Welcome home! Please contact lincoln@icrontic.com if you have any difficulty logging in or using the site. New registrations must be manually approved which may take several days. Can't log in? Try clearing your browser's cookies.
The benefits of Mindfulness
I've been reading more and more about mindfulness. I've been trying to practice it. Jon Kabat-Zinn's words have really galvanized me to make it an important part of my life. Partially because he made it sound also relevant outside of a buddhist context.
Just like meditation though, I've been reading and hearing mixed reports about it. Apparently some people say they've been practicing it for years and years....and still have problems with actually being mindful.
I guess this thread is a means for me to get some reassurance as to the actuality of the benefits of mindfulness in normal life.
1 - How has it changed your life? The more specifics and details the better
2 - Did it get easier with time for you?
Just like meditation though, I've been reading and hearing mixed reports about it. Apparently some people say they've been practicing it for years and years....and still have problems with actually being mindful.
I guess this thread is a means for me to get some reassurance as to the actuality of the benefits of mindfulness in normal life.
1 - How has it changed your life? The more specifics and details the better
2 - Did it get easier with time for you?
0
Comments
An example would be, I used to get really annoyed if I would send someone a text message to someone and they would ignore me. I'd hold that thought in my head and use it to think of insults in my head "This person is a jerk, this person doesn't care about me, its not worth it to text this person anymore, etc." I've become much more aware of the images that I create about people and things, and how those images affect my relationships.
I'm still working on it though. My brain is some what neurotic, and I still have a lot of useless chatter that goes on. My main problems have been ones of self-doubt and self-pity. Not having the confidence to say and do things that I would like to do, simply because of nagging doubts. But I'm beginning to understand the source of them, and I've been beginning to practice mindfulness in speech and in action, which goes a long way to changing habits.
Me, it's been easier to think about what I'm saying or doing out loud. It took a few months for me to actually stop gossiping or talking about something that wasn't really important, or just talking to talk.
For me, it was when I realized that when I would try to explain my views on something, I never got much of a reply or was just ignored- don't say anything unless they want to know.
Overall, I'm not really sure about when to talk, etc. But I think eventually you'll know when to and not to speak, and it helps out in the long run. When you're gossiping, you come out as the bad guy, even if you don't want to, and sometimes you don't even mean to say anything at all. But it happens, especially if you've done it so much. It does get easier with time, and I always have so many thoughts racing around, so I'm still working on calming myself.
I wish you luck, I know it can be difficult. Just hang in there, and don't give up- it takes time.
Which theoretically is the step stone for mental mindfulness right?
But in terms of day to day activities, it can vary. Sometimes I find concentration very easy, other times I'm very distracted by my thoughts. But I believe once one makes the commitment to practice mindfulness, it can only improve your situation. Mindfulness has only gotten easier since I began meditating.
And in terms of physical senses, I've learned to actually look at things. Like at their texture, and at the small components that comprise them. When you just glance over things its easy to miss all the small details. But if you are focused and aren't distracted by thoughts and image, you can really look at something. If you look at something really closely, you can see individual fibers and structures, its really pretty cool. Its definitely a way of bringing yourself out of your thoughts...just trying to actually seeing something for what it really is, concentrating on it.
Here's a couple of recent ones:
I don't feel the need to kill any insect that's in the same room as me.
I don't feel the need to take them outside either, I am comfortable with spiders being around.
I don't flinch when it feels like there's something crawling on me.
^Those things used to annoy me
I am able to see craving brewing and sometimes stop it in it's tracks.
There are heaps of others, these are the ones I've noticed today. Little things, but they stood in the way of calm.
It becomes easier with practice and diligence, time alone does not make much difference.
Although practice does help, it also opens the door to deeper mindfulness, so in a way it does not get any easier, but we do get better at moving down the path of mindfulness, and enjoy the many benefits of mindfulness, so the benefits, if not making it easier, provide a certain faith in our practice and this is motivating. The changes continue and there is always a better state of mind to look forward to.
I like how you phrased that Yeshe. I totally agree with you. Once one truly begins to understand their own nature through mindfulness, it really becomes easy to see the benefits...and then you begin to realize that your nature IS actually mindfulness.
Just notice that you are trying to control and relax. If your mind wanders, notice that it is wandering and gently bring yourself back to the present moment.
As soon as you notice your mind doing/feeling something you will also notice that it fades quickly. You can then get back to whatever you were doing.
