Mind Full Or Mindful? Changing Relationships With Thoughts

Is your mind constantly bouncing between lesson plans and laundry lists? You’re not alone—and you’re not doing it wrong. This meditation is a gentle, teacher-centered pause to help you shift from mental overload to meaningful awareness.

In this session, we explore what to do when thoughts won’t slow down and how to meet them with curiosity and compassion instead of criticism. The meditation is short, doable, and designed for real teacher brains—offering you a moment of calm that’s actually within reach.

Transcript

Hello,

And welcome to your slice of mindfulness.

For today's talk and meditation,

I wanted to take a few minutes to talk about something I know many teachers experience.

Many teachers I speak with mention the stress of learning how to leave work at work and how to focus in on the present moment when they finally arrive at home.

So many teachers tell me that they experience a phenomenon of being consumed by racing thoughts.

I wanted to address racing or consuming thoughts during meditation in an effort to help you be more present in each moment.

Our brain is designed to think,

Plan,

Organize,

And perform executive functions.

It's also designed to protect you.

I'm fascinated by the neuroscience of mindfulness.

The prefrontal cortex is the linear,

Literal left side of the brain that is designed to think,

Plan,

And protect you at all times.

That is its job.

So it's constantly bombarding you with thoughts.

Did you turn off the stove?

Is your child safe at college?

Will the flight land on time?

With thousands of thoughts a day and the mind's ability to really have infinite thoughts,

It can feel overwhelming.

So when you sit down to take a breath,

You may suddenly find your mind is everywhere.

Did I respond to that parent email?

What's the plan for that IEP meeting?

I forgot to take the chicken out for dinner.

I need to check in with that student again.

Did my own kid finish their homework?

Sound familiar?

Well,

You're not alone.

It's completely normal and especially common for teachers to experience an avalanche of thoughts during meditation.

You're constantly toggling between work mode and home mode,

Often with no clear boundary in between.

You might be at school thinking about your family and then at home thinking about your classroom.

Let me assure you,

This is not a sign that you're doing meditation wrong or that you just can't be mindful.

This is just the human mind doing what it was built to do.

Meditation isn't about having a perfectly clear mind.

It's not about pushing thoughts away or getting to a blank sleep.

It's not about trying to achieve a blissful state of unicorns and rainbows.

That is simply unrealistic.

It's about noticing what's happening in your mind with a kind curiosity and compassion and then choosing how to relate to it.

Think of the brain like a glitter jar.

When you shake it up,

Just like a busy school day,

Everything swirls in a clattering of overwhelming yet beautiful concoction of thoughts and ideas.

Meditation is a practice of watching and observing the glitter settle,

Of creating space between your thoughts.

It's about helping your thoughts to slow down and spread out so that you aren't controlled by them.

But rather,

You can decide how to respond to what is happening.

We cannot control the waves,

But we can learn to surf.

You can't control how many thoughts of anxiety,

Worry,

Fear,

Or planning will arise,

But you can absolutely control how you respond to them.

Teachers are constantly juggling thoughts that blend the personal and professional.

You're teaching a math lesson while you're worrying that your own child had a hard morning getting off to school.

You're grading papers at night and realize you haven't spoken to your partner all day.

You're in a staff meeting,

Mentally writing tomorrow's grocery list.

Your brain is trying to keep track of everything.

And that's not failure,

That's love,

That's responsibility,

That's care.

So when those thoughts show up during meditation about home while you're at work,

About school while you're at home,

See if you can greet them with kindness instead of frustration.

Here's the shift we're working towards.

Not erasing thoughts,

But noticing them,

Naming them,

Choosing not to get swept away by them.

This is especially effective with negative or unhelpful thoughts like,

I'm not showing up enough for my family,

I should be more patient with my students,

I'm dropping the ball everywhere.

We can learn to ask ourselves,

Is this thought true?

Is it kind?

Is it helpful?

Sometimes the answer is no,

And if that's the case,

You can just let the thought go or simply note it and come back to your breath.

Here are some simple techniques that you can use when thoughts arise during meditation,

Especially those teacher thoughts that seem to be on repeat all day long.

Noting.

When your mind jumps to your to-do list,

Apparent conversation or what to make for dinner,

Simply note it,

Planning,

Or worrying,

Or remembering,

Or judging.

Then return to your breath or other anchor.

This practice builds the habit of awareness without entanglement.

So if you're meditating and suddenly you remember that you forgot to respond to a student's email,

Instead of jumping up to fix it,

You note remembering and then return to the breath.

Another practice that I love is warm and a little playful.

When a thought shows up,

Say to yourself,

Hello thought,

Thank you thought,

Goodbye thought.

It invites kindness and puts you back in the driver's seat.

For example,

While meditating at home,

You're suddenly caught up in worrying about tomorrow's math lesson.

Try saying hello lesson plan,

Thanks for showing up,

Goodbye for now.

Another technique you can use is to choose your breath as an anchor,

Inhale and exhale,

And then count one,

Inhale,

Exhale,

And count two,

And so on,

All the way up to 10,

And then start over.

So if you're meditating and you get to four,

When your mind suddenly remembers about those field trip permission slips,

Just notice that you wandered,

Not a problem,

And gently begin again at one.

That return is the practice.

There's no right way to practice this,

But remember what you practice grows stronger.

I have had experiences when I've sat down to meditate with the intention of focusing on my breath,

Only to have my mind wander into a full on lesson planning mode.

One time I actually visualized an entire course during my meditation practice.

So I paused,

I wrote it down,

And then I came back.

That course,

It turned out to be one of my favorites,

And be on the lookout for it to be showing up on Insight Timer one day soon.

Many times our biggest inspirations come to us when we finally take the time to sit in quiet stillness.

