Mindfulness
In This Chapter
- How to live in the present moment
- Learning to distance yourself from your thoughts
- Accepting thoughts in order to move forward
- Developing control of your mental focus
When you practice mindfulness, you live in the moment. Mindfulness helps you look at your thought process, not to change it, but to observe without judgment. While different from many of the traditional CBT techniques, it still plays an important part in understanding and changing behaviors. In this chapter, you will learn what mindfulness is and how to incorporate it into your everyday life.
What Is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is directing your attention to the present moment and becoming aware of your thoughts, emotions, and sensations. It teaches you to be focused on the present and to remove yourself from the past and the future. It has been said being anxious means being focused on the future; and being depressed is focusing on the past. When you practice mindfulness, you are in the moment. You are experiencing without judgment and you are practicing the art of acceptance, which means simply observing and feeling without analyzing or contemplating. It is accepting exactly what is happening right now, without thinking about what is right or wrong, or looking for solutions. Mindfulness can be described as a way of being rather than doing.
Your brain’s autopilot is inclined to default to doing mode rather than being mode. When you are in the doing mode, you assess for discrepancies between what is happening and what you think should be happening (or should have happened.) Mindfulness exercises enhance your brain’s ability to utilize and benefit from the being mode of the brain. This is important because the doing mode can be harmful at times, especially if you are prone to worrying and states of depression, because it can lead to rumination.
DEFINITION
Rumination is the mental act of reviewing and analyzing thoughts and situations, including why you feel the way you do. When ruminating, you attempt to answer the self-imposed question, “Why?” You then analyze why you feel sad, you think about your shortcomings, and you try to decide how these led to problematic situations. This can be particularly harmful when there is nothing or little to be done to change a situation.
Your Turn: Mindfulness Breathing
When you first start practicing mindfulness, it is common to begin with focusing on your breathing. This is similar to traditional meditation practices, but unlike traditional meditation, you can be mindful while engaging in the world. The purpose of the exercise is to train your mind to focus on one element of your present experience. In traditional meditation, you focus on your breath to begin the journey into your inner wisdom.
Find a comfortable, quiet area where you can sit upright. You can keep your eyes open or have them closed, whichever is more comfortable for you.
As you sit in the chair, start to listen to the sound of your breath without making any changes to your breathing. How does it sound on the inhale and the exhale? Do you make a sound during the moments in between your inhale and exhale? Notice how it feels when air enters your nose, how it feels as you fill your chest and abdomen with air, notice all of the sensations as you exhale. Pay attention to each breath you take, from the moment you breathe in until the moment the air leaves your body.
Continue this exercise for 10 minutes. Each time you notice your thoughts becoming distracted or wandering, take notice of those thoughts and then bring your attention back to your breathing. Don’t judge yourself for letting your attention wander and don’t look to change your breath. Remember, you are observing without analysis or judgment.
Practice this exercise once a day for a week. As you continue to practice you will notice your thoughts wandering less often and you will be able to keep your attention on your breath with greater ease.
When you observe and accept a negative thought or emotion, without reacting to it, it is easier to move on to other thoughts. In other words, you allow a negative thought to exist without fixating on it or giving it any weight. The attitude you are adopting is “it is just a thought” and of course not all thoughts are true or permanent. Once you accept this “just a thought’ perspective, the thought no longer has any hold on you.
Imagine you are waiting for an important call. You have the thought “he is not going to call me.” Instead of ruminating on the thought or testing the validity of the thought, you let it go. The person calls and you move on as though the thought never occurred. You don’t need to stop and analyze your negative attitude each step of the way. This is mindfulness.
Mindfulness allows you to activate the “being mode” by producing a change in perspective known as distancing. This technique changes not just the way you think about something but also nature of your thoughts. Distancing helps you gain control of your thoughts because it allows you to see the thoughts as “just thoughts” rather than as reflections of reality that need to be worked out. Distancing is particularly helpful if you obsess over situations you have little control over or things of minor importance.
The Role of Mindfulness in CBT
Many of the techniques and strategies used in CBT are meant to change your thoughts and your behaviors. Mindfulness, although used in CBT frequently, works in a different way since it’s not about challenging the thoughts themselves but changing your focus and controlling the content. It’s not about how you think about a situation but more about what you think about it. The more you learn to distance yourself from certain thoughts, the more you learn to let things go. You no longer spend unnecessary time analyzing information that doesn’t really matter; instead, you move on. Distancing helps you gain control of your thoughts. By allowing yourself to see thoughts and feelings without judgment and analysis, you reduce the tendency to relapse into states of depression.
