I first heard about the 555 meditation technique in Garrison Keillor’s Thanksgiving monologue on Prairie Home Companion last fall. He described a teenaged girl who used it to relax when she was playing the piano (if you listen to the Real Audio of the show, the description begins at the 4:15 minute mark). Towards the end of the show, he paints a scene of her dad using it to calm his anger towards his brother at Thanksgiving dinner (13:30 minute mark).
The idea is simple: quiet the noise in your head (especially if it’s producing anxiety, tension, fear, anger) by making a mental list of five things you see, then five things you feel, and five things you hear. (If possible, you can list five things you smell, too, but that’s pretty rare.)
I first started using the technique if I found myself getting nervous before a racquetball game. It’s more effective than just trying to do abdominal breathing and muscle relaxation. My busy, noisy brain tends to win out over those techniques. Lately, I’ve also started to use it at other times during the day — while shaving and doing other bathroom sink duties in the morning, going out in the garage to get in the car, walking anywhere, doing household chores like vacuuming or doing the garbage. It’s turning out to be a good way for me to both quiet the noise in my head and take more notice of the world around me and its small pleasures.
Like Ferris Bueller said: “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it.”