body scan – Page 2 – Grow Mindfulness

Meditation on Courage

Diana Winston recently offered a guided meditation on the topic, “Mindfulness, Courage and RBG” in honour of the life of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg of the US Supreme Court who died on 18 September 2020 at the age of 87. RBG was a popular figure admired for her intellectual prowess and fierce determination to support the rights of women and native Americans. During her tenure as a Supreme Court judge she tirelessly opposed gender discrimination and supported the right of women to have an abortion. She changed the course of the American legal system through her dissenting judgements including her influential role in the development of the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009.

In her meditation podcast, Diana portrayed Justice Ginsburg as the epitome of courage – displaying “strength of heart” in the face of powerful opposition and ongoing difficulties and challenges. Despite being daunted by the task ahead, Justice Ginsburg pursued her convictions over a lifetime and took each step towards realisation of her goals even in the face of fear. Although she was a “tiny person” she was a very deliberate and articulate person who had a “commanding presence”. These characteristics were lauded by Judy Cohen and Betsy West, filmmakers and directors of the 2018 film on Justice Ginsburg’s extraordinary life, simply titled RBG.

Courage meditation

Diana begins her courage meditation podcast (at the 5-minute mark) by encouraging relaxed breathing and a body scan followed by a focus on sounds. She uses these initial processes to help you achieve grounding in the moment.

Diana then asks you to recall a moment when you displayed courage in the face of strong opposition, challenges, and difficulties. Your display of courage might involve a single event in your life or a protracted effort to achieve some level of justice, equity, or recognition. It might have occurred in a work context, within your family environment, in a not-for-profit endeavour or in a sporting context. Diana suggests that if you cannot think of when you displayed courage in your own life, you might reflect on the courageous life of Justice Ginsburg.

In the latter stages of the meditation, Diana asks you to capture what it felt like in mind and body to display courage and resilience in a challenging situation. This reflection could generate both positive emotions (e.g. a sense of achievement/contribution) and a challenging emotion such as resentment (for the opposition you experienced). It is important to be with these emotions and capture the whole-body experience of being courageous.

Reflection

Once we have captured what it means to be courageous in our lives, it is worth reflecting on what things/issues/ideals motivated us to be proactive in the face of challenging odds. As we grow in mindfulness and self-awareness, we are better able to tap into what provides the energy for us to initiate and/or sustain courageous action. We can gain a greater insight into our life purpose, our innate creativity, and our capacity to make a difference in our own life and that of others.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Benefits of Body Scan Meditations

Body Scan meditations take many forms but typically involve a process of progressive noticing of parts of the body, usually beginning with the feet. A body scan meditation can be undertaken anywhere or at any time and can be brief or extended. One of its advantages is that it can be easily integrated into other forms of mindfulness practices such as gratitude meditation or loving-kindness meditation. It can also be undertaken while lying down or sitting on a chair (e.g. in a workplace). A powerful example of the benefits of this form of meditation is provided by Tara Healey who offers a guided meditation incorporating a 10-minute full body scan.

What are the benefits of body scan meditations?

There are many benefits that accrue from this form of meditation and these benefits are typically mutually reinforcing. I will discuss several of the benefits here, but the real test is to try different forms of body scan and select one that is appropriate for the time you have available and your needs at the time. A daily practice will be habit forming so that in times of stress you can automatically drop into a body scan.

