Mindfulness

There are three mental states which comprise the psychological process termed mindfulness, these are: acceptance,awareness and being present. In psychology, mindfulness is not a type of therapy per se. It is rather a way of approaching emotional struggles. Nowadays, humanistic psychologists and cognitive therapists are adopting it more and more, with the purpose of guiding clients through a different way of perceiving suffering.

This need - of changing people’s outlook on emotional-pain - emerged from the realisation that individuals in many societies (mainly in the west) live in an incessant search for happiness and emotional safety. Aspects that drive them towards an existence of craving what they don’t have, and grasping what they do have. Aspects that also propel people to seek approval, success and possessions; which in turn make them fear losing what they have and continuously compare themselves to others.

Origins

I trust that many of you know this realisation is not a new thing, as it was something Siddhārtha Gautama (the Buddha) became aware of when he, according to the story, left his sheltered, pampered life of a prince over 2,500 years ago. Outside the walls of the wealthy palace where he and his family lived in; as a young man, he saw for the first time things such as a woman crippled by old age and people incapacitated by bodily illnesses. After witnessing all this suffering he could no longer return to his old way of living. He then, through meditating 7 days under a tree, had an ‘awakening’ which brought him the understanding of the transitory nature of life, and of its inherit suffering.

Of course, the accuracy of this story may be called into question. Nonetheless, the message it conveys is one that addresses the very issues still seen nowadays: People try to protect themselves in their ‘palaces’ from the things they fear, where they also develop an ‘adoration’ for their achievements and a desire for more. This message also leads to the idea that lies at the core of the Buddha’s teachings, which is:

to live a life where we directly engage with suffering instead of trying to avoid it

Mindfulness delivers the means to this through its three main elements:

Acceptance

First of all, I would like you to recall the last time you felt sad or anxious. How did you approach that emotion? Did you try to distract yourself from it, or did you accepted it?

My Experience

As I am writing this down I decided to embark on this moment of reflection with you: So, last time I felt low, I just went straight to my computer to get some work done while listening to some calming music. Not only that, whenever my frustration revisited my thoughts I criticized myself for feeling irritated.

Now, within the mindfulness mindset this only makes us feel worse. And the explanation as to why this is the case is a fascinating one, in my opinion. The logic behind this explains that whenever people are afflicted by anguish what they do is to focus on the gap that separates them from how they feel/are and how they would like to feel/be. This is a situation in which craving takes places: the craving for feeling (or being) the opposite of how they feel (or are).

How to address this

The way mindfulness addresses such distress is through acceptance. Using my case as an illustration (very easy in retrospect) this would have gone like this:

In order to not distract myself from my frustration, I would have taken a moment in which I fully acknowledged my stress : what caused it, how it made my body react and how it disrupted my emotions. From there I should have expanded my acknowledgment of that entire moment. How? By making a effort to tell myself that there was more to that moment than my anguish, by understanding that that moment was not defined only by my frustrations, but also by my breathing, my heart beat, the slight discomfort in my lower back, the moving trees that I could see through the window and so forth.

The idea behind this is that through accepting one’s difficult feelings and ‘giving’ them the space to exist as a component of the whole experience they don’t become overwhelming and one doesn’t feel entrapped by them.

Being Present

As I move on to the second element of mindfulness - being present – I realise that as I am typing these words, every now and then my thoughts drift away imagining what kind of images I am going to choose for this post “cartoon? Yes, I love using cartoons for my Steemit posts. It makes them less serious.” Also, I remembered that when I was making dinner yesterday I was also thinking of work. And now that I am reflecting on this, it feels as if I don’t spend much time fully in the present moment. Hum ...

Mindfulness, however, is a practice that requires us to bring ourselves to the present moment. But it doesn’t stop there, it also tells us why this alternative way of experiencing life has favourable outcomes. This is a notion that I find not only useful, but also quite smart; especially when dealing with sadness.

I have already pointed out the notion that people don’t always allow themselves to “feel their feelings” (the painful ones in particular). What they do instead is to elaborate stories to make sense of the feelings; with this, they inevitably bring a load of events from the past and even venture predicting the future. All that just to come up with an explanation that can help them to get rid of their pain.

I suppose a good example to illustrate this is the familiar scenario where a guy or girl is rejected by someone they have been dating for a while. You can imagine all the explanations they resort to in order to avoid the dilacerating rejection.

