What is Mindfulness, and What it's Not - Talk

This is a great way to become familiar with "mindfulness" and "meditations" - words that are flying around us these days. We also cover some of the common misconceptions about mindfulness and meditation, ones which often keep people from actually giving it a try. Finally, we talk about why this particular style of secular meditation is so radical and profoundly impacting of our daily lives.

Transcript

Hello there.

I'm happy you've joined me.

Looking forward to kind of chatting about what is mindfulness,

What is mindfulness meditation,

What is this whole world.

These words mindfulness meditation are definitely currently buzzwords I would say they're flying all around us,

Which is really wonderful.

And so,

Let's I think it's helpful just kind of start with a definition.

What is mindfulness.

So,

One of the definitions I like of mindfulness is the simplest and gets to the core of it is mindfulness is kind attention of whatever is present for you in the present moment.

Another way of thinking about it or defining it is loving awareness.

So there's big components.

It's a very simple definition there's a big component there's three big components is the awareness piece.

This kind of accepting accepting or this yes miss or this kindness or kind of just a welcoming of whatever you find in your awareness.

And then there's the specifically of what's going on for you in the present moment,

And that's generally in your physical state,

Your emotional state and your mental state.

So it's really simple,

Simple definition and it sounds so simple and easy.

So,

Like me,

Maybe decades,

Spending a lot of time maybe caught up mostly in kind of just the thought scape or the mental landscape where it's easy for us to kind of really get carried away in our,

In our thoughts,

And not really pay attention to the other components of our experience.

And I just want to kind of know that it's so it is really simple and there might be.

If you're new and exploring this world,

There might be a lot of moments of it just being very simple.

And also like any new skill or thing that you're exploring.

It takes time,

It can.

Time in practice yields benefits.

And that also means it takes patience,

So just want to say it's simple,

And it really is quite simple and also it's a,

It's a,

It can be if you're kind of later into your life and you're not a new baby in the world,

It can be,

There's a lot of patterns we may have developed that make it make it feel like it's challenging.

So I want to briefly touch upon what is meditation.

Because mindfulness meditation are not there,

They're together but not exactly the same thing.

And in this case of mindfulness meditation,

There's actually a lot of different types of meditation,

You may be aware of some of those and practice other types.

There's,

There's chanting,

There's mantras,

There's visualizations,

A lot of people know about a lot of breath meditation.

These days,

There's even,

You may know of Sufi spinning which is also another type of meditation so there's a lot of different types of meditation and mindfulness meditation is particular secular form of meditation has roots in Buddhism.

But the,

What I find that is particular about it is that it's,

It's just the definition that I gave it to have rattle hole and it's in its simplicity and its ability to kind of transform our lives.

So meditation is simply the formal practice but mindfulness can be practiced at any time,

And that's one of the most powerful things about it is it can be practiced at any time in our lives.

So I think it's also helpful talk about what mindfulness is not not because that points us kind of helps point in the direction of what it is.

And because this is,

This is,

I'm going to specifically speak to some of the most common misconceptions I think that are kind of out there.

Now that mindfulness meditation are more common household words.

So the first one is that it's mindfulness is not not thinking.

I've many many times,

You know,

Shared that I am into meditation or mindfulness and people say oh I can't do that my mind is too busy.

And I say,

In my head I say,

Why do you think I do it.

And a lot of people have this picture that you're kind of trying to eliminate all thought,

And I just want to kind of make it clear that,

Again,

Going back to the definition,

We're being present with better with whatever is physical mental emotional.

And that includes noticing and being with whatever thoughts are present so it's not about not thinking we're not having this goal of,

Of trying to empty our mind,

That would be impossible I promise you.

It's also very common to kind of think that mindfulness is about cultivating of a special state.

And I will say that this is kind of there's a nuance here and that there are types of meditation that are about cultivating a special state,

And that getting you into a very particular psychic state.

So mindfulness meditation is not about that if you if you think back again to the definition that I gave kind attention or kind awareness of whatever is present for you in the moment.