Relaxation: the body scan is often described as a form of progressive relaxation as you consciously progress from your feet to your head paying attention to parts of your body, e.g. your toes on your left foot. The very act of noticing serves to relax the different parts of the body as you progress. Michelle Maldonado, when discussing self-care, suggests that a body scan can be used by people who have difficulty going to sleep in these challenging times.
Tension release: some forms of body scan involve identifying different parts of the body where tension is being experienced in the form of tightness, ache, pain, or soreness. This approach involves noticing these specific physical tension points so that you can consciously release them. Because of the close mind-body connection, the release of physical tension can also serve to lessen sources of mental tension such as anxiety, fear or worry. Deepak Chopra maintains that “there is no mental event that doesn’t have a biological correlate” – in other words, our thoughts and feelings are automatically manifested in our body.
Body awareness: as you develop the habit of a body scan, you increase your body awareness. Some forms of this meditation focus on body sensations as you progress through the scan. In this way, you become more conscious of how your body is reacting to your daily experiences – often an aspect of your daily living that is outside conscious awareness. Thus, the body scan is a route to developing mindfulness through heightening awareness of your body and its various sensations.
Being present: body scan helps you to be in-the-moment, not distracted by thoughts of the past or anxiety about the future. Focusing on body sensations such as heat or energy in various parts of your body (such as when your fingers touch), can enable you to become really grounded in the present moment.
Building capacity to focus: the act of conscious noticing of parts of the body, builds the capacity to focus – a key component of achieving excellence in any endeavour. Learning to pay attention to what is going on in your body builds your awareness muscle and can help to reduce debilitating habits such as procrastination.
Developing self-awareness: this is a key element in the process of developing self-regulation. As you develop self-awareness, you become more conscious of what triggers negative emotions for you and are better able to build your response-ability, thus controlling how you respond in specific situations. You can become aware, for example, that particular situations make you “uptight” and learn what it is about those situations that contribute to your body and mental stress.
Dealing with trauma: body scan is a form of somatic meditation that is often employed in helping people who have suffered trauma or adverse childhood experiences. Trauma and associated experiences leave deep imprints on your body, and mindfulness activities such as body scan can help to reduce this scarring and release harmful emotions.

Reflection

There are many benefits that accrue from the use of body scan meditations. However, the benefits are intensified with daily practice. As we grow in mindfulness through body scan meditations, we can develop self-awareness, release tension, improve self-regulation, build our body awareness, and heighten our capacity to be in the present moment. In this way, we can learn to focus our mind and energy and overcome the dissipating effects of distractions and challenging emotions.

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Image by John Hain from Pixabay

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Forgiveness: A Reflection

In a previous post I discussed an important topic, Don’t Wait to Forgive, based on the book by Frank Ostaseski, The Five Invitations. Forgiveness is something that we tend to put off because it is too self-revealing and painful. Frank suggests that we have to face up to who we really are and not who we project ourselves to be. We have to look in the mirror, not into an internally fabricated image that shows ourselves in the best possible light. The honesty required is disarming and can be disturbing. Experience and research suggest that some principles can help us along the way:

Be grounded and relaxed – Forgiveness is a difficult pursuit at the best of times. However, if you are agitated or highly distracted, it is extremely difficult to focus on forgiving yourself or someone else. The starting point is to become grounded and relaxed. Grounding in the present moment can involve tapping into your breath, your bodily sensations or the sounds around you. I find sometimes that sounds can themselves be distracting because I am always trying to interpret them. I like using a particular body sensation as a means of grounding, e.g. the sensation of fingers on both hands touching. I find that I can use this practice anywhere, whether waiting for something or someone, or beginning a meditation. It can quickly induce relaxation and focus for me. Each person will have their preferred approach to grounding and relaxation – for some people, it may involve a full body scan to identify and release tension.
Manage distractions – Distractions are a natural, human frailty – they pull us away from our focus. However, they can be more persistent and intensive when we are trying to focus on forgiveness because of the level of discomfort that we may feel when dealing with our shame. Having a “home” or anchor such as our breath can enable us to restore our focus. Persistence in returning to our focus builds our “attention muscle” over time – a necessary strength if we are to progress in our goal of developing forgiveness.
Start small – Self-intimacy around our need for forgiveness (for the multiple ways in which we have hurt others) can be overwhelming if we take on too much at once. When you think about it, our need for forgiveness can be pervasive – impacting every facet of our interactions in close relationships, with work colleagues or with strangers in the street or shops. We can think of times when we have interrupted someone, ignored people, been harsh towards them or spoken ill of them. There are times when we have taken out our frustration or anger on someone who is not the trigger for our difficult emotions. We can begin by focusing on a small, recent incident where we have caused hurt or harm to someone and gradually build to more confronting issues, situations or emotions. Mitra Manesh in her guided meditation podcast on forgiveness suggests that a simple way to start might be to bring a particular person to mind and mentally say, “For all the pain and suffering I may have caused you, I ask for your forgiveness”. This kind of catch-all statement avoids going into all the detail of an interaction. Sometimes we can become distracted by what Diana Winston describes as “being lost in the story” – we can end up recalling blow by blow what happened, indulging in blame and self-righteousness. Forgiveness is not a process of justifying our words or actions.
Forgiveness is healing for ourselves – We have to bring loving kindness to our forgiveness practice whatever form it takes – loving kindness for our self as well as for the person we are forgiving. The process is not designed to “beat up on” our self but to face up to the reality of what we have said or done or omitted to do that has been hurtful for someone else. It’s releasing that negative, built-up energy that is stored in difficult emotions and is physically, mentally and emotionally harmful to our self. It is recognising that holding onto regret, anger, resentment or guilt can be toxic to our overall wellness. However, like giving up smoking, it takes time, persistence and frequent revisiting of our motivation.

