When you’re facing a situation whose bleak edges scrape you raw, when doubt, anxiety, lethargy, hopelessness, or despair assail you, deepen your breath, all the way into your belly.

Breathe and soften your joints, your elbows and shoulders, hips, knees, ankles, wrists. Let your brain rest gently in the nest of your skull. Let the inner corners of your eyes lengthen towards the bridge your nose. Lie down on a bed of grass, or in your own sweet bed. Let gravity cradle your spine. Let the palms of your hands and the soles of your feet soften and widen.

Feel your heart pumping blood steadily through your body. Feel your heart expanding to embrace and hold all of you — make room for, and welcome your joy. Now, choose how you want to feel, and act to change your energy accordingly.

Listen to music that enlivens and uplifts you. Explore pieces you’ve loved in the past, but perhaps haven’t listened to in a long while. Really listen, letting the music flow into and transform your cells, reverberate through the chambers of your bones.

Head outdoors. Let sun and wind play with and through you. Let them restore you to your senses. Find a friend to laugh with, to share a meal with. Savour a bowl of nourishing soup. Walk or run by the sea and feel your own wings slipstream you into the raucous world of gulls and cormorants.

Not every situation can be resolved quickly and easily. But you can transform your inner landscape almost instantly. When you do, your most creative, joyful, powerfully generative self will dance with whatever situation you’re facing, and find a way to bring it to a state of greater wholeness, clarity, playfulness and peace.

#ToBeSoul_DoSoul #AdventuresInCreativeConsciousness