Practising Mindfulness

Category: Mindfulness Training

  • Mindful of Others

    It’s very easy to forget that mindfulness includes the awareness of how others choose to behave

    For some time now I’ve followed a rule that concerns the preservation of my own wellbeing. After all, if I’m going to look after my mind, through the process of mindful awareness, then it naturally follows, that I must be mindful of the behaviour of others towards me.

    The rule is simple: If others are unable to respect my time, privacy and feelings, they will fail to gain my attention

    This is important because – just as you should – I believe my time, privacy and feelings need protecting. They are important. Important, because how we use these things, determines are general wellbeing. The loss of my attention, as is the loss of anyone’s (that we may have fought hard to gain in the first place), is also something I believe others should be cautious of.

    We all have something valuable to teach each other

    If you no longer have my attention, it could well mean that your suffering will remain unaltered. We can all change the suffering of each other. Some can make this worse, some can improve our lives. Ceasing watching the news is good example of this. Since I’ve stopped watching or listening to the news my mindset has changed for the better.

    Privacy must be respected because this is a direct reflection on how important we believe time to ourselves is. Your time must be respected because time is very precious. Time is all we have. Feelings must be respected because they influence our choices and thinking.

    Feelings must be understood if we desire control over our thinking and choices. If others are unable to respect your feelings it reflects on how they understand the importance of their own. If this is lacking, spending time with such people will prove stressful. It’s very easy to dismiss these words as unimportant, yet if you want wellness, always remember to be mindful of others.

  • Abhaya: Non Fear

  • Personal Growth and Mindfulness

    Personal growth cannot happen until we’re aware of our thoughts and the processes involved

    When we think about it there’s a certain logic in the above statement. How can it be possible to walk the path of personal growth without first becoming aware of what drives us?

    And when I ask what drives us, I’m not asking about the motivation behind embarking on personal growth. What I’m really asking is: What drivings do you have that you’re currently unaware of?

    Once we become mindful of our thoughts we increase the likelihood of recognising those thoughts, that our own minds have designed, to scupper our chances of growing.

    Discovering the nature of our thoughts and then tracing them back to what we believe, and where these beliefs came from, enables us to take control.

    We’re in control because we’ve made ourselves consciously aware, not only of the thoughts, but the nature of them. Are our thoughts limiting or empowering? Positive or negative? What are the beliefs that drive them?

    Yes it is this simple. Never assume though, that just because it’s possible to sum up what we must do in a few sentences, that it’s going to be easy.

    In fact taking control of mind can be very challenging. Isn’t this what life is about? Being challenged at every step? Indeed it is. I doubt you’d be interested if it was easy.

    And consider the rewards of being in control of your mind. Your mind is the only thing you’ll ever be in control of. Your choices are what make the difference.

    And improving the quality of your choices begins by become aware of your thinking and the drivers; Beliefs.

  • Destress Through Mindfulness

    When we’re mindful and focused on those things that really matter we automatically care less about the things that don’t

    It is important to bear in mind that the statement above is empty unless we become actively involved in learning how to improve our ability to be mindful.

    To be mindful simply means to be aware. Aware of the present moment. To be this way we will need to train the mind in certain ways to improve our mental fitness.

    Keeping the mind aware and present takes a lot of mental energy. If the mind isn’t fit it will have become undisciplined.

    The natural tendency is for the mind to follow the path of least resistance and in this way it conserves energy.

    If the mind is unfit this becomes ever more the habit. Our thoughts drift and wonder because the mind is lazy in its habits.

    To be present and aware (alive) we need mental fitness. This is achieved through learning the ancient art of meditation.

    One of the simplest disciplines to learn yet one of the hardest to follow if we are lazy. Bit of a paradox there I feel.

    The solution is the need to improve. We must want an improved quality of life. We must want to be fully alive

    If you are stressed and dissatisfied with your lot, by simply allowing the mind to lazily follow the path of least resistance, nothing will change.

    Except the fact that you’re getting older, that is.

    Life may well just pass you by as your mind wonders off into the past, future or fantasy.

    At the risk of sounding like I’m repeating myself, when we’re able to bring the mind constantly back to the things that are important to us, we will automatically care less about the things that don’t.

  • Something from Nothing

    How can something come from nothing? What happened before time? What was there before the birth of the universe? Can something really come from nothing?

    I sense my addiction to stimulation on a constant basis. Indeed there was a time when my need for stimulation was at the extreme end of the scale. I needed chaos. I needed mania. There had to be something going on constantly. And if not I would find a way to create the chaos I craved. Drama. Oh yes please.

    Imagine coming to the understanding that the thing you prided yourself on (thinking) has actually been the cause of your troubles.

    I used to spend a lot of time in my head. Loneliness will cause this. Thinking, judging, ruminating, puzzling, questioning on and on and on. Constant chatter and deliberation. Chaos in my head and chaos in my life. So here is the solution . . . nothing.

    In my current role I spend a lot of time doing nothing. There are periods of time when I don’t see a customer for days. This can be excruciating for someone who needs stimulation.

    There is a need to keep the mind occupied if you’re addicted to stimulation. This can take the form of thinking or perhaps reading or watching something. Anything to take the mind out of the present moment. Because in the present moment there is nothing happening. And for me, purely because of my addiction, this nothing can be very tricky to deal with. There is even the possibility I’ll look to fill this nothing with eating! Again my addiction to sugar kicks in. Can you gain a sense of my dilemma?

