Awareness – Page 7 – Grow Mindfulness

Cultivating Curiosity and Openness

Frank Ostaseski in his presentations during the Healing Healthcare Summit focused on openness and curiosity. In the process, he revisited two of the key lessons of living and dying that he had previously written about – (1) welcome everything, push nothing away and (2) cultivate a don’t know mind.

Openness – welcome everything

Frank suggests that we need to be able to meet whatever our life circumstances bring our way and do so in a way that we are open to the full range of thoughts and emotions involved. He reminds us that life is a series of constant changes, e.g. loss of a job, death of a close family member, change In financial circumstances or location. He encourages us to meet these changes as if welcoming a familiar person at our front door. He draws on James Baldwin’s insightful comment for his rationale – “Nothing can be changed, if it is not first faced”.

Frank reminds us that denial or ignoring unpleasant experiences does not create freedom, only servitude. He encourages “fearless receptivity” – awareness of fear without imprisonment by it. He maintains that mindfulness involves moment to moment awareness of everything we are experiencing – bodily sensations, thoughts and emotions. In this openness lies true freedom – because we are fully aware of what is happening to us and conscious of our habituated responses and yet able to regulate our emotions and explore alternative ways of responding.

Frank suggests that sometimes mindfulness practices involving “precise attention” to a single thing, e.g. a word or our breathing can create something of a struggle or tension in our minds and somewhat defeat the purpose of the practice. He contends that the practice of “open boundless awareness”, sometimes called “natural awareness”, can be more liberating when we feel constrained by a focused meditation practice. He offers awareness of the sky and its vastness as an example. He also provides a mini-practice that can help to engender this sense of boundlessness.

In the mini-practice, Frank encourages us first to become grounded and relaxed so that we can focus on the meditation. He then encourages us to take in the space above us, to our left, then to our right, followed by the space below and in front of us. An alternative to this, is to focus on the sounds that surround us, progressively shifting our focus onto the soundscape in the directions that Frank mentions above. Frank suggests that we treat distracting thoughts like birds flying past, not landing or hovering above.

Becoming more curious and less critical

This topic was the theme of his second presentation during the Summit and aligns with his exhortation to “cultivate a don’t know mind”. Frank argues that mindfulness is not about searching for some future enlightenment goal but becoming “up close and personal” with ourselves. He contends that our aim is to become “intimate” with ourselves and every aspect of our lives, pleasant and unpleasant. He explains that this is the path to true liberation and reinforces the view that “the path is right beneath your feet”.

In cultivating intimacy with ourselves we will become aware of parts of ourselves that we do not like. In Frank’s view, the inherent challenge is to be able to “tolerate intimacy” – be able to fully face up to who we are really, warts and all. In his podcast interview with Whit Missildine, Frank addressed the question, “What if you witnessed a thousand deaths?” – a question that was based on his personal experience as End-of-Life Teacher, Founding Director of the Zen Hospice Project and Director of the Metta Institute. Frank maintained that the ways we define ourselves will be stripped away in the process of dying and death. He contends that throughout life we live a delusion about ourselves – we project an image that is not our real self, but our imagined or idealised self. He has witnessed numerous people expressing regret as they lay dying – regrets about what they have done of failed to do. In dying, we are confronted with who we really are.

Frank maintains that when people are dying they have no interest in, or energy for, maintaining an illusion of who they are and cease to be concerned about what others think about them. He suggests that it behoves us during life to express remorse rather than regret – because remorse confronts the unpleasant side of ourselves and motivates us to avoid similar actions or omissions in the future. As we grow in intimacy with ourselves through meditation, we can progressively strip away the illusions about who we are through a process of loving kindness and forgiveness towards ourselves, avoiding harsh self-criticism.

Frank argues that In developing intimacy with ourselves, we become acutely aware that we are not separate but connected to everyone. He maintains that in this deep learning about ourselves, we develop a “deep sense of belonging” – an acute recognition of our interdependence and a strong desire to move beyond our limiting self-centredness. He suggests that a simple practice is to just “pause” throughout our day, taking a break from the busyness of life, and to focus on our experience as it is occurring. Frank contends that “mindfulness emerges from a relaxed heart and mind”.

Reflection

Frank has learned so much through observing the process of dying and death and willingly shares the lessons he has learned. He explains that he learns from the dying as they learn from him – there is a reciprocity about his engagement with them. He is humbled and amazed by what he learns and yet he recognises that he still harbours a fear of death because of its uncertainty. Frank has detailed his lessons learned in his book, The Five Invitations: Discovering What Death Can Teach Us About Living Fully.

