Sharpen Your Senses With These Gestures And Meditations

Sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch open the door to the outside world and allow us to enjoy it. But the current lifestyle causes that, sometimes, we do not take advantage of the great possibilities that they offer us.

Here we propose ways to reconnect with the senses and also to rest from them when stimuli saturate us.

Gestures on the surface

These experiences stimulate touch in constant dialogue with the body.

1. Hug a tree

Hugging the trunk of a tree, noticing its roughness and the recesses of its bark, is a way of thanking it for its vital work and feeling its strength and roots. Experience indicates that each tree species, even each specimen, conveys a different sensation.

2. Pet a pet

The simple gesture of stroking a cat or dog helps to lower blood pressure. Feeling the softness of their fur relaxes and comforts. So does the purr in the case of felines.

3. Go barefoot

Touch is not the exclusive province of the hands. It can be felt through other parts of the body, such as the feet. Walking on the beach or on the grass, freeing them from the compression of shoes, refines the touch and improves circulation.

4. Give yourself a massage

Feeling how professional or friendly hands slowly relax our muscles opens us to the therapeutic power of touch. Giving yourself a hot stone massage is another good option. If we have pain, a self- massage can also relieve us.

Learn to see with the eyes of the mind

Some meditations and visualizations help sharpen our senses.

5. Close your eyes

Sight is the predominant sense; For this reason, to empower others, sometimes we instinctively close our eyes (for example, when kissing or listening). Doing daily activities closing your eyes, such as eating or walking around a familiar space in the house, stimulates the other senses.

6. Inside look

Taking care of the internal organs brings body awareness.

• Standing in a quiet place with dim light, we feel how our feet take root, how legs and back support us, how tension perhaps accumulates at the nape of the neck.
• Then, sitting down and with our eyes closed, we listen to our heart, our breathing, we can even imagine the path of the blood and how it oxygenates us.

7. Our place in the world

In times of stress, closing our eyes for a few minutes and simply “observing” a place that relaxes us, paying attention to the feelings that awakens us, can bring great well-being.

Give your senses a well-deserved rest

We can give our senses a break with simple gestures such as the following.

8. Tea, for your eyes

To relieve tired eyes after a day at the computer:

• Two cotton pads soaked in a cold infusion of black tea are applied to the closed eyes .
• Lying down, we let them act for about 10 minutes.

If you feel discomfort at work, closing your eyes and covering them with both hands, supporting the weight of your head with your palms, is a comforting gesture.

9. Zero gravity

The flotation therapy is based precisely on the senses rest. It consists of floating, face up, in water with abundant Epsom salts. In the cabin you can choose that there is neither light nor sound, thus eliminating external stimuli.

10. Fasting days

” Fasting is a forgotten path to health that should be recovered as the best way to detoxify, revitalize, regenerate and recover the body,” says Dr. Karmelo Bizkarra in his book Cuidarte para curarte (Ed. Dilema).

Another of its benefits is that it helps to rest the sense of taste. It is advisable to start fasting progressively and with expert advice.