A persistent sensation can become harder to live with when it is treated as a continuing threat. The more threatening it seems, the more attention it demands, and the tension, resistance and predictions that gather around it become part of what you are carrying. This practice separates the sensation itself from everything that has built up around it. The aim is not to remove the sensation, but to stop adding to it.

In this exercise you will bring your attention to the familiar area of discomfort and observe what is actually there, without trying to change it. You will describe the physical sensation quietly to yourself, where it is, whether it is sharp or dull, constant or intermittent, localized or spread out. Then you will notice your reaction to it, checking for clenching, bracing, shallow breathing, or the effort of pushing it away, and let unnecessary tension relax on one steady breath. Next you will notice the story attached to the sensation, that it will never change, that it will get worse, that you cannot handle it, and recognize those as thoughts rather than as the sensation. Where it is accurate for this familiar sensation, you will remind yourself that this is discomfort and not a current danger. Then you will let it be present without measuring every moment of it, and widen your attention to include your breathing, the support beneath your body and the sounds around you, so the discomfort becomes one part of the present moment rather than the whole of it. At the end you will return briefly and notice whether its intensity, the tension around it, or its hold on your attention has shifted.