It's changing my whole way of living and I now realise mindfulness is living in the real Universe, everything else is just living, trapped inside your mind.
You've received a lot of good responses here already so I'll just add a slightly different perspective.
The practices of mindfulness and meditation, like some other psychological techniques, actually change the physiology of the brain by reinforcing positive thought patterns and awareness and by forging new, healthy neural pathways in the brain. The positive changes that occur as a result of consistent practice can't be overstated, in my humble opinion or experience.
These practices changed my life completely. It was my doctor (a GP and Jewish....) who suggested Buddhist meditation for me years ago before I became a Buddhist to deal with chronic pain and the real reduction in gray matter of the brain that people experience with chronic pain over time. He'd been reading the results of scientific studies being conducted at the time and there is even more literature today supporting these views. It's amazing brain work that changes people's lives profoundly. You'll see it for yourself after a little while.
Mindfulness is not concentration. It is noticing. When you notice you have drifted off. Then that is all. You have noticed you have drifted off. All the heavy guilt trips and disappointed thinking that you drifted off actually makes you more agitated or else more dull (stony).
I think I'm much more aware of my body then I was when I started practicing it. I just hope I'm not deluding myself.
With meditation, I have very nagging thoughts...but it's easy for me to zone out of those thoughts....but zoning in on something, thats's the problem. And just when I think I'm zoning it...really one with the breath and all that....I realize I might be making progress...and BAM! All goes to hell lol
I've also noticed a little part of me starting to really questioning my philosophical and spiritual pursuits which have been going on for months now. I'm starting to think I'm going slightly insane. A certain sense, I'm not myself anymore...a lack of confidence in what I'm doing.
She does say that she is more settled now since she meditates. Which includes settled with drifting off I imagine.
It will matter to you if you value it. I have thought on occasion, "Well, if I might practice and practice and practice and then still have times when I can't let the chatter go, let things be, be at peace, can't even stay mindful for more than a minute at a time, then what is the point?" For me, the point is to have a path. The point is all the faith that I have developed through consistent mindfulness and meditation. I see positive changes in my moods, my relationships, and so many things outside of my own form around me. This builds my faith, which isn't blind, it's based on what I've actually witnessed.
Without the faith that I'm building up, I get lost a lot more in the, "what's the point"s. I know that if I continue to walk this path, then everything will be okay. It will be okay even if I don't walk this path, but I think that I will be a lot more reactive and a lot less at peace with that, "okay."
It can be found here.....
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/nyanaponika/wheel121.html
(You can google up other versions which may be easier to print off.)
Through difficult times in my life I went into auto pilot which made me 'cut off' to my feelings and desires and this then became a habit. Being mindful has helped me to get back in touch with myself and see things the way they are, rather than through my interpretation of them. I liked the post earlier about desire. I have just finished reading a very good book 'Open to Desire' by Mark Epstein.
Acceptance, curiosity, and non-attachment to experience are major components of mindfulness.
The benefits would seem obvious.
I guess I would describe it as having a better attitude. Not so caught up in my delusional thinking, centered on myself, and all the nonsense that goes with that is liberating.
Does it get easier? Don't know. Maybe in another year I could answer. Then again that would just be a judgement.
'Mindfulness : The Path to the Deathless' by Ajahn Sumedho
http://www.what-buddha-taught.net/Books2/Ajahn_Sumedho_Mindfulness_The_Path_to_the_Deathless.htm
.
The intended outcome of mindfulness is becoming less and less attached to an ego-self (if I understand your question correctly).
I edited my post to reflect my question better.
If part of mindfulness practice is to become aware of our thoughts, bodily sensations, etc, doesn't that sort of re-affirm a self?
From an intellectual philosophical perspective I think no. From a yogic experiential perspective if you look at your thoughts and bodily experiences (are mindful of them) and you see a self, then that would be your understanding of your experience at that time.
Your understanding itself would be impermanent.
I would think awareness of bodily sensations when reflected on in terms of a permanent self would tend to diminish and dissolve the sense of self. "I have thoughts but those are not my self. My stomach is gurgling but that is not my self. My heart is beating but that is not my self. My legs hurt but that is not my self. None of these is my self. So what is my self? It's certainly none of these things..."
Ah I see. So the use of "my" is more or less inevitable, and sort of the "First level truth" to lead to the "Second level of truth?"
One has to start somewhere. In the search for no-self we have to begin with self- start where we are, as Pema Chodron says.