8/8/2023
Summer is here, which can often be a good time to practice mindfulness. There may be more time to practice formally by meditating regularly. With meditation practice we often say that more is better, and it is also important to remember that any practice is better than none. This can apply to even a few minutes a day, perhaps pausing before getting out of bed in the morning to do a short body scan or attention-focused meditation, noticing breathing, sounds or other sensations arising from the body. If more time is available, there is good evidence that meditating for 15 minutes a day can have positive effects on stress and emotion regulation. The evidence for benefits increases further with longer periods of meditation. In addition to practicing formal meditation, summer offers many opportunities to practice mindfulness in everyday life. Many people take vacations during the summer and, if so, we may notice the anticipation that arises when thinking about returning to a favorite location, or traveling to a new destination. Some of the anticipation may be positive, related to old memories or excitement about going somewhere new.
7/7/2023
When we practice attention-focused meditation, we choose an object to focus on, like the breath, and place our attention there. We may follow a few breaths, then the attention wanders, often to thoughts and we get caught up in thinking. Eventually we will notice the thinking, and we can choose to return the attention back to focusing on breathing again. We do this over and over again. With time, the period of time between thoughts might begin to increase, and we become aware of awareness, of paying attention without thoughts arising. In this space without thoughts, we can just be aware of our present moment experience. At first we may only be aware of wherever we have chosen to place our attention, perhaps noticing the sensations of breathing or the points of contact from sitting. We can also pay attention to the mind, noticing the absence of thoughts. How is this absence of thought experienced? With no thoughts there is no judging, no worrying, no wanting things to be different than they are. There are no thoughts of the future or of the past, there is only the present moment. In the space between thoughts, everything is just as it is.
6/2/2023
Thinking is obviously necessary to accomplish many tasks- around the house, at work, for hobbies and leisure activities. Yet our minds continue to generate thoughts at other times, thoughts that often distract us from our present moment experience, and often increase our stress as negative thoughts or worries arise. We live our lives in the present moment, and if we are caught up in thinking about the past or the future, we may miss what is unfolding right now. Humans have an innate negativity bias, so the thoughts that arise are often worries about what has happened in the past or what might happen in the future. When thoughts arise, recognizing whether they are about something over which we have some control or whether they are focused on something beyond our sphere of influence is important. If the thoughts are about something we have control over, we can focus on how to address the issue. For instance, if we are worried about money, we can look at our budget and see where we might spend less or earn more. If the thoughts are about something over which we have no control, perhaps an event in the past that had a negative outcome that is still bothering us, we can first recognize this.
Moving On From Difficult Interactions
5/12/2023
Last month’s Musing focused on having a conversation with someone with whom we’d had a difficult interaction. This month the topic is about how we might move on without having such a conversation. Difficult interactions with others can lead us to feel many different negative emotions, such as anger or resentment, and may result in us going over the event repeatedly, trying to understand what happened or imagining how things might have gone differently. Often this does not accomplish much except to make us feel worse. Getting caught up in the story of what happened in the past does not change the events although we still can learn from them so that similar situations might have a different outcome in the future. When we find ourselves in these situations it can be helpful to pause and assess what is happening. First, is it even possible to take any action regarding the others involved? If we can address it with the other person directly then we might choose to do so as was discussed last month. But what if we can’t do this, perhaps because it was a one-time interaction with someone we don’t know, or if we choose not to because it is too difficult or there is too much risk?
2/22/2023
“Inviting our thoughts and feelings into awareness allows us to learn from them rather than be driven by them.” -Daniel J. Siegel When we choose to try a sitting meditation, we are making a special time and place for non-doing in our lives. The regular practice of sitting meditation provides the opportunity to wake up to this moment, the only moment we truly have. Our lives move at such a hectic pace that it can become a blur of lived but un-noticed moments. It can be as if we are sleep walking through life, moving in a type of automaticity, not noticing how we really feel, what we really think, how we truly want to live. The days can become weeks, the weeks can become months, the months can become years and before we realize it, much time has passed, and we have missed most of our life. Mindfulness is waking up to the present moment on purpose without judgement. It is setting our intention to pay attention and then focusing our attention and observing the underlying attitudes that show up. It’s about letting go – letting go of expectations and letting the present moment be as it is. It’s about developing patience and openness towards ourselves with kindness and curiosity, being aware of the tendency to push to achieve an outcome or to resist those experiences that are unpleasant. It’s about the tendency to judge.
