in resting. But after reading this book, I realized that there is still much to learn about resting.
This article will introduce three effective and efficient methods of resting (mindful breathing, dynamic meditation, stress breathing transformation).

This is an article that I recommend you to bookmark. When you feel like you never have enough rest and always feel tired, come and practice Ryosuke Hisage's "Efficient Resting Method" - mindfulness. Even if you master one of the methods mentioned, I believe it can effectively improve the quality of your rest.

Regarding mindfulness, there may be a more popular explanation in China called "meditation". It doesn't matter what it's called, but remember one thing, mindfulness is not about having a blank mind (in fact, it's very difficult to achieve), on the contrary, it requires you to consciously be aware of the present moment.

Real Cases#

• One of the founders of Apple, Steve Jobs, was a practitioner of mindfulness.
• Google is one of the well-known companies that introduced mindfulness, calling it "Search Inside Yourself (SIY)".
• Antai, a company that fully introduced mindfulness, successfully reduced employee medical expenses significantly and increased productivity by $3000 per person per year.

Why Do We Need Mindfulness?#

• The fatigue we usually feel is actually a phenomenon of the brain, not the body, it's called brain fatigue. It is different from physical fatigue, even if the body gets enough rest, brain fatigue will continue to accumulate unconsciously.
• About 80% of the brain's energy consumption comes from the default mode network (DMN), which functions automatically in the brain even when it is not consciously engaged in activities, it can be understood as habitual thinking. This mode of operation can be understood as "putting the car in neutral", which means that the human brain is always in a state of "running the engine".

How can we suppress the excessive operation of DMN? Mindfulness is one of the methods.

How to Practice Mindfulness?#

Here, I will introduce the three methods that I believe are the most effective. The original book has seven methods, so you can read the book after finishing this article if you are interested.

1 Mindful Breathing#

When you feel mentally sluggish, use mindful breathing. It will help us regain the innocence and curiosity we had when we first encountered the world.

🏁 Four Steps

1. Adopt a basic sitting posture: Lift your back off the chair, relax your abdomen, place your hands on your thighs, do not cross your legs, close your eyes, or relax your eyes and look at a position about 2 meters in front of you.

2. Consciously focus on the sensations of the body: Feel the contact between the soles of your feet and the floor, the buttocks and the seat, the hands and the thighs, and other interactions with the surrounding environment, feel the sensation of being attracted by gravity.

3. Focus on the breath: Breathe naturally through the nose, focus on the rise and fall of the chest and abdomen caused by the air entering and leaving, the pauses between each breath, the depth of each breath, the temperature difference between inhalation and exhalation. You can also number each breath, "1, 2, 3...".

4. If distractions arise: Redirect your attention to step 3. Remember, the breath is the "anchor of consciousness", and it is normal to have distractions, so don't be too hard on yourself.

⚠️ Tips

• "Eliminating distractions" is not the goal. Due to the activity of the DMN in the brain, various distractions arise naturally and irregularly. Distracted a hundred times, return a hundred times, that's all. If you can see how your mind becomes "filled with distractions" through this process, it can be considered a gain.
• Brain fatigue comes from the "past and future". It is not about dwelling on the past or worrying about things that have not yet happened. Therefore, the purpose of mindfulness is to free oneself from the pressure of the past or future. In this regard, we should learn from children. Children are full of curiosity about everything and they pay great attention to the present moment. They don't get annoyed by doing one thing while thinking about another.
• The human brain loves habits, so it is more effective to practice at the same time and in the same place every day.

2 Dynamic Meditation#

When you are burdened with thoughts, use dynamic meditation. It can improve your concentration on the current task.

🏁 Four Steps

1. Walking meditation: Walk at your own pace, but it is recommended to walk slowly at the beginning, pay attention to the movements of your muscles, joints, and the sensation of contact with the ground, and label your own movements, "right, left, up, down...".

2. Standing: Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, stretch your arms out to the sides and slowly raise them, focus on the changes in the muscles of your wrists, the sensation of blood flowing down, and feel the gravity. Repeat the motion of raising and slowly lowering your arms.

