This month’s blog is focused on mindfulness. We’ll explore what mindfulness is and how we can build up mindfulness skills for use in everyday life.
Mindfulness is a very specific kind of awareness and it takes a series of skills to be able to achieve this. The first skill is the ability to focus - a difficult task for many as there are often any number of distractions, but this could be a skill that many with neurodivergence may struggle with. The second skill is compassion - being able to offer yourself a non-judgemental environment. The third skill is the ability to maintain some distance from your thoughts and feelings that arise - this is linked to the ability to focus, but it’s a skill in itself not to become overwhelmed by what arises when we enter a state of mindfulness. These skills come with their own set of challenges and it might be worth reflecting on what you struggle with and how you might be able to overcome that with practising mindfulness.
In order to understand mindfulness, we might first want to explore the concepts of the “thinking self” and “the observing self”. The thinking self is the part of us that does the thinking - the internal monologue of our mind. The observing self is the part of us that is aware of what we are thinking and feeling. When we are in a state of mindfulness we are in touch with our observing self and this allows us to have some distance from our thoughts and feelings that arise. For many of us, in our daily lives we are simply thinking and feeling - we are not necessarily paying specific attention to, or observing, the fact that we are thinking and feeling.
So to put all the above together, mindfulness is the practice of noticing your thoughts and feelings without judgement and without being overwhelmed by or distracted by what you notice. In this state we can process our thoughts and feelings and you’ll likely find that they generally pass by on their own - this is what many call “feeling your feelings” - being very present and aware and allowing yourself to experience anything that comes up without avoidance or other unhelpful coping mechanisms. Easy, right? Well, actually for many of us this is incredibly challenging and that is why we might develop other ways of coping with uncomfortable experiences.
While mindfulness is by no means going to magically change your situation, it can help with processing your thoughts and feelings. But it takes time and practice in order to reap the benefits. If you think mindfulness might help you, here are some tips to get you started on your mindfulness journey:
Start off slowly - setting a goal of doing 15 minutes of mindfulness is not realistic for many people so why not start off with 1-2 minutes and see how you do
We’re only human - you will get distracted! Rather than beating yourself up over it, expect to lose focus at some point. You can practise getting back into a state of focus from here. If you notice that you lose focus quite easily, set a smaller goal, or perhaps reflect on why it’s hard for you to focus - all information is good information when it comes to mindfulness!
Find a focal point - many people use the breath as a way to help enter a state of mindfulness. By focusing on one thing it can reduce the amount of distractions. If you find focusing on your breath difficult, especially those who may struggle with anxiety, try visualisation and entering mindfulness through imagery e.g. think of a safe place, or you could pick something in the room to focus on, such as an object you like.
Manage your expectations - mindfulness is not necessarily about being calm. While mindfulness can certainly help with feeling calm and reducing anxiety, that is actually not the ‘goal’ of mindfulness. Mindfulness does not really have a goal! There is essentially no right or wrong way of doing mindfulness. It’s about noticing and being present with your thoughts and feelings - this includes all those feelings that we might tend to avoid like sadness, fear, loneliness. Expecting yourself to be calm means that we are not practising the skill of compassion and creating a non-judgemental space. When we try to forcefully change our state, we are sending a message that those feelings you might not particularly like are unwelcome - when we do this it can create a pattern of avoidance and even lead to shame surrounding those feelings.
Use journaling to help - combining mindfulness with journaling can increase your awareness of your thoughts and feelings and allow you to process them. You might find it helpful to write down what you noticed while you were being mindful - this can include specific thoughts, feelings, sensations or it could be about the theme of what you notice - for example, if you notice that you are thinking about work a lot you can use journaling to reflect on why this might be occupying your mind. You might then like to think about what you want to do, if anything, to address those thoughts, feelings and sensations that you noticed - reflect on what you need.
Mindfulness is actually really challenging but an incredibly helpful state of awareness. I hope these tips might help you in your mindfulness practice. But if you feel that you need a little more help then please do not hesitate to contact me and we can discuss working together.
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