What Is Mindfulness?

Before we begin,

Feel free to take a couple deep breaths,

Allow the body to relax or release.

It's kind of nice for me to do that too.

Anytime you just take a couple deep breaths,

It's like a reset of the day,

Of the moment,

And then you can start again.

Is to me what the capacity for mindfulness tends to do.

It allows you to briefly reset,

Re-begin,

And then start from here.

So in this video,

I'm just going to offer you three definitions of mindfulness.

One more modern,

Conventional,

Western definition,

And then one ancient,

More traditional eastern definition.

And then one of my own.

So first of all,

The conventional,

More modern definition.

This one comes from Jon Kabat-Zinn.

Who's famous for creating mindfulness-based stress reduction.

And the definition goes like this.

It has four main pieces,

So I'll share it and then we'll just touch on each one.

Mindfulness.

Is the awareness that arises through paying attention on purpose.

In the present moment.

Non-judgmentally.

I was smiling because I was hoping I would remember them all.

Mindfulness is the awareness that arises through paying attention on purpose.

In the present moment.

Non-judgmentally a key element.

So first of all,

Paying attention.

You're always paying attention to something,

But often it's not on purpose.

Often it is unconscious or habitually paying attention to my thoughts,

My judgments,

My thoughts about the future and past.

So here it is actually intentionally,

Purposefully paying attention.

I choose to pay attention right now.

Like maybe you're choosing to pay attention to me,

Maybe.

Or the mind has gone somewhere else and then you can notice it and play with it.

Bring it back on purpose,

So paying attention on purpose in the present moment.

So paying attention specifically to what's here,

What's here right now.

You and me here in this moment.

One way to think of it is here and now versus then and there.

Easy to get lost in the then and there,

Paying attention to what is then and there.

Of course,

In reality,

There is never any then and there,

Because when you are actually then and there,

You will be here.

So paying attention on purpose in the present moment,

Paying attention to what is here and now.

And then a key element,

The fourth element,

Non-judgmentally.

Because you could find yourself doing those three while there still is some very subtle judgment involved.

Judgment of the present moment,

Wishing that it was slightly different than it is right now.

So that non-judgmental peace is to allow the present moment to be exactly as it is with no desire for it to be different.

Paying attention,

On purpose,

In the present moment,

Non-judgmentally.

You can notice if you have any judgments about me or if any have subtly arisen under the surface.

Naturally,

That kind of always happens.

And then the capacity for mindfulness is just to notice those,

Notice those,

And then allow them to release,

Release,

Release,

Soften,

Soften.

Paying attention on purpose in the present moment,

Non-judgmentally.

So you could remember throughout your days,

If you're attempting to engage in this practice,

Maybe you're missing one of those pieces.

Am I paying attention?

Is it intentionally,

On purpose?

Is it to the present moment?

And then is it without judgment?

So objective versus more subjective.

This tends to be a path of objectification,

Increasingly noticing my experience more and more objectively,

Less and less subjectively.

Okay,

That's the first definition.

The second is.

.

.

The traditional ancient word that conventional mindfulness was a translation of.

It translated into this word mindfulness.

It's the word sati,

Which is from the Pali language.

And this,

A more pure or simple translation,

Is to remember or to keep in mind or memory.

And what does that mean,

To remember?

What are you remembering?

You're remembering the present moment.

You're remembering the fact that you are actually alive right now,

That this is happening right now,

And that this is actually your whole life.

This can seem so inconsequential or so uninteresting relative to everywhere else that the mind wants to go.

But I remember that this is it.

This is my whole life.

This is my one opportunity to be alive,

To be the person that I want to be.

And that is the capacity for mindfulness said differently.

So sati,

To remember,

To keep in mind,

The constant practice to keep this in mind that I am here and now,

And this is the whole thing.

So,

The first conventional one,

The more ancient Sati word that has been translated into mindfulness to remember or to keep in mind.

I like that one because it simplifies things.

Just remember.

Keep remembering.

Keep remembering.

We keep forgetting.

We keep forgetting.

We keep falling back into the dream.

Of future and past.

Of the story of my life,

The story of how I want my life to be,

The story of how I wish that my life was,

And then we can wake back up,

Literally,

Like from a dream.