IMAGINE THAT
While mindfulness has its origins in Buddhism, most major religions include some form of it. In Buddhism and Hinduism, it is known as Samadhi, in Islam as zikr, and in Christianity as recollection.
Acceptance Does Not Mean Settling
When introduced to the concept of acceptance, you might confuse it with the concept of settling. Mindfulness does not mean you have to settle for less than what is ideal; it gives you the space to pause and prioritize what you issues you want to address. In the example of waiting for the call, if you didn’t practice mindfulness you might have invested unnecessary energy into a fleeting thought.
Unproductive thought processes often follow one of two paths. Once you have a negative thought you feed into it, giving yourself an entire narrative to back up your negative thought. Imagine you are preparing to take a test. You have the automatic thought “I am going to fail.” If you stop and give in to this thought by ruminating, then your negativity feeds on itself and you remember every test you have failed. You continue chaining negative thoughts until you have worked yourself into a frenzy. The second path is to try to avoid the negative thought—pushing it from your mind—but this technique rarely works because the more you try to ignore a thought, the more it pops back into your mind.
Mindfulness gives you a third option. It allows you to see and accept the negative thought and then move on because you are recognizing that “it’s just a thought.” The thought itself cannot hurt you. It also cannot really help you beyond reminding you to move. It is similar to watching television. You become engrossed in the show and when a commercial comes on you tune it out. You know it is there, but it is “just a commercial.” When the show comes on, you once again become engrossed and no longer think about the commercial.
Controlling Urges
When you first start mindfulness, you will notice that it is very difficult to simply notice a thought, feeling, or urge without responding to it. Practicing mindfulness helps you accept challenging emotions and urges without acting on every one. For example, imagine you are trying to lose some weight. You go out to eat and have the urge to order chocolate cake for dessert. You finish your meal and the waiter approaches to ask if you would like dessert. You notice your urge for chocolate cake but instead of ordering it you think, “I am having a craving for chocolate cake, but just because the thought and feeling are there, that doesn’t mean I need to give in to it.” You tell the waiter “No, thank you.” This is mindfulness at work.
STOP AND THINK
When you first start practicing mindfulness, you might become frustrated because you can’t seem to stop the unwanted thoughts or distractions. Be persistent and keep trying. As with anything, mindfulness takes commitment and practice. The longer you work at it, the easier it becomes and the more you will realize the benefits.
Your Turn: The Raisin Experience
This exercise is a good way to begin practicing mindfulness. By focusing on the raisin and the experience of eating the raisin, you develop your ability to be mindful in other experiences.
Place a raisin in your hand. Look at it. Examine how it feels in your hand. Notice the smell, texture, and color of the raisin. Lay the raisin on your tongue. Close your eyes. Notice again how the raisin feels. Notice how it tastes as it lies on your tongue. Notice any urges you have to eat the raisin. Just notice them. Don’t give in to the urge to eat the raisin. Just notice how it feels. Then, after one minute, start to chew the raisin. Notice every sensation as you chew. Don’t swallow. Notice the urge to swallow without giving in. Then, after one minute, swallow the raisin. Notice any body changes as you swallow the raisin including the changes in facial, hand, and body muscles. Notice the differences in muscle tension in your face and throat after you swallow the raisin. Notice any thought and sensation after you swallow the raisin.
Your goal is to become completely immersed in the experience of eating a raisin.
Being Present in the Moment
Today is the only important day. This moment is the only important moment. You have heard this many times. Even so, you probably spend most of your time thinking about what happened yesterday or sometime in the past or worrying about what will happen tomorrow or the next day. Even though you are living this moment, you are not present in it—unless you focus on it.
You might wonder how it is possible or even helpful to only live in this very moment. After all, you have goals and dreams for your future. If you live only in this moment, how can you take steps you need to take to reach your goals? But, it is only the present moment you can control or cope with. And, it is this moment that shapes your future. If you live by focusing only on your future, you miss the moment you are in right now and the opportunity to experience it in a way that works for you. Instead, learn to experience your emotions and recognize the future will take care of itself when you handle the present moment.
