Mindfulness
"You can't stop the waves, but you can learn to surf."
Jon Kabat-Zin
If you follow the latest trends in “alternative” health care, you are probably at least somewhat familiar with the term “Mindfulness.” Strictly speaking, mindfulness refers to a particular way of paying attention, in which we accept our experience with a calm and non-judgmental awareness; we practice "Mindfulness Meditation" as a means of opening ourselves to this way of seeing the world.
Although Mindfulness Meditation and the mindful way of life have been a tradition in Buddhism for over 2500 years, it is nonetheless currently being touted in the "Western" media as a hot "new" trend in alternative health care. Perhaps that is because-for the first time ever-science is backing up the claims of Mindfulness practitioners and enthusiasts. Researchers have demonstrated that those who are engaged in the practice of mindfulness meditation generate high amplitude gamma waves-a type of brain wave associated with attention, conscious perception and learning, and that these brain waves are concenrated mostly in the left prefrontal cortex, an area of the brain that is associated with positive emotion and inhibition of fear and anxiety. In other words, -mindfulness meditation produces changes in the brain that decrease our anxiety and promiote relaxation. (Didn't we already know that?) Furthermore, follow up studies indicated that this relaxed state of mind stays with the practitioner long after the actual meditation session is over, a point which scientifically validates what those who meditate regularly have said for centuries.
While Mindfulness is a meditation technique, it is also a way of experiencing life that allows us to gain a deep and lasting insight into the nature of the world we live in and into ourselves. When we practice mindfulness meditation, a skill that anyone who is committed to the process can learn, we concentrate our attention on a single fluid process-our breathing- watching the repetitive motion of our breath as we allow our thoughts and feelings to move in and out of awareness -neither judging nor attaching meaning to them or their presence.
Similarly, when we live mindfully, we use the skills that we acquire through our meditative practice to focus our attention on the fluid nature of the present, accepting each moment as it arrives, without assigning value or judgement to what is happening. In doing so, we gain insight into the changing landscape of reality. As we experience life mindfully, we are aware of each passing moment; in time this awareness allows us to notice and accept that everything in our environment-including ourselves and those people and things that we cherish most dearly- is in a constant state of flux. We come to accept that change-while often emotionally disturbing and sometimes quite painful -is the natural order of things and to realize that even when we are in pain, life is proceeding exactly as it should. In other words, we begin to understand and incorporate into our world view the impermanence of life and the perpetuity of change. (continue reading "Mindfulness")