Foundations of Mindfulness

Foundations of Mindfulness


  • Basics of Mindfulness
    • Mindfulness: paying attention to present moment experiences with openness, curiosity, and willingness to be with what is
      • Training attention, cultivating awareness.
      • Mindfulness is a type of meditation that is cultivated through meditation.  
      • Mindfulness is a quality of attention accessible to us at every moment.
    • Taking us back to what we already know.
    • Presence
      • Focus on present moment experience is central to mindful meditation.
      • Presence cultivates stability, connection, contentedness and wisdom.
      • Harvard Smartphone Study
        • Time participants reported spending in the present moment: 54%
        • Time participants reported not spending in the present moment: 46%
          • Positive non-present moment thinking: 15%
          • Neutral non-present moment thinking: 15%
          • Negative non-present moment thinking: 15%
            • In latter two conditions, people reported unhappiness.
      • Cure for thinking: presence.
        • Ground in the present.  Breathe, feel the ground, feel the body.  Where is the space?
      • Concentration is a transferrable skill.
    • Power of Naming - David Creswell Study, "Name it to Tame It"
      • Researchers showed participants stimuli of emoting faces (disgust, fear, anger).  Control condition = name gender; experimental condition = name emotion.  Group who named emotions showed that the activation moved from the amygdala (reactive, fight or flight) to the prefrontal cortex (executive function, higher order reasoning)!  Other group had only activation in the amygdala.  Naming tamed!
        • Calming to work with things logically; decreases reactivity.
    • It is the quality of attention we bring to our experience that determines "our experience," not the raw experience, itself.
    • Pain is inevitable; suffering is optional.
    • Between wisdom and compassion lies all I need.
  • Practices
    • RAIN trick: if answer to "allow" is no, ask why and work with that.
      • ex: Why won't I allow this?  Guilt.  This is the new "R."
      • If able to do any of "R," "A," or "I," "N" is automatically happening!
      • N = non-identification; disentangled participation, meta-cognition
    • Cultivation practices complement mindfulness practices.  Go hand in hand.
    • Starting any activity (such as a class I am teaching): "Let's all take a few deep breaths, feel the ground, check in (how are you?) in the body."  Start with being in the moment.

Notes from MARC Day of Mindfulness: "Foundations of Mindfulness," led by Diana Winston, May 12, 2018.

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