Regrets are a natural response in the event of someone dying who is close to us (or not as close as they should have been). I can certainly acknowledge that I had regrets on the recent death of my brother Pat. However, as Frank suggests, remorse is a better option. With remorse we can revisit what we have said and done or failed to say and do, give ourselves forgiveness and express the intention to do better in the future. We can reflect on our individual regrets and ask ourselves:

What will I do more of in the future?
What will I do less of?
What will I stop doing?
What will I start doing?

As we grow in mindfulness through reflection, meditation and other mindfulness practices, we can develop intimacy with ourselves, recognise our connectedness, deepen our connection with others and learn the profound lessons from death and dying.

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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.

Coping with Grief During the Pandemic

Jenée Johnson, mindfulness trainer and visionary leader in the public health space, gave an enlivening and inspiring presentation during the current Healing Healthcare: A Global Mindfulness Summit. In her talk, Honoring Grief with Your Whole Heart, she highlighted the collective grief resulting from the pandemic and offered processes and tools to cope with grief, whether pandemic-driven or the result of life’s normal circumstances. She mentioned that she had been well equipped for the pandemic – having the solidity of a house, finances, nutrition, supportive partner, work and a relevant skillset – but she too found the pandemic “unmooring”.

Jenée experienced the added personal grief of the death of her brother – an experience I can relate to with the recent death of my brother Pat. However, her brother died not only from the isolation associated with the pandemic but also from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) resulting from 9/11. Jenée spoke of grief, whether personal or collective grief, as depleting and “an energy expenditure”. She maintained that the pandemic created a “tsunami of emotions” which Dr. Lise Van Susteren describes as “emotional inflammation”.

Ways to cope with grief

While Jenée acknowledged that the pandemic and associated events impacted individuals differentially, grief was a common outcome – a sense of loss of people, a way of life and/or positive memories. She contended, however, that there are ways to replenish ourselves, rebuild our energy and achieve emotional regulation. Some of the ways to cope with grief that Jenée suggested are:

Firstly, acknowledge that the reactions of fear, anger and grief are natural human responses. The challenge is how we manage or regulate these difficult emotions in a time that is constantly unmooring us from our established way of doing things and our regular supports. The pandemic and personal grief impact our whole human system – our minds, hearts, body and emotions.
Cultivate awareness of everything that has happened to you over the period of the pandemic and subsequently. Jenée suggested that we need to attend to, rather than hide from, our emotional state. There is a tendency to shut down and block out painful feelings and recollections but unless we face them, they can overwhelm us when we least expect. She mentioned that there were times when she cried and wailed after her brother’s death, releasing pent-up emotions.
Central to Jenée’s approach is heart-focused breathing. She stated that when we breathe deeply and release our out-breath we can let go of what is constraining us. The HeartMath Institute that has pioneered research on the intelligence of the heart has promoted heart-focused breathing and developed a suite of tools, programs and videos to promote health and wellbeing. They contend that heart-focused breathing contributes to heart coherence which helps to balance mental and emotional energy and activate creativity. Jenée argued that this form of breathing creates space for energy, enables the pain of grief to move through us and opens us up to flourish and experience joy and pleasure once again.
Change our expectations about our capacity to focus and achieve productivity. Jenee suggested that is not reasonable to expect that we can be as productive during the pandemic as we were before and the same applies to personal grief. The pandemic and personal grief contribute to a depletion of energy and reserves. Rather than overload our system with unrealistic expectations, it is important to modify our expectations in the light of our reduced energy levels. For example, I have to reduce my expects about how many posts I can write per week given my recent grief and the accumulated effects of the pandemic. Some people have gone so far as to change their expectations about he nature of their work and sought more fulfilling and rewarding work that is less depleting in terms of time and energy.
Pamper ourselves with things that relax us – spending more time reading novels or the paper, sleeping in when appropriate, enjoying a massage, purchasing aromatherapy oils or indulging in treats (Jenée admitted that coffee and almond croissants are one of her treats – something else I have in common!). One of the dangers is to resort to alcohol to dampen our pain (alcohol sales have exploded during the pandemic) and we need to be cognisant of the impact of increased alcohol consumption on our sobriety goals and this may entail a reassessment of the “reward value” of consuming more alcohol in times of grief.
Rebuilding social connections through our recreation and work activities. Resuming social activities such as social tennis or dancing (where permitted) along with walking generates movement which in turn builds up dopamine which makes us feel good. Sometimes grief brings extended family members together and creates the opportunity to develop new connections or re-establish old ones. In the workplace, we could begin our meetings with a grounding exercise followed by an emotional “check-in” to see how everyone is coping – putting people ahead of task in these challenging times.
Practicing gratitude can generate appreciation and joy even amidst grief and pain. Jenée suggested buying a beautiful gratitude journal and an exquisite pen to cultivate the habit of journal writing and expressing gratitude. She recommended Robert Emmons’ book, Gratitude Works, for its insights on the benefits of gratitude and its tips on ways to foster gratitude.

