Posts tagged ‘Mindfulness’
Being Oneself
“If you want to identify with me,
ask me not where I live,
or what I like to eat,or how I comb my hair,
but ask me what I am living for, in detail,
and ask me what I think is keeping me from living fully
for the thing I want to live for.”
— Thomas Merton
Do you know where are you getting ideas of who you are supposed to be? These messages can be coming from a myriad of sources: family, friends, peers, work environments, media, to name a few.
With all of the input surrounding us suggesting who we are supposed to be, we can find ourselves unconsciously striving to live up to other peoples’ ideals or trying to “keep up with the Jones’”; who we actually are can get lost in the noise. Attempting to be someone not consistent with who we are takes a lot of energy and can add a great deal of stress to our lives. It can be as wearing as trying to swim upstream or it can feel as awkward as wearing a shoe on the wrong foot.
What if, instead, you were able to accept yourself as you are, not needing to change, or to be someone or someway different? This can be done by turning inward rather than searching for answers outside ourselves and judging ourselves by what other people think or say or by whether they approve of us. It may be possible to be more comfortable with yourself as you are – to look less to others to find out who you should be, “and settle back more comfortably with this mind, this body, this sense of limitation.” When we stop trying to become somebody, we can discover who we truly are.
One way you can take steps toward being yourself is to take 15-20 minutes each day to sit quietly, away from interruptions. During that time, bring your attention to your breath. Notice your breath as it enters your body and as it leaves your body. Each time your mind wanders away from your breath, as soon as you notice this, redirect your attention back to the simplicity of your inhalations and exhalations. This basic practice of mindfulness can help you begin to develop awareness of what is truly driving your thoughts and actions so that you can have more choice in the matter.
Reference: Sharda Rogell, Reinforcing Patterns of Loving in Voices From Spirit Rock, Edited by Gil Fronsdal and Nancy Van House. Clear & Present Graphics, 1996.
Support Systems
“I used to sit on the banks with a raft and watch the water roll lazily by. One day I pushed my raft into the shallows of the water and found the water moved swifter than I thought. My raft was actually a boat. Then, after some time, I rowed my little boat into deeper water. There were great storms. Mighty winds, tremendous waves, and sometimes I felt so alone. But I have noticed my little rowboat is now a mighty ship manned by my friends and loved ones; and beautiful calm seas, warm sunny days, and nights filled with comfortable dreams always double after a storm. Now I could never go back and sit on the bank. In fact, I search for deeper water. Such is life when lived.”
— B.D. Gulledge
Life is filled with inevitable ups and downs: stormy experiences and also sometimes calm periods. Support systems can help us survive – even thrive – through challenging times, encourage us while we attempt to make changes in our life, and share the joy of our successes. Moreover, “new evidence supports what we feel instinctively: People need people. Inadequate social support is as dangerous to your health as smoking, lack of exercise, and obesity. … People with weakened social connections have higher rates of cancer, heart disease, infections, depression, arthritis, and problems during pregnancy.”1
Support systems are an ongoing need; they come into play whether or not you are in crisis. For example, when you are clear about your values and priorities in life, you might find support in being with people who not only embrace those same values and priorities, but also reinforce them in your life. When you are trying to learn new behaviors or make changes in your life, change is much easier if friends or family support your effort. Others can also provide us with roles modeling, showing us new options, or inspiration to stay with our efforts if they become challenging. “When we forget, we are reminded. When we have remembered, we become the reminders for others.”2 Also, as you attempt to make changes in your life, those who support you can provide a safe place to experiment with new ways of being.
There are several types of social support: emotional, information, physical and financial. Social support also takes many forms: relationships with family, friends, neighbors, casual acquaintances, memberships in groups and organizations, contacts at work, and pets. “When you seek support, first identify what type you really need. Then decide who might be able to provide it. Try answering the following questions to identify your sources of support:
When you are feeling upset, who can you share your most private fears and worries with?
Is there someone who takes pride in your accomplishments and thinks highly of you?
When you have a problem, who would you go to for practical advice or information?
If you needed a loan of $100 for an emergency, who would you go to?
Who would bring you dinner if you were sick (or even if you weren’t sick)?”1
Although we may be able to get through much of life on our own efforts, seeking appropriate social support may help us to maintain “the best of ourselves and also supports the abandoning of the worst of ourselves. What greater gift can we give each other than that?”2
1. The Healthy Mind Healthy Body Handbook, David Sobel, MD and Robert Ornstein, PhD, Patient Education Media, Inc.: New York (1996)
2. The Beginner’s Guide to Insight Meditation, Arinna Weisman and Jean Smith, Bell Tower: New York (2001)
Identify Intentions Before Setting Goals
”Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives.”
— William A. Foster
With the onset of the New Year, many folks are reminded of changes they would like to make in their lives and, thus, renew their focus on these aspirations. All too often, this effort ends up in frustration or disappointment. In order to increase the chances of successful results, before setting goals or making resolutions, get in touch with your true intentions.
Intentions are a reflection of your values, what is most important to you. They are related to who you are and how you are “being” in the world. Webster’s dictionary defines “intent” as “the state of mind with which an act is done.” Intentions set the course or direction of your life.
Goals, as defined by Webster’s dictionary, are “the end toward which effort is directed.” They are about taking action toward a future outcome. Goals can help you progress in life by setting a target and defining the steps to reach it.
Working towards goals is a valuable skill; however, goals can easily become a reaction to the external influences in your life. When your goals are not aligned with your intentions, they may be stumbling blocks rather than an aide. You may experience great resistance along the way and even failure. Or, equally as defeating, you may achieve your goals only to find that it is not where you want to be. As Steven Covey suggests, “It’s easy to get caught up in the busyness of life … to work harder and harder at climbing the ladder of success only to realize it’s leaning against the wrong wall.”
To maximize the integrity in your life, take some time to reflect and understand your intentions (which are an internal experience) before defining your goals. In this way, you are more likely to have your goals be the outer manifestation of your true intentions; how you want your life to “be” moment to moment. Align your worldly actions with your inner values and live them day to day. If you stay true to your intentions as you pursue your goals, not only do you have a greater chance at being successful in achieving your goals, the process itself becomes more rewarding no matter what the outcome.
“Before you agree to do anything that might add even the smallest amount of stress to your life, ask yourself: What is my truest intention? Give yourself time to let a yes resound within you. When it’s right, I guarantee that your entire body will feel it.”
–Oprah Winfrey
Fresh Air Intake
“The true journey of discovery does not consist in searching for new territories, but in having new eyes.”
— Marcel Proust
Along side the driveway outside of the cafeteria at El Camino Hospital in Mountain View, where I periodically teach a one-day stress reduction retreat, there is a sign that reads:
FRESH AIR INTAKE
No Parking or Idling Engines in This Area
Each time I see this sign it is a helpful reminder of how easily I get caught in and recycle my thoughts and behaviors, and how this keeps me stuck: parked or idling. Most of us have patterns of thoughts and behaviors that cycle through our minds over and over, much like tapes that we replay once they get triggered. Although this is a common human condition, it leaves us little chance for new responses and, more often, we find ourselves reacting automatically out of these conditioned thoughts and behaviors. At times, our automatic reacting causes us a great deal of stress or suffering, even if we are not aware of it at the time. More effective responses may arise if we can free ourselves from these automatic thoughts and patterns to see new options.
Just as most cars have a button on the dashboard which allows the driver to manage whether the air in the car is “fresh” (coming into the car from outside) or recycled (reprocessing the air already inside the car), each of us, too, can learn to chose whether we allow ourselves to take in new information, experiencing each situation with a “beginner’s mind” (seeing it as if for the very first time), or whether we merely react to each situation based on our preexisting thoughts, out of what we already think we know about the situation.
- In what way(s) might you be recycling old thoughts and behaviors as you react to situations/challenges in your life?
- Can you shift to a “fresh air intake,” allowing yourself to see these situations/challenges from a new perspective – to perceive new options for your response?
Impermanence and Equanimity
“I am not afraid of storms, for I am learning how to sail my ship”
— Louisa May Alcott
Impermanence, or change, is a universal aspect of life. Things arise and, inevitably, they pass as well. We can see this from a variety of perspectives. For instance, from the lifespan viewpoint, we are born, we mature into adulthood, we evolve into older age and then we eventually die. Aging is a constant process of change. Similarly, day-to-day we experience evidence of impermanence in our lives; relationships, housing, jobs, family and health are often in changing states.
Change can be very stressful for us to experience and respond to. Changes require us to constantly adapt. Some changes are joyful: marriages, new homes, birth of children, to name a few. Yet, these joyful changes can be equally stressful as unpleasant ones: challenges in health, loss of a job, a relationship that ends, or loss of a loved one.
With awareness, we can learn to respond to changes in life with greater equanimity. “Equanimity is the strength to stay open-hearted and stable through changing conditions.”* Equanimity first requires us to accept whole-heartedly the fact that everything in life has the nature of impermanence. Out of this deep acceptance we can than acknowledge changes without trying to hold onto or push away any of them. This is particularly helpful during distressful or disruptive times; at these times it might help to remember the age-old wisdom, This, too, shall pass.
It is not uncommon to be overwhelmed by the changes in life. At times you may feel that your reactions to these changes have control over you rather than you having influence over them. Fortunately, equanimity is something that can be cultivated. To begin to bring greater equanimity into your present experience you might try repeating simple phrases such as
“May I have peace amid the changes in my life, and may I have peace amid the changes in others lives.” *
Although we cannot direct the wind, we can adjust the sails.
* Reference: The Beginner’s Guide to Insight Meditation by, Arinna Weisman & Jean Smith, Bell Tower: New York, 2001.
Spring Cleaning
“Letting go is simply making a decision – no longer to allow something from the past to influence your life now or to reduce your inner sense of peace and well-being.”
— Sylvia Clare
We’ve officially transitioned into Spring, a season of renewal. With Spring often comes an urge to purge – to rid your environment (room, home or office) of clutter that has accumulated gradually over time, or even to remove the weeds that have settled into your garden or yard. Eliminating unessential “stuff” from your environment can be quite liberating, enabling you to lighten your load both physically and spiritually.
This purging process need not take place only externally. Internally, you likely have been accumulating clutter as well: old patterns that no longer serve you well, ruminations over past experiences, and attachments to people or things that are not adding value to your present life. It is hard enough sometimes to see the external clutter that surrounds you; as you become used to it, it becomes less visible to you. Yet, the internal clutter can be much harder to recognize.
Now is as good a time as any to reflect on what you have been carrying around with you, internally, day in and day out. Some of what you are carrying may have been with you much of your life. However, no matter how long it has been part of your life, once you begin to see this internal clutter more clearly, you have the option to release it – freeing yourself of this ongoing burden, and creating more space, potentially, for new patterns or responses that are more effective for you.
What can you let go of, right now, to lighten your load?
Sympathetic Joy
“In seeking happiness for others, you find it for yourself.”
— Anonymous
Sympathetic Joy can most simply be defined as taking delight in your own successes and the wish for greater success, as well as pleasure in the happiness of others as if it were yours. It is the understanding that someone else’s joy doesn’t threaten our happiness; it actually enhances our own happiness.
In the midst of the demands of our life, we can fall into two common traps that are symptomatic of our comparing mind. One trap is when we play our own success down: “It was nothing,” or “I didn’t try that hard.” In this way, we are not acknowledging or honoring our own success, respecting who and how we are. At some level we are sure that we are not good enough. The second trap that we can fall into is comparing ourselves to others in ways that produce envy and jealousy. You might notice a contraction that appears in your heart when someone talks about their successes. This is the opposite of sympathetic joy. We are separating ourselves when we assess ourselves in relation to someone else’s experience.
Cultivating the capacity for sympathetic joy enables us to connect to ourselves and others more deeply. In rejoicing in the good fortune of others we overcome resentment, envy, and jealousy and even find inspiration in the accomplishments of others. Ultimately, sympathetic joy keeps us intimately connected to others without being overwhelmed by the sight of the world’s suffering, including our own.
To practice sympathetic joy, you can repeat these simple statements to yourself:
May I enjoy my successes; may they grow and increase.
May others enjoy their successes; may they grow and increase.
Gratitude
“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow”
— Melody Beattie
What is gratitude? One way to define gratitude is “a feeling of thankfulness and appreciation.” More specifically, Webster’s Dictionary defines gratitude as a “warm and friendly feeling toward a benefactor.”
“O.K.,” I hear you saying, “but what does gratitude have to do with stress?” Well, our thoughts happen to be a major trigger of our natural stress response (fight or flight reaction). When left unchecked, our thoughts often contribute to stress as a result of our being preoccupied by suffering over the past (replaying, regretting, or stewing in anger) or over the future (worrying, planning, fantasizing). However, when your thoughts are, instead, directed towards the gratitude that you are experiencing in your life, they are more likely to be serving your well-being rather than contributing to ongoing physical and/or emotional wear and tear. Simply put, practicing gratitude can be a process that has a similar effect on your stress as affirmative thinking or reframing your thoughts. For this reason, bringing awareness explicitly each day to the gratitude that you have for people, things, and experiences in your life can have a stress-reducing effect and ultimately improve your peace-of-mind and well-being (both physically and emotionally).
Greg Krech, in his book entitled, Naikan: Gratitude, Grace, and the Japanese Art of Self-Reflection, suggests that “To live a life of gratitude is to open our eyes to the countless ways in which we are supported by the world around us. Such a life provides less space for our suffering because our attention is more balanced.”
Try out this simple practice of gratitude for yourself:
Each day write down, or share with another person, three things for which you are grateful.
“My advice to you is not to inquire why or with whither,
but just enjoy your ice cream while it’s on your plate.”
— Thornton Wilder
Let It Be: Letting go of resistance
“When I find myself in times of trouble
Mother Mary comes to me
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be
And in my hour of darkness
She is standing right in front of me
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be”
– John Lennon
As human beings, we have a natural tendency to move away from suffering. We tend to close ourselves off to things we don’t like to feel or experience.
Our mind supports us by devising various strategies of avoidance and denial to push away those things we don’t want; resisting painful sensations and emotions; resisting difficult people and unpleasant situations. One way we avoid painful experiences is by ignoring them and pretending they don’t exist. A common variation of this means of avoidance is to remain frantically active so we are distracted from the distress we feel. Although this may work temporarily, eventually the pain may become too great to ignore. Another tactic we may take is to be willing to be with the pain, but only in order for it to go away. This is also a form of resistance, albeit a more subtle one.
How much of what we do in our lives is simply an effort to avoid feelings or experiences that we don’t want? Unfortunately, the unwillingness to be with and experience these feelings keeps us always reaching or grasping for something else. It is often difficult enough to be with the original pain, the discomfort that we are attempting to push away. Yet, ironically, through the dynamic of our resistance to the pain, we are actually adding optional suffering into our lives.
How much simpler it would be to just allow these painful feelings and experiences, letting them arise and pass away without struggle or resistance. Ultimately, our willingness to be with the original pain, without trying to deny it or push it away, enables us to let go of the optional suffering that we add to our lives when we resist our actual experience.
Reference source: Seeking the Heart of Wisdom, Joseph Goldstein & Jack Kornfield, 1987
Example
Original pain: Finding yourself stuck in bumper to bumper traffic when you feel time pressure to arrive somewhere. Some frustration or anxiety may arise.
Resistance (Optional suffering): Escalating the disappointment or anxiety into anger. Tensing your muscles in reaction to the frustration of not being able to change your circumstance. Ultimately, you might yourself developing a headache from the withheld tension, or transferring your anger onto others when you arrive at your destination.
Letting it be: Acknowledge your frustration at being caught in traffic. Recognize what you do and no not have influence over in the situation. Shift your attention to an abdominal breath to maintain physical balance. Combat any negative thoughts by giving yourself a reality check and reframing the distorted thoughts into more realistic ones.
“In the end, these things matter most:
How well did you love?
How well did you live?
How deeply did you learn to let go?”
— The Buddha
Goal Setting for Positive Change
“It is only when we have the courage to face things exactly as they are,
without any self deception or illusion, that a light will develop out of events,
by which the path to success may be recognized.”
— I Ching
As we experience the end of 2003 and transition into the New Year, I encourage you to refrain from making New Year’s resolutions. Resolutions made at this arbitrary time of year are often based vastly on emotions and rarely include a realistic action plan that has been defined for your success.
Instead, I encourage the practice of setting goals for yourself. Goal setting is an ongoing skillful practice – all year round. Moreover, it is a practice that can help you experience successful change, if engaged in realistically and with awareness.
In setting goals for yourself, a concrete plan can keep you on course and increase your commitment. Start with a bite-sized, realistic goal, something that you will be able to accomplish in the next several weeks. If you have a large goal, break it down into smaller steps that will be less overwhelming and more reachable. Try putting together a plan that includes the following elements:
· Specific
Set a concrete goal that addresses behavior and results, not emotions.
· Measurable
You must be able to tell when you arrive, and to set milestones along the way.
· Agreed upon
Don’t be the Lone Ranger; ask others to help you and support you.
· Rewarding
Make your behavior change as much fun as possible. Decide how you will reward and acknowledge yourself; both for achieving your main goal and for passing the milestones along the way.
(Source: Stress Management, Beaverton, OR: Great Performances, Inc., 1987)
Example
Goal: I will develop a regular stress reduction practice over the next six weeks.
Measurable: I will begin by practicing mindful yoga or meditation 20 minutes, three days a week for the first two weeks, work up to practicing 20 minutes, four days a week for the second two weeks, and practice 20 minutes, five days a week by the end of the six weeks.
Agreed upon: I will share this plan with my sister and check in with her each week about my progress.
Reward: At each milestone, I will by myself some flowers for my office at work.
Minding Your Stress 