    A dilemma until I find myself able to cope with nothingness in the present moment. And then something does come from nothing . . . calm control over my mind and my beautiful life.

    Learn to improve mindfulness from the gentle art of meditation

  • Carrying Suffering that has no Place in the Here and Now

    Something that has come to light recently for me is the subject of suffering. In particular, I’ve become aware of the possibility, that I’ve been hanging on to suffering that occurred many years ago. To some extent we all do this. Can becoming aware, that we haven’t fully resolved and let go of past suffering, instigates the process of change?

    There is no doubt in my mind that if we continue to hold on to suffering from the past, it will reveal itself to us in ways that bring suffering, in the present

    Put simply, if we fail to resolve and let go of the past, our health will suffer. And in the present moment this might manifest as backache, hypertension, headaches, joint pain, obesity . . . you name it. As the saying goes: ‘The body weeps the tears the eyes refuse to shed.’

    We must find a way to extinguish the pain of the past. This can be achieved through firstly becoming ware of it, and then accepting it as past. It has no place or bearing on the present. It has no bearing on the present because it no longer exists. It is an imagined past (that could well be misremembered anyway) just as the future is imagined. We must also stop blaming the people and situations of the past. Constantly blaming our difficulties on the circumstances we faced in the past only exacerbates our problems. It never helps to seek blame.

    The present moment, void of past and future thinking, can create a beautiful freedom. Logical thinking can sometimes be very beneficial

    We can ask ourselves: how is it I still feel guilty for the mistakes I made all those years ago? The answer may well be that we’ve failed to acknowledge them and accept; that was then and this is now. That was what I was learning at that time. For some reason, only known to yourself, the mind sees a benefit to holding on and replaying the past. Guilt and self-pity can do this.

    In the same way we hold on to suffering from the past, are our expectations, concepts and ideas (beliefs) of happiness stuck there also?

    A common mistake is to assume that the conditions for happiness, we found when young, should remain the same throughout life. This cannot be the case. We have grown and therefore the conditions we have for happiness must evolve also. If we continue to seek the same conditions (imagined or real) in ways we did as a child, it simply won’t work. We’ll never fully realise our true self: A happiness that can come from within. Ponder for a moment: what conditions need to arise for me to feel well now? Now that I am grown what conditions must I maintain to bring out a true sense of joy?

  • Self-awareness & Objectivity with Mindfulness

    I noticed in the news today that the mother of a child that was murdered by fellow students wants mindfulness introduced into schools. The story doesn’t make it clear what she believes there is to gain from this and I can only imagine it’s the following:

    Mindfulness increases self-awareness through our ability to see ourselves objectively

    Although this is the case, for children who have murder on their minds, for objectivity to be a preventative measure, these children would firstly need some comparisons and of course a developed sense of wrong and right. They would need a developed understanding of cause and effect. They would also initially need to care about whether their actions are wrong or right. Does self-awareness and objectivity award this to a child?

    My personal feeling is that it would need to be the parents, carers or those responsible for murderous children, to be the ones who’re more mindful

    Mindful parents are those who’re aware of what children’s minds are exposed to and the effects of this exposure. Mindful children who’ve been exposed to – and consequently instilled with – prejudices, hatred and the belief violence is a solution, will still commit murder. In fact, it might even make them better at it. Mindfulness training for children, on its own, would be insufficient.

  • Improved Empathy with Mindfulness

    So often when in conversation we’re not fully attentive to the talker. The story of what we believe about the person begins to play out in our minds, and not only this, our attention is directed toward what it is we need to say to reinforce our position and beliefs. Our resistance to fully listening to the talker is due to our need to compound our own identity. To do this we judge and compare. With all this noise internally it really is a wonder we hear anything.

    So rather than this, when we listen mindfully – have our attention 100% fixed on the talker without our own dialog interfering – we will notice something remarkable

    Without your internal script – your own story, resistance, judgements and comparisons – going on in the background, this renewed stillness, opens up your empathic responses. You will begin to feel the other person and they will respond accordingly. Favourably. It’s a win win situation.

    Silence your internal noise through mindfulness. You will improve your empathy toward others – your experience of people – and they will feel loved, and above all, deeply heard.

  • Calm and Untroubled Because I am Mindful

    What is it that causes anxiety? What is it that causes fear? How is it I fret and worry?

    It is my mind. It is my thoughts. For when my mind is still, there is no fear. There is no anger, worry, or anxiety. What remains is a beautiful feeling of serenity. Heaven on earth. A place I’ve found from within.

    It may take some time to reach this place, and when you do, you may wonder why it has taken so long to find such a simple solution. Stop questioning even this. Dismiss it as unimportant. What matters is that you are finally here.

  • Catch your Destructive Thoughts

    It is possible to catch our destructive thoughts before they become actions. To achieve this, we must practise. We must learn to Meditate, and we must then turn our improved mental strength into everyday Mindfulness. We must be dogged and determined if we are to improve our mental health and quality of life

    It may seem like an oversimplification to say the cause of our troubles, lies within our thinking, and yet this is an inescapable truth. The tendency with sitting Meditation is for us to not practise. We must. And we must practise every day if we are to gain the life changing ability of catching our thoughts.