As we grow in mindfulness and self-awareness through meditation, reflection and daily mindfulness practices, we can learn to face up to our real self and our past and seek forgiveness. However challenging this may be, we need to begin the journey for our own welfare and that of others we interact with. Diana Winston in her forgiveness meditation podcast reminds us that mindfulness involves “being in the present moment with openness and curiosity” together with a “willingness to be with what is” – it entails honest self-exploration. She cites Lily Tomlin who maintains that forgiveness involves “giving up all hope for a better past” – seeing our past with clear sight and honesty.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Self-Compassion in Times of Uncertainty and the Coronavirus

There are many people offering ways to manage anxiety and fear in these times of uncertainty brought on by the global Coronavirus. Psychologist Rick Hanson, for example, provides multiple online mindfulness resources including the Wise Brain Bulletin. In the latest issue (Volume 14.2), Kristin Neff and Chris Germer offer 10 self-compassion practices for self-management during this time of the pandemic. Self-compassion is about being compassionate towards ourselves despite our mistakes, deficiencies and perceived weaknesses. It takes time and effort to build self-compassion, particularly if we are used to negative self-talk, berating ourselves for our mistakes or constantly comparing ourselves to others (and coming up short in our own estimation).

Elsewhere, Kristin provides a video explanation of the concept of self-compassion, discusses the three components of self-compassion and offers exercises on how to develop each of these. She also offers a range of guided meditations and exercises on the website for the Center for Mindful Self-Compassion. Kristin and Chris are co-developers of the Mindful Self-Compassion (MSP) Program designed for those who want to explore more fully the richness of this mindfulness approach. They are very well qualified to teach mindfulness and compassion (for ourselves and others).

Additional Approaches to developing self-compassion

There are multiple resources and exercises available to help you build self-compassion. Some that are very accessible and easy to use are:

Compassionate body scan: a 20-minute progressive body scan that focuses attention on different parts of the body and treats each part of the body with kind awareness and tension release. The guided body scan is offered in separate audio recordings by both Kristin and Chris.
Mood tracking: an essential element in building the self-awareness necessary for developing self-compassion and improved mental health. There are many mood tracker apps that help you identify your triggers and enable you to gain control over your emotional responses. Steve Scott provides a review of the 14 best mood tracker apps available today. These apps provide a ready means of tracking stimuli and your responses in terms of moods/feelings.

Reflection

Self-compassion is the antidote to negative self-evaluation, just as gratitude and savouring what we have reduces competitive comparison and envy. As we grow in mindfulness and self-compassion through meditation, mindfulness practices/exercises and reflection on the triggers that precipitate our strong emotional responses, we can progressively develop self-intimacy and the self-regulation necessary to identify our negative triggers and control our responses.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Developing Kindness through Meditation

Neuroscientists tell us that we become what we focus on because the act of focusing and paying attention creates new or deepened neural pathways in our brain. So if we are constantly obsessed with criticism – finding fault – then this stance begins to pervade our whole life, and nothing will ever satisfy us. So too if we develop kindness through meditation, our thoughts and actions become kinder towards ourselves and others.

Diana Winston, Director of Mindfulness Education at the Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC) at UCLA, offers a specific guided meditation designed to develop kindness. This meditation podcast is one of the weekly podcasts offered by Diana or one of her colleagues on a weekly basis through MARC – drawing on personal experience, dedicated research and the wisdom of the global mindfulness community. The kindness meditation as with most MARC meditations begins with being grounded and then moves to offering kindness to ourselves followed by kindness to others.

