MINDFULNESS PRACTICE

Mindfulness can be defined as a state of open attention to the present moment. It involves intentionally being aware of one’s mind, feelings, sensations, and environment. This is clearly largely related to meditation. If meditation involves practicing to attain an unconditioned state of consciousness, then mindfulness practice involves maintaining that state throughout the day. However, there are a few extra concepts in mindfulness that are important to know.

Why Practice Mindfulness?

Mindfulness shares many benefits with meditation, such as reducing stress and improving attention. But the mindfulness approach achieves this mainly through reducing compulsive thinking aka overthinking. Has a memory of a past event ever kept you awake at night? Have you ever felt fear of anxiety in public with no reasonable threat of danger? Have you noticed that you’re more neurotic compared to those around you? Well if so, there’s a chance that these tendencies originate from compulsive thinking. But before I go into how mindfulness can remedy this, it’s important to understand the nature of the mind from a mindfulness perspective.

Disclaimer: If you suspect that you are experiencing serious mental health issues, please seek professional attention and advice. Mindfulness alone cannot substitute this.

The Mind and the Ego

“Our drifting awareness, our tendency to take the path of least resistance by being less than fully awake to the present moment, creates a void. And the time bound mind, which has been designed to be a useful servant, compensates by proclaiming itself master” – Russel E. DiCarlo

In the western world, we are raised to identify with our ability to think. The idea that we think, therefore we are, is reinforced by our family, our friends, our education system, and usually our careers. Now it’s important to develop the mind, but overidentification with it can create a false mind-made self which I will refer to as the ego. According to Eckhart Tolle, the ego is the culmination of the many ideas, labels, impressions, and judgments that the mind forms as a result of your personal experiences and the collective cultural mindset you inherit. This part of psychological conditioning serves to separate you from other people and extends beyond your basic sense of self or identity. And once you’ve accepted this conditioned state of mind which most of us unconsciously do, you will come to interpret reality through this screen of ideas.

But what’s wrong with this?

The problem is the ego rarely lines up with the reality of the present moment. Instead of being grounded in the present, the ego will actively keep the past alive in you head while projecting itself into the future. We tend to experience this as a little voice inside our heads that drives compulsive thinking. For example, the ego may reminded you of a past mistake or embarrassing memory. Or maybe it will cause a preoccupation with the fear and anxiety of a hypothetical future. All in absence of any credible personal threat or problem. In other words, the ego causes illusions that prevent you from fully experiencing the present moment, often resulting in ego-gratification which can take many forms. And at it’s worse, the ego can be a large source of pain in day-to-day life.

A solution in Mindfulness Practice

In all fairness, the predominance of the mind is an important stage in the evolution of human consciousness. Like I said in my basic meditation article, it’s unlikely we would even be here without the mind or negative emotion to protect us when we’re actually in danger. But thinking is only a small part of consciousness. The mind cannot exist without consciousness, but consciousness can exist without the mind. In mindfulness practice, the next stage of the evolution of human consciousness is to rise above thought, rather than dwelling on it or falling back below it.

“Fear is wisdom in the face of danger, it is nothing to be ashamed of.” – Sherlock Holmes

The next time you hear that little voice in your head, experience it as a watching consciousness. Simply watch your thoughts and emotions. Become intensely aware of the present moment underneath the filters of the ego. When you stop energising the mind through identifying with it, your thoughts will slowly lose influence over you. What remains is a state of perception like a meditative state that can be maintained almost anywhere.

The ego will resist these efforts, usually through an unconscious fear of losing your identity. But only you can wrestle with this process – no one can do it for you. You will not attain an unconditioned state of consciousness overnight, but you have to start somewhere. And if you persist, you gain access to a state of mind free from compulsive thinking and unfounded negative emotion. For more information on mindfulness check out ‘The Power of Now’ by Eckhart Tolle which was a big source for this article – and always remember to ask yourself ‘what, at this moment, is lacking?’.

Sources:

The Power of Now by Eckhart Toll – https://eckharttolle.com/