how do you talk about mindfulness?

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Maisy

I wonder what is aware the mind is doing that?

I think in mindfulness you are the neutral observer. If thoughts, reactions, sensations are there, they change and do not last long. That way instead of being ruled by the mind, likes, dislikes and so on as if that's the normal default, you can do what you actually intend to do, though it takes a bit of determination. Mindfulness involves determination, persistence, relentlessness, so the question is, why? What is the motivation behind it?

Unlike most motives which pursue pleasure and avoid pain, the mindful motive is to be aware and find out about what is true. You can't get anything out of that. All the automated tendencies are the tricks ego knows will work to keep you distracted, so you have to be observant to find out how that operates, and if ego can't slip by you unawares, it can no longer rule the roost.

Hence, when we start with breath awareness, we just watch and know 'it feels like this'. In addition, we examine closely how it feels so that we penetrate reality deeper. Breath awareness later expands to encompass the whole body which you investigate from the dense solid surface level to the light dynamic subtle levels. By looking into the body neutrally, without trying to get pleasure of avoid pain, the mind, thoughts, reactions, tendencies, automatically reveal itself.

The neutral bit is important because we might say I'm the one aware, the one thinking, etc, but the one who reacts is not the one aware - that's just the ego you identify with, and these reactions are what implies 'me'.

If you go ahead on those understandings, there will come a time when ego is completely exposed, and you be like, 'wait a sec, that's not me'. Then you realise ego can do whatever it wants and you don't care at all because you have detached and no longer live as that, and it can't steer the ship anymore.

Now I said that, people will start to desire, what about me, when will I experience this, etc and so on (always an 'I' thought)... and you can notice the discontent that generates, so it's not about the 'end game' as such, even though there is 'a final goal'. It's about this reality, as it is, just as you experience it, right now.

[Maisy]

Originally Posted by Gem

I think in mindfulness you are the neutral observer. If thoughts, reactions, sensations are there, they change and do not last long.

I read some scientists did brain scans on people doing mindfulness and what they found was the regions in the brain that produce thought, that are where thoughts originate, slowed down their production of thought or stopped altogether if one was "mindful." I think somewhere in this thread I posted that link about the networks in the brain and it talked about the fact people can be "stuck" in certain networks like the one where thought focuses on thought....and they found people stuck in this network tend to be prone to mental illness, anxiety disorders etc. In other networks, externals, sight smell taste etc take priority over thought as far as the focus of ones awareness. In these persons, centered in these networks and regions, thoughts can be ignored or dropped etc. They have more mental peace.

Someone can say to these persons, "Hey it's almost hurricane season are you scared?" And they may say, "Hey it's a beautiful day! I'm not going there. I'm not ruining my day thinking about that!" Then the other person says, "I'm really afraid." That person is letting a thought now about the future which is unknown and doesn't really exist now make the now full of a fear experience. The same thing can happen with anger etc. Focusing on thought as reality can make one mad now when nothing is present now to cause that anger except a thought or memory. We can add conflict to now focusing on thought as well. This should be this way and not how it is etc...a thought. Focusing on a thought changes our experience of now.

I know of a person who has major anxiety problems. Doctors have her on all kind of drugs. She is always having fear based thoughts. She has panic attacks all the time. Intense fears. She just dropped out of college with just a few classes left to get her degree. So sad. She's in love with a guy she met online and feels she can't meet him even though they talk on video chat all day on their computers. She has too many fears to meet him in real life. She can not get out of her head, out of her thoughts. Her thoughts cause intense physical and mental pain and suffering, yet she is clueless how to let go of them, how to not believe them, how to not take them as reality because her physical responses to them is her reality. She's stuck in a very destructive loop.

Originally Posted by Gem

That way instead of being ruled by the mind, likes, dislikes and so on as if that's the normal default, ... Mindfulness... so the question is, why? What is the motivation behind it?

I think the person above could be "cured" if she could learn to not focus on her fear based thoughts. To not let her attention go to them, to not accept them as reality, to not let them in her life or the now. Easier to say than do of course. So I think "mindfulness" can make a lot of people have better lives. But then I don't view it as a technique that one does sometimes though it can be thought of or practiced as such. I see it as a potential way to be in any given moment. And I think one can live always free of thought priority or focus. I think that's what enlightenment is. To see things as they are. To be as one is.