GIVE IT A TRY
Stop and notice your surroundings. What do you see? What do you smell? Use all five senses to take in your surroundings. Notice how your clothes feel. What noises do you hear? Notice if you are hot, cold, or comfortable. Notice if you are relaxed or tense. What are your points of tension? Take some deep breaths and feel the tension leaving every time you exhale. Pay attention to what is happening in this very moment. Do this daily, on your commute or as you run errands. Instead of just going through the motions of life, learn to take in the experience.
Practicing mindfulness on a daily basis helps you incorporate it into different parts of your life, including times when you face difficult or uncomfortable situations. There are times in your life when you anticipate feeling uncomfortable. During these times, you probably anticipate every possible difficulty. Instead, be mindful of yourself and the situation. This helps you to distance yourself and cope more easily.
Suppose you are afraid of flying and are about to board an airplane. Instead of worrying about all the possible disasters and thinking that you will not be able to handle being on a plane, try focusing on your body’s sensations. Notice each thought that passes through your mind. Identify thoughts about uncertainty and those about your discomfort. Once you observe these thoughts and emotions, you should begin to feel grounded. You feel more in control of your feelings and better equipped to manage the situation.
CBTIDBIT
Anticipating discomfort is one of the primary causes of anxiety. This means instead of being in the present, your brain focuses on the future.
Tips for Living in the Present Moment
Spend 10 minutes a day practicing mindfulness. Pick a basic task that you often do mindlessly, such as brushing your teeth, commuting to work, or washing the dishes. In each of these experiences, pay attention to all five senses. Notice any thoughts and emotions. Just notice without reacting. The more you practice, the more you will find yourself stopping throughout the day to appreciate the moment.
Don’t rush. If you are rushing through the process, you are probably more focused on what comes next than the moment at hand. Use slow, deliberate movements. You may need to give yourself additional time to complete each task or remove some of your tasks from the day. However, you put more into each task you complete and find more satisfaction.
Reduce the activities that don’t promote mindfulness. Turn off the television, shut off your computer. Eliminate things that distract you from paying attention to the moment. If you find yourself reacting negatively to the people around you and what they are doing, focus on accepting them for how they normally behave. Instead of judging their actions as “wrong,” just notice them, as you notice your own thoughts and your own body sensations.
Take the time to be present in conversations. Listen to what the other person is saying and respond thoughtfully. Don’t rush to express your own opinions.
GIVE IT A TRY
Imagine the last time you were with someone who was endlessly complaining—about their health, their job, their spouse. Chances are you tried to address the problem and offered advice. Instead, let go of your desire to solve the problem and become mindful. Sit back and listen. Notice their body sensations and their energy; listen without giving advice. Tell yourself, “I cannot resolve this problem. That is okay. Listening is enough.” Your friend will feel heard and you will feel less frustrated.
Watch Your Thoughts Sail By
One of the main concepts of mindfulness is to become aware of your thoughts without judging them. Think of your thoughts as sailboats. Instead of trying to fix them, just notice them sailing by. When you see a sailboat in the ocean you don’t try to jump on board or tell the captain how to drive the boat. You sit back and take pleasure in watching them sail by. Remember, your thoughts are not good or bad, they simply are. Practicing this helps when going through a difficult or emotionally charged situation. You can recognize that you are feeling sad, frustrated, or angry but know that the feeling will pass just as the sailboat sails out of sight; it is a temporary feeling. As you practice watching your thoughts sail by, it will get easier to say, “I am angry but this is a passing thought and I will get through it.”
Your Turn: Observing Thoughts
Sit back in a comfortable chair, with your back upright. Spend a few minutes focusing on your breathing, paying attention to how your breath feels as it enters your body, fills your abdomen, and then leaves your body. Don’t change your breathing, just notice it. Then start to pay attention to your thoughts, recognizing they are simply thoughts. Do not make any judgments, just notice the thought.
Use this technique daily to help gather information about what is on your mind and gain a sense of your autopilot mode. You are practicing “being” rather than “doing” which helps build mental dexterity, the ability to direct your attention as needed. The point of this exercise is not to try to dismiss your thoughts or make them go away, but to let your thoughts happen. It helps you understand that thoughts come and go.
Accepting Upsetting Thoughts and Moods
When feeling sad, upset, or angry, you may try to analyze your thoughts. You might ask yourself:
- Why am I feeling this way?
- What did I do to cause this feeling?
- Did I act differently than I usually do?
- What other times have I felt this way?