Becoming grounded in meditation

There are multiple ways to become grounded – becoming focused, still and fully present. Often, we can start with deep breathing to enable our body and mind to relax and increase awareness of our bodily sensations. This enables our focus to move inwards and away from the distractions and intensity of the day – away from the anxiety, negative thoughts and worries associated with meeting deadlines, doing presentations, dealing with conflict or challenging interactions with colleagues or salespeople in stores and supermarkets.

Once we gain some sense of balance and ease with deep breathing, we can move on to undertake a body scan. This entails progressively noticing the various parts of our body and related bodily sensations, releasing any tension and tightness as we progress. We can observe the firmness of our feet on the floor, straightness of our back, weight of our thighs on the seat, the pressure on our back from the chair and the tingling and warmth from energy flow in our fingers. Observation will lead to awareness of tension which we can release as we go – tautness in our shoulders and arms, rigidity in our stomach, stiffness in our neck or tightness in our jaw, forehead or around the eyes. It is important to focus on tension release and not seek to work out why we are so uptight or tense or, even more importantly, to avoid “beating up” on ourselves or being unkind towards our self because of the “failing” or deficiency” represented by our tension.

Finding our anchor in meditation

The next stage of the meditation is to find an anchor that we can continuously return to in the event of distractions or loss of focus – an anchor to stop us from being carried away by the tide of our thoughts or emotions. An anchor is a personal choice – what works for one person, may not work for another. Typically people choose their breath, sounds in the room or some physical contact point.

You can focus in on your breath – bringing your attention to where you most readily experience breathing – in your chest, through your nose or in your abdomen. For instance, you can increase your awareness of the rise and fall of your abdomen with each breath and choose to rest in the space between your in-breath and out-breath.

Another possible anchor is listening to the sounds in your room – listening without interpreting, not trying to identify the nature or source of a sound and avoiding assigning a feeling, positive or negative, to the sound. You can develop a personal preference for using your “room tone” as your anchor.

Choosing a physical contact point in your body is a useful anchor because it enables you to ground yourself wherever you happen to be – whether at work or home or travelling. It can help you to turn to awareness rather than your phone whenever you have waiting time. An example is to focus on the firmness of your feet on the ground, the floor of your room or the floor of your car (when it is not moving!). My personal preference is to anchor myself by joining my fingers together and feeling the sensations of warmth, energy and strength that course through the points of contact of the fingers.

Whatever you choose as an anchor, the purpose is to be enable you to return your attention to the focus of your meditation and, in the process, build your awareness muscle. As Diana reminds us, “minds do wander” – we can become “lost in thought”, distracted by what’s happening around us, planning our day, worrying about an important meeting, thinking of the next meal, analysing a political situation or indulging in any one of numerous ways that we “live in our minds”.

Throughout the process of grounding, it is important to be kind to our self – not berating our self for inattention or loss of focus, not assigning negative labels to our self, such as “weak”, “distractible”, or any other derogatory term.

Kindness meditation

The kindness meditation begins with focusing on someone who is dear to us – our life partner, a family member, a work colleague or a close friend. Once you have brought the person into focus, the aim is to extend kind intentions to them – you might wish them peace and tranquillity, protection and safety, good health and strength, happiness and equanimity, the ease of wellness or a combination of these desirable states.

You can now envisage yourself receiving similar or different expressions of kind intentions from the same person. This can be difficult to do – so we need to be patient with this step and allow our self to be unsuccessful at the start (without self-criticism or unkindness towards our self). We can try to become absorbed in, and fully present to, the positive feeling of being appreciated and loved. Drawing on our memories of past expressions of kindness by the focal person towards us, can help us overcome the barriers to self-kindness.

You can extend your meditation by focusing your loving kindness meditation on others, particularly those people you have difficulty with or are constantly in conflict with. We can also extend our kindness meditation by forgiving our self and others for hurt that has been caused.

Reflection

Kindness meditation helps us to grow in mindfulness – to become more aware of others, the ways we tend to diminish our self, our bodily sensations and our thoughts and feelings. It assists us to develop self-regulation – learning to maintain focus and attention, controlling our anger and criticism (of our self and others) and being open to opportunities and possibilities. Through the focus on kindness, we can become kinder to our self and others (even those we have difficulty with).

