{"id":2769,"date":"2025-02-24T09:34:35","date_gmt":"2025-02-24T14:34:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.med.virginia.edu\/mindfulness\/?p=2769"},"modified":"2025-02-24T09:43:36","modified_gmt":"2025-02-24T14:43:36","slug":"2769","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.med.virginia.edu\/mindfulness\/2025\/02\/24\/2769\/","title":{"rendered":"Pausing During the Holidays"},"content":{"rendered":"<table>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td><strong>By John Schorling<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>The holiday season is here again, a time that has many different meanings for people. For some it is primarily a religious holiday, for others it is more about giving, and for still others it has no real significance, and may even be considered an annoyance.\u00a0 Whatever one\u2019s beliefs about the holidays, it can be an ideal time to practice pausing and noticing what is arising within us.\u00a0\u00a0 Our usual routines are often altered, with different work schedules and leisure plans.\u00a0\u00a0 These changes may be experienced as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral.\u00a0 If we are not paying attention, we may not even notice what we are feeling although it may still influence our behavior.\u00a0 We tend to automatically want to continue activities that are pleasant, and to not continue those that are unpleasant.<\/p>\n<p>Pausing can be helpful in shedding light on this process so that we are not just reacting to our circumstances.\u00a0 The acronym <strong>STOP<\/strong>\u00a0stands for useful steps to follow when pausing.\u00a0 The <strong>S<\/strong>\u00a0is for <strong>Stopping<\/strong>, remembering to pay attention to what is present right now.\u00a0 The <strong>T<\/strong>\u00a0is for <strong>Taking a few breaths<\/strong>\u00a0to center ourselves.\u00a0 If the breath does not feel centering, we might instead place our attention on our feet or our hands. Focusing on anywhere in the body that feels like it helps stabilize the attention is fine.\u00a0 The <strong>O<\/strong>\u00a0is for <strong>Observing our present moment experience<\/strong>, without judging it.\u00a0 We can ask ourselves, in this moment, what am I thinking?\u00a0 What am I feeling, physically and emotionally?\u00a0 We can also ask ourselves, what are my goals? What are my choices?\u00a0 Having done this, the <strong>P<\/strong>\u00a0is for <strong>Proceeding with awareness<\/strong>, choosing our response rather than just reacting to what is happening.<\/p>\n<p>Even if the holiday season is a predominately positive experience, difficulties may still arise.\u00a0 When this occurs and we pause to notice what\u2019s arising, one of the choices that we can make when proceeding with awareness is choosing to practice compassion.\u00a0 We can have compassion for ourselves, desiring to alleviate our own suffering, and compassion for others, desiring to alleviate theirs.\u00a0 Sometimes there are concrete actions we can take to do this, and at other times we can just open our hearts to the suffering and respond with kindness and wishes for its resolution.\u00a0 In either case, when we pause to pay attention and notice suffering, compassion is a gift we can give to ourselves and others during this holiday season.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The holiday season is here again, a time that has many different meanings for people. For some it is primarily a religious holiday, for others it is more about giving, and for still others it has no real significance, and may even be considered an annoyance.\u00a0 Whatever one\u2019s beliefs about the holidays, it can be an ideal time to practice pausing and noticing what is arising within us.\u00a0\u00a0 Our usual routines are often altered, with different work schedules and leisure plans.\u00a0\u00a0 These changes may be experienced as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral.\u00a0 If we are not paying attention, we may not even notice what we are feeling although it may still influence our behavior.\u00a0 We tend to automatically want to continue activities that are pleasant, and to not continue those that are unpleasant.<\/p>\n<p>Pausing can be helpful in shedding light on this process so that we are not just reacting to our circumstances.\u00a0 The acronym STOP\u00a0stands for useful steps to follow when pausing.\u00a0 The S\u00a0is for Stopping, remembering to pay attention to what is present right now.\u00a0 The T\u00a0is for Taking a few breaths\u00a0to center ourselves.\u00a0 If the breath does not feel centering, we might instead place our attention on our feet or our hands. Focusing on anywhere in the body that feels like it helps stabilize the attention is fine.\u00a0 The O\u00a0is for Observing our present moment experience, without judging it.\u00a0 We can ask ourselves, in this moment, what am I thinking?\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1202,"featured_media":1817,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2769","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-monthly-musings"],"acf":false,"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Pausing During the Holidays - Mindfulness Matters<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.med.virginia.edu\/mindfulness\/2025\/02\/24\/2769\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pausing During the Holidays - Mindfulness Matters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The holiday season is here again, a time that has many different meanings for people. For some it is primarily a religious holiday, for others it is more about giving, and for still others it has no real significance, and may even be considered an annoyance.\u00a0 Whatever one\u2019s beliefs about the holidays, it can be an ideal time to practice pausing and noticing what is arising within us.\u00a0\u00a0 Our usual routines are often altered, with different work schedules and leisure plans.\u00a0\u00a0 These changes may be experienced as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral.\u00a0 If we are not paying attention, we may not even notice what we are feeling although it may still influence our behavior.\u00a0 We tend to automatically want to continue activities that are pleasant, and to not continue those that are unpleasant.  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