Mindfulness exercises for groups are a form of mindfulness meditation[1] widely practiced in the Western world. Mindfulness, despite originating in one country, can provide wisdom and understanding through emotions and senses to anyone who seeks it.
In return, the person redirects all energy to strengthen themselves and have wellness amidst anxiety and the trying moments all of us have.
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Mindfulness Excercise
As people develop the commitment to meditate, they set themselves up to reap the benefits of their mindfulness, including reducing stress, anxiety, and depression. Mindfulness has also been shown to improve sleep quality and cognitive function. A recent study showed that mindfulness might also help protect against age-related cognitive decline.
Mindfulness practices may be used to treat bodily pains and insomnia. The practice of mindfulness meditation is an effective approach to reducing stress and improving overall health. It has been used to alleviate chronic pain, especially from fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, and cancer.
In a review of the literature on mindfulness meditation and the role of mindfulness in cognitive aging, researchers found that mindfulness practice has the potential to enhance cognitive functions, preserve brain health, and reduce age-related declines. Mindfulness is also used as a therapeutic intervention for treating chronic pain.
As you can see, being mindful offers you a variety of benefits and proven efficacy that will surely pave the way toward mental clarity.
9 Mindfulness Group Exercises
Participating in mindfulness exercises for groups can be as effective as group cognitive behavioral therapy. Doing these free mindfulness exercises in group settings allows you to regulate any social anxiety you feel while managing behavioral triggers and mastering your meditation practice.
The Body Scan
The body scan is one of the mindfulness exercises for groups that requires participants in large or smaller groups to lie down on their backs and have their palms facing toward the ceiling and their feet parted.
Overseerred by a group facilitator, this guided meditation exercise requires all participants to begin by taking control of their physical and mental states and paying attention to their breathing patterns as the chest and stomach rise and fall.
The session continues as family, colleagues, and friends are directed to focus their senses systematically throughout their bodies, starting from the soles of their feet until they reach the top of their heads. The following steps require the participant to observe parts of their body for any feelings of soreness, heaviness, tightness, or sensitivity.
Everyone must be in the current moment and draw attention to the feel of the floor where they lie in a comfortable position, their clothes that touch their skin, and their environment. After feeling all the body sensations, participants are directed to return to a comfortable sitting position, open their eyes, and slowly return to the present moment.
The Raisin Exercise
The raisin exercise is a great exercise, similar to mindful eating. This mindfulness exercise aims to “discover” the raisin, acknowledge the present moment, and bring awareness to it. You begin this mindfulness practice by having a raisin or any food similar to it. The participants in this group’s mindfulness practice should act as if it is their first time seeing or tasting a raisin or any food.
All group members should pay attention to minor details and all the physical sensations like its scent, texture, and taste to become familiar with the strange food. Aside from what they have perceived through their five senses, the group exercise participants should focus attention on the fruit.
By maintaining focus on the raisin itself, you are gaining self-awareness and actively putting yourself in the moment, training yourself to focus, and setting aside any distractions and all the worries of your everyday life. As you eat the raisin, savor its taste and chew it slowly.
Feel it as it floods your senses. Engage with the group and describe the flavors you felt to them and yourself. Gain awareness of your feelings and identify whether there is a connection between your emotions and the food.
All in all, this is one of the great mindfulness exercises for groups to enhance your ability to practice mindfulness and quit paying attention to things that seek to corrupt your full attention. By doing this exercise, you develop a rhythm with your concentration and change your attitude and perception of food.
Mindful Listening Exercise
This group therapy is the key to learning mindfulness and a vital part of reducing stress. It serves as a blueprint to gently guide people to reduce social anxiety and build a stronger connection with every family member, friend, or colleague at work. Listening to others means validating them and allowing them to gain respect from others with their presence.
In this mindful practice, participants are encouraged to build personal relationships, achieve awareness of themselves as adults, and have stillness and acceptance of how the world perceives them as people.
To begin this mindful group practice, everyone must think about the most stressful trigger and the happiest event they’ve anticipated. Every participant will have the chance to talk about and experience how it feels to speak in a group setting.
Participants in mindfulness exercises for groups like these are tasked with noting all emotions and being mindful of any physical feelings they feel as they speak. As the participants discover themselves during this session, they are further tasked with talking about how they felt during the listening and speaking. Everyone should know that having like-minded people listen to you is a safe space for all emotions.
Mindful Seeing
To begin this mindful exercise, every person is tasked with seeing through the window, observing nature, and taking note of everything they see. Afterward, they should label the things with generic attributes like size, shape, color, etc.
If you find yourself distracted or your mind wandering at work, school, or home, remember this guided meditation and integrate mindful seeing into your daily routine.
Beats Listening
Out of the five senses, participants in this group mindfulness practice are challenged to focus mainly on their hearing. Participants must focus on the beats they hear to play them the same way. These mindfulness exercises for groups will start with sitting together in a huge circle.
The first person creates a beat or sound, and the next person needs to echo the beat they hear while adding a beat or sound, and the cycle moves on. If a person repeats the wrong order or misses a beat, they are considered “out” and will have the freedom to distract other players until the victor remains.
Doing these kinds of mindfulness exercises for groups will help you focus on the present moment, shut off any distractions, and build a mindful approach to dealing with life and all of its stress.
Mindful Breathing
Practicing mindfulness may not be as hard as anyone could imagine. This exercise allows people to reduce mindfulness-based stress by doing simple tasks like breathing. In doing these mindfulness exercises for groups, everyone must pay attention to how they breathe and think of it as something that would help them with their stress and anxiety.
Begin by facing one another with eyes shut. Everyone must observe the patterns and focus their attention on how other people breathe. Unlike other creative mindfulness exercises for groups, this one is quite relaxed and would allow anyone to be in the present moment without any feelings of anxiety, stress, or mental instability.
Mindfulness Bell Exercise
This particular mindfulness exercise is often used in yoga classes or meditation to end or begin a group session. It requires a chime or a bell and starts by allowing all participants to listen to the bell’s chime while keeping their eyes closed.
Every person must focus on the sound of the bell as it fades completely. This free mindfulness work helps to ground people and is perfect for incorporating into other mindful group activities like yoga.
Guided Meditation
This type of mindfulness exercise is perfect for beginners and is helpful for other individuals who wish to explore other creative mindfulness exercises for groups. In group settings, it is perfect for incorporating into other mindfulness exercises as a way to end a session with a pleasant mental and emotional well-being.
This mindfulness exercise comes in various forms and can be done with other variations, as long as one person guides another to have full control over their mind and body.
Five Senses Exercise
Participants in mindfulness exercises for groups like this must be able to observe and share the following in exact order:
- Five items you see around you (it would be helpful to look for things that aren’t that noticeable)
- Four items can be felt
- Three things you can hear (listen to the most difficult things for me to notice)
- Two things you can smell (it will be helpful not to focus on just the pleasant smell)
- One thing you can taste
With their simplicity comes the effectiveness of these mindfulness exercises for groups to help anyone meditate, develop a technique to build patience, and manage stress and anxiety.
Conclusion
Practicing mindfulness may be hard, but doing the aforementioned mindfulness exercises in groups with friends and colleagues is perfect for individuals who lack energy and time because of a lack of motivation or jam-packed schedules.
These mindfulness exercises for groups will allow you to take advantage of all the benefits of purposeful mindfulness exercises for groups together with like-minded individuals who constantly seek self-improvement and have the same goals as yours.
Hence, the next time you and your friends and family members are caught up in tight situations, remember to look back on these exercises, and from there, you can encourage the people around you to do the same.