Mindfulness

Zooming along the highway of our lives, balancing work, children, marriage etc. can at times feel overwhelming. Many experience debilitating anxiety and or depression as part of  their daily life. Our society tends to lean towards a way of living and thinking that is always doing, always on. The opportunities for finding a silent time and place devoid of goal directed activity, to just be with ourselves, can be few and far between. How often do you take a shower or eat a meal and find your self preoccupied with past or future activities, as opposed to truly being attentive to the experience of showering or tasting a meal?  The consequences are increasing levels of stress, anxiety, depression which result in unhealthy coping behaviors / addictions as a way of subduing anxiety and depression.

Twenty years ago the medical community would have greeted a prescription of meditation to treat emotional illness such as anxiety or depression with great skepticism. Currently, there is a growing body of scientific research that supports the role of meditation in the management of a range of psychological problems including depression, post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), anxiety disorders,eating disorders etc. In a western society struggling to cope with increasing levels of stress, anxiety and depression practices such as yoga, tai chi, and meditation have become popular. A number of major hospitals in Toronto and all over the United States now offer meditation as part of their mental health programs.

For centuries Buddhism taught that through meditation one could achieve a state of self awareness and peace of mind. The word "Buddha" means to awaken. The act of meditation is a way of cultivating an "awakened" frame of mind referred to as Mindfulness.  In western terms the end result of achieving greater degrees of mindfulness is less suffering from anxiety, depression, and stress.

Before going on with the rest of this article, why don't you take a few moments and experience a short meditation. Find a comfortable position, this might be sitting in a chair or lying down or some other position that is comfortable for you. Now bring your attention to your breathing and note any sensations that might occur with each breath in and with each breath out. You might choose to focus on the sound of your breath or the movement and rhythm of your belly or chest as it rises and falls. It matters not which sensation you choose to focus on. If you have a timer set it for 3 minutes, and if you don't have a timer, then just trust your inner gestalt to tell you when three minutes are up. Close your eyes and just bring your attention to your breath and see what happens.

So how did it go? If you found it a challenge to maintain your attention on your breath, then take a moment and contemplate what occurred in your mind that prevented you from being focused? When the above exercise is conducted with a group of people who have little or no experience with meditative practices, the most common experience encountered is that of thoughts buzzing through what appears to be a scattered mind. You might ask yourself where these thoughts were before you tried the 3-minute exercise. Why do these thoughts arise in such an uncontrollable fashion and what might their effects be on your mood, anxiety and stress level, depression and other emotions, coping styles etc. as you go about trying to live your life?

So what is mindfulness? Mindfulness might be described as simple non-judgmental awareness of whatever one experiences in the present moment. By way of example, if someone at work does not acknowledge our presence as we enter the office in the morning then perhaps we may think to ourselves, "did I do something wrong", "they are not very friendly", "they don't like me". The consequence of getting caught up in these thoughts might be anxiety, worry, sadness. If we suffer from depression then our depression may escalate. Looking more closely at the situation the actual experience is that someone did not acknowledge us. The thought "they are not very friendly" is a layer of interpretation or judgment we might superimpose onto the actual experience. In response to this judgment we might avoid the person who "is not very friendly". In reality there may be a thousand and one different reasons why someone might not acknowledge our presence yet we tend to interpret our experiences in the world based on our own beliefs of why people do what they do. We judge and label our experiences and then respond to the judgment or label as opposed to the actual experience. This pattern of interpretive processing of events, can consume our emotional energy leaving us drained, anxious,depressed sad or angry, preventing us from experiencing whatever is, as it is.

Many emotional difficulties such as depression and anxiety are associated with ruminative patterns of thinking, which consumes emotional energy on past or future events and results in emotional exhaustion. In a similar way, people who become addicted to drugs often have a very low tolerance for any event which causes emotional (anxiety, depression) or physical discomfort because at some level they superimpose an interpretive label or judgment such as, "this anxiety  is intolerable", "I have to stop feeling this". Once this belief takes root in the psyche they respond to the interpretive judgment by engaging in some addictive activity, which stops them from thinking or feeling anxiety, depression, sadness etc.

Meditative practices cultivate mindfulness, which is simple non-judgmental awareness of our thoughts and experiences. As we begin to become aware and let go of how we process events and thoughts, we are left to discover that each moment is unique unto itself and one begins to live life from one moment to the next, accepting pleasurable or difficult experiences as they arise and then letting go of these experiences, to open ourselves to whatever is present in the next moment. Some might say one begins to surrender to the present moment, undistorted by filters of judgment, and so create a space in which one is better able to hold challenging circumstances.  Thoughts become mental events that one can recognize and choose to act on or let go of.

The result of this changing relationship to thought is less anxiety depression and stress.  So in my personal hectic day I am increasingly able to recognize the thought "Its going to be a difficult day" as a judgment of my day that is destined to create anxiety/ depression. I make a conscious choice to not play the thought over and over again because to do so will simply move me farther away from my desire to remain calm, enjoy my day and experience less anxiety and depression. The paradigm shift is from a "reactor to thoughts" to a "watcher of thoughts". In my clinical practice I often explain mindfulness partially as the process of building an imaginary shelf called the "it’s OK but it’s NOT OK shelf" on which one learns to hold experiences or unpleasant parts of one's life. On this shelf one can see one's difficulties and acknowledge their presence but not reject them or become consumed by them. Although the destination of becoming mindful might seem intimidating to some people, I remind them of the saying by Lao Tzu: "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.". Likewise, the journey to a mindful way of being, begins with a single breath.