Mindfulness Explained
What is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness does not conflict with any beliefs or traditions, whether religious, cultural or scientific. It is simply a practical way to notice thoughts, physical sensations, sights, sounds, smells- anything we might not normally notice. The actual skills might be quiet simple, but because it is so different to how our minds normally behave, it takes a lot of practice.
Mindfulness and meditation can bring you on a journey of ‘coming home to yourself.’ We all have the inner resources of wonder and awe, joy and contentment. But years of ‘conditioning’ may have clouded over these innate states. We seek happiness in the external; money, clothes, cars and the big house. These are all no good if we don’t have inner peace, love and compassion, for ourselves and all living things on this planet.
Mindfulness offers us freedom, freedom to choose to live in the present moment. Mindfulness lets us live with awareness, clarity and space, which lets us respond mindfully to what happens us during our daily lives. Helping us to put things into perspective and not reacting automatically to everything.
Why Mindfulness?
“Oh, I don’t have time for that sort of thing. I’m far too busy with work and everyday life”.
What I do have time for is, trying to deal with all these thoughts going on in my head. These worrying, anxious, stressful thoughts that keep popping into my head day after day after day. In fact, I’m so good at this that I’m on the verge of burn out. But I still don’t have time to look after the most important person in my life….myself.
When the joy of life is being sapped from you slowly day after day.
When your thoughts, emotions and behaviour reflect that of someone who is not ‘living life’, isn’t it time to stop and say, enough is enough.
In our daily lives , when we are not consciously aware of where our attention is, we tend to drift off into the future or the past, and unfortunately, it’s not always to the positive things. We love to worry about the future and ruminate about the past. When we practice mindfulness , we are noticing all of this living in our heads in the future and the past, and we are skillfully and intentionally bringing our attention back to the present. We can plan for the future and learn from the past, but we can only live in the present. Another way of looking at mindfulness is the noticing that our mind has wandered off into thought and then gently guiding it back to what we are doing in the present, with an attitude of kindness, curiosity and non judging .
Don’t put off starting a mindfulness practice until sometime in the future. That’s like saying you are going to postpone your happiness because you are just too busy at the moment. I’ll be happy sometime in the future……
Benefits of Mindfulness
Scientific research has proven that mindfulness can have enormous benefits for us.
But one might think it is selfish to spend time being mindful and meditating in the midst of a busy life. When you look at the benefits of mindfulness, you would have to ask yourself ‘why would I not start a mindfulness practice’.
- Inner peace
- Clarity of mind
- Reduced stress and anxiety
- Increased happiness levels
- Having a more positive outlook
- Lowered blood pressure
- Increased immune function
- Boost resilience
- Reduced worry and rumination
- Better sleep
- More creative
- and much more.
Inward Bound Mindfulness’s mission is to teach mindfulness to people so they can find their way back to all that is good about being human and to living a life that is authentic and balanced.
Download the CD (you will need a password for this).