Reflection

Jenée quoted Jon Kabat-Zin when he said that “the challenge of mindfulness is to be present for your experience as it is”, not as you wish it to be or try to make it different by denying the reality of the experience and your related thoughts and emotions. Mindfulness can build resilience in challenging times as has been proven by extensive research. As we grow in mindfulness and enhance our self-awareness, we are better able to gain insights into the way forward, develop the courage to face our fears and increase our window of tolerance. We can experience gratitude, joy, renewed energy, and heightened creativity.

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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.

Understanding and Developing AWE

Jason Silva maintains that whatever we find that is awe-inspiring extends our “perceptual frameworks” , expands our comfort zones and builds compassion and creativity. When we experience wonder and awe, our “mental maps” are challenged and our mind is expanded to accommodate “land beyond the maps” that we have in our head. We encounter boundarylessness, mystery, and the majesty of creation. Through his Shots of Awe video podcasts, he encourages us to move beyond the “banality” and disengagement of our lives, to open to emotional and aesthetic experiences and to awaken to awe. He suggests that, in the final analysis, we have a “responsibility to awe”. Jason offers ways to understand and develop awe through his free video, Find Your Awe.

Developing awe through nature

Louie Schwartzberg, time-lapse photographer and filmmaker, presented a TEDx Talk that focused on Wonder, awe and the intelligence of nature. Louie explains that he often makes the invisible visible through his slow motion photography. He opens us up to a sense of awe in the light of the ineffable beauty, power and interconnectedness of nature. He maintains that nature takes us beyond ourself and our limited, self-absorbed focus and develops gratitude, compassion and wellness. He argues that our sense of awe and wonder is heightened when we develop an intimate relationship with nature.

Louie, through his awe-inspiring, time-lapse photography, brings us visual sources of wonder by capturing the beauty, intricacy, expansiveness and grandeur of nature. His photography unearths the incredible cooperation and coordination between plants and trees and the mind-boggling cycle of life. He captures in slowed-motion the pollination of plants by birds, bees and bats; the development and emergence of fruit (such as strawberries); and the incredible internet-like network of fungi beneath the earth (captured in Louie’s film, Fantastic Fungi). The wonder and awe experienced by people viewing his photography is clearly illustrated on the faces of people seeing his time-lapse photography projected onto St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican.

Developing awe through sound and sight

Louie captures other sources of awe through his Wonder and Awe Podcast. Some of these podcasts focus on auditory sources of wonder and awe, e.g., the wonderful compositions and singing of Lisbeth Scott; the soaring, healing sounds of violinist Lindsey Stirling; and the productions of Cosmo Sheldrake, musician and composer, who reinforces the “power of sound in nature”.

Rebecca Elson, dedicated poet and astronomer, left a legacy not only of scientific discoveries but also her poems and personal notes/musings captured in her book, A Responsibility to Awe. One of her poems, Antidotes to Fear of Death, is shared publicly through readings by different people and captured visually by the accompanying deep space photography of Scott Denning.

Louie also interviewed Anna Bjurstam as part of his series of podcasts and explored energy science beyond the immediate realm of visibility. Anna is a pioneer of wellness through Six Senses Spas of which she is Vice-President. These luxury resorts stimulate the senses through the incredible beauty of nature and experiences that are meaningful, empathetic and enhance well-being. Anna mentioned her near-death experience which led her to understand “how beautiful, amazing and what a gift this life is”.

Reflection

Jon Kabat-Zinn encourages us to develop wonder and awe through our senses. His book Coming to Our Senses, e.g., ways to fully enjoy our “tastescape”, “touchscape” or “soundscape”. He suggests that mindfulness meditation creates the doorway to be consciously in the present moment in a non-judgmental and open way.

