Decades ago I took off to the mountains for a 10 day silent Vipassana Meditation retreat. Bliss, it was going to be 10 days of absolute silence; no talking, no writing, not even a glance at another human being and of course up at 4am for an almost full day of silent meditation. I was exuding with enthusiasm albeit most of my friends were taking bets I’d be back within a few days -I am known to be rather loquacious and scribacious.
Day/evening one – instruction time
How to breathe, sit and observe sensations in the body including pain whist of course not being able to move so much as a nose hair. Jeez I was already itching, sniffing and in pain while planning my escape. My mind or my ego as we were told was having none of this mindfulness stuff.
I survived day one, albeit in pain and with the 100 mile an hour internal dialogue between the committee members discussing benign topics starting with “what if” and “maybe” I had a source of entertainment. Anyone who has completed a 10 day silent retreat is most likely nodding their head and laughing by now.
Day four – settling into mindfulness
The arising thoughts were starting to slip by without as much attachment. I was observing bodily sensations and the breath; being in the present moment, experiencing mindfulness and letting go.
I won’t give you the full account of the 10 days other than to say that the longer I had been silent, the more profound the experience. The mere act of cleaning my teeth had become almost unbearably loud not to mention the thunderous noise of a sneeze.
After sitting in silence for 10 days I had embraced my new mindful way of being and was reluctant to venture back to the real world. The real world is where the test is. It’s in our everyday lives and business activities that we find our greatest need for the practice and benefits of mindfulness.
In simple terms, mindfulness is the practice of having your awareness in the present moment. Developing a mindfulness mindset does not require you to go into silent isolation. You can do it in your everyday life and although it may be challenging in the beginning, through time your mind will begin to calm, your sensory acuity and your intuition will develop and you will delight in the new found richness of every experience. Ready to start?
5 tips to enrich living in the now
Don’t believe everything you think
Your mind can be a powerful friend or a equally powerful foe when not trained. Like an untrained puppy off the leash – wandering here, there and everywhere, an untrained mind can get you into all sorts of trouble.
Considering you have between 50,000 – 70,000 thoughts a day, wouldn’t you like to better train your mind so you can stop wandering off with all the spammy thoughts or at least stop zoning out when you need to be zoned in?
- If you are not able to let unresourceful thoughts go, then let them be without grasping onto, reacting or attaching a belief to them
- When you mind is racing with the what- ifs, buts and maybe’s, remember that you are playing out scenarios that have not yet and may never happen. Don’t dramatize or catastrophise that which has not happened
- Quit over analysing – I call it the “Analysis, paralysis syndrome”
Focus on the breath to bring you into the now
Breathing is mostly taken care of by your autonomic nervous system (ANS) i.e. your nervous system that is independent of the conscious mind – in other words you don’t have to spend 24/7 thinking about breathing. That would be a major design fault and very scary for us. Having said that, through conscious awareness you can change how you breathe. Love the sciencey stuff like me and want more info, check out “The Science of Breathing” by Sarah Novotny and Len Kravitz, Ph.D.
Being able to control the breath can affect your psycho physiological states. By bringing your awareness back to the breath when you are stressed, scared, anxious, angry or your mind is wandering, you can focus your thoughts, enhance emotional regulation and bring yourself into more self-awareness.
Feeling stressed or overwhelmed?
- Stop and take a few slow, deep nasal breaths i.e. count to 4 on the inhalation and exhale through the nose to the count of 10 – pause for 2 counts and then repeat the cycle a few times before making a decision or taking action
- Repeat the above breathing for at least 10 repetitions morning and night in bed before arising or going to sleep
Be present for the good, the bad and the ugly
Life is not always a bed of roses in fact sometimes it can be quite thorny and ugly.
Some of your most significant and valuable evolutionary moments will have been and will be through the more challenging times in life (no I’m not an advocate of the “we need struggle to grow” paradigm).
- Remember your stress levels are more about your perception i.e. how you think about and react to a situation rather than the situation itself
- Experiencing an unpleasant face-to-face communication? Focus on the other persons face and non-verbal communication. You may be able to see something more about what’s going on for them, see something more pleasant about them than their words and tone and feel compassion for them
- When life gets challenging remember that nothing is permanent, not even the difficult times
Being mindful during the more stressful and challenging situations will hold you in much stronger stead for future challenges. Being present with all of life’s experiences including the good, the bad and the ugly will bring you more exuberance with the happier, easier and more overall good times.
Come to your senses
How aware are you of the sights, sounds, tastes, smell and touch that you experience on a continuous basis?
- Walk as if you are kissing the earth with your feet. – Thich Nhat Hanh
- Slow down your movement when gardening or walking nature to “take the time to stop and smell the roses”
- When you are in the shower, become aware of the sensation of the water on your body; the temperature and texture
- Eat in silence and observe the flavour, texture and color of the food
- Sit still with your eyes closed and without headphones on and listen to inspiring music
You are a human being not a human doing
In today’s rush we all think too much – seek too much- want too much- and forget about the joy of just being. – Eckhart Tolle
- Think about what specifically you want or need i.e. what is your intention through filling up so much of your time with all that doing?
- Identify if you have a FOMA (fear of missing out) pattern and recognize that you cannot and will not be able to do everything
- Back to a values check in. Maybe it’s time to recalibrate your top priorities
Mindfulness is rich in benefits- an antidote for the increasing stresses of our modern era, a way through the quagmire of information overload, the “stuff” that consumes our everyday life and a pathway to a more conscious and holistic way of living.
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