How Mindful are you - Monkey Mind or Monk Mind?

What is Mindfulness? According to Jon Kabat-Zinn, creator of the SRMB program - “Mindfulness is a state of heightened alert-awareness, a form of non-judgmental and nonreactive attention to experiences occurring in the present moment-including bodily sensations, emotions, thoughts as well as environmental stimuli, such as scents, sounds, etc.”

So how mindful are you? Another way of putting it is - Do you have a monkey mind or monk mind? 

Naturally many of us have been programmed to be operate with our Monkey mind. Our monkey mind is very easily influenced and controlled by outside forces, it also loves jumping to the familiar past and predictable future as much as it can.

In the world we live in today nearly all of us naturally live in a state of Monkey mind – far from the present moment.

To begin our mindfulness month here is an exercise you can do in 5 minutes that will turn on your monk mind and tame the monkey. It can be done anytime and anywhere. You can also do this with your children – in the car is always a great place to practice.  

‘The Five Senses in Five minutes Exercise.’  

The intention here is to calm your mind by using your five sense to focus on your environment and tame that monkey. Bringing you fully into the present moment.

Here are the steps to complete this exercise:

·       Notice 5 things that you can see. Look around you and become aware of your environment. Try to pick out 5 things that you don’t usually notice.

·       Second, notice 4 things you can feel. Bring attention to the things that you’re currently feeling, such as the texture of your clothing or the smooth surface of the chair/couch you’re sitting on.

·       Third, notice 3 things that you can hear. Listen for and notice things in the background that you don’t normally notice. It could be the birds chirping outside or an appliance humming in the next room.

·       Fourth, notice 2 things you can smell. Bring attention to scents that you usually filter out, either pleasant or unpleasant. Catch a whiff of the pine trees outside or food cooking in the kitchen.

·       Finally, notice 1 thing you can taste. Take a sip of a drink, chew gum, or notice the current taste in your mouth.

Ask yourself how you feel now in comparison to what you were feeling 5 minutes ago. Are you calmer? More relaxed?

An exercise adapted from Brad Walters, Career Coach Consultant. University of Michigan.

Gem x

Disclosure: Mindfulness and Meditation at times is hard.

DISCLOSURE: Mindfulness and meditation at times is hard.

Sometimes we can breath deeply, feel the peace and serenity easily and effortlessly. Other times it’s facing the discomfort we are feeling and accepting the moment for what it is – and this can be really hard. Mindfulness and meditation can be blissful, natural and comforting but it’s not always the case.

Sometimes meditation can be uncomfortable. For many of us, motherhood is a huge growth period in our lives - we are doing a lot of transforming and healing. At these times we are often working through some deep seated beliefs and challenges. Through meditation sometimes our stuck energy that is no longer serving us can become unstuck and come to the surface to be released. When we ride through the discomfort and realize there is peace on the other side there is nothing more empowering.

Meditation and mindfulness practice requires that we become more in tune and intimate with our life experiences – both the positive and the negative parts.

Growth periods in our lives (like motherhood) offer us the ability to build resilienc and gain perspective and compassion. When we are continuously distracting ourselves from the discomforts and potential growth periods in our lives we miss the opportunity to flourish.

Mindfulness in moments of discomfort and pain is more powerful than we realize. At times distraction is necessary but if we go through life continuously distracting ourselves from what ‘IS’ we miss the opportunity for growth and healing.

In a recent study done on mindfulness and pain they discovered when people in pain turn towards it people report that they experience less of it, and their resistance usually decreases.

3 helpful mindful strategies you can try right now to bring you into the moment: (By Victoria Schmidgall)

1) Meditation/mindfulness: The Sorting Boxes Exercise

o   To begin, set a timer for 5 minutes to complete this exercise.

o   Focus on breathing normally.

o   Then, begin to notice thoughts, sensations, or emotions that come into your awareness while breathing.

o   Now, imagine there are 3 boxes in your mind labelled “thoughts”, “sensations”, and “emotions”.

o   As each enters your field of awareness, identify them as a thought, sensation, or emotion and place them in their respective box.

o   Continue clearing your mind until time is up.

2) The 3-Minute Breathing Space Exercise

Mindfulness does not take up time. You can try one small exercise to move your mind in a better direction. Can you find three minutes for this exercise?

Here are the steps to complete this exercise:

o   During the first minute, begin breathing and focus on answering the question “how am I doing right now?” Focus on any feelings, thoughts, and sensations that arise.

o   During the second minute, focus solely on the act of breathing.

o   During the third minute, expand your attention from the act of breathing to the in’s and out’s of your breaths and how they affect the rest of your body.