Being curious about what we are experiencing in all its dimensions opens the way to develop wonder and awe in our lives. As we grow in mindfulness, we become more aware, increasingly focused on the present, and more attuned to nature and the world around us. Jason Silva maintains that we often forgo the present for the future and we need to reverse this tendency if we are to awaken to wonder and awe.

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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.

Enhancing Receptivity through Mindfulness

Jamie Bristow and Rosie Bell maintain from their research that mindfulness enhances our receptivity thus enabling us to reclaim our attention and sense of agency – our sense of the ability to positively influence our relationships and our external environment. According to their research, mindfulness increases our receptivity in a number of ways – widening the “bandwidth of perception”, overcoming unhelpful habituated responses, reducing our distorted perceptions, improving our relationships, and developing our “don’t know mind”.

Widening the bandwidth of perception

Mindfulness increases our capacity to take in information through its emphasis on acceptance of “what is”, consciously noticing bodily sensations and heightened development of our senses. Acceptance is a precondition for action, not inaction – if we cannot accept what is happening to us (e.g. through internal dialogue such as “Why me?”, “What have I done to deserve this?” or “This can’t be happening to me”), then we cannot move forward and take constructive action to redress our situation.

Mindfulness meditation often focuses on our bodily sensations – we are encouraged to notice what is happening in us bodily when we experience difficult emotions. By noticing our bodily sensations, we are better able to name our emotions and tame them. Our bodies are windows to our feelings – by paying attention to them we widen the bandwidth of our perception and gain better access to our inner landscape.

Mindfulness expert Jon Kabat-Zinn, in his book, Coming to Our Senses, shows us how to access all our senses – e.g., our seeing, touchscape, soundscape, smellscape, tastescape – to enable us to heal ourselves and act positively on our world. Being open to our senses enhances the depth and width of our perception and increases our sense of connection with nature – developing a sense of empowerment and resulting in healing ourselves.

Overcoming unhelpful habituated responses

As we come to understand our inner landscape through mindfulness, we gain insight into our negative triggers and their origins. This leads to awareness of our reactivity and habituated responses. Often, we are triggered by our distorted perceptions that arise because of our bias, projections, prejudice, and unfounded assumptions. As we unearth these distortions in perception through mindfulness meditation, we are better able to understand their influence over us and what we perceive, and to exercise control over our reactions.

Improving our relationships

Through mindfulness, we not only reduce our perceptual distortions but also emotional baggage that can destroy relationships. We are able to bring to the relationship increased self-awareness and self-regulation. For example, by reflecting on any resentment we carry towards another person, we can come to see their side of the story, understand where they are coming from and reduce our self-absorption and hurt – thus healing our relationship. Through mindfulness we can also bring to the relationship an increased consciousness of our inner landscape, a sense of personal empowerment (not disabling dependence) and a growing capacity to feel and express empathy. We are better able to engage in active listening because we can be present in the moment of the conversation, attentive to non-verbal cues and less defensive and self-protective. Mantra meditations, as one form of mindfulness, can increase our capacity for deep listening.

Developing our “don’t know mind”

Jamie and Rosie write about the “beginner’s mind” developed through openness and curiosity – which are hallmarks of mindfulness according to the Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC). In discussing the lessons from death and dying, Frank Ostaseski encourages us to develop what he calls, the “don’t know mind” which has the same characteristics of openness and curiosity and he suggests that these characteristics can be developed through mindfulness meditation. The result is that we are able to enter conversations with others not trying to be “interesting” but demonstrating being “interested in” the other person – a stance that enhances trust and relationships. Mindfulness enables us to listen for understanding rather than attempting to always persuade others to our point of view – in the process, developing our influence and strengthening our relationships.

Reflection

As we grow in mindfulness, we can strengthen our sense of agency by developing our receptivity – to information and to others. We can gain better awareness of our distorted perceptions and their impacts, develop greater self-control over our reactions to negative triggers, improve our relationships and grow our influence through our curiosity and openness. Our enhanced perceptual bandwidth developed through paying attention to our senses gives us uncluttered access to our inner landscape and the healing power and sense of empowerment of our natural landscape.

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Image by yamabon 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.

Reclaiming Attention through Mindfulness

In a recent research paper published by the mindfulnessinitiative.org, Jamie Bristow and Rosie Bell identified how mindfulness strengthens agency in these challenging times. Their paper focuses on three main outcomes of mindfulness that build agency. The first of these was “perceiving, gathering and processing information”. Drawing on extensive research, they showed how mindfulness builds our capacities in these areas by progressively developing our attention, receptivity and “cognitive resilience”.

Reclaiming attention

By definition, mindfulness involves “paying attention in the present moment” to develop awareness. Mindfulness meditation builds our “awareness muscle” by helping us to overcome distractions while focusing on an anchor. We can become distracted by our own incessant thoughts, our basic drives and the relentless marketing that stimulates our desire to have, hold and enjoy. Through mindfulness, we can progressively regain control over our attention and direct it to more meaningful and healthful endeavours.

In discussing “reclaiming attention”, Jamie and Rosie make the point that what we attend to creates our reality. They draw on the work by cognitive neuroscientist Professor Stanislas Dehaene featured in his 2020 book, How We Learn, when they maintain that what we choose to pay attention to, shapes our inner and outer world – “our brains and our whole reality”.

The lack of paying attention in a meaningful and healthful way can lead to disconnection – a loss of connection to others, meaningful work, and childhood traumas. This disconnectedness, in turn, can result in alienation and loneliness along with depression and anxiety. Mindfulness meditation, on the other hand, can help us to train our attention so that we can value our external connectedness, build our inner landscape, and manage difficult emotions.

Reflection

The paper by Jamie and Rosie reinforce the idea that we have choice – we can choose what we pay attention to and how we pay attention. We can create our own reality – the quality of our life, our health, and our relationships. As we grow in mindfulness, we can build our agency – our capacity to act on our inner and outer world. So, mindfulness will not only help us to realise effective self-care in these challenging times, but also enable us to have the awareness and focus to act wisely in the world for the benefit of others.

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Image by yamabon 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.

Overcoming Hasty Judgments

Daniel Kahneman highlighted the tendency to develop hasty judgements in his book, Thinking, Fast and Slow. Daniel, Nobel prize winner in economics, explains that most often we make hasty, automatic and intuitive judgments that are helpful in crisis times but can rupture relationships. He describes this “fast thinking” as System 1 thinking. In contrast, “slow thinking” (System 2 thinking) is more considered, reflective, deliberative and analytical. Fast thinking is resource efficient for the brain, taking less time and brain power. However, as neuroscientist Gina Rippon points out, these “pervasive shortcuts” are riddled with stereotypical thinking, half-truths, myths and untruths.

Overcoming hasty judgments

Mindfulness coach, Brian Shiers, highlights the fact that one of the problems with System 1 thinking is that we tend to have blind faith in our perception, however ill-informed or inadequate it is. We do not subject it to scrutiny or challenge because such activity would be time consuming in our time-poor world. The increasing pace of life and our heightened reactivity make it more likely that we will resort to the time efficient System 1 thinking. We end up seeing the world and individuals through the veil of our biases and prejudices.

Brian Shiers suggests that we can overcome this tendency to make hasty judgments, by developing “meta-attention” – an outcome of mindfulness which heightens the depth and “granularity” of our inner awareness. He suggests that to truly understand other people we first need to get in touch with our System 1 thinking which hastily boxes them into one of more of our easy-to-use stereotypes. He offers a meditation to look inside our self to observe our thinking and how it shapes our judgments about individuals.

Developing “meta attention”

In a MARC guided meditation podcast, Brian leads us in a meditation designed to increase our attention and power of concentration. The meditation is grounded in our body through a focus on the breath. He suggests that it is important during this meditation to avoid a tendency to perfectionism and to ensure that we engage in observation of our “thought stream”, rather than analysis.

The guided meditation involves extended focus on our breathing, without trying to control our breath. As thoughts about another person appear during the meditation, we notice them and observe what they are saying about the individual – staying in observation mode, not reverting to analysis. As we capture these thoughts, we return to the focus on the breath.

Brain’s guided meditation builds inner awareness – helping us to get to know our self better and understand what thoughts are passing through our mind in relation to another person. At the mid-point, he suggests that we get in touch, too, with what is happening in our body – noticing any points of tension such as tightness in our fingers, arms, shoulders or legs.

As we increase our awareness of our thought processes, we begin to notice the accompanying feelings which Brian suggests we treat with “acceptance, curiosity and friendliness”. As the meditation comes to an end, we are invited to take some deep breaths and, on exhaling, let the thoughts and feelings pass through us into the open.