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Image by John Hain from Pixabay

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Ways to Develop Gratitude

In a previous post I offered a specific gratitude meditation presented by Diana Winston through the MARC weekly meditation podcasts. I also mentioned the practice of developing personal reminders to appreciate some aspect of your life – I mentioned in my case using mistakes in tennis (of which there are many) to savour the capacity to run, hit the ball and engage in social activity with friends. Here I would like to discuss different forms of meditation and mindfulness practices that can also assist in developing a deeper sense of gratitude that can increase our enjoyment of life and improve our relationships.

Gratitude meditations and mindfulness practices

Some of these meditations or practices can become part of your daily life or employed on a one-off basis. The important thing is to incorporate some form of gratitude practice on a regular basis because as Jon Kabat-Zin reminds us, “we become what we pay attention to”. So, focusing on gratitude makes us grateful. Here are some relevant meditations/practices:

Loving-kindness meditation – this form of meditation can enable us to appreciate ourselves as we are (rather than wishing we were different) and the people who positively impact our lives. Jon Kabat-Zin provides an all-embracing loving-kindness meditation that extends also to people who may have hurt us and to whoever in the world is in need. Expressing kindness to others engenders appreciation for what we have.
Journalling – there are many forms of gratitude journal that can be used as part of your mindfulness practice. Jason Marsh provides some sound, research-based tips for keeping a gratitude journal – including the benefit of regular, rather daily gratitude journalling. Ryder Carroll in his Bullet Journal Method (pp. 185-187) identifies ways to incorporate gratitude in his approach to journalling. Rick Hanson suggests that a gratitude journal can focus on three simple aspects of your life – things that I am grateful for, people that I appreciate and events that I value. Our journalling can also cover the people in our lives who have imparted their knowledge and experience as mentors, guides, parents, carers or coaches – in Aboriginal terms, it involves expressing appreciation for a Goondeen, a wise person who is a source of wisdom and understanding.
Sharing your gratitude – Tara Brach suggests engaging a gratitude buddy to support your practice of expressing gratitude. She recommends developing the practice of regularly sharing your expressions of gratitude with one other person, e.g. by email or text. Your buddy can support your positive intentions through regular contact.
Appreciating the moment – Nicole Bayes-Fleming offers meditations for “resting in the flow” (19 minutes) and savouring the moment through your senses (5 minutes). These gratitude practices help to displace harmful thoughts and to build appreciation for the simple things in life. Chris Walsh encourages the practice of mindful check-in, particularly during transitions in life, as a way to tap into the benefits of being grateful (including cultivating resilience).
Developing sympathetic joy – this process replaces envy with valuing and rejoicing in the success of others. Johann Hari describes a form of loving-kindness meditation that can develop sympathetic joy by savouring the achievements of others as well your own.
Somatic meditation – developing awareness of your body and bodily sensations. There are various forms of somatic meditation, e.g. lower-belly breathing and body scan. Somatic meditation has proven to be particularly powerful in developing gratitude in times of difficulty.

Reflection

As we grow in mindfulness, we can become aware of the many people and things in our life that we can be grateful for. Focusing regularly on these positive aspects of our daily life can displace negative thoughts and engender the many proven benefits of gratitude.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Paying Attention to Your Breath and Body

Allyson Pimentel, a teacher at the Mindful Awareness Research Centre (MARC), offers a guided meditation podcast on the theme, Mindfulness of the Body and Breath. She explains at the start of the meditation that mindfulness involves paying attention in a particular way that induces ease, restfulness and tranquillity.

Allyson focuses on three elements of paying attention that lead to inner and outer awareness:

Purposefully – paying attention is undertaken consciously with clear intention and purpose
Focusing on the present – paying attention to the present moment, not to what has gone before or to an anticipated future event
Openly – paying attention with curiosity and willingness to be with what is, not ignoring what is unpleasant, painful or challenging.

Allyson reminds us that our breath and our body are always with us in the present moment, even if our mind is continuously wandering with endless thoughts. Our body and breath provide the anchors in the turbulent sea of life.

Allyson cites lines from a poem, “I Go Among the Trees” by Wendell Berry, that capture this stillness:

All my stirring becomes quiet

Around me like circles on water.

