Mindfulness helps patients learn how to pay moment-to-moment attention to themselves and their surroundings without judgment.
What is Mindfulness?
Often when we are stressed, depressed or struggling in life with sadness, pain or any other difficulty, we can feel out of control and unable to put our situation into perspective.
Our automatic coping mechanisms often make matters worse. We can use all kinds of strategies to avoid our feelings by retreating into our head to think our way out of our situation. Rumination and judgmental thinking tend to carry us down a path of automatic pilot where we often find ourselves dwelling on the past or anticipating the future. This mode of mind creates additional stress and agitation at our failure to make ourselves feel better. Such distraction takes us away from the present moment and life passes us by with little satisfaction and a lot of exhaustion.
When we bring Mindfulness into our lives, we are learning to acknowledge what is going on for us in each moment – noticing the activity of our mind, body and emotions and developing the skill to respond in ways that are gentler and more compassionate. We develop the ability to notice when we have engaged in critical and judgmental thinking and learn how to use the breath and body as a safe haven to anchor us to the present moment.
Instead of using energy and stress in the struggle to get rid of our difficulties and uncomfortable feelings, we learn how to relate to them differently and to be more accepting of our direct experience, as it is.
This shift in awareness and attitude can enable us to respond to problems with renewed focus, wisdom and confidence.
Mindfulness can help you to:
