Mindfulness
Mindfulness is one of the most important tools to have in your mental health toolkit! Mindfulness helps us to become aware of what is happening in the present moment… and we can’t change what we aren’t aware of!
We sometimes confuse mindfulness with meditation (there is mindful meditation!), however, the easiest way to think of mindfulness is as the awareness of the present moment. Being mindful helps us to become aware of the thoughts that we are having, the emotions that we are feeling, and the physical sensations that we are experiencing. Once we become aware of them we can then create the space to choose how to respond to them.
“Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementally,” Jon Kabat Zinn (my go-to mindfulness guru!)
Why is Mindfulness so important?
Mindfulness is an important tool in therapy, but more importantly in our everyday lives! We live in an incredibly distracting world, with countless things at our fingertips to pull our attention (ie. A Smartphone that holds access to the whole world, food that can be delivered almost instantly, endless shopping, and any content we could care to watch on our Smart TVs!).
These distractions can pull us away from being in tune with ourselves, meaning we might not notice boundaries being crossed, our energy levels, the way the people we interact with make us feel, what brings us joy, and what depletes us. We also might not know why we react the way we do. Mindfulness is our way to start to gain this information.
There is no “goal” of mindfulness, it is merely a state that we want to practice being in. That being said, increased mindfulness can lead to improvement in mental wellbeing and a decrease in symptoms of depression and anxiety and is an important tool in many therapeutic modalities. The reason it can be beneficial is that by allowing ourselves to be aware of all emotional states and body experiences, without judgement, we can actually start to let go of patterns and habits that keep us stuck in symptoms.
Example
Mindfulness says "I'm feeling sad right now... as I sit with this sadness I notice I'm missing my hometown"
Not Being Mindful might say "I'm feeling sad right now. Why on earth am I sad? I have a good life so I shouldn't be sad. I'm so weak for randomly feeling sad for no reason! Why can't I just be normal! Now I feel worse because I think something is wrong with me"
Given this example, we can see how mindfulness can help us just be with our emotion, and then we would probably be able to do something to help with the feeling (ie. I feel homesick, maybe I call a friend or loved one from my hometown), and probably feel better after! Rather than piling onto the initial feeling of sadness with judgements about the "appropriateness" of that emotion. We can see that allowing ourselves to feel the emotion might actually be more helpful then trying to get rid of the emotion!
How do I Practice Mindfulness?
There are lots of ways to practice mindfulness. Ideally, you want to spend some time being fully immersed in the present moment, noticing internal experiences or you could focus on noticing external experiences. If you find your mind wanders to the future or past, to judgements, or to anything else, just gently refocus on what you have chosen to be mindful about. An important note, just because you have thoughts, doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong! You WILL have thoughts. Mindfulness is the act of noticing them and gently guiding your mind back to what you have chosen to focus on. That’s where change happens!
As you are practicing mindfulness, you might notice emotions or physical sensations, ie my shoulders feel really tense, or I feel so sad. Try getting into the practice of just noticing, if you start having thoughts about the tension or the sadness, try letting go of the thoughts and refocusing to the sensation or the physical experience of the emotion. Try to be curious and let go of any judgements about it.
I recommend getting creative to practice mindfulness, here are some examples:
-Mindful brushing your teeth
-Mindful walking
-Mindful nature immersion
-Mindfulness in your yoga practice or stretching
-Guided mindfulness meditation (Headspace has a great free intro and there are lots of free meditations on youtube!)
-Mindful breathing practice
-Body scan
If you would like to learn more or start your mindfulness journey working with me, please connect with me on the main page of my website.
Until my next post, Enjoy Practicing!
Samantha
An Important Note on Mindfulness and Trauma: Sometimes we might find mindfulness really difficult to practice. Especially in cases where we have experienced trauma or chronic childhood stress, being present might feel really unsafe. In these instances, it might be helpful to work with a trauma informed therapist to help establish safety as you begin practicing mindfulness. This is not any lack in your capacity, the research supports that folks who have experienced trauma and chronic childhood stress have a challenging time helping their brain and nervous system to be present and regulated, and so the safety of a present and regulated therapist can be really helpful to assist in this! If you'd like to learn more about trauma and mindfulness please connect with me on the main page!
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