My tasks lie in their places

Where I left them, asleep like

cattle…

Guided meditation on your breath and body

The guided meditation provided by Allyson incorporates mindful breathing together with a thorough body scan. After inviting us to sit “upright not uptight”, she encourages us to notice our breathing (its pace, length and evenness). After inviting us to pay attention to our breath, she guides us in a progressive scanning of the body.

Two things that I noticed with the body scan are its completeness and the focus on openness. She guides us to pay attention to our head as well as the rest of our body – top of the head, our forehead, cheeks, eyes, mouth and tongue. While Allyson asks us to release points of tension in our body during the body scan, she also suggests that we notice points of openness once tension has been released.

As we grow in mindfulness through paying attention in the present moment to our body and breath, we can become grounded, release tension in our body and experience the ease of acceptance. We can learn to more skilfully and openly respond to the challenges of the many aspects of our daily life and extend kindness to ourselves and others we encounter. This, in turn, will lead to the experience of equanimity.

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Image by John Hain from Pixabay

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Mindfulness as Self-Observation

Brian Shiers suggests that underpinning mindfulness is self-observation, the foundation of self-awareness. This means, in effect, that there is no one right way to meditate – that paying attention to and noticing ourselves, in whatever way, is essentially mindfulness. While there is a tendency for people new to meditation to judge themselves against a presumed standard, the experience they are having in self-observation is what mindfulness is about, not some prescribed level of awareness. Mindfulness practices are designed to stimulate this curiosity about oneself in an open, exploratory way. Tara Brach describes this lifelong journey as “waking up” – a deep shift in inner awareness that leads to equanimity and increased empathy and compassion.

In a recent guided meditation podcast, Brian asked the question, “What is “Myself”? and he encouraged participants to activate their “observational mind” in a relaxed manner. He maintained that the fundamental question, “What is the “self”? is both an ancient and a recent question (through the pursuit of neuroscience).

Is the “self” my body, my thoughts, my roles I undertake, my affiliations, my emotions or my mind? Brian sited the work of Dan Siegel, a founder of the Mindful Awareness Research Centre (MARC), who believes that the “self” is not only what we are born with, but also the cumulation of billions of impressions that we are exposed to through interactions with others – thus shaping our perceptions and responses. Dan’s perspective reinforces the uniqueness of our “self”. Brian suggests, then, that the self is “intertwined in inter- relationships” – the direct and indirect influence of others throughout our lives.

Researchers have yet to establish what the “mind” is, even with the advent of neuroscience. Brain stated that neuroscientists at Stanford University have estimated that we generate between 65,000 and 90,000 thoughts per day. We are reminded of the admonition of Jon Kabat-Zinn that “you are not your thoughts”, thoughts that come and go like bubbles in boiling water. Brain suggests that the “enterprise of mindfulness” is “self-observation”, including bringing to conscious awareness and guidance, the unconscious, spontaneously occurring thoughts that pervade our minds. So, from Brian’s perspective, mindfulness is the pursuit of self-awareness through observation of the various domains of our existence, including our bodies and our minds.

A process of self-observation

Brian’s guided meditation podcast takes you on a journey of paying attention to your “self” through a process of self-observation of body and mind – noticing your body on the chair, engaging in mindful breathing, noticing your thoughts (but not entertaining them), undertaking a body scan while releasing tension, and participating in a reflection.

The personal reflection involves identifying a positive trait in yourself, e.g. wisdom. loving kindness, gratitude, thoughtfulness or resilience; and exploring how it manifests, its impact on others and how you could further develop this trait. Brian offers some guided questions for the reflection:

What is happening when you exhibit this trait? (you can visualise it happening)
What impact does it have on others?
Who is a role model for you in respect of this trait?
Who could help you develop it?
How can you further develop this positive trait?

As we grow in mindfulness through self -observation during the process of meditation, we can better understand who we are, how we experience the world, and what we bring to our interactions with others. We can also identify strategies to strengthen our positive traits and increase our motivation to use them to create a better life for ourselves and others.

