15-minute letting go meditation for anticipatory anxiety, on a train

About this practice

15 minutes to meet anticipatory anxiety with less of a fight. A letting go practice, on a train. A guided session of about 15 minutes, suited to all levels. Nothing is recorded and no account is needed.

What this works on: anticipatory anxiety

Dread of an upcoming event is often heavier than the event itself. The waiting period keeps the body in low-level alert for days.

It tends to show up as:

• Stomach dropping when you remember what is coming
• Sleep getting worse as the date approaches
• Wanting to cancel to get relief

The anticipation is a state, not a warning. Practising being in the present while the dread is present teaches the body it can wait without bracing.

Doing this on a train

• Pick a window seat if you can and let the view do part of the work
• Set an alarm for your stop
• Keep the bag on your lap rather than unfastening to find it later

The motion can make reading or screens uncomfortable, which is another reason audio works better here.

How letting go works

Letting go is about loosening grip rather than dropping things. It works on the effort attached to a problem — the holding, rehearsing and bracing — which is separable from the problem itself.

• Pick one thing you are gripping and loosen a single finger
• Release the effort with the exhale, not the issue
• Set down temporarily; you can pick it up again after

What happens, minute by minute

1. 0:00Nothing needs to be decided in the next few minutes. Park the decisions.
2. 0:13Pick one thing you are gripping — a plan, a worry, a grudge — and loosen a single finger.
3. 0:29We'll be quiet for a bit longer than usual. Stay with whatever shows up.
4. 0:43If it helps, imagine your attention is a torch beam. Right now it's wide and soft.
5. 0:58Feel the air as it passes the back of your throat. It's cooler going in.
6. 1:12Notice the small pause before your body decides to breathe in again.
7. 1:25Notice the backs of your knees, which you feel more than you think.
8. 1:38Feel your knees. They're just hinges, but they've worked hard.
9. 1:50Notice the space between your shoulder blades.
10. 2:00Notice your fingers, one by one, starting with the little finger.
11. 2:12Start at the top of your head. Notice the scalp, which you almost never notice.
12. 2:26Picture the nervous hours before as a weather front passing over. You are not the weather. You are the sky it moves through.
13. 2:44You are allowed to be unimpressed by the dread of an event that has not happened. Indifference is a legitimate response.
14. 3:01Follow three breaths and let the fourth one go unobserved.
15. 3:13This is not the last time the waiting that feels heavier than the thing will visit. That is not bad news. It means you will get more practice.
16. 3:33Notice how the nervous hours before changes shape when you stop resisting it. Usually it gets smaller, not bigger.
17. 3:49Feel the middle of your back, the part that never gets attention.
18. 4:02Stay with it.
19. 4:10Notice the breath you're taking right now. That's the only one that exists.
20. 4:23Feel your calves, front and back.
21. 4:33Just the breath, still.
22. 4:42Count four breaths silently. Then stop counting and just follow.
23. 4:54Feel your upper arms hanging. They're heavier than you remember.
24. 5:06Remain here for a few more breaths.
25. 5:16Notice if your breathing is faster than you expected. Don't correct it. Just note it.
26. 5:30Feel your tongue sitting in the bottom of your mouth.
27. 5:42Keep following the air.
28. 5:51Feel the air move past your upper lip. It's the coolest spot on the way in.
29. 6:06Feel the soles of your feet. All the weight of you goes through them.
30. 6:20Silence for a few breaths. Nothing to do in it.
31. 6:32Notice whether you're breathing or holding. Start breathing again.
32. 6:43Let your body keep settling.
33. 6:52Breathe in through your nose and out through your nose, if that's comfortable.
34. 7:05Quiet now. The next part will wait for you.
35. 7:16Notice your shins, which take small knocks all day and never complain.
36. 7:29Notice how many breaths you take in a minute. Don't change the number, just check.
37. 7:43Let it be this simple.
38. 7:52Notice the difference between a thought and the space around it.
39. 8:04I'll stop for a moment. Take the pause at your own speed.
40. 8:17Ask yourself what you could stop holding for the next sixty seconds. That one is a good start.
41. 8:33Notice any part of you that wants this to be over.
42. 8:45A gap. Don't rush to fill it with thinking.
43. 8:56With each exhale, let a little of the effort go. Not the problem — just the effort.
44. 9:11Notice if you're being hard on yourself about any of this.
45. 9:23Let's rest here in silence. It's short.
46. 9:33We are not solving anything in the next few minutes. We are setting it down, temporarily.
47. 9:48You might be planning something. Notice the planning, then come back.
48. 10:00Quiet for a moment. No need to fill it.
49. 10:11You have been carrying this competently for a while. A few minutes off will not undo that.
50. 10:26If you feel emotional, you don't have to explain it to anyone, including yourself.
51. 10:40Breathe as if you had all evening. There's no rush in this part.
52. 10:53A short silence. Let it be empty.
53. 11:03Whatever the dread of an event that has not happened is doing right now, your breathing can keep going underneath it.
54. 11:20Feel the weight of the waiting that feels heavier than the thing somewhere specific, then let the floor take a share of it.
55. 11:38Let the breath be slow enough that you can hear it, just barely.
56. 11:51Notice where the nervous hours before lives in your body. Chest, throat, stomach. Rest your attention there without trying to change it.
57. 12:09There is a part of you that has handled hard moments before. That part is here now, even if it is quiet.
58. 12:27Notice your breathing getting quieter on its own, without you deciding anything.
59. 12:40If your body wants to move, let it move, then come back.
60. 12:53If your mind is quiet, don't grab at it. Quiet comes and goes too.
61. 13:07If you're irritated, that's allowed. Irritation is just weather.
62. 13:18I'll step back. You stay here.
63. 13:28Setting something down is not the same as giving up. You can pick it up again after.
64. 13:43Stay a moment longer than is comfortable.
65. 13:53If you're going straight back to work, take ten seconds at the doorway first.
66. 14:07Notice the quiet you made, and let it close gently.
67. 14:19A few seconds more.

Questions people ask

Meditation is a practice, not a treatment. If you are dealing with ongoing distress, please also reach out to a professional.