Mindfulness
Mindfulness is a term that began to gain popularity in the mid-1980s, mainly due to the MBSR stress reduction programs that Jon Kabat-Zinn introduced in many clinics and hospitals in the USA. To extend this originally Buddhist practice into a conventional medical framework, any reference to Buddhism and its contextual framework within Buddhist teachings was omitted.
While acknowledging the effectiveness of mindfulness techniques in reducing stress and increasing emotional regulation, among other benefits, we believe that the practice of mindfulness reaches a fuller meaning when it rests on an ethical foundation and is undertaken to liberate ourselves and all beings from suffering.
01
Attention
Jon Kabat-Zinn defined mindfulness as "paying attention in a particular way: intentionally, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally." The first component is paying attention intentionally. This means learning to direct and maintain our attention. It's like shining a flashlight in a dark room; without mindfulness, the light of our attention jumps from one place to another. In this way, mindfulness has an aspect of concentration, and its practice helps to stabilize a scattered mind.
02
Spaciousness
But mindfulness is not limited to keeping our attention concentrated on an object; it's not just about noticing our breath, sounds, or whatever we might be feeling at a given moment. It's about doing this in a specific way: in a balanced way, with equanimity, with gentleness and care, and without judgment. Mindfulness is observing what arises in our awareness without attachment or aversion, without wanting our experience to remain the same or to be different. It's a recognition of what is, free from attachment, aversion, greed, ignorance, and identification with what is happening.
When we are mindful of attachment and aversion, we find a mind that is not attached, that is not feeling aversion, and we realize that mindfulness frees us from those states. In this way, we discover something beyond our fleeting experiences, a place of calm and peace.
03
Awareness
Mindfulness is about noticing that there is anger, worry, anxiety, without believing the thoughts we have in that state, without identifying and starting to blame, or judge. Cultivating this energy allows us to be with our feelings without being completely consumed by them. By realizing that there is anger and we have identified with it, that there is fear, that we are defending an opinion, that there is a certain feeling, we free ourselves to some extent from acting from that place. We find a larger space where anger or defending an opinion is part of a broader experience of ourselves. Our capacity to respond to difficult situations increases. Instead of reacting to them automatically from our habits and conditioning, we open up to a broader sense of ourselves where we find more freedom to act from our best intentions.
04
Change
Mindfulness is being in the present, but observing in a particular way, observing without the filter of attachment and aversion, without wanting things to be different. It's like looking through an open window and seeing that everything that appears in our experience, everything that arises in our body, in our mind, emotions, thoughts, feelings, inside and out, is present for a moment and then changes, giving way to something else.
With mindfulness, we learn that the present moment contains not only our experience, but also how we relate to that experience. Seeing this opens up the possibility of responding differently, changing our habitual patterns and freeing ourselves from automatic reactions.