So I've come to embrace whatever thoughts arise,

Create space,

And with kindness and curiosity decide how I'm going to proceed.

All this to say,

You get to choose.

Sometimes the thoughts are creative,

Sometimes they're anxious,

And sometimes they're just tired.

Meditation helps us tune into what's here,

Create space,

And decide what to do next.

Let's remember,

You are not your thoughts.

You are the one noticing your thoughts.

Understanding this separation can be very helpful and empowering.

And every time you notice your mind has wandered,

That's actually a moment of mindfulness.

So whether you're at home thinking about school or at school thinking about home,

Bring a little compassion to the moment,

Name the thought,

Notice it,

And gently return to now.

As teachers,

Your minds are powerful.

You are constantly balancing care,

Structure,

Creativity,

And problem solving.

It's no wonder your thoughts keep going.

But meditation can help you build a gentle pause,

A space,

A moment of choice.

And that space might be one of the most powerful gifts you give yourself,

Not just for your own well-being,

But for your students,

Your family,

And your whole self.

Thank you for doing this work.

I invite you now to carve out your slice of mindfulness with me in an effort to practice becoming curious about your thoughts.

Inviting you to settle into a comfortable position.

Taking a moment to check in with your body and tuning in to what it needs in this moment.

Does it need to stand,

Sit,

Lay,

Move?

Honoring whatever it is that is showing up to you at this time.

And finding a position that you can sustain.

If it feels comfortable to you,

You're welcome to close your eyes.

Inviting your whole body to soften into this present moment.

Inviting any tension you may be holding in your neck,

Shoulders,

Belly,

To release.

Now,

Bringing your attention to your breath.

Noticing the quality of your breath in this moment.

Is it shallow,

Deep,

Shaky,

Or steady?

The invitation is to breathe in and notice where the inhale turns into an exhale.

Noticing how the breath effortlessly works for you.

Breathing in and breathing out.

And keying in now to where the exhale turns back into an inhale.

Staying with this pattern for a few breath cycles and simply noticing the patterns of your breath.

I'm taking in the relationship to your experience,

Starting with a lot of curiosity to where the body is right now.

It can even be the short scan of the body,

Noticing if the body feels okay,

Which doesn't necessarily mean it has to feel comfortable.

We aren't looking for the absence of pain.

Mindfulness isn't about eliminating or avoiding pain.

It's more simply about recognizing and accepting what is present for us.

I invite you to visualize a strong table to place a glitter jar on.

And as you do,

You're just creating the container of stillness for anything and everything to be held,

Whether it's racing thoughts,

Painful emotions,

Distractions,

Holding it all in your awareness like you would a loved one with care,

Compassion,

Curiosity.

And like the glitter jar,

Racing sensations,

Thoughts,

Emotions are represented by the glitter,

Floating,

Swirling,

Dancing to the surface,

Taking up space,

Pulling you from this moment.

From here,

Set an intention to ground into an anchor.

An anchor can be your breath,

A sensation,

A sound,

Gravity pulling you to the earth,

Or where your body makes contact with the surface beneath you.

And can you allow your attention to collect to your anchor?

Key into this anchor point with the recognition that the mind does like to be in motion and will most likely try to entice you in other directions.

We live in a world with way more distractions than the mind was designed for.

So knowing that,

Of course,

The attention is going to wander probably hundreds of times during this meditation.

Become curious and feel into an appreciation for that.

When we set the context and realize just how wild and interesting it is to have a mind that is running around thinking different things,

Worrying,

Getting excited,

Planning,

Thinking,

We don't have to take it personally.

It's part of the design and how the design is interacting with our ongoing environment.

And yet with all of that,

We're exploring and all of that happens each time we're pulled into it.

Can there be an invitation to presence to that anchor point with as much compassion as is available to you so that it's not this ripping of the attention back or any sense of the thoughts being wrong,

But they're just there.

And the game we're playing right now is to see them and to anchor into the anchor with some curiosity,

Falling into deeper presence with your anchor of choice,

Treating it with the utmost love and devotion and just see if you can do one breath or one cycle with full presence,

Keying into your anchor with a clarity or a vividness,

Or even just bringing a sensation into focus.

And if you're able to do that once,

Then see if you can do it another time and again and again.

And so if the imagery is the glitter jar with all the glitter falling and swirling and we're holding each speck with compassion,

Acceptance,

And love to help add to sustaining this continuity,

Going to invite you to add a counting technique.

This technique is to note any thought that passes beginning by taking a deliberate inhale and exhale and count one.

Continue this breathing cycle and counting to breathing in,

Breathing out,

And as you're breathing,

If a thought passes through,

Did I make those photocopies?

Note it thinking and count three.

Allow this to be a fun game to help you see your thoughts,

Accept them,

And place your focus on your anchor.

Breathing in,

You may note planning,

Breathing out,

Count four.

If at any time you lose track of counting,

Not a problem,

Simply begin again.

It's not a race or a contest.

Simply noticing with a kind observation.

Another technique you may want to play around with is when a thought arises,

Notice it by saying hello thought,

Thank you thought,

Goodbye thought,

And then back to your anchor.

Hello thought,

Thank you thought,

Goodbye thought,

And back to your anchor.

The invitation is to do this for a few breath cycles.

As the glitter begins to settle in the jar,

Perhaps there is more space between each thought.

Perhaps the mind is more expansive,

Or not,

There's no right or wrong.

Simply noticing what is occurring in your present moment.

And there will be some silence for the next few moments so you can practice in your own way,

In your own pattern.

Notice how you feel in this moment,

And maybe send yourself gratitude for carving out your slice of mindfulness today,

For creating space between your thoughts,

And for maybe engaging with your thoughts in a more kind and compassionate way.

And before you leave,

I invite you to respond as to which technique worked best for you.

Thank you for your practice.