Mindfulness is the practice of deliberately paying attention to the present moment — one's thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and surroundings — without judgment or reactivity.
Rooted in Buddhist meditative traditions (notably sati in Pali), it involves observing experience as it arises rather than getting swept up in it, replaying the past, or worrying about the future.
In secular contexts, mindfulness has been adapted into psychological and therapeutic practices, such as Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), to help reduce anxiety, improve emotional regulation, and increase overall well-being.
It can be cultivated through formal meditation or informally, by bringing focused, accepting awareness to everyday activities.
Of course, this is all very marketable.
That's code for saying: there's gold in them there Mindfulness hill(s).
I don't buy it, though.
What?
Mindfulness?
Yes.
I don't buy it because we don't need another fix or label or praxis to be fully human.
Or to put it another way, if we weren't so easily distracted, then we'd be able to fully bring our attention to whatever we're doing.
What was it Mary Oliver said in her poem "Sometimes"?
Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
How hard can that be?
Very hard, especially when, as is now the case, your face is glued to a screen.
In the end, these pith posts of mine are just that, but I can't help but wonder why we're so easily seduced into believing that mindfulness is the cure-all when, in fact, we're the problem -- nothing more, nothing less.
Take care.
Ju
Photo by Evgeny Lazarenko on Unsplash