Mindfulness Audios Download: Exercise to Exhaustion

Daily Mindfulness Practice: Free Audio Download

by Monica A. Frank, Ph.D.

The following is part of a series of audios to teach how to practice mindfulness. Developing your ability to focus on the present moment can reduce distress and improve well-being.

Exercise to Exhaustion

Index for Mindfulness Audios

Additional reading:

Some tips for using these audios:

Start with the Understanding Mindfulness audios to learn about mindfulness.
These short practice exercises are to help train your brain to be more mindful when engaged in daily activities.
The audio format is just for convenience to help learn the material. You can also read the transcript. When you practice, however, you should engage in the behavior mindfully without listening to the audio.
The best way to train your brain to be more mindful is to practice in short sessions throughout the day while engaged in your normal activities.
The descriptions are an artificial way to help you get started. Eventually, the practice of mindfulness is being aware of what is described without using an inner verbal description.
This exercise focuses on doing aerobic exercise to exhaustion.
This is a good exercise to practice the mindful experience of discomfort and just "being" with the changes that occur in your body as you exercise and afterwards as you relax.

Next Exercise

Listen

Transcript of Audio: Exercise to Exhaustion

Choose an aerobic exercise that you can safely do to exhaustion. A simple exercise that will exhaust most people in a short time is walking or running up and down stairs. As you engage in the exercise notice the changes in your body. What does your body feel like at the beginning? What is your energy level like? How fresh are your muscles? As you continue with the exercise, what do you notice? How does your rate of breathing change? Do you feel a tightness in your muscles? Do you feel fatigue in your body? Where do you feel the fatigue? Is it in your muscles or is it in your energy level? What does it feel like to breathe harder and faster? Are you sweating? What do you feel when you sweat? Does it cause your clothes to feel different in places? Does it cool your body? As you continue this exercise to exhaustion notice what your body feels like. Does it feel pleasant or unpleasant? Whatever it feels like, allow yourself to just “be” with that sensation. When you stop the exercise, what are the differences that you notice? How does your breathing change? What does your chest feel like? What do your muscles feel like? How do these things change as you relax after the exercise? Allow yourself to fully experience the changes that occur.