And all of a sudden,

I'm here.

Just like the difference between dreaming,

Being in some dream that feels so real,

And then all of a sudden you wake up.

And the dream has a certain reality still,

But it doesn't have that same effect on you that it did while you were in the dream.

Okay,

Those two.

Now the third definition,

And this is my own definition,

Could seem kind of corny,

But hopefully it's also kind of memorable,

Is mindfulness is the sense of hearing.

Not H-E-A-R,

Although it could be,

But I mean H-E-R-E,

The sense of hearing.

I could hear.

Here,

H-E-R-E-H-E-A-R.

But I can also hear vision,

I can experience vision.

In the way that it's actually happening right now versus my thoughts about what I see or my thoughts about what I hear,

My interpretations of what I hear,

My interpretations of what I feel or smell or taste or think.

I can hear the sense of thinking.

So let's take a moment.

So just practice that briefly.

So let's begin with hearing,

Hearing.

If you like,

You can allow your eyes to close.

And just becoming aware of the sense of hearing.

But possibly dropping any labels about what you hear.

Maybe it's the sound of my voice,

But of course it's not really the sound of my voice.

Those are words.

What is it really that is hearing to directly experience present moment reality?

But also maybe any sounds in your environment.

Letting go of the label or interpretation or evaluation or judgment.

This is a good sound.

This is a bad sound.

Dropping all of that.

And directly experiencing the sense of hearing,

The raw sensation.

And now,

If you like,

You can allow your eyes to open if they were closed and here.

To directly experience the sense of seeing.

Not your thoughts about what you see,

That's the opposite of mindfulness.

Here,

We're not full of our thoughts about what we experience,

We're full of what we experience,

Full of the present moment.

Mindful of presence.

Hearing.

If you want,

You could look into my eyes for just a little while and experience direct eye contact without any story about it.

Hopefully I am actually looking at you directly in the eyes based on this.

Camera.

That's okay if not.

You can also just scan around.

The room or the space that you're in and see that it's not a room because that's a word or a space because that's also a word.

Or a hand,

Because that's also a word.

What is this really?

That's the sense of hearing.

And when my mind is full of what's actually here,

There is no room for self-consciousness.

There's no room for future past worry.

There's no room for anything other than what is actually genuinely here,

And that is always a miraculous thing.

Bizarre experience.

It purifies my mind.

So I won't do the other senses,

But you could play with them,

Hearing anything,

Also hearing thinking.

I can be aware of thinking without evaluating it or judging it,

Just noticing it.

What is it even?

Maybe let's consider that for just a few more seconds here.

What is thinking?

Eyes open or closed.

Not really trying to find an answer,

But just observing.

What is it,

Really?

Maybe you could invite the next thought.

So clear the slate of thoughts in this moment.

And then.

Invite the next thought.

Just see what's the next thought that happens.

Can be kind of interesting to notice what happens when you genuinely invite thoughts to do whatever they want to do.

You could consider them as thought trains,

Too.

There are these constant thought trains that are coming.

And the capacity for mindfulness is,

To put differently,

Is the ability to notice these trains and to not get on the trains,

Or notice you're about to get on a train that you don't really want to get on,

And that goes to a destination where you don't really want to go,

But there's just so much habit energy to getting on these trains.

That you find yourself on it without even knowing that you got on.

So,

To notice the train.

And then see the doors have opened,

Have started to move on to this of like rumination or judging or all these different things that I know are actually not helpful for me.

And increasingly I can notice.

Before I get on,

Before I get on,

And then step back,

Step back,

Step back onto the platform of the train station.

And just sit here.

Or choose which trains I actually want to get on.

I actually like that train.

I want to think about that.

I want to plan for the future.

I can plan presently.

And still be here,

Still be mindful in the practice or in the exercise of planning for the future.

Okay,

So I'll leave it here.

Feel free to ask any questions.

I have plenty of other content,

Long courses that could help you really deepen your experience of this stuff.

Maybe I've gone on for too long,

Even here for an introductory video.

But my hope is that this was helpful for you,

And thank you for being willing to spend this time with me.

Let's practice hearing together.