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Image – Personal reflection during sunrise, Wynnum, Brisbane

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Develop Equanimity to Overcome Reactivity

Much of the time we are reactive because of our ingrained habituated responses. These develop over time and can vary with different stimuli – a confronting email, a perception of criticism by a partner or colleague, thoughtlessness by another person or traffic delays. Our responses may be precipitated by negative thoughts that generate emotions such as fear, anxiety, frustration or anger. We then act out these emotions in a reactive way – not stopping to maintain our balance or evaluate the best possible response. As we have mentioned earlier, there is a gap between stimulus and response and within that gap are choices and associated freedom. Developing equanimity helps us to better utilise the gap between stimulus and response and widens our potential response options – as it frees us from being captive to our habituated responses.

Equanimity is being able to maintain a state of calmness, balance or even-mindedness in the face of a situation that we find challenging – physically, mentally or emotionally. It builds our capacity to overcome reactivity and enables us to accept what is, without reacting impulsively. Diana Winston makes the point that equanimity is not passivity – acceptance of what is, does not mean avoiding taking action to redress injustice, insulting behaviour or meanness. What equanimity does mean is acknowledging what is and the inherent challenge (e.g. illness, mental illness of a family member, or loss of a job), not railing against all and sundry for our “misfortune”, but actively pursuing redress – including building our capacity to remain calm in the face of life challenges. Equanimity enables responsiveness that is positive and productive.

A meditation to develop equanimity

Meditation, by its very nature, helps to calm us and, in the process, develop equanimity. Diana Winston, however, provides a specific “equanimity meditation” designed to build our capacity to retain our balance and to remain even minded when confronted with a life challenge. She provides this meditation as part of the weekly guided meditation podcasts provided by the Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC), UCLA. Her guided meditation podcast, Equanimity and Non Reactivity, contains several steps:

Grounding yourself in your chair by adopting a comfortable, upright posture; closing your eyes or looking down; and focusing your intention on the present – not thinking about the past or worrying about what is coming up. Being present-in-the-moment is a calming activity that can build equanimity.
Complete body scan – starting with your feet on the floor (feeling the firmness and envisaging the stable ground below); moving progressively through your body, while noticing and releasing any points of tensions (such as in your neck, shoulders, stomach, legs or hands). You can begin to notice the sensations as you progress with your body scan – feeling the tingling in your fingers or the softness/looseness in your legs as you let go and allow the tension to drain away. During the meditation, it pays to be conscious of a tendency to let your shoulders droop. [Note: this part of the meditation resonates with the first part of the Yoga Nigra Meditation focused on the physical body]
Focus on your breathing – you focus on wherever in your body you can feel the sensation of your breathing, the in and out movement of your stomach or the air passing through your nose. The process involves noticing, not controlling your breathing. You can also rest in the gap between your in-breath and your out-breath. You can extend the observation of your breathing to other parts of your body such as breathing through your mouth.
Noticing sounds – now switch your attention to the sounds within and outside your room. Again, the process involves noticing not interpreting or judging the sounds (whether they are pleasant or grating, for example).
Anchoring yourself – you can choose to focus just on your breath or the sounds or adopt a position of natural awareness where you are open to the sense of being aware. Whatever you choose becomes your anchor that you can return to when your mind wanders. It is natural to have passing thoughts and emotions – the important thing is not to entertain them or indulge them but to acknowledge them, for example, by saying to yourself, “I’m wandering again”. Once you notice and acknowledge your diverting thoughts and/or emotions, you can return to your chosen anchor.
Equanimity meditation – this involves two main parts that focus directly on developing calm, no matter what your stimulus is. The first involves capturing a time when you were able to remain calm and balanced when confronted with a challenge – it is important to visualise the event and recapture the memory in all its richness including the stimulus, your initial thoughts/emotions, how you brought yourself under control and your calm response replacing what normally would have been a reactive response. The second part involves envisaging a challenging situation you have to deal with; identifying what is your “normal” response; and picturing yourself tapping into your boundless internal equanimity, energy and awareness to adopt a response that is both creative and positive.

Diana maintains that this process of equanimity meditation builds your capacity to manage difficult challenges rather than revert to reactivity – that involves adopting habituated responses that are potentially injurious to yourself and others. On a personal note, I like listening to the calmness of Diana’s voice and hearing her highly developed insights as she leads me through a guided meditation process on the weekly podcasts.

As we grow in mindfulness, through meditations such as the equanimity meditation, we can realise a new level of personal resilience through the development of calmness, balance and even-mindedness. We will experience less reactivity in challenging situations and be open to more positive and helpful responses.

