A Brief introduction to Mindfulness
What is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is a special way of paying attention that can help with how people cope with everyday life or deal with tough times. Practicing mindfulness can have great benefits for your physical and mental health. Mindfulness as a concept has its origins in largely obscure Buddhist concepts from around 2,600 years ago, and today it is practiced all over the world through a variety of different methods, some of which can be done in your own home.
How to practice Mindfulness
Practicing mindfulness is a relatively simple thing to organise to do, as there are no requirements other than a quiet place to relax. When practicing mindfulness, try to focus solely on the present moment, without thinking about things that went on in the past, or things that may be coming up in the future. While focusing on the present moment, it is also important to purposefully concentrate on what is happening around you, things you can see, hear, smell, taste and touch. Allowing thoughts to come into your mind is also important, however the key is to practice how to notice these thoughts without letting your mind focus on those thoughts. Thoughts and feelings will still come during mindfulness exercises, but the main thing to remember is to recognise the thoughts without identifying with them. Let the thoughts remain thoughts, without them influences what you are thinking. The key to mindfulness is remaining aware of what is happening around you and what you are feeling, without allowing your mind to focus on things that may distract you.
What are the benefits to mindfulness?
Mindfulness has many benefits to both physical and mental health, and can help to; relieve stress, improve sleep, manage depression and anxiety, control emotions, improve memory, reduce heart rate and cope with pain. Other benefits that can come from mindfulness include improved focus, less emotional reactivity, more cognitive flexibility, greater relationship satisfaction and improved self- insight. Most of these benefits come naturally with simply having greater control over your thoughts and emotions.
What activities are there to promote Mindfulness?
There are a wide variety of activities that can be used to promote mindfulness. A lot of these can be done in the comfort of your own home.
1. Mindfulness Meditation, which was discussed above and focuses on relaxing in a quiet place while focusing on the present moment and what is going on around you.
2. Savouring, which is taking the time to enjoy and appreciate an activity that you are doing. This can be any experience such as eating a meal, conversation or enjoying the view. There are many other things that can be savoured, those were but a few examples. The key to savouring is to pay really close attention to the details, including being aware of smells, sights, tastes, things you can feel and sounds.
3. Mindful breathing, which simply has you focus on your breathing. How your body feels when taking in a breath, and the things that happen when you inhale and exhale.
4. Mental photography which is taking mental images of things you want to remember. The easiest way to do this, is to think about the details you would like to capture in your picture and focus on those things.
References
1. How to be more Mindful. [Available at]: http://au.reachout.com/how-to-be-more-mindful
2. Daphne Davis, What are the benefits of mindfulness. [Available at]: http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/07-08/ce-corner.aspx