What is Mindfulness?

What is Mindfulness?

What is Mindfulness?

Written by Team BLOOM

  |  Reviewed by Em Morrison

Has anyone ever told you to “pay attention?” We’re guessing yes. But has anyone ever told you HOW to do that? That’s what mindfulness is all about. Mindfulness means paying attention on purpose with curiosity and kindness. Oftentimes, as caregivers, we are extremely mindful of our young people when they are babies – paying attention to their every movement, watching closely how they interact with the world with curiosity, a sense of wonder, and kindness. In these moments of being deeply immersed in their play, our young people too, are interacting with their world mindfully.

Mindfulness is a way of paying attention to the present moment on purpose with curiosity and kindness, and without judgment. This way of paying attention involves tuning in to our thoughts, feelings, body sensations, and surrounding environment, with acceptance of what is and without judgment. We call it “mindfulness” but you can see it’s really “heartfulness” or “bodyfulness” too, since we are paying attention to our bodies, hearts, minds, and surroundings. When you practice mindfulness, you tune in to what you are sensing right in the current moment rather than thinking about the past or imagining the future.

Being Present

Mindfulness is being present to the here and now. Practicing mindfulness gives you awareness (information) of yourself, those around you, and the world. And this new sense of awareness can be an incredible tool to help you build the life you want.

Mindfulness can help you:

  • Have the power to choose where you place your attention
  • Know more about yourself and others
  • Enjoy the things that you like
  • Move away from things that you don’t want to be doing anymore
  • Feel more connected to the world around you
  • Notice your thoughts and know they are just thoughts
  • Be kinder to yourself and everyone around you
The Power Inside You

Everyone has the power to practice mindfulness. You probably practice it sometimes already without even knowing you’re doing it! Observing the first beautiful buds beginning to sprout in the spring, noticing the feeling of warm wind on your face as you walk to your office, the replenishing feeling you experience in your body with a cool drink of water to quench your thirst, are just a few examples. There are so many ways to bring mindfulness into your life. And as you learn how to practice it on purpose, you will develop skills that can help you live a happier and healthier life. A life that aligns with who you want to be in the world. Mindfulness is a powerful tool that is always available to you and can help you find your inner calm when your life feels stormy or out of control: whether that be from stress, anxiety, or negative thoughts, feelings, or experiences. It can also help you feel happier, have better attention and focus, and perform better at work, sports, and hobbies. The more you practice mindfulness, this way of paying attention on purpose, the more noticeable and long lasting these positive effects will be.

As you learn how to practice mindfulness, you will begin to develop and strengthen this sense of awareness, noticing what may be pleasant or unpleasant in your body or mind, and use this information to make new decisions that are more in line with what feels good or are more fulfilling to you.

A good example of this would be if someone has been practicing mindfulness a few times a week, noticing how their body was feeling as they breathed quietly for one minute each day, for the past few weeks. Usually by 5pm each day, they feel their energy is tapped, they are easily reactive, and are running on fumes to get through the rest of the day. After a week of their mindfulness practice, they notice themselves being less reactive around 5pm, feeling more energy than normal. This simple and short practice of mindfulness, with consistency, has made a tremendous impact on their life, and that is all it takes to see lasting changes. By breathing and tuning into their body for a short period each day, they have helped regulate their nervous system back to a state of balance, deepening their reservoir of resilience – allowing them to deal with their inevitable 5pm stressors, more effectively. The positive benefits of incorporating a practice into your day will slowly seep into your life, but with time and consistency, can really make a big impact.

Choosing How To React

Mindfulness also teaches us how to respond instead of just reacting automatically to situations or people. Think of your young person not doing what you ask or challenging your request of them, or someone cutting you off while driving — these are two examples of a stimulus that will cause you to respond. When you are in a tense or stressful situation, such as these two examples, you can use a simple mindfulness practice to help you navigate the negative emotion or experience more effectively. A brief pause, with a mindful breath, can allow you to quickly check in with your heart, body, and mind, then determine your feelings/emotions/thoughts around the situation, and then respond with more clarity, calm, and intention.

As Viktor Frankl so eloquently said, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

Mindfulness teaches us to use our awareness to recognize that space between any stimulus and our responses in our life so that we can respond wisely with intention more often instead of reacting blindly in a way we may later regret.

Once you know how to practice mindfulness, it can become a way of being that you can tap into whenever you want or need.

Are you Ready to Give It a Try?

Stop reading this and notice: are you breathing in or out? Are there loud noises around you? How many sounds can you hear? Are your feet cold, warm, or just right? Paying attention and noticing these things, without judging whatever we notice, is part of mindfulness.

Mindfulness for our Young People

For our young people, in its simplest form, mindfulness is simply paying attention to what is happening around them in the current moment. Whether that be what they are presently feeling, hearing, or seeing. They don’t need to achieve calm or clear their minds, they just need to experience the moment they are in, for what it is. Mindfulness can be introduced to our young people at any age. Children and young people are so receptive to mindfulness because it is their natural way of experiencing the world. Here we will explore mindfulness and how to translate this knowledge to our young people, so they can benefit as well.

Where do Mindfulness Practices come from?

Anyone can be mindful — it’s a natural way of being that is in all of us. You’ve been mindful plenty of times in your life before exploring this hub! When it comes to using specific practices to be mindful on purpose, it’s important to know that people have been practicing mindfulness for thousands of years through several different ancient Asian religious and spiritual philosophies, including Buddhism and Hinduism. Eventually these people brought their practices of mindfulness to every continent, including North America. In the last fifty years, more and more people have started practicing secular (non-religious) mindfulness in order to reduce their stress and improve their lives, and scientists have started studying its benefits. What you are reading about mindfulness in BLOOM today is the culmination of thousands of years of religious, philosophical, and now, scientific study.

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