Bringing mindfulness to habits we wish to change.
In my book,
The Here and Now Habit,
How mindfulness can help you break unhealthy habits once and for all,
I explore how different kinds of unhealthy or problematical habits have different feelings and energies associated with them.
But all can be experienced and changed when met with mindfulness,
With a kind,
Interested and accepting awareness.
We'll explore and work with four main kinds of habits.
The first are habits of wanting.
These kind of habits,
Wanting,
Craving,
Have an energy of moving towards something we desire,
Including craving or habitually seeking food,
Drink,
Drugs,
Sex,
Recognition or any other object of desire.
Working mindfully with habits of wanting means opening fully to the feeling of wanting,
Or the feeling of reaching out as it manifests in the body,
In the emotions and in the mind.
We can experience the energies of wanting,
Of desire,
Without fixating on the object of desire.
And then the energies can,
With practice,
Come and go without being a problem.
The second kind of habit is habits of resistance,
Getting caught up in feelings or emotions of wanting to get away from something that we find undesirable.
Includes anger,
Frustration,
Judgment,
Impatience,
And the habits associated with these energies,
Like making angry remarks or impatient or aggressive driving.
Working mindfully with these habit energies of resisting,
Involves learning how to stay with the unpleasant feelings that underpin these habitual reactions.
The third kind of habit is habits of distraction,
Moving away from our present moments experience,
And towards something that seems more attractive,
Interesting or more exciting,
Such as social media,
Text messages,
Email,
TV,
Etc.
Working with these habits of distraction involves becoming familiar with the feelings,
And the emotions that we feel.
Working with these habits of distraction involves becoming familiar with the feelings,
Sometimes they're subtle feelings,
That trigger the wish to move away from our experience.
It might be a feeling of boredom or anxiety or fear,
And the invitation is to stay with the feeling rather than moving toward the habitual distraction.
The fourth area involves habits of doing,
Habits of stress and worry,
Feeling like we're always on our way somewhere,
Without enough time to get everything done,
Checking off our to-do list.
With a stressed,
Often frenetic sense of disconnection from the present.
Working with these habits of stress and worry involves coming back to the bodily feelings and emotions that are present,
And opening to them,
And bringing awareness to the thoughts and beliefs that can help perpetuate them,
And choosing not to believe the narratives and beliefs,
As though they were the truth.
For example,
I'll never be able to do this,
Or this is never going to change.
Though the energies behind these types of habits feel quite different,
They are always in which we move away from the present moment,
Dissatisfied with how things are here and now.
We try to get something we don't have,
Or we try to escape from a painful or uninteresting experience,
Or we feel we have to keep running just to keep pace.
It's important to stress that these energies,
Wanting,
Resistance,
Distraction,
Doing,
Are not bad or wrong.
They're natural human energies to get what we need to thrive and survive and avoid threats.
What's important is how we meet them.
When we meet them with awareness and with kindness,
We can make choices to live more healthily,
More wisely,
And with greater freedom.