In one sense, this guided meditation is another form of building our “awareness muscle” but the approach here is to focus purely on being-with-our-breathing, not controlling it – unlike the fifty conscious breaths described in my previous post as a way to use the “Awareness-Focus Loop” to overcome procrastination.

As we grow in mindfulness by engaging in meditations designed to develop meta-attention, we can become more conscious of our thought stream and the automatic thoughts that shape our hasty judgments about people. Through this process, we can gain better control over our thoughts about others and adopt a more considered, understanding position while maintaining self-compassion.

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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.

Overcoming Procrastination by Building the Awareness Muscle

We can handle procrastination by adopting the direct approach of focusing on a task that we are putting off and exploring through meditation what is the self-story behind the procrastination. This involves bringing the story “above the line” – bringing the messages we are telling our self to the level of conscious awareness. However, procrastination may be a habit related to a range of activities and the habit will often be accompanied by inertia – a lack of energy to move forward. In this case, it could be useful to attack the problem of procrastination indirectly by building what I call, your “awareness muscle”.

Building your awareness muscle

Tony Stubblebine offers a meditation exercise that can progressively develop your awareness muscle (or what he describes as your “mental muscle”). His exercise is a variation on mindful breathing that takes distractions or mental diversions as a source of awareness strengthening. His argument is that every time that your focus wanders represents an opportunity to increase your awareness of what is going on for you and hence building your awareness muscle – both the mental element and the energetic element in terms of readiness/energy to deal with the feelings/emotions behind the wandering.

Tony sees the exercise involving restoring your focus to your breath, after naming your source of distraction, as a form of “reps” like you would undertake in a gym or a series of exercises with a personal trainer. The “reps” serve to build the capability to undertake a given activity when the demand arises e.g. running a race, lifting heavy weights, undertaking housework, handling a stressful job (or in our case here, dealing with a specific procrastination). The repeated action of bringing your attention back to your focus, after raising your awareness, is embedding a “focus-awareness-focus” mental cycle that can be applied anywhere to any activity. Tony describes this cycle as the “Awareness-Focus Loop”.

Utilising the “Awareness-Focus Loop”

Tony describes an “I Am Aware” meditation that can take five to ten minutes of your time. The basic four-step approach is as follows:

make yourself comfortable and close your eyes
Focus on your breathing by counting 1 to 50 (or more if you want to extend the meditation for mental endurance training)
Whenever your mind wanders away from the focus on your breath, pay attention to what is happening and frame it as a “I am aware that…” statement. This needs to be a complete sentence to elevate the unconscious source of wandering to the conscious level e.g. “I am aware that I am thinking of a major meeting coming up later today”; “I am aware that I am getting anxious about what I forgot to do this morning”; or “I am aware that I am wondering whether I got the job I applied for a week ago”.
When you have noticed and named your distraction, you resume your focus on counting your breaths from where you left off counting. I found that I lost track of where I was up to in my counting once a distraction set in. If this happens, you can restart your counting somewhere, without cheating to get to the end in a hurry.

Using your awareness muscle to deal with a specific procrastination

Having developed your awareness muscle, you can now apply this mental capacity, and associated energetic impetus, to dealing with a procrastination over a specific task. Once you notice yourself procrastinating you can use your highly developed awareness muscle to become aware of the anxiety underlying the procrastination, name the anxiety and related feelings (e.g. fear) and deal with the anxiety without seeking a diversion or some form of flight.

The mindfulness exercise serves as a form of mental training that can develop the self-regulation necessary to overcome your natural tendency to avoid what is perceived as painful or personally challenging. The awareness muscle has stored the history of your personal distraction tendencies and these can be more readily noticed and dealt with.

As we grow in mindfulness through meditation exercises designed to build our awareness muscle, we can develop the consciousness, willingness and strength to deal with procrastination as it occurs in our daily lives. The “I am aware that…” meditation is designed for this specific purpose.

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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.

The Potential of the Present Moment

As you develop your appreciation of the power of mindfulness to make a difference, you become increasingly aware of the potential of the present moment. In the present moment lies creativity, gratitude, zest for life, happiness and the capacity to love.