The way to deal with this

Mindfulness suggests an alternative way to this approach, and that is, ‘be with the pain’; because only through this one can fully comprehend it. Not the causes of it, but the pain itself: how it churns one’s stomach, how it makes one’s heart sink etc... in this way what once was a bitter sensation, becomes an unpleasant memory; which although still painful is something that you have faced and, therefore, is more familiar to you; which, in turn, makes it less frightening.

Awareness

The third element of mindfulness, awareness, enlightens us about the importance of returning to the present moment. As this is a notion that puts forward the concept that the more we fail to fully experience the present moment, the more we are carried out by those feelings that we suppress, by those automatic thoughts that keep coming back and sometimes drag us down to a path towards sadness and anxiety.

In other words, this tells us that through not attending to the present one can easily end up in a state of despair without quite knowing how one got there.

In short, it says that when people engage with whatever the present moment has to offer without attempting to avoid it, or get rid of it they ‘tune in’ and become ‘aware’ of themselves, and are, therefore, less carried away by damaging, negative thoughts.

Meditation

The aforementioned psychological processes (acceptance, being present and awareness) are not exactly easy for people to put into place. As it requires a certain level of alertness - about oneself as well as the present moment - that simply goes against the auto-pilot mode under which we function most of the time. Some psychologists, actually, consider this to be one of the limitations of mindfulness.

However, for those who actually are willing to apply the three elements of mindfulness to their lives; meditation delivers the means to make them a natural strategy for not only coping with difficult emotions, but also with fully engaging with those good moments in life that sometimes we are too distracted to notice.

My personal view of meditation, or mindfulness for that matter, is not aligned with any particular faith. Rather, I see it as a way to regulate the process of attention through focusing on something - either one’s breathing or a candle flame. But, there are several techniques’ available, and long-term practise meditation is associated with: less distress in the presence of pain, significant reductions in blood pressure and reduced levels of cortisol. This happens due to the change of activity in parts of the brain such as the pain matrix, the parasympathetic branch of the ANS (autonomic nervous system) and the pre-frontal cortex.

The more one practices meditation changes in connection patterns between neurons are expected to occur (this is an example of plasticity); also, less mental effort is involved. Therefore helping all the psychological processes we discussed before come more natural to us even in moments of frustration. Basically, helping them become our natural way of coping with emotional distress.

Criticism

Those who criticise mindfulness are mainly against the notion of acceptance. They argue that through encouraging people to remain in a given situation this idea stops them from fighting for change.

I disagree with this; particularly when I see this through the lens of mental-well being. Over and over again life throws at us situations that simply cannot be changed. For example, the loss of a loved one, or maybe even a break-up where there is no going back. What approach would you say is a healthier one for someone going through such experiences?

Personally, the only fight for change I would encourage here is that of how one deals with a particular kind of distress. Through the conscious effort of understanding that either sadness or fear is only part of one’s entire moment and existence, that pain becomes less overwhelming indeed.

[Original Content by Abigail Dantes - 2018]

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Reference list:

Hayes, S. (2005) Get out of your mind and into your life, Oakland, CA: New Harbinger Publications.

Lutz, A., Slagter, H.A., Dunne, J.D. and Davidson, R.J (2008) ‘Cognitive-emotional interactions – attention regulation and monitoring in meditation’, Trends in Cognitive Science, vol. 12, pp 163-9.

Newberg, A.B. and Iversen, J. (2003) ‘The neural basis of the complex mental task of meditation: neurotransmitter and neurochemical considerations’, Medical Hipotheses, vol. 61, pp 282-91.

Schneider, R.H., Staggers, F., Alexander, C.N., Sherpard, W. Rainforth, M., Kondwani, K. Et al. (1995) ‘A randomized controlled trial of stress reduction for hypertension in older African Americans’, Hypertension, vol. 26, pp 820-7.

Image source: 1,2,3,4

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Dear Reader,

This week I have some homework for you 😊

I would like you to please time three minutes on your alarm clock, sit comfortably, close your eyes; then, try to focus on your breathing. Whenever your thoughts drift away bring them back to your breathing pattern. It is very likely that this will be what the whole three minutes will be about. But it will still be a good way of exercising focus.

Now, how would you describe that experience? Did the three minutes last forever? Or, were you so engrossed in the moment that, next thing, your alarm went off!?

I am really curious to hear how you did!

As always, thank you so much for reading my post. It means the world to me 💓