You probably ask these questions in an attempt to feel better, but often analyzing your thoughts leads to ruminating—remembering past times you were sad and angry or blaming yourself for feeling this way. As you delve into answers about your mood, you often feel worse and instead of helping the thought or emotion go away, it exacerbates it.
Instead of “solving” your mood, try accepting it and all it encompasses. Our moods usually come with physical symptoms. For example, feelings of anxiety are often accompanied by a racing heart, shortness of breath, an upset stomach or trembling. When noticing your thought, stop to pay attention to your body’s reaction. Pay attention to your body sensations and focus on everything you are feeling. Allow yourself to feel the emotion, paying attention to the changes in your body and your thoughts as you let the emotion go through you. Your feelings may ebb and flow. For example, you may feel sad for a little while, then, as your thoughts change, it may disappear only to return again later.
Describe or write down the facts of what you’re feeling.
- My stomach feels like it is in knots.
- I have a headache.
- I feel sad.
- I am having a hard time breathing.
Writing down your thoughts in a factual way helps you create distance; the thoughts are no longer a part of your emotions but instead are facts. You can see them as part of the process, rather than the process itself.
In mindfulness, you should be aware of everything that is going on, including the good. Notice the good in your environment. You may be sad, but maybe it is a beautiful day outside or a friend calls to see how you are. Maybe you are comfortable in your home. These things need to be included in your experience. They help you keep balance in your emotions.
Incorporating Mindfulness in Everyday Life
Mindfulness practice sessions are important and give you an overall sense of well-being. But don’t leave mindfulness in your chair. There are plenty of opportunities throughout your day to be mindful.
While brushing your teeth. Pay attention to the taste of your toothpaste in your mouth and how it smells. Notice how the toothbrush feels going across your teeth; be mindful of each tooth. Notice the sound of the toothbrush as you brush your teeth. Pay attention to how your arms move. Ignore the urge to look in the mirror, check your hair, or multitask getting ready for work. Pay attention to only the task of brushing your teeth.
When waiting in line. In our hectic lives, there are usually times throughout the day when you have to wait in line—at the bank, waiting for lunch, buying groceries, sitting in traffic. These times are often frustrating; you just want to get done and get back to your routine. Standing in line stops you from doing other things. Instead of becoming impatient, take the time to breathe deeply. Pay attention to where in your body you feel tense. Instead of focusing on your frustration, take this as a time to be quiet and still for a few moments.
When eating. Enjoy the entire process of eating. Notice how the food looks on your plate, the different colors and textures. Pay attention to the smell of the food. Savor each bite, noticing the texture, temperature, and taste of the food. Notice how the silverware feels in your hand. Pay attention to those around you and focus on what they are saying.
While taking a shower. Pay attention to the how the water feels on your body, how the soap or shower gel smells and feels. Feel the temperature of the water and listen to how it sounds. Notice the feel of the shower floor on your feet.
CBTIDBIT
Mindfulness is most effective if you practice it in short bursts throughout the day. Start your day with five minutes of mindfulness and then take several mindfulness breaks throughout the day.
No matter how hectic your day is, there is always time to be mindful. Stop several times during the day to pause for a few minutes, take several deep breaths, and be in the present moment. Write down five things you notice at this moment for each of the five senses. Just taking five minutes can leave you feeling more refreshed and more connected to your environment.
Your Turn: Diary of Mindfulness Exercises
It’s good idea to develop a daily habit of practicing mindfulness. Any of the exercises introduced in this chapter are a good way to start. As you continue, these exercises will become habit. Keep a journal of your mindfulness exercises. Record the following for each exercise you do:
- Date
- Mindfulness activity
- Location
- How easy it was for you to be mindful, on a scale of 1 to 10
- Whether or not you were distracted
- One word that describes what you observed during your mindfulness activity
During times of stress you might find it harder to be mindful. Instead of judging yourself as a failure or retreating back to bad habits, accept this is a part of stress. You will find that it becomes easier with time. Remind yourself that this is why you practice.
The Least You Need to Know
- Practicing mindfulness helps you view your thoughts without judging them or labeling them as right or wrong.
- When you accept that your thoughts are just thoughts, they no longer have the power to control your actions.
- Mindfulness helps to reduce anxiety and depression by focusing on the present moment, not looking back to what already happened or worrying about what is yet to come.
- Thoughts and feelings come and go. Accept negative thoughts and then let them go and move on.
- When you notice your senses, you are able to be present and accept what is happening in this moment. Acceptance is needed for adjustment and peace.