The famous Irish novelist, Cecilia Ahern, has her central character, Christine, describe the potential of the present moment when reflecting on her life experiences:

Life is a series of moments and moments are always changing, just like thoughts, negative and positive. … Moments are precious; sometimes they linger and other times they’re fleeting, and yet so much could be done in them; you could change your mind, you could save a life and you could even fall in love. (How to Fall in Love, p.327)

Heather Bestel, in an email communication, expresses her growing appreciation of the present moment when she writes:

The longer I live the more I’ve come to understand that life is just a moment in time and space. It’s a moment to cherish, treasure, value and honour.

Heather works tirelessly through her blog, publications, videos and email communications to help women appreciate the present moment, to value themselves, overcome depression and find happiness in their daily lives.

She is an great example of making a difference through mindfulness and helping people to appreciate the power of the present moment.

The more you learn to reside in the present moment, the more you are able to realise its potential for improving the quality of your life and that of others. The present moment is the pathway to happiness, gratitude, creativity and wellness.

Image Source: Courtesy of Pixabay.com

Making a Difference Through Mindfulness

One of the things that we often fail to realise is what impact our own consciousness has on people around us – how we can make a real difference through being mindful.

Paulo Coelho captures this principle in his book, The Alchemist:

That’s what alchemists do. They show that, where we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better, too. (The Alchemist, p.150)

Recent research reinforces the fact that our moods are contagious – so if we are happy and calm, then we can positively impact those around us. We can make a difference in other people’s lives by living mindfully – by developing our emotional intelligence and building our sense of gratitude and contentment.

Joseph Folkman, who has made a personal study of the contagiousness of mood and engagement, reminds us:

Since doing this research, I have begun thinking about the fact that every interaction I have with other people can be inspiring and building, or discouraging and frustrating. We can build others up or tear them down.

The impact of our mindfulness can spread to our social network just as a person’s grief can impact those connected to them to “three degrees of separation” (friends of friends of friends) – like the concentric ripples that result when a stone drops into a pool of water. Nicholas Christakis has studied this ripple effect over 15 years and demonstrated the pervasive influence of social networks. His study can explain the growth of obesity, drug use and depression within a social network over time.

Whether we are conscious of it or not, our mindfulness can impact others in a positive way and make a real difference in their lives. This was recently reinforced for me with the death of a friend, Pam Kruse. People from all walks of life and different phases in her life, expressed their appreciation and gratitude for her sense of fun and humour, her zest for life, her thoughtfulness, her energy and readiness to serve others in a generous and unassuming manner. In a lot of ways, Pam epitomized the “servant-leader“.

So let the warmth of your smile and your sense of contentment shine on those around you, just as the setting sun brightens the darkness of the night sky.

Image Source: Copyright R. Passfield

What Am I Doing This For?

Ricardo Semler, entrepreneur and author, became well known for his ground-breaking book on the democratization of organisations. In Maverick, he describes his approach to managing his business, Semco, which involves allowing employees unprecedented autonomy in many aspects of organization life.

What is not so well known is his personal philosophy of life. His comments give some insight into his own approach to mindfulness and his perspective on idleness:

The opposite of work is idleness. But very few of us know what to do with idleness. When you look at the way that we distribute our lives in general, you realize that in the periods in which we have a lot of money, we have very little time. And then when we finally have time, we have neither the money nor the health.

Semler suggests that we put off so much in life because we are so busy about the future that we cannot enjoy the present. In the process, we miss the opportunity to develop wisdom and to pursue the fundamental question of “What am I doing this for?”

And so, what we’ve done all of these years is very simple, is use the little tool, which is ask three whys in a row. Because the first why you always have a good answer for. The second why, it starts getting difficult. By the third why, you don’t really know why you’re doing what you’re doing. What I want to leave you with is the seed and the thought that maybe if you do this, you will come to the question, what for? What am I doing this for? And hopefully, as a result of that, and over time, I hope that with this, and that’s what I’m wishing you, you’ll have a much wiser future.

These comments by Ricardo Semler are extracts from a TED Talk that he gave in 2014, “How to run a company with (almost) no rules.” The video of this talk is embed below and the transcript is available online for those who prefer to read rather than listen.

Semler asks some fundamental questions about life and work and how we spend out time. Busyness is the greatest impediment to mindfulness – the pathway to wisdom, calm, clarity and creativity.

Postcript: I often take a short detour in the morning via the Manly Esplanade so that I can see the bay, the islands and the emergent sunrise. On the morning I watched Richardo’s video, I asked myself, “Why don’t I stop and capture the image that I see, instead of rushing back home?” And so the image in this blog post captures calmness in the spotlight of the sunrise.