- by Lori Elliott, MSW, RSW, Grey Bruce Psychotherapist
Developing a knowledge base around mindfulness can encourage a person to consistently and gently re-direct their attention back to the present moment, through a non-judgemental, self-compassionate approach. This repeated mindfulness practice will generate happiness and well-being without anything actually changing in the person’s life. When a person learns to direct more focus to the present moment, their social narrative is automatically turned off, which may greatly assist with any sense of loneliness.
People can live in a fog by lacking an awareness of their own thoughts. Mindfulness offers real clarity, even when one is feeling pressure from their outside world or from within. When someone experiences this kind of fog, and associated procrastination, this is often the best time to carry out mindfulness. The goal would simply be to consciously accept the presence of the fog, the status of procrastination and to identify and sit with any associated, unwanted feelings to allow them to be processed. Through this type of reflection, growth and change may later occur.
One’s attitude around starting mindfulness practice is the key. It’s helpful to not force anything and it’s also advantageous to take a curious, non-judgemental and self-compassionate approach along the way. Mindfulness is only about paying attention and seeing things as they are- it doesn’t require that the person change anything. Kabat-Zinn refers to the benefits of “Beginner’s Mind” and describes this as a mind that is willing to see everything for the first time. Over time, people lose some capacity to be mindful of the present moment because they have experienced more and more moments in their lives, which they constantly draw upon to apply judgements of the moment through. The adult mind is constantly shifting from placing one judgement to the next judgement upon their current reality- applying each of these judgements through the use of their accumulated experiences, all the while missing the present moment. Basically, the brain is constantly processing information from the external world and placing the information into meaningful patterns, which are stored for future reference. This can make the brain very, very busy and constantly distracts the brain from the moment. Most of us can consider time as passing more slowly during our youth. This is typically because, as a youth, we spent more time living in the moment and had fewer experiences to use as comparison bases to constantly apply judgements toward our experiences. Over time, people usually lose their capacity for beginner’s mind since the way that they see each moment changes and their happiness generally decreases as a result. One of the many benefits of the use of mindfulness is that it brings back the capacity for beginner’s mind.
Kabat-Zinn’s world-renown Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program has been redesigned into a free online course that is available for anyone to try out. It may be accessed through: www.palousemindfulness.com. As mentioned, Kabat-Zinn has also authored the book Full Catastrophe Living, which includes most aspects of his eight-week, in-person program. Kristin Neff, who is an Ottawa-based social worker, has created a free website with exercises to increase one’s level of self-compassion. It may be accessed at: www.self-compassion.org. As discussed, these mental health strategies significantly reduce one’s experience of loneliness and improve overall well-being by providing more engagement with one’s sense of self. I wish you all the best along your hopeful journey to implement these mental health recommendations.