3. Sitting: Feel the state of sitting in the chair, slowly rotate your shoulders from back to front, and focus on the subtle movements and sensations of your muscles and joints.

4. Others: Putting on clothes, brushing teeth, driving, eating, exercising, focus on the movements and sensations of the body during these dynamic processes, essentially avoiding habitual thinking.

⚠️ Tips

• Why do people feel more tired in the "autopilot state"? It's because we are not only focused on the current task, but also thinking about and executing other things while doing one thing, which means losing the state of "being present", such as "walking while playing with your phone". If you are used to such "multitasking", your brain is more likely to lose an "important function" - concentration. Mindfulness can improve your concentration on the current task, and afterwards, you can also complete multitasking tasks more quickly. PS: In the recently released iOS 15 system by Apple, there is a switch for the focus mode, which is worth trying.
• Mindfulness can effectively suppress the secretion of stress hormones, so it can indirectly have beauty effects. Stress hormones are factors that increase sebum production (acne, pimples, hair loss), cause dry skin, and disrupt the balance of the autonomic nervous system.

3 Stress Breathing Transformation#

When stress affects your physical state, use stress breathing transformation. It allows us to face stress directly.

🏁 Three Steps

1. Be aware of the impact of stress: Adopt the basic posture of mindful breathing, summarize the cause of stress into "one sentence", silently state this sentence in your mind, and feel how your inner self and body react.

2. Focus on the breath: Similarly, number each breath and feel the relaxation of the body.

3. Expand your attention to the whole body: Imagine that the whole body is breathing.

⚠️ Tips

• When inhaling, it is recommended to imagine sending air to the body parts that feel uncomfortable in the first step. Every time air passes through, it will take away the stiffness and make the body more flexible. Experience this feeling of openness.
• To eliminate fatigue, exercise is essential. Exercise can change the human brain. I also believe that the physical energy consumption brought by exercise is only temporary, and in the long run, it will lead to an increase in total physical energy.
• People who can run continuously are not overly obsessed with "goals". Try to think about when you are running, you often have more motivation when you are close to the finish line because the finish line is right in front of you. So, if you want to avoid exhaustion on an extremely long journey, you should focus not on the distant and endless goal, but on the present moment.

Conclusion#

The secret to practicing mindfulness can be summarized in one sentence: "Be present, feel the breath".

Nowadays, people pursue methods of making money and improving their abilities too much, while neglecting methods of resting. However, rest is indispensable on the path of growth. I hope that after reading this article, you will gain something and ensure that you rest well. ♨️～

Additional Insights#

• The three stages of mindfulness experience are: 1) Initial stage - feeling excited about focusing on the "present moment"; 2) Middle stage - becoming aware of distractions and being able to refocus on the "present moment"; 3) Later stage - not needing to make deliberate efforts, the mind is always in the "present moment".
• Interestingly, studies on the connection between the gut and the brain have shown that when the gut bacteria of elderly mice are transplanted into young mice, the aging process of the young mice is accelerated. Therefore, adjusting the gut microbiota is also beneficial to the brain. For more information about the secrets of the gut, you can read my previous article: [Little Science Knowledge | Secrets of the Digestive System You May Not Know](https://Little Science Knowledge | Secrets of the Digestive System You May Not Know).

1. Regular exercise can increase your energy capacity.
2. When you are already staying up later than usual, don't worry about getting less sleep and affecting the quality of your sleep. Think back to the night when you hardly slept at all, and compare it to now, don't you feel fortunate that you can still sleep for such a long time? Maintain the consciousness of "I can do without rest", which can lead to deeper rest.
3. When you don't feel like studying anymore, take this time to rest fully, such as sleeping, meditating, or getting a massage, instead of engaging in activities that drain your energy and make you less motivated to return to studying.
4. Give yourself 5 minutes of buffer time in the morning when you wake up. You can try the breathing methods mentioned above during this 5 minutes. Remember to set an alarm, otherwise, it's easy to oversleep.

🔚Alright, this is the end of the rest sharing. Feel free to leave a comment and let's exchange ideas～

WeChat Reading Link: Efficient Resting Method: How World Elites Relax Their Minds