Are you mindless or mindful?
Mindfulness is about training your mind. It’s about NOT being mindless!
When you are mindless you do things without actually thinking about them: they are automatic or repetitive actions, behaviours and reactions.
Being mindful is training your mind with concentration so that it will stay where you want it to stay.
How would it feel like to be able to enjoy each moment you are living instead of worrying about the past – which you cannot change – or worrying about the future?!
Wouldn’t that be great?!
Is your mind fighting with itself right now…?
You think, yes this is a good idea…in theory. But every thing I do has consequences. So it would be silly to only be concerned with this exact moment!
I know exactly what you mean, and no, being mindful doesn’t mean that you are enjoying the moment without regard for the consequences of what you’re doing or saying!
Of course you will be aware of those things.
But wouldn’t it be amazing to enjoy right now all of the time!!
Mindfulness meditation and visualisation exercises can help you to calm your mind and to find peace. They can help you to get a clearer understanding of how things really are – to get perspective.
The two most important elements are awareness and acceptance.
A lot of times you get stressed because you cannot see things how they really are and instead you wish they were exactly how you want them to be.
So you need to learn to be aware of exactly what is happening and then to accept that fact.
Here’s an example from my own life right now: I’ve applied for a visa to travel to Australia and it’s been granted which is great news because it means VeraFlow is coming to Australia and I get to meet lots of new people and visit somewhere I have never been before!
But my partner does not have a UK passport and therefore the application for him is a bit more complicated. We’ve submitted the application and could either spend the next days or weeks worrying about whether it will get granted or not and become stressed out thinking about it.
Or we could put our minds at ease knowing that we’ve made the best application we can and that we will find a way to get any supporting documents they might request.
If we are able to do this then we can enjoy all the different and potentially wonderful moments we will have during the time it’s being processed instead of constantly being worried and stressed over something we have no power to change.
And, it might just get granted in the next few days with no problems at all!
So what would be the point to worry and get stressed out!?
Here’s another scenario:
Let’s say you have an important person in your life who did something that hurt you – perhaps a particular situation just jumped to your mind!
You are aware of what happened and you are aware of the pain you are suffering. But your mind is in turmoil, constantly thinking “why?” or “how could they have done that?” or “what if they do it again?”…
These thoughts are stopping you from experiencing your life right now in a good way.
You are basically hijacking your own happiness.
We all make mistakes and we all suffer because of situations or events that are out of our control. If we are aware of them and can accept that it has happened and that we cannot re-live the past and change it, and we cannot know what is going to happen in the future, then we will be able to live a much more relaxed and happy present.
Does that make sense?
It takes time to train your mind. To train it effectively it needs to become a habit – a new pattern of behaviour and way of thinking.
In VeraFlow we include mindfulness.
To begin with you will notice only at the end of the class in the guided meditation or visualisation section. But as you become more skilled at it you will also learn to bring mindfulness into the whole class, becoming more aware of your body and your muscles, feeling your body and aligning your body more effectively to stretch in the way your body needs it.
You’ll be able to focus on yourself and what you’re doing rather than having your mind jumping around all over the place thinking about all kinds of things that have nothing to do with what you’re doing in that very moment.
Have you tried being mindful? What has been the impact on your life?
