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Chapter 10 - Why mindfulness feels so good
Mindfulness doesn't cure all, but it always cures.
It corrects the mind's natural tendency toward
dispersion, diffusion, and agitation, redeploying
mental energy toward insight, clarity, and well-being.
--Thich Nhat Hanh
A few minutes of mindfulness can make a world of difference in how you feel and act. Even if you're thrashing around in the oblivion of distraction and obligation, simply paying attention to your breath grounds you in the here and now and, as a result, brings you closer to balance, harmony, and awareness. As the bridge between body and mind, breath leads us home to our bodies when we've wandered far afield via such avenues as busyness, frustration, anxiety, or preoccupation.
Agitation and feeling overwhelmed can drop your energy levels so low that your zest for life is diminished. Practicing mindfulness is calming and centering and, therefore, adds to your energy storehouse. An abundance of energy enlivens you, giving you the oomph to be more engaged with yourself, others, and life in general. Mindfulness encourages energized inner and outer connections.
Along with increased energy, mindfulness promotes inner spaciousness, clarity, and well-being. While automatic behaviors and fear-driven feelings contract our lives and cause us to hover in an atmosphere of limitation generated by our smallselves, mindfully being present to our actions, reactions, and choices is incredibly expansive. In the spaciousness of expansion and peace of mind, our calm, wise, and intuitive self is able to fully function. Expansion and spaciousness open our hearts, allowing us to hear the sweet whispers of spirit.
Awareness First
Mindfulness leads to awareness. Awareness is the first step on the path to change. With awareness, you gain insight into the facets of your life that need balance, the parts of yourself that yearn for calm, and the times and situations in which your heart is tempted to close. With commitment, important insights can lead to equally important actions that improve your life exponentially. Bringing an intentional and nonjudgmental awareness to yourself and your environment opens your mind and heart to the best choices available. Such awareness empowers you to make wise, healthy, and mature choices based on real and appropriate needs and desires. Conscious choice is freedom.
With greater awareness of yourself, you can appreciate what is working for you and alter what isn't in gentle, supportive ways. Awareness helps you take responsibility for your personal life and be accountable for your actions and experiences. Awareness and maturity dance hand in hand. Maturity is not the overresponsible, drudgery-inducing ball and chain that perpetual Peter Pans would have us believe. Maturity is a freeing state of being that gleefully waves good-bye to any victim persona lurking within and consistently acts in ways that help create a joyful, productive, fun, and purposeful life. Awareness built through the practice of mindfulness helps us mature in loving, light, and laugh-filled ways.
As with most everything, maturity is an ongoing process, and we are never too old to learn new things that make mindfulness and joy more possible. As an example, neither I nor my husband, Gene, could be considered spring chickens, but we recently committed to giving up complaining, criticizing, and gossiping by wearing the purple Complaint-Free World bracelets written about in chapter 5 in the section called "Giving Up Grumbling." Even though we weren't big on complaining, criticizing, and gossiping before making the commitment, both of us feel happier as a result of wearing the bracelets because they increase our awareness of the temptation to indulge in any habit that dampens good feelings.
Truth be told, I can benefit from the reminders more than Gene, but he did have a funny experience with it. Because his golf game had been iffy for several outings and he didn't want the bracelet to be a distraction -- both physically and mentally, I suspect -- he decided not to wear it the next time he went out to play. After the round, he laughingly told me, "Even though I didn't have the bracelet on, I could feel it on my wrist!" He also had more fun and no angst at all, even when shots were less accurate than he'd hoped.
Besides feeling lighter and happier since wearing the bracelet, I've experienced an unanticipated side effect. I've stopped swearing. For decades I've believed that using my few favorite swear words was pretty benign and simply added "flavor" to my personality. Interestingly, in monitoring my responses and reactions due to the purple bracelet, I became aware that swearing insidiously exacerbated negative emotions, no matter how seemingly innocuous the words I chose. Although I didn't set out to stop swearing, it simply happened as a result of increased awareness. Surprisingly, I don't miss it at all. Go figure . . . Visit AComplaintFreeWorld.org if you are interested in learning more.
Another incredibly important awareness to cultivate is knowing how tired you are. Tiredness dulls positive feelings and experiences and intensifies negative ones. My wonderful mother, who was often overworked and underappreciated, had a little sign in her kitchen window stating, "Dearie is Weary." As an adult, I wish I'd paid more attention to that obvious plea for a little help lightening the load. But, as a kid, I simply chuckled and chalked it up as one more of Mother's idiosyncrasies. If you have a similar sign hanging in a corner of your body or soul, please pay attention to it! In fact, if you get nothing more from practicing mindfulness than the awareness you are tired and need to slow down, and then do so regularly, it can dramatically increase your sense of well being and zest for life.
Although we may get a chuckle of recognition from Garrison Keillor's claim "I believe in looking reality straight in the eye and denying it," in order to really wake up to the glory of our lives, it's best if we act on Thich Nhat Hanh's belief that "each thought, each action in the sunlight of awareness becomes sacred." Awareness is a priceless and life-enhancing benefit to be gleaned from the practice of mindfulness.
Copyright © 2008 Sue Patton Thoele
Author Bio
Sue Patton Thoele is a psychotherapist, former hospice chaplain, and bereavement group leader. She is author of eleven other books, including The Courage To Be Yourself, The Woman's Book of Soul, Growing Hope, Freedoms After 50, and The Woman's Book of Courage. Sue and her husband, Gene, live in Colorado near their adult children and grandchildren. For more information, please visit: http://suepattonthoele.com
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