3) The Gratitude Exercise

One example of a mindfulness exercise is called the Gratitude exercise.

o   First, think of one thing for which you are ungrateful. It could be a job, relationship, health condition, financial situation, etc. — anything that you react towards with anger, frustration, or rejection.

o   Then, take two minutes to list all the possible “silver linings” or “hidden lessons” within this thing for which you are ungrateful. The idea is to shed light on ways to be resourceful that you never realised before.

Good mindfulness authors for further reading for you:

• Pema Chodron

• Thich Nhat Hahn

• Jon Kabat-Zinn

Gem x

The space between your breathe is where the magic can happen.

How aware are you of your breathing right now? Or throughout your day?

Did you check in with it as you read the above? Was it shallow and short? Deep or long?

Once we become aware of our breathing it becomes incredibly powerful. When we acknowledge the space between our breath and begin to quieten our mind chatter and thoughts that's where the magic happens. The magic of intuition, creativity and inspiration.

Here is a short breathing exercise from psychic medium Michelle Beltran:

Sit up right, meeting this moment with dignity.

Put your bare feet on the ground.

Rest your palms gently on your lap, face upward.

Make an agreement with your left brain you will come back to it for any unfinished business or daily on-goings after these few moments of deep breathing.

For now, you are here, with your breath.

Be aware of your breathing right now.

Feel the gradual rise and fall of your chest.

Can you feel the sensation of the breath?

Feel the air moving in and out of your lungs and body. Listen to the sound of your inhale and exhale?

Now, if you can, pay attention and be as present as possible with the space in between each breath. Continue to breathe.

Just one conscious breath – a breath taken with mindfulness – is enough to make some space when in the moments before there was the uninterrupted relentless mind chatter and thought, one after the other after the other. Breathing brings this to a standstill.

A few breaths at various moments in your day will bring space into your life.

It replaces thinking.

Michelle Beltran said - Deep breathing and quieting of the mind, which we often find in meditation and yoga, actually shifts your brain. It temporarily adjusts the parts of your brain called the lateral prefrontal cortex and the medial prefrontal cortex. The lateral prefrontal cortex is responsible for regulating your emotional responses and automatic behaviours and habits. The medial prefrontal cortex is responsible for constantly reviewing past experiences, responses, and behaviours. These two automatic sets of responses work to prevent you from quieting your mind. Breathing slows those responses and gives you enough control to allow you to truly quiet your mind.

Gem x

Mindfulness and Children.

The best way to teach a child to be mindful is to embody the practice ourselves. We are their world, they look to us for guidance, knowledge and advice. While TMP Village is focused on us as mothers directly it indirectly provides potential to contribute to our families lives too – when we help ourselves we help the people around us.

For children who are anxious or struggling, overthinking or hyperactive here are two helpful mindful exercises you can try with your children:

The Finger-counting breathing is an ancient Indian ritual used in meditation. It is also used as a mindfulness exercise around the world , the one below has been simplified for children. 

(Jillian Pranksy a therapeutic yoga teacher explains the exercise beautifully)

It is a useful do-anywhere exercise for the middle of the day to calm a child who is having a meltdown at a birthday party or just to re-centre. Create gentle fists with your hands, and with each breath, unfurl a finger from your palm. For example, on your first exhale open your left thumb from your fist. Pause and enjoy an inhale. On your next exhale, unfurl your left index finger. Pause and enjoy an inhale. Continue until you have two open palms on your lap. Sometimes we “om” for each finger unfurled, or use a personal mantra that evokes the feeling we are looking for, like peace, love, quiet, calm or relax. When children make up the mantra, it helps them have self-awareness of what they may need, as well as how they can take charge of how they want to feel.

This is a practical mindful exercise I do with my girls when they are worked up about something.

1.     Acknowledge the feeling.

I can see you are really frustrated/sad/angry because…

2.     Ask the question is there anything we can do about it? If the answer is no we move on. If the answer is yes, we discuss what we can do about it and decide what that will be. (Parent modelling calm voice)

3.     Important next step: ‘Let’s think about what is happening right now that you are enjoying.’

4.     If your child is struggling, you can model the ‘good thought’ first – something that is in the moment. So if you’re in the car ‘I love all the different colours of flowers I’m seeing in people’s gardens at the moment.’ Give your child a turn.  

5.     Watch your child come back to the moment. You will be in the moment with them too.