5-minute guided grounding practice for tired eyes — at lunch

About this practice

For the times at lunch when tired eyes takes up more room than you would like — 5 minutes, grounding. A guided session of about 5 minutes, suited to all levels. Nothing is recorded and no account is needed.

What this works on: tired eyes

Screens reduce blink rate sharply, and the muscles that focus at close range stay contracted. The result is strain, ache and blur by the end of the day.

It tends to show up as:

Aching, gritty eyes after screen time
Blurring at the end of the day
Headaches above the eyes

Closing the eyes is the only real rest they get. A few minutes without visual input is the specific thing your eyes are short of.

Doing this at lunch

Do it before eating rather than after, so you are not working against digestion
Leaving the desk matters more than the session length
Take the headphones off afterwards so the break registers

A break that happens at the same desk is only half a break.

How grounding works

Grounding brings attention to physical contact and the immediate environment. It works on the principle that the body cannot be somewhere else, so contact with the surface you are on is always available as an anchor.

Feel the contact points — feet, seat, back — and let them take your weight
Use the senses deliberately: what you can see, hear, touch
Return to solidity whenever attention drifts

What happens, minute by minute

0:00Keep your eyes open if you like, resting on one point of the floor a metre or two ahead.
0:16Press down slightly and feel the push back. Your body already knows where it is.
0:30We're going to move through the body in order, roughly from top to bottom.
0:44Let the last hour go on its own. You can pick it up again afterwards.
0:58Let your breathing find the rhythm it uses when you're almost asleep.
1:11Count four breaths silently. Then stop counting and just follow.
1:23Notice your ears, which mostly just receive things.
1:34Notice your hands again. Check whether they've loosened on their own.
1:46Feel the tops of your thighs.
1:56Nothing changes for a moment.
2:05If your mind has gone somewhere else, the floor under you has not moved. Start from there.
2:20Your mind will leave about a hundred times. Come back about a hundred times.
2:34If the strained eyes after screens shows up, let it be there without arguing with it. You are not trying to remove it, just to sit beside it.
2:54the heavy lids of a screen-lit day may quiet down, or it may not. Either is fine. We are practising staying, not performing calm.
3:13Count down from ten, one number per exhale.
3:24You do not have to solve the ache of staring too long in these few minutes. Your only job is to keep breathing while it is here.
3:44If you're sleepy, sit up a little. Or let the sleepiness be there.
3:57Let's pause. Just the breathing for a while.
4:08The floor is holding you right now. You do not have to hold yourself up.
4:22If you're going straight back to work, take ten seconds at the doorway first.
4:36Just the breath, still.

Questions people ask

What does this session help with?

Screens reduce blink rate sharply, and the muscles that focus at close range stay contracted. The result is strain, ache and blur by the end of the day. Closing the eyes is the only real rest they get. A few minutes without visual input is the specific thing your eyes are short of.

Where and when should I do this one?

Do it before eating rather than after, so you are not working against digestion. A break that happens at the same desk is only half a break.

What actually happens during the 5 minutes?

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