Unwinding Anxiety – Part Three
1/12/2023
"Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better." -Maya Angelou S-T-O-P Stop: Pause, notice what’s in the body in this moment Take a breath: feel the breath as it flows throughout Observe all that’s here: Stressed? Angry? Anxious? Bored? Proceed: after recognizing what shows up, knowing there’s freedom to choose. We’ve been talking about unknowingly feeding into our anxiety over the last two Musings. What “feeds” do we gravitate towards when feeling anxious? There was an invitation for us to take a mindful moment before surfing our social media by pausing to collect some data before automatically engaging with Instagram, grabbing that candy bar, checking our email or twitter account. Pausing to notice what sensations are here in the body, where they are felt, and what thoughts or emotions are provoked before proceeding. With this information we can ask ourselves, who’s in the driver seat, me, or my anxiety? Here’s a little science behind how this works. It’s called operant conditioning or reward-based learning. Our minds set up habit loops based on the results of our actions. These results are interpreted by the brain as “rewards”. These rewards shape our behavior. With positive reinforcement, we learn to do more behaviors that make good feelings continue.
1/6/2023
“Most of the shadows of this life are caused by our standing in our own sunshine.” Ralph Waldo Emerson Understanding the Habit Loop and How We Feed It The definition of anxiety is a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome. Where does anxiety come from? Without even knowing it we may be feeding it or making it worse in attempts to make ourselves feel better. We mentioned “feeds” in last month’s Musing, the endless activities that can consume our time and attention. Feed binging is just one way we may be playing into our anxiety. There is nothing wrong with the feeds depending on but how we are in relationship to them. However, this relationship may be making our anxiety worse. Because anxiety is at an all-time high, it is worth considering. The iPhone was designed after a casino, with all the bells and whistles to keep our attention. It activates our sympathetic nervous system, the flight, fight or freeze system in the body. You get that nice hit on your Instagram and your phone “bings”. Someone “likes” you. This feels good and now you want to post again. You may think, I want to feel good right now, I’m going to post something, and I’ll feel better. This repeated behavior begins to lay down a habit. Post- get a bing- feel better.
11/22/2022
“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” - Alan Watts What is mindfulness training? Mindfulness training is practicing how to operate in present moment awareness intentionally and non-judgmentally. In our current societal state of being driven by distraction, this has become a lost art. Consciously or unconsciously, we tend to choose to distract our attention away from whatever- usually something uncomfortable to something more comfortable. Those cute little puppy videos, Tic Tok, Instagram or our cell phones are good at this. It’s so automatic, we aren’t even aware of it. There are endless “feeds” today in which to spend our time and attention. Although there is nothing inherently wrong with these feeds, they can impact our lives in some unknowingly adverse ways by increasing anxiety. Take a few moments reflecting on how many feeds you find yourself spending your time pursuing. Here are just a few examples of our daily “feeds”.
Reflections on the Tragedy at UVA
11/22/2022
It’s been a week since the mass shooting occurred at the University when three football players died, Lavel Davis Jr, Devin Chandler and D’Sean Perry, and another football player, Michael Hollins Jr, and a student, Marlee Morgan, were seriously injured. Another student, Christopher Jones, has been arrested for the shooting. Many others’ lives have been irrevocably changed. Grief over the deaths as well as the impact of trauma of the event will persist for a long time, undoubtedly for the duration of their lives for some. How can mindfulness be helpful in such a terrible situation? We can remember that we can just be with whatever arises without judging our experience. There are multiple emotions we might feel-grief, anger, fear, among many- and we can see if it’s possible to acknowledge whatever we’re feeling, even if we then choose to shift our attention to something else. Connecting with others can be helpful in validating what we are experiencing and recognizing that we are not alone. The University did this on a large scale with the memorial service that was held on Saturday at the John Paul Jones Arena. We can cultivate kindness for ourselves because many of the emotions that arise are difficult to be with.
9/29/2022
Have you noticed how much the word “mind” is part and parcel of our lives, how we tell stories and sing songs about the mind, as though it were a phenomenon that operates on its own, separately from “me”? Song titles with the word “mind” abound: the difficult conditions of your mind…Pain of Mind, Mind War, Crazy Out of My Mind, Dead-end Mind, Unsound Mind, Mind Games, All in the Mind, Quiet Mind, Thorn in My Mind, Half a Mind, A Mind With a Heart of Its Own. Then there’s your mind and what to do with it - Say What’s On Your Mind, Send Your Mind, Make Up Your Mind, Mind Control, Relax Your Mind, Free Your Mind, Open Your Mind, Mind Eraser, When the Heart Rules the Mind, Quiet Your Mind, Change Your Mind, Travel With Your Mind, (but while you’re traveling, Don’t Lose Your Mind!) And questions about your mind… If You Change Your Mind, Did You Ever Have to Make Up Your Mind? Where Is My Mind? Can I Change My Mind? And traveling around inside the mind… In the Back of My Mind, First Thing on My Mind, Mind over Matter,
