The Mindful Migraine

One of the strategies that I have developed that has helped me significantly is ‘feeling my face’.  Wherever you are right now, (whether it’s lying down, sitting, or standing), loosely holds your hands together in front of you.  Now, with your hands staying together – feel your face.  Using nothing but your concentration what do you feel?  Are you frowning?  Squinting your eyes?  Clenching your teeth? 

I was amazed to discover how much tension I held in my face throughout the day.  Almost every time I did the exercise, some part of my face was tense.  On bad days, my face was as wrinkly as a pug puppy, with the skin between my eyes all scrunched up.

Once you’ve done the mental assessment of your face, start to ‘soften’ it.  Again, with nothing other than focused attention, relax your forehead, your jaw, your mouth, the muscles around your eyes.  ‘Melt’ the muscles as if they were warm wax.  Let them ‘droop’ or ‘slump’.  You’re trying to obtain a ‘resting face’ that is actually at rest.  If you want, you can add a gentle smile.  The more you do it throughout the day, the better you will get at relaxing even the micro-tensions that have built up in your face. 

Once you’ve got good at ‘feeling your face’ you can extend the approach to ‘feeling your body’ (melting the tension out of your neck and shoulders etc), and potentially even ‘feeling your life’ (getting used to identifying and reducing the tension in your daily routine that triggers a migraine).

Elsewhere on the blog you’ll find links to explain ‘face massages’.  They will help you ‘feel your face’ in a more hands on way.

Take care, Linda.