Not Another Blog About Mindfulness
Written by, Carley Foster LCPC
Mindfulness is a term that gets thrown around a lot. In the last decade, it has made its way into schools, businesses, and community programs. Opinions on the subject can easily be found on mental health-related blogs, websites, and social media. In most cases, people agree that mindfulness is a worthwhile practice. Have you ever been curious about how it could apply to your life?
That was also a question I was asking myself as a college sophomore after signing up for an extracurricular mindfulness group on my campus. In this group, I learned it can be tempting to use “mindfulness” and “meditation” as interchangeable terms. However, they are not quite the same thing. Jon Kabat-Zinn, a university professor who developed Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), describes mindfulness as “paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgmentally.” He also explains that mindfulness is “the heart of Buddhist meditation,” though mindfulness as a concept transcends time, place, religion, and culture. Both these ideas can be found in the book “Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life.”
This distinction between mindfulness and meditation is important because, while meditation requires some level of mindfulness, we can access mindfulness whether or not we are meditating in a traditional sense. When we do, it creates an opportunity for almost anything to become a meditative act.
Kabat-Zinn suggests that lack of awareness in the present moment can lead to a variety of issues, including a tendency to take life for granted and feeling out of touch with yourself. However, decades of research into mindfulness suggest that a regular practice can significantly improve areas of life, including both physical and mental health. For example, multiple studies support the role of mindfulness in decreasing anxiety levels in research participants. As a result, it has been incorporated into therapeutic models and programs such as Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). However, anxiety reduction is not the only way mindfulness can improve your life.
A note before we continue…
Later in this post, there is an opportunity for a very brief, low-stakes mindfulness activity. Before you engage, it is important to consider that mindfulness does hold the potential for side effects. For those of us who have histories of post-traumatic stress, the experience of trauma can make mindfulness difficult and meditation near impossible without the support of a trained professional and the right environment. This is not a personal failing, but the body’s natural response to coping with trauma. While mindfulness has been shown to improve aspects of post-traumatic stress, there is growing research in the field of trauma-informed practices for mindfulness professionals. Prioritizing your self-care may look like seeking additional support or resources before taking any steps toward a mindfulness practice. As always, this blog is not a substitute for a qualified professional who understands your unique needs.
Improving distress tolerance
Humans have a natural tendency to avoid pain and distress. However, our ability to tolerate stressful situations is like a muscle: if we don’t use it, we lose it. The gym is a great place to observe this process in action. People don’t get stronger by stopping at the first signs of discomfort. Instead, they can ideally learn to recognize the difference between the normal discomfort that comes from working out and the point at which their muscles have truly had enough, and going further would risk injury. This is a mindfulness practice in itself! As muscles get stronger, they can tolerate more stress from a workout.
By seeking avoidance at the first signs of distress, we risk creating a situation where uncomfortable events feel increasingly overwhelming. A variety of research continues to support the link between mindfulness and increased distress tolerance. You can find this outcome repeated in many specific populations. One of the skills commonly taught in mindfulness programs is the ability to recognize an internal state without rushing to change it. In this way, we can recognize and be curious about our own discomfort without rushing to a solution. Sometimes, we might find that it’s tolerable after all.
Helping you appreciate the little things
Have you ever thought about mindfulness as a part of everyday life? It can be easy to complete daily tasks like sitting down to a meal, washing dishes, putting on your shoes, or driving without ever noticing the actual experience. Some people call this being on autopilot. I also like the phrase “brain on a stick.” This state pulls us out of the present and into our head, where we are usually engaging with something in the past which has already happened, or something in the future which may or may not happen how we envision it. This can make it difficult to recognize or appreciate what is occurring in the here-and-now.
As children, we are masters of playing and living in the present moment. Very few tasks are completed on autopilot because we spend a lot of our time learning how to do them and marveling at our newfound abilities. With maturity, many people lose this ability and become preoccupied with inner thoughts. Practicing mindfulness gives us the opportunity to reclaim this skill and spend more time in a simpler, less frantic state of mind.
Getting in touch with your authentic self
The most enduring memory from my college mindfulness program was the day we covered mindful eating. I have since learned that some programs, including my own, tend to use a raisin to introduce people to this experience. That day, I realized I had just spent the first 19 years of my life never considering if I liked raisins or not. Surprise—I don’t.
Part of being in touch with our authentic self is honoring our likes and dislikes. Sometimes, these preferences can be strong and overt. Asking people for their opinions about pineapple on pizza is a great example–many people are very passionate about this preference, one way or the other. Other times, like with my raisin experience, they can be subtle enough to ignore until we start paying attention.
Beyond learning more about our preferences, practicing authenticity requires an awareness of our true feelings. Just like preferences, feelings can be subtle and easy to miss. An initial feeling can give way to something else when we sit with it for a moment. If you don’t believe me, here is that mindfulness activity I mentioned earlier: I invite you to notice how you’re feeling in this moment, right now, reading this blog post.
Now, if you did that, you might have also noticed a little voice in your head trying to modulate your experience. It may say things like “I shouldn’t be feeling this way,” “I’m being silly,” or “I’m feeling that way because…” Or, you might have jumped ahead to something else entirely—what you’re planning on doing when you’re finished reading, for example. An important part of mindfulness is allowing the experience to be exactly what it is, and acknowledging our inner monologue (we all have one) without getting carried away by it. This is part of why mindfulness is referred to as a “practice.” The goal is not to make our thoughts go away. Even people who regularly practice meditation have this little voice in their head. The practice is learning to live with our thoughts in a different, possibly less combative way. Congrats! You practiced mindfulness today.
If you would like to learn more about how mindfulness can apply to your life, many of our clinicians incorporate these skills into their work with clients. We encourage you to meet our clinicians and request a consultation where your questions can be addressed in detail. If we can’t help, we can utilize our large referral network of licensed professionals to match you to someone who can.