I think focusing on breathing does take the attention off of the mind or thought and it is one way to "get there" into a state where one is not focusing on thought but I think it is not the only way one can do it. I think there are thousands of ways. Maybe millions. Looking at the beauty of a flower or a mountain or a face can stop thought focus. Getting into some activity like painting can stop thought focus. Dancing can stop it, sufi dancing comes to mind. Chanting etc. Building a car engine! One can also just be it without doing anything at all. But if thoughts of the future are present, using it to "get somewhere else," to achieve something in the future then it may seem like mindfulness, seem like one has transcended thought but one is still carrying some thought focus in there. One has some thought focus in what they are thinking is mindfulness. I think one has to take the attention off ALL thought in my view. So to me that involves selflessness.

The self has goals, plans, desires. It wants something it does not have. Which creates a conflict in the now. That to me is having a thought, a goal, a desire change the experience of now. I think one has to eliminate the person or ego or whatever one calls it all together. I think that's the true way to be free from all thought focus. To me, I don't focus on breath to change something, as that is believing a thought something needs to be changed. Now is always perfect, I am always perfect. Only believing a thought, focusing on a thought makes it something else. Makes me something else. Makes me experience something else besides the now as it is, empty, quiet, still, peace, love.

I can get caught up in thought and thinking. But then I can let that all go as well. I may be unaware, then experience the now with thought involved. Resistance, not liking etc, some form of conflict is experienced because thought is involved, mental interpretation. But then I know the other as well. Non-attachment, not focusing on ideas about now or how things or others or myself "should be." Experiencing just things as they are in the now. Not being a "person" or ego that has comments about the now. Feelings about the now. That wishes to change the now or desires the now or myself to be different in some way.

The very desire or thought to experience mindfulness can be a focusing on thought as reality. So to me there is nothing to do. It's already been done. I have always been in mindfulness. It's just I was focusing on a thought so didn't notice that. Mindfulness to me is just the now as it is. Before I was here, while I am here, and after I am gone. It's always been the same experience. I think in mindfulness I am not adding one thing to what exists but I exist and my existence is a projection of what I am and what I am is total acceptance and awareness of what is so I am a part of everything I perceive, everything around me.

A tree is one with everything. With the dirt and the sky. The insects, the stars, the totality of reality as we are. We are not really individuals unless we focus on a thought or personal interpretation. We are all one. The love that is the center of our being that has always been there.

“It is eternity now. I am in the midst of it. It is about me in the sunshine; I am in it as the butterfly in the light-laden air. Nothing has to come; it is now. Now is eternity; now is the immortal life.”
― Richard Jefferies, The Story of My Heart: My Autobiography

[FallingLeaves]

so um it just hurt so much to be told all the things i should do, fight with my problems, or release things like thoughts, and on and on and on... to get to this glorious mystical place called 'joy'... and it is all so hard as to be impossible but noone wants to do anything more than just tell me to do it anyway... and in the end it is just so much harder to keep doing all that than it is just to accept my lot as icky as it is... so i listen to god for a change and just do that... and everyone is mad at me because I won't do all the beautiful things that lead to glorious joy but I just couldn't and I was lying to myself trying to make myself do something I couldn't do anyway.

much easier just to accept my lot... even though everyone is mad at me about not doing the proper things to get the proper feelings...

much easier to be mindful, though, when I'm not always trying to go somewhere else first before I will let myself do that... lol...

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Maisy

these persons, centered in these networks and regions, thoughts can be ignored or dropped etc. They have more mental peace.

major anxiety problems. "cured"
I think there are thousands of ways. Maybe millions. using it to "get somewhere else,"goals, plans, desires. It wants That wishes to change the now or desires the now or myself to be different in some way.

experience mindfulness

Yes. I also find the immediate reality more peaceful, and with mental opinions more stressful. Focusing on a thought is not in itself more stressful, but giving truth and therefore importance to thoughts is stress. Indeed, giving any importance to any sensation is stress because it's actually the thiught about the sensation which is believed and thereby made important. In meditation a person might have times of non-stop thinking, and therefore less contact in reality, but if one just watches and allows it to play through, it won't disturb you or affect your depth of mind. Provided you remain detached, it's not going to affect you.

