Getting Started with Mindfulness

Mindfulness is becoming more popular these days as our lives get faster and more fragmented. The rush and demands of daily living seem to have caused a craving for a slower, more contemplative way of being. That’s why so many people are learning mindfulness.

Mindfulness is not technically meditation, though it is sometimes called that. It is however a practice that can make you feel more connected with your body and help you to release stress and tension. It’s also good for making you more aware of your emotional states, which is key in self-control and self-knowledge. This benefits make mindfulness a great daily habit that you can add to your life to benefit every aspect of your health and well-being.

Do you rush through your day barely aware of the world around you? What could you learn by being more mindful? And how could it help you improve your life overall?

In its most basic form, mindfulness is a practice that makes you more aware of your body, your thoughts and feelings, and your surroundings. There are mental and emotional components to these practices as well. Mindfulness encourages acceptance and concentration solely on the present. It has roots in Buddhism, but has become a secular practice in the western world over the last few years.

So often we rush around and only become aware that we’re tired when we feel a headache or dizziness coming on. Mindfulness teaches you to become more aware of these types of messages. We all do this naturally of course, but our technology drenched world has encouraged us to disconnect from the most basic facts of our biology. And mindfulness can help you to overcome this tendency.

Mindfulness is not a religion, you don’t have to believe in any particular ideology or deity to practice it. It’s also not a way to fix any problems you might have, or stop your thoughts. Some forms of meditation do focus on calming the mind, but mindfulness is different. It teaches you to experience the world, your thoughts and your body, without judgement.

For people who are interested in the benefits for self-development offered by this practice, mindfulness lowers emotional volatility. This is because it fosters better understanding and acceptance of emotions, which improves self-control. The research on the benefits of mindfulness is only in its infancy, but it’s already proving to be a practice well worth trying.

Mindfulness can be practiced in a number of ways. You can do it more formally, through meditational practices, or informally by consciously making an effort to become more aware of your body and your surroundings.

Whichever ways you choose to practice, you need to make mindfulness a part of your daily habits to get the benefits. Five minutes every day is far more valuable than twenty minutes once a week. Apart from that, there are no set rules. This is your practice and your experience. Sit somewhere comfortable and use a guided session if that’s what you want to do. If you don’t like these kinds of practices, just sit quietly and listen to your body and mind.

The key with mindfulness is to practice it every day, not just when you’re meditating. This means taking time throughout your day to become aware of your surroundings, of your body, and the messages it is sending you. You can do this by:

If you want to formally meditate you can probably find a class or an audio guide that will help you do it properly. For a basic routine that almost everyone can do, try the following:

Self-improvement isn’t just about achievement. It’s also about keeping your mind and your body healthy while you’re doing it. Mindfulness meditations can help with this. The techniques of mindfulness may not work for you, but they’re a good place to start testing what does.

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