Many years ago, I took a class on mindfulness. In it I learned that mindfulness is the act of deliberately paying attention in a particular way.
Deliberate and particular. Hmmm.
This particular way involved bringing the attention back to the present moment and being non-judgmental.
One of the exercises that we participated in to hone this skill, was to take a gummy worm and eat it! I should say, we had to eat it…being mindful. Dave Phillips, the MBCT (Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy) instructor had us first just look at the worm. He asked us to notice what it looked like, smelled like. When we thought of eating it, he asked what sensations we felt in our body as we anticipated eating. Once we took a bite, we were instructed to hold it in our mouths and to notice if it was sweet, sour, or salty. To notice what it feels like on the tongue, when you chew it, once it slides down your throat. The exercise was intended to teach us to draw our attention to self. To teach us to notice what happens in our bodies when we experience something.
It’s one thing to think that it’s a splendid idea to slow down and be more mindful, but it’s quite another thing to put it into daily practice!
Jon Kabat-Zinn, a Ph.D. in molecular biology and one of the leading voices in mindfulness work says that, “To be effective, mindfulness requires an embodied engagement on the part of anyone hoping to derive benefit from it.”
In other words, we need to set aside some time and develop a practice!
The practice of mindfulness has been shown to influence one’s health (mental and physical), as well as our happiness and well-being. It is not something that is attained over night but rather established as we commit to practicing it.
So, how do we start?
First, watch this 2 minute video and hear how Jon Kabat-Zinn explains that you are not your thoughts. He talks about how parts of our brain light up when they are on auto-pilot: Mindfulness
Next, practice implementing these small steps into your everyday life:
- Set aside some time. Get into a quiet space, free from distraction and give yourself some time.
- Observe the present moment as it is. The goal is to aim to pay attention to the present moment without judgement.
- Let your judgments roll by. Notice them, make a mental note, then let them pass.
- Return to observing the present moment as it is. You have a puppy dog brain. It sees something “shiny” and loses its attention. That is why mindfulness is the practice of returning to the moment again and again.
- Be kind to your wandering mind. Don’t judge yourself for whatever thoughts crop up, notice them and gently bring yourself back to the moment. (www.mindful.org)
Finally, if you feel like you would like to explore this a little further, take a look at more of Jon Kabat-Zinn’s work and try one of the online Guided Meditations .
“Mindfulness is like watching the stream of consciousness rather than swimming in it and being buffeted by its eddies and currents.”
To close, I saw a post on the Humans of New York Facebook page today. Do you follow it? If you don’t, I encourage you too. There are raw, beautiful and thought provoking stories of people lives. This was today’s post and I found it quite fitting for this blog:
“If I think back I get depressed, if I think ahead I get afraid.”
Depression can live in the past, anxiety lives in the future. This is all the more reason to practice mindfulness and live in the moment instead. xo
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