Mindfulness
The term “mindfulness” has wiggled its way into the zeitgeist over the last few years, but what does it actually mean? Is it meditating? Being zen? Is it a silent retreat? Yes and no. Mindfulness means that you are conscious of your present moment. It means you try to become more aware of what you feel, and what happens around you while simultaneously turning down the continuous chatter running rampant in your head.
That chatter can be repetitive, exhausting, and unhelpful. And it's hard to shut up. That’s why mindfulness is a practice, not a quick fix. When and if you decide to start practicing mindfulness, you’ll find it’s a challenge. You’ll try to do something mindfully for one minute — was the dishes, weed the garden, contemplate a beautiful bottle of wine — and instead of calm contemplation you’ll start to hear the chatter again. And that’s ok! Just like any other practice (bodybuilding, piano, archery maybe?) mindfulness takes time and patience. But as you practice you’ll get better and better at calming the chatter of your mind.
So why do it? Why take the time? There are a few reasons — actually, a ton of reasons — but add them together and let’s just say it’s great for your mental and physical wellbeing. Here’s why.
Remember in the last post, where I wrote about how to frame the voice in your head? That voice (which we’re also talking about here) is the narrator of your life. It tells you a story about how the world impacts you and how you impact the world. And this has a huge effect on your mood and the choices you make. So by practicing mindfulness, and turning off that voice (a.k.a. brain chatter) for a bit, you are able to take a little breath and be aware of what thoughts are going through your mind. Maybe they’re really negative, and are hurting you. In that case, practicing mindfulness is an opportunity to refresh, slow down, and be more intentional.
On the physical side of things, mindfulness can also give you more mental energy! Thinking all day can be exhausting. Doing activities to purposely slow down and strengthen that mindfulness muscle can have huge benefits for your energy, mood, and motivation.
Here is a small list of mindfulness exercises. Keep in mind the point of each of these is to spend some time away from the internal narration happening all day.
Spend 2-5 minutes listening to your breath
Run water over your hands and focus your attention on how the water feels on your hands
Color in a coloring book, paint, any creative activity
Eat delicious food and pay attention to what it is and how it tastes
Take a minute to find 5 things you see, 4 things you physically feel, 3 things you hear, 2 things you smell, and one thing you taste
While walking, pay attention to how each foot feels during each step
Take a moment to check in with your body. Are you tense? Hows your heart rate?
There is so much room to be creative with mindfulness, and you can practice anywhere. All you have to do is find something in your physical, external world to focus on rather than the chatter in your internal world.
This is the first step in changing the way you speak to yourself, because the time away from your own thoughts makes you MORE aware of how you speak to yourself once you come back to them. Think of it like taking a vacation: You relax on the beach for a week, feel the wind and sun on your cheeks, take in the beautiful blue horizon — it’s great. Then you come home to find the reason you NEEDED that vacation was that your bedroom is painted bright red and it makes you feel tense and angry. Now you have the information you need to make a change!
I hope that was helpful! Next we are going to talk about cognitive distortions, the effect they have on your narrative, and how to call them out.