What is mindfulness?
There have doubtless been many attempts to encapsulate it and most typically seem to refer to it as being some variety of present moment awareness, meaning that to them mindfulness is describing a process of ‘being here now’. And whilst developing the skill of being ever-present is undeniably part of what is intended by mindfulness practice, in reality it is only one aspect of the entire spectrum of experience that this vast and highly transformative process points towards. So to effectively reduce it down to some kind of mind-ninja training whereby we rigidly anchor attention in the present moment for it’s own purpose, is to oversimplify the practice and to do so is to miss the true intent.
The Oxford dictionary qualifies it as …
‘… the intentional, accepting and non-judgemental focus of one’s attention on the emotions, thoughts and sensations occurring in the present moment’
And in doing so highlights the equally important notions of intentionality, acceptance and non-judgementality which all help to bring greater color, depth & warmth to the seemingly, cold & unflinching stare of ‘now’ that the practice would otherwise be.
It’s been pointed out by some teachers that even our pets are quite clearly capable of keeping their attention firmly anchored in the present. Good old Fido isn’t usually troubled about yesterdays events or what might (or might not) be for supper tonight, but does that make him mindful? Unlikely. The aforementioned qualities alongside others such as curiosity, patience, wisdom, clear understanding and kindness also help infuse the practice, adding a far deeper, richer dimensionality and allowing the possibility for it to become a vehicle for extraordinary and lasting personal transformation. This permits us to not only truly see, understand and be with our moment by moment experience, but also to be able to consciously frame the most wise and helpful response to all of that experience as it arises and passes away. To do so first you have to be able to see it and then know how to see it.
Is it meditation?
Fundamentally yes. But as the term meditation has been co-opted by everything from Find Your Soul Mate to Get The Job Of Your Dreams it’s clear that what constitutes meditation can be open to a very broad interpretation. You’ll notice we will often refer to it more as a practice though it is undoubtedly meditation.
As you’ll discover in this training, all our informal daily life experiences contain opportunities for meditation practice – to meet them skilfully with mindfulness. Nonetheless, mindfulness is undoubtedly also taught as a formal meditation practice – mostly by sitting (though also walking, standing and lying down) whilst intentionally directing one’s attention to a chosen point of focus, and then resting that focus within the framework of those aforementioned qualities of kindness, curiosity etc. Much emphasis is placed on the calm, quiet seated posture, and it is certainly fundamentally important to practice in this way regularly (preferably daily). But also in time we can begin to expand the same process outwards throughout all our everyday life, allowing the practice to reframe all of our experience in more helpful, healing and wholesome ways.
You’re probably already aware that there are an enormous variety of meditation styles and techniques available. The type of mindfulness meditation we will teach is a variety of practice drawn from the Insight meditation (or Vipassana) traditions. It is the same practice referred to in the many Mindfulness-Based programs (MBSR , MBCT etc) and also in much of the vast body of scientific research which has revealed its many benefits – an overwhelming proportion of which have used the eight week MBSR program as the primary research tool. This refers to a variety of techniques that have been inherited directly from Buddhist practice and as such they have been in continuous use for almost 2600 years, though recontextualised (albeit not denatured!) into the current secular format. Clearly there’s been plenty of opportunity to iron out the bugs!
Finally, even though the intention is for it to become a whole-life practice, it must be learned and cultivated via formal meditation practice. Mindfulness can’t be acquired from a book, a movie, a TV series, workshop or lecture. Nor is it sufficient enough to just do a little mindful cleaning or have a mindful cup of tea, helpful as they might be. The proximal cause for mindfulness to arise is the intentional, moment-by-moment cultivation … in the formal practice.
It’s often referred to as a kind of non-conceptual learning, and so all our traditional educational techniques such as those above will never impart what is truly meant or intended. There are no mindfulness CliffsNotes, no short cuts and no secret back door hacks.
Is it religious?
As mentioned previously, the techniques undeniably have their roots in Buddhist practice but are taught simply as secular tools. You will not become a Buddhist simply by learning and practicing mindfulness meditation.
Why would I do it?
We all understand the rambling nature of our own mind, ever dysfunctionally traipsing forward and backwards though time whilst fruitlessly attempting to alter some event that has already happened or predict one that is yet to occur. That simple process lies at the heart of much of the sense of overwhelm and exhaustion which characterizes 21st century life for so many of us. That we humans have this marvelous thinking box on top of our shoulders is an undeniable bonus but the downside is that the ability to predict also allows us to attempt to predict (and replay again and again!) what may go or has gone wrong as much as it does what might go well. Sadly, most of us tend to suffer an evolutionary quirk known as pessimism bias. In our less evolved incarnation, constantly scanning for danger was a useful evolutionary hedge against an early demise. But in this hectic, modern, always-on age it usually means we wind up mindlessly stuck in an unconscious mental mire, seeing only the downsides and reacting accordingly. This defective default position once activated, underpins the unhelpful ruminative thinking patterns that these days we tend to label as simply ‘life stress’, which consequently delivers the full gamut of health downsides we’re now only too familiar with in our contemporary ever-on age.
The neuroscientist and long term practitioner Rick Hanson has characterized the mind’s default position as: positive emotions are like teflon whereas negative one’s are like velcro and that mindfulness practice is a kind of ‘self-directed neuroplasticity‘. In his book Hardwiring Happiness Rick tells us, ‘… with practice, you’ll learn to light up the neural circuits of positive states even when you’re rattled or upset, like reaching through clutter to get the tool you need.’
