mindfulness

Beginning Practice

Practice.

Beginning a meditation practice can be daunting. I have often heard, “Oh, I stopped because I couldn’t stop thinking,” or a similar statement. It’s a challenging stigma to overcome — meditation doesn’t mean your mind is blank, and it means we can lose the attachment to the thinking mind; we release the attachment to the thought.

When I was first dipping my toes into the meditation pool, the easiest way I found was to view my thoughts as just something happening.

Like this: When you have a thought (it doesn’t matter what it is!), say to yourself, “there goes a thought,” and I guarantee you’ll have another one following right behind-“oh, look more thoughts.”

Thoughts come and go all day long. It’s not necessarily the thoughts that cause us stress but the attachment to specific thoughts. Replaying stressful situations or worrying about the future are both forms of this attachment.

Meditation allows us to learn how to find space and release our attachment to constant mind chatter. Over time, with consistent practice, we are able to sit with a calm mind. Outside meditation, the chatter quiets down, loses its hold on us, and we begin to live more mindfully with less attachment, stress, and worry.

If you are just beginning your practice, I recommend guided meditations as they provide a focal point for the mind’s eye. I have some short guided meditations, perfect for beginners or seasoned meditators, available on Insight Timer for you to explore.

Once comfortable with guided practice, try sitting for 1 minute. Yes, only 1. Trust me. Set a timer. It’s longer than you think if you are not used to sitting quietly. The first time I attempted this, I lasted about 35 seconds before checking the timer!

Patience. Practice. Perseverance.

Namaste.

Intention

 /inˈten(t)SH(ə)n/

noun

a thing intended; an aim or plan. “she was full of good intentions”

  2. MEDICINE; the healing process of a wound.

I have realized that the power of intention can dynamically impact your life, but never more so than in these last couple of months. I have experienced a tremendous energy shift due to my intentions. Over the next month, I will share how setting an intention daily has opened me to new experiences and opportunities and how intention can help you shift not only your perspective but your life.

Now a little about the first definition of intention, and in the next blog post, we will take a look at the concept of intention as medicine and its healing effects.

Merriam-Webster defines intention as a determination to act in a certain way; what one intends to do or bring about; and the object for which a prayer, mass, or pious act is offered. Most are familiar with setting an intention, but how does it work?

Manifesting intention has to do with the power of thought. Our thoughts are energy, and every thought we have puts energy into the world, gently influencing the nature of existence and our view of reality.

Here is a simple example. We have all woken up grumpy at some point and decided it would be a miserable day; everything that can go wrong does go wrong kind of day…. that is intention in action. Our first thoughts in the morning set the tone for the entire day.

I am far from a morning person. Yet, I recognize that it will be miserable if I am grumpy every morning because I have to get up earlier than I would like to get to work on time. Grumpy mornings lead to grumpy commutes and gloomy work days, which turn into weeks and years. Is that really how I want my life to be? Complaints every day because I have to wake up at 5:15?

HELL NO!

Do you know what to do? We make a CONSCIOUS CHOICE to be grateful every morning. If we wake up, AWESOME, that means we are still alive! YAY! BE GRATEFUL! That simple.

Waking up grateful does not ensure a pleasant day, but it is the first step to realizing we can INTEND how our day will go. You can try it for a week. As soon as you wake up, before you get out of bed, be grateful for something. Say, “I am grateful for _________.”

Want a simple suggestion to start with? Try “I am grateful for my breath.” Notice if this allows you to be more mindful of your breath during the day. Do you find yourself breathing more deeply, more diaphragmatic breathing?

Take note of any subtle shift in awareness that may occur.

…and I’ll be back to see how you did and tell you how setting an intention in the morning changed my life in 1 short month! Until then…..

Magic

There is ★𝙈 𝘼 𝙂 𝙄 𝘾 ★ in the ordinary. Being present in the moment- 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘯𝘰𝘸 -is where spontaneous joy arises.
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Meditation can help us become comfortable with stillness. It gives us practice being in the moment.
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Over time we begin to notice that every part of our day can become our practice. We can mindfully make our beds, prepare our food, read to our children.
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We begin to live in the now, no longer dwelling in the past or worrying about the future.
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We live in the ★𝙈 𝘼 𝙂 𝙄 𝘾 ★ of now.
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Now to be completely honest while in the middle of writing this, I had to stop to clean up dog puke. It doesn’t get much more ordinary than that!🤣 But if we learn to laugh in these moments -when we can see the absurdity of life in all its splendor AND in all it’s hardships- we realize it is all 𝗣𝗟𝗔𝗬.

That’s the whole point of mindfulness- discovering the magic in every moment of your life- whether cleaning up dog puke or falling in love, there’s always magic to be found.

Where do you experience 𝙈𝘼𝙂𝙄𝘾 in your daily life?

This is the essence of MINDFULNESS. We move though each moment authentically, with intention. Of course this does not happen over night. In our fast paced world, we are inundated with technology that demands our attention, yet our attention spans have dwindled, our patience eroded away by perceived instant gratification.

What does it mean to be MINDFUL? …and almost more importantly, WHY should we practice mindfulness?

We are going to delve into these two questions today and hopefully discover simple ways to practice mindfulness daily. First, I would like to share some background as to how and why I began to cultivate a mindfulness practice over 12 years ago.

Simply put, I was a mess. I had allowed health issues to cause extra stress and frequent stress reactions in multiple areas of my life. I was not THRIVING. Deep down I knew something needed to change but was not sure where or how to begin. Then I came across a book by Thich Nhat Hanh, The Miracle of Mindfulness and everything changed.

I think I read the book cover to cover in two days. Thich Nhat Hanh had provided me with a new perspective. Something that should have been plain to see. Everything we do should have our full attention. Everything.

In the book, a question was posed: “Why do you wash the dishes?” Most people, including myself 12 plus years ago, would answer “Well, to get them clean of course!” However that is not the reason Thich gives us. We “wash the dishes to wash the dishes.” Think about that for a minute.

When washing the dishes, or car, or whatever; our focus, our attention should be on the task at hand, not the outcome. When we place significance only on the outcome, we are not living intentionally in the moment. Instead we hitch our happiness to an unpredictable future event.

Thus we miss out on the experience. We wind up reminiscing about the past or worring about the future while our NOW passes us by. Which brings us to our WHY? Why should we be praticing mindfulness? Becuase the alternative is to live mindlessly in the past or future; to be awash in stress or worry. We have a choice in each moment to be present and aware. But it takes PRACTICE.

We have now arrived at the WHAT. What is mindfulness practice. Well, it could simply be washing the dishes or attentively listening to a piece of music. It is moving from moment to moment with attention, focus, and intention.

Practice daily. Begin slowly. Pick a activity you enjoy doing and notice if your mind drifts. If your attention wavers, gently refocus your attention back to your activity. Personally, I began with mindful walking. Learning to notice the feeling as each foot makes contact with the ground. Noticing the pattern of my breath while immersed in the sounds of nature. This is still one of my favorite activities- I love being barefoot in order to really experience that contact with the earth! When I can’t go barefoot, I wear Vibram Five Fingers —barefoot feel with sole protection!

How much time do we spend inattentively adrift? Which senses are being ignored when we stare into our phones for hours? What moments are we missing when we ruminate worriedly about the future? Mindfulness bring us back to ourselves, back to the moment.

Remember, each moment of our lives is a beautiful , once in a lifetime sensory experience.