There's a lot that can be going on the moment so we're not it's not about going to this place of a hovering bliss out blissed out being.

And which kind of leads nice into the third one that I think is really closely related that people also think it's just about being calm or the only benefit for about the only benefit of mindfulness meditation is about being calm.

And so I will say that that is truly one of the most remarkable and true benefits of of meditation and mindfulness meditation is that in paying attention coming back to whatever is actually going on for you in the moment,

But often ends up bringing a great sense of ease quite quickly.

And just simply by getting out of whatever's going on in our mind we're often the future of the past.

And just by coming back to what this,

What is this moment actually like can really be quite settling and and kind of,

And stress reducing.

And it is very,

It is often very very calming,

Just inherently.

And so I think that's the goal of.

The focus of mindfulness meditation is just so radical because,

As I mentioned,

Most of us most of the time,

Spend kind of our focus our attention is on whatever's going on in our mindscape.

So,

Excuse me,

Mental proliferation is absolutely completely normal.

Where I go into this and other talks that I have available here about thinking and kind of the whys and hows etc behind thinking.

But,

You know,

Our brain is is an organ just like our heart and it's it's pumping out thoughts for us and many of them are very helpful.

So we whenever mad at our brain for pumping out thoughts and taking us other places.

It's just doing its job,

Just like the hardest thing it's job.

So,

A key piece and key thing to remember is that we're not.

We're,

We're not changing our thoughts,

We're changing our relationship with our thoughts and that actually,

It's helpful to think about that kind of with all of our experience where we're not trying to change what our emotional state we're going through.

We're changing our relationship to it,

And there's a lot of freedom that comes in.

In that perspective shift.

I'll end with a story of when I started meditating.

I was at a retreat.

And it was a long retreat in the first few days.

And it was just,

You know,

It was just absolute,

Like,

Oh my gosh,

My,

My thoughts are just absolutely everywhere and we were being,

Though the teaching that we were learning in that retreat was to just kind of focus our soul attention for the duration of all of our meditation for the,

For the,

For the extent of three days was just a bit focus our soul attention on our breath,

And particularly a very very specific place where you feel the breath which is the,

The feeling of the air going out of the nose.

And so I was trying to focus there and gosh,

If I couldn't last a few milliseconds before I was kind of lost in thought and my attention was just running away somewhere,

Somewhere else.

And I started to realize this feels like when you're training a puppy and you know you look away for a brief moment,

It feels like a millisecond.

And then when you look up you realize oh my god the puppy is half mile away.

And,

And it's gotten into some horse poop and it's just making a mess and it's,

Oh my gosh,

It's just,

Oh wow,

Like how quickly so the analogy is how you know how quickly.

And so it's a great analogy for us to lose attention and for to kind of get lost in thought,

And how when we finally kind of pay attention again and we touch back and oh my gosh where's my attention.

We may have strayed very very far and who knows what our thought the content of our thoughts could be.

And as I kind of got better at holding my attention,

Where I wanted to.

The feeling of my breath.

Now,

Some focusing attention there I realized that I could actually with training,

Just like training a puppy.

I could hold my attention on one place and I actually notice,

Much more quickly when the puppy had strayed and so I would actually don't,

I would actually begin over some time to notice,

Oh,

I would notice when the puppy was maybe a few feet away from me and meaning like when I had was lost in thought for a few moments rather than for minutes or hours.

And it felt like I could kind of just kind of sense really quickly and readily.

Oh,

The puppy is straight,

It's only a few foot away and bring it back.

So that's one of the friendly images I like to keep in mind,

As I,

As I remind myself,

It's just,

It's just like training a puppy and it's,

You know,

The kindness and and love that we bring to a puppy is what we want to bring to ourselves,

When we explore this journey of learning how,

Where we place our attention is what grows and what what thrives.

So it's a beautiful.

It's a beautiful journey of learning.

So I hope that's a good little summary for you and invite you to explore either a simple breath meditation that I have on here or any other meditations I have and any other mindfulness meditations that are available on this amazing app.

Have a lovely day.