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Image – Heron on branch in Wynnum Creek, Brisbane

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Doing That Meaningful Work You Have Been Avoiding

Leo Babauta, creator of the blog Zen Habits, reminds us that we each invariably have one meaningful task, endeavour or initiative that we keep putting off. We find excuses, maintain our busyness, visit the fridge, go out for coffee or adopt any number of tactics to avoid facing up to the challenge of doing the one meaningful thing that we know we ought to do. Leo describes this process of procrastination as our “habituated avoidance.”

What meaningful work are you avoiding?

Your avoidance may relate to developing a solution to a seemingly intractable problem; doing that significant blog post about a controversial topic; engaging with a particular ethnic group; volunteering your services to a charity; offering a special service to a group in need; joining a Men’s Shed; or undertaking any other meaningful work.

Factors that could contribute to your habituated avoidance of the meaningful work can be many and varied, e.g. the work takes you out of your comfort zone; there is a chance you could be embarrassed; you may “fail” in what you are setting out to do; it could require significant courage to undertake the work; you could be perceived to be an “upstart”; or you might be challenged because you lack specific professional qualifications.

One of the things that I have been putting off that would fall into this category of meaningful work is the development and conduct of guided meditations via an online conference platform. The reality is that through this blog (with over 350 posts) and its numerous hyperlinks to resources, I have what I need to create these guided meditations. I also have experience conducting online conferences and have access to an online conference platform. But what is stopping me from developing these valuable events? I know that part of the reason is my uncertainty about the reliability of the online conference platform (or is this just an excuse?). I find that even in the downtime between meetings with clients, planning training activities, facilitating workshops and writing this blog, I do not embrace the challenge of creating these online guided meditations – even when I have surplus time in my life. To me, an important first step is to revisit the reason why the avoided “work” is significant or meaningful.

Revisiting your intention

Why is the work/task/endeavour meaningful? What group or individual (family member, friend or work colleague) will benefit from your undertaking this work? What are their needs that you can meet or partially address? In what way would your activity make a difference or improve the quality of their life?

For example, The process of online guided meditations would enable me to help people who are experiencing anxiety or depression, mental health conditions that have reached epidemic proportions. It would provide a way for them to connect with other people, use mindfulness to address some aspect of their adverse mental health condition, become aware of resources and support that are available to them and learn techniques and mindfulness practices that they can use outside the guided meditation experience.

Revisiting your intention in doing the meaningful work is important to tap into the motivation and energy needed to take the necessary steps to make that meaningful endeavour happen. Spending time meditating on this intention can help to energise you to take action – and overcome the internal objections, self-doubts and excuses for inaction. Leo offers three easy ways to translate this intention into action.

A simple Three-Step Method for getting your meaningful work done

Leo offers a 3-step method that is simple, time efficient and workable (he uses it himself with great effect! – you don’t create a blog with 2 million readers without successfully pushing through the inertia or the procrastination barrier).

Create a space (a brief period that you can free up) – Leo suggests that this can even be 15 minutes, but it is important to start now (or very soon so you don’t put it off).
Meditate on meaning and feelings – tap back into your intention and what gives the planned work meaning or significance. Having captured this meaning in your mind, do a body scan to tap into any fear, resistance, tension, anxiety or worry that you may be experiencing as the meaningful work comes clearer into focus – in the process release the tightness, pain or soreness. Then really focus your attention on the people you will be helping – tap into your feelings, sense of loving-kindness, towards them (and experience your own positive emotions that accompany compassionate action).
Do the smallest next step – do something that will progress your meaningful work, no matter how small it seems to you. Translating intention into action, however small, sets your momentum in the right direction. Small actions build to larger steps which, in turn, increase energy; provide reinforcement; develop motivation; and offer personal reward.

As you adopt these techniques for advancing your meaningful work, you will grow in mindfulness (internal and external awareness) and build your capacity to pursue creative endeavours to make a real difference for individuals or a group. The insights gained will help you overcome inertia in relation to other things that you need to get done and the experience of overcoming procrastination in relation to your meaningful work, will flow into other arenas of your life.

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Image by Anemone123 from Pixabay

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.