More about Mindfulness
Living a mindful life can be expressed in only six words: understand, feel and practice, repeated over and over.
Mindfulness
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Understanding ourselves generates self-compassion. The more we understand and have compassion for ourselves, the more we are able to offer understanding and compassion to others. One of the many understandings that practicing mindfulness helps us to appreciate about ourselves is the universal phenomena of the wandering mind. Having this understanding allows us to accept this reality and work with the repeated focusing and re-focusing of attention. When our mind wanders we simply note where our attention has gone without expending energy to repress or suppress thoughts or feelings, and come back again and again to the object of our attention - which is classically our breath.
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Mindfulness
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Practicing mindfulness involves both formal and informal practices including meditation, mindful eating and mindful communication. It is through repeated practice that habits develop and skill emerges.
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Our feelings, often intimately interwoven in our perceptions, how we see things, or don't see them, determines in large measure how we respond. It is not the circumstances in our lives that cause stress, but rather how we relate to them that has the power to trigger or not trigger a stress reaction. The triggering of stress reactions has a powerful influence on both our short and long term health - physically, mentally and emotionally. By choosing to mindfully notice, observe and pay attention to our perceptions, we afford ourselves the opportunity to respond thoughtfully instead of reacting unconsciously. This ability, the skill to choose to respond, and how and when to respond, is pivotal for effective sustained stress management.
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Mindfulness
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The best way to arrive at the place of meditation is to not try to get anywhere, rather to simply let go.
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Our bodies have a wonderful non-conceptual language and intelligence; mindful meditation helps us access this.
