Think of props as the equivalent of simplifying your to-do list — they gift you the opportunity to stop struggling against yourself, your ego, and overwhelming sensory information so you can give your attention more fully to the nuances of your internal experience.

It’s really easy to confuse brain business with body presence. Brain business (or brain presence, if you will) is you trying to tangle intellectually with whatever’s happening — trying to puzzle over it, work it out, or solve it. Body presence is literally being with it. Noticing the sensation and your breath, and then whatever happens next. Not trying to exert force or make it into anything in particular. It’s riding the wave with wide open inner eyes.