If a person has a chronic or serious mental issue, it's probably beneficial to use mindfulness techniques, but you need to be regulated by a mental health professional. The way I describe mindfulness is kinda risky for severe, problematic mental issues because the healing or purification component can get messy if someone really loses the plot.

Mindfulness is essentially experiencing things just as they are, and there are good reasons that people avoid their overall reality, but mindful equanimity can be cultivated over time so the person can 'go through' more extreme experiences. If they are subjected to something extreme without the even-mindedness needed to endure it, it can be traumatic and do more harm than good. In mindfulness the reactionary cycle is halted, and without those resistive tendencies, everything caught inside is unteathered, so it comes to the surface of conscious awareness. If that becomes too overwhelming or creates vulnerabilities in hostile environments, people can go off the deep end. People with more severe mental issues need specialised care, so I wouldn't recommend mindfulness meditation to that cohort, but there are therapists that do.

Breath awareness is the beginning of mindful meditation in most Buddhist traditions, but of course that is not the entire thing and any momentary experience can be 'the object' - all of them. I think people interested in it can simply dedicate a time each day to sit still and feel what breathing is like, but breath practice and psychology can't be separated, so even just breath practice alone is a highly nuanced discussion.

The main principle in breath practice and mindfulness generally is 'see it as it is'. You simply know 'it feels like this'. If you're trying to change something, that's coming from a mental reaction that incites the will. Mindfulness aims to interrupt that reactionary process, and we want to keep all attention in reality without the distraction of thought.

The idea of experiencing mindfulness implies there some sort of state of mind that is being experienced, but that state of mind and any other experience is not going to last, so in mindfulness practice, the experience might be very dense and uncomfortable or it might be very spacious and subtle, but the meditator is neutral in any case with 'this is what it's like'. Trying to 'make something happen' is what mindfulness is not. Thus, mindfulness involves the cessation of such volition - but not intent.

Yes, that rules out many things touted as 'mindfulness', such as counting/timing/controlling the breath, saying Budho, visualising prana and so on. Nothing against these techniques.It's just that they contradict mindfulness practice specifically. If people need them in 'mindfulness', I just need another name for what I'm talking about.

Breath awareness as a proxy for mindfulness is be aware of what breathing feels like and examine that feeling as closely as you can. There are nuances to that, but there is nothing to add.

[sky]

Originally Posted by FallingLeaves

much easier just to accept my lot... even though everyone is mad at me about not doing the proper things to get the proper feelings

Accepting is your choice and those who get 'mad at you' should accept that their choices are not yours

[Maisy]

Originally Posted by FallingLeaves

much easier just to accept my lot...

That's it!

[Maisy]

Originally Posted by Gem

The main principle in breath practice and mindfulness generally is 'see it as it is'.

I think neither seems a way to "see it as it is" as I think both are adding mental ideas or concepts to now. The ego may be doing breath practice or mindfulness.

[sky]

“Do not pursue the past.

Do not lose yourself in the future.

The past no longer is.

The future has not yet come.

Looking deeply at life as it is

in the very here and now,

the practitioner dwells

in stability and freedom.

We must be diligent today.

To wait till tomorrow is too late.

Death comes unexpectedly.

How can we bargain with it?

The sage calls a person who knows

how to dwell in mindfulness

night and day

‘the one who knows

the better way to live alone.’

The Buddha.

[JustBe]

Originally Posted by FallingLeaves

much easier just to accept my lot... even though everyone is mad at me about not doing the proper things to get the proper feelings...

on and on and on... to get to this glorious mystical place called 'joy'... much easier to be mindful, though, when I'm not always trying to go somewhere else first before I will let myself do that... lol...

What kind of beautiful things do they think lead to glorious joy?

My experience with authentic clear joyous being, is more spontaneous and more about aliveness than mystical. The middle path taught me more closely, the highs and the lows integrate together forming a balanced state of being. You’re neither up nor down in this place. Joy arises in moments of that integration.

I think there