Mindfulness Ashley Messana and Sarah Brothwell

What is Mindfulness? • Mindfulness is both a process (mindful practice)

and an outcome (mindful awareness).

• Mindful awareness is fundamentally a way of being- away of inhabiting one’s body, one’s mind, one’s moment-by-moment experience. Mindful awareness is a way of relating to all experience-positive, negative, and neutral- in an open, receptive way.

• The awareness involves freedom from grasping and from wanting anything to be different. It simply knows and accepts what is here, now.

Mindful Practice Mindful practice is one way individuals can intentionally pursue the mindful awareness.

Mindful practice refers to the conscious development of skills, such as greater ability to direct and sustain one’s attention, less reactivity, greater discernment and compassion.

Mindfulness can be richly complex yet simple in practice.

In its most basic form, mindful practice involves paying attention on purpose and without judgment.

Three core elements of mindfulness

1) Intention

2) Attention

3) Attitude

Intention

Intention is why one is practicing (self-regulation, self- exploration, and self-liberation and selfless service).

Intention is different from “striving” or “grasping” for certain outcomes. Intention is a direction not a destination

Attention Attention involves observing the operations of one’s moment-to-moment internal and external experience.

A dynamic process of learning how to cultivate attention that is discerning and nonreactive, sustained and concentrated

Enables us to see clearly what is arising in the present moment including one’s emotional reactions, if that is what comes up.

Attitude

Attitude is how one attends. Not just as a bare attention, but as an affectionate attention.

The qualities one brings to attention have been referred to as the attitudinal foundations of mindfulness Use the acronym COAL: Curiosity, openness, acceptance and love

Concentration vs. Meditation

Concentration: The goal is to focus attention on the object of meditation to the exclusion of everything else

As in the breathing process is meant to be experienced consciously and as uninterrupted as possible

The goal is to make attention to the object as stable as possible

Meditation Involves the moment-to-moment observing of three characteristics

Impermanence

Suffering (attachment/aversion)

Not Self

Seated Yoga The poses and salutations used in yoga were originally designed to help quiet the mind so that one was able to peacefully sit and examine the contents of his/her own thoughts.

Yoga is a contemplative practice

Stay mindful during practice and notice your breath, your thoughts, and physical sensations

Guided Meditation Is a form of meditation where an individual is verbally guided into a state of consciousness.

Requires an individual to follow verbal instructions that teach the individual how to relax the entire body, clear the mind, concentrate on breathing, and focus one’s awareness and attention.

The following guided meditation is aimed at reducing social anxiety and increasing self-confidence.

Mindful Eating How is it that food and eating have become such a common source of unhappiness? And why has it occurred in a country with an abundance of food?

The fundamental reason for our imbalance with food and eating is that we’ve forgotten how to be present as we eat. We eat mindlessly.

Benefits of mindful eating: learning to be aware of physical hunger and satiety cues to guide your decision to begin and stop eating.

Loving Kindness Meditation

May (I, he, or she) be happy and live with a joyful heart

May (I, he, or she) be healthy and have a body that gives (me, him, her) energy;

May (I, he, or she) be safe and protected from harm;

And

May (I, he, or she) live with the ease that comes from well-being

5 Minute Formal Meditation

Free time to practice your new skills!

Begin this practice by focusing on your breath

Then become mindful and aware of the three characteristics of experience

Impermanence Suffering (attachment/aversion) Not Self

What is Mindfulness?

At the deepest level mindfulness is about

freedom: freedom from reflexive patterns,

freedom from reactivity, and ultimately

freedom from suffering