Practice Mindfulness in the Age of Mindboggling Complexities
Mindfulness
is the quality of being conscious or aware of something. It can be defined as a
mental state that is achieved by focusing one’s awareness on the present moment
while calmly acknowledging and accepting one’s feelings and thoughts. It’s a
basic human quality to be fully present and cautious of what’s happening around
and how to respond to it.
Once
a blind, old man was walking on a road. He had a lantern in one hand and holding
a clay pot in another. One passerby stopped him and asked, “You are blind, day
and night are same for you then why you need this lantern?” The old man
replied, “The lantern is for you dear young man! So that you don’t hit me in
dark and cause damage to my clay pot.”
To
explain the importance of mindfulness I would like to quote the words of Viktor
Frank1, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our
power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
Mindfulness is an innate quality that
every human being possesses, we need not acquire or conjure it up; we just need
to learn how to access it. It guides us not to overreact or being unnecessarily
overwhelmed by what’s going on around us. When your jobs become
Anxiety-provoking and the day-to-day happenings put a significant stress on you,
mindfulness can help. Being mindful will certainly make you more charismatic;
let’s learn how to practice it:
Mindfulness Means Making the Most of Your Abilities
Be
mindful to what you can do and how to prove it, whenever given an important
responsibility, always take care of making the maximum use of your abilities
and let never others overpower your skills and strategies for the task. When
Lord Krishna lifted the Govardhan Parvat, many people in Gokul came rushing in and
supported it with their sticks. They had a misunderstanding that it’s their
power that had lifted the mountain; Lord Krishna had only one tiny finger to
support it. So be rational in utilizing your strengths and keep a check if
people try to misuse it. Mindfulness allows us to improve our focus, it brings us back to the present moment over and over again, thus reducing the strain on
our brain.
Being Mindful is Being Purposeful
During
the pandemic we all have developed an ability to reflect and understand that
every moment of life is precious and having a purposeful life turns these
moments into immeasurable happy memories. A mindful living can win over instant
gratification and drives you to gain self-knowledge. It helps you differentiate
between the futile, superficial goals and your realistic goals which further
propel you to go beyond your boundaries and rediscover your SELF. Being mindful
enables you differentiate between your act due to anger and the one done with
patience.
Mindfulness Helps You Forget the Past
People
waste a lot of time and energy feeling guilty or regretful about their past,
they keep judging how good, bad, successful or failure they were at certain
points in life. This hankering after past makes our life miserable and we find
ourselves in a quandary. Mindfulness doesn’t mean stop thinking or reflecting,
it means to pay a close and sincere attention on your sensations and EMOTIONS so that you can observe and analyze them and grab the solutions quickly and
efficiently. Mindfulness makes you kinder to yourself and more caring to your well being.
Spare Your Mornings to Cultivate Mindfulness
We
all know that practicing a diligent approach to mindfulness can do magic as it
helps you create a short mental space between an event and your stimulus to
respond to it. Morning hours are the best to work on it; because the mind is
very focused, creative and expansive during that hour of the day. A 10-minute
meditation can be of great help to channelize your infinite energy. Take a
breath, feel your own breathing and be in the present moment before you proceed
for your day’s activities. Stop multitasking as it is a pernicious myth which
prevents us from attaining contentment and peace of mind. Never check mails in
the morning neither pay attention to the pop up notifications as such practices
keep your mind occupy all the time and reduces your productivity. Spend your mornings with you because none can be a better companion to you than yourself.
Mindfulness
transforms us and teaches how we should relate to the events and experiences in
our life. It changes our way of reacting on trivial issues and trains our mind
how the important ones can be taken into considerations wisely and with a
problem solving attitude. Problems and frustrations keep mounting when we don’t
deal with them properly. Our habit of making judgments on every day to day’s
problem drags us into the pit of sorrow and regret. This habit restricts our
creative thought process and skillful responses. Cultivating mindfulness helps
us pause and ponder over a situation, get a clearer picture of the situation,
find the options to resolve the issue and respond with a poised demeanor.
Being mindful is staying strong and motivated in all situations; awards or appreciation- neither to boast about if received nor to sulk if not. It encourages you to select your responses wisely and make calculated choices instead of ending up to irrational and impulsive acts and decisions. Let’s learn to be less reactive and more in tune with the present.