Mindfulness

‘When you wake up and you see that the Earth is not just the environment, the Earth is us, you touch the nature of interbeing.’

The Empathy Trap: Lessons from Contemplative Medicine | Jud Brewer

“When we can see how being with suffering doesn't deplete us, and, in fact, energizes us... then also we can know what our limits are, instead of trying to be the hero.”

The unwanted and the shadow imagination are real and necessary parts of our inner landscape. They’re wisdom, dipped in discomfort. When teaching mindfulness, I’ve noticed people either move away from their unwanteds or get sucked into them. Those who move away have conditioned themselves to avoid what they don’t want to hear, see, feel, or think.... See more

We need to stop fearing boredom and be comfortable with what is going on around us, whether it’s exciting or not. This is an argument made eloquently by my colleague Ellen Langer, who defines mindfulness as the practice of actively noticing new things. You can do that only when you are not distracting yourself.

If you do this long enough, if you tune this instrument on the meditation cushion long enough, after a while that does become more your default mode. You live in the room rather than living in the agitation of your conceptual reality.

when the trauma label has been applied by outside mores – when an event like an explosion, an assault or a sexual event has taken place and our culture insists that it be traumatising. Sometimes this extraneous narrative resonates and provides a sense of relief, but in other instances disagreement and refusal of the label can lead to judgement from... See more

in times of intense stress or adversity, future-oriented thinking such as hope may be more effective than mindfulness in sustaining positive mindsets and action-oriented outcomes such as engagement.

Our minds often wander into darker thoughts like a curious but cautious cat exploring a dimly lit room. It takes great willpower and a blend of wisdom, perspective, and a touch of whimsy to extract oneself from these shadowed corners