How to practice mindfulness
I’ve got great news for you, you already do it. It will be something that makes you feel alive, feel grounded or feel like the world makes sense.
It might be in nature, during exercise or driving.. even jumping out of a plane.
We often stimulate ourselves by driving fast, exercising hard, drinking to excess even hurting ourselves.. it helps us to make the present moment so big and audacious that we couldn’t possibly miss it!
Sound familiar?
In some circumstances, I start my coaching by helping people to locate this feeling where they find it pleasurable to practice mindful, curious, non-judgmental observation of themselves and the world around them in the present moment.
From there you can learn to observe your body and your mind’s habitual patterns. Applying it in other areas of your life will be a natural progression.
You don’t need to change you, to understand you.
If you are trying to help bring mindfulness into your life to resolve something (stress, ADHD symptoms, addiction, depression) or achieve something (personal best, unwavering focus, closer relationships):
Find your mindful comfort zone
Learn to observe that moment with a smile on your face
Then peel back 1 layer of discomfort at a time, reducing your stimulation.. see what you observe
Cook each layer, let it soften, sweeten and become rewarding
Then move onto your next layer towards your goal
Trying to bite the whole onion, raw and all at once, might be quite a shock!
You don’t have to sit still, or even be silent straight away. With practice, there will come a time when your curiosity will drive you towards trying that.
Stillness and silence removes as many layers of stimulation as possible, and the resulting sound of your internal narrative can be deafening.
Meditation is a way of practicing mindfulness and we often have an expectation that it is a blissful experience of peace and quiet.
In reality, your first experience of meditation might feel more like you are sitting on the side of a motorway, watching the cars go by and trying to spot your favorite car in its nicest colour (a feeling of ‘bliss’). You notice lots of things, even birds in the sky but not your favourite car yet.
You may even see it, that perfect incarnation of metal and rubber.. it doesn’t stop for you to keep enjoying it. So you savor every moment, focusing on nothing but that car.. and no matter how much you wish for it to remain in sight, it drives away from you.
You spend the next little while loving that amazing moment, then missing it, then wishing the car could come back… reliving it.. will there be another one? will it be the same?
Mindfulness is not searching for a good car (or a ‘good’ feeling), or trying to fill your motorway with Ferrari’s.
Its simply observing the flow of cars.. noticing the sports cars, trucks, buses, broken down vehicles, emergency sirens.. all of it being noticed equally and non-judgmentally.
This might sound boring, and I understand that.
But this is actually the same thing that Formula 1 drivers do whilst they are racing. They make their perception of time slow down because they practice observing everything and letting the information flow through them like water. You can get that same grounding feeling of connection, by practicing mindfulness anywhere, anytime.
Shauna Shapiro PhD does a great job of explaining this in her TEDx video. I love her recommendation at the end, try it out and let me know how it goes for you.
Like any motor skill or brain function, repeated practice will help you to improve the function over time [M. Treadway & S. Lazar 2010].
I strongly recommend that at some point in your journey, you immerse yourself in the practice for 7+ days. Retreats help you to have food and shelter catered for and often offer experienced and free guidance. Silence might sound scary to you, so only take this option when the leap of faith feels like another layer of discomfort that you can handle peeling back.
That’s all for now.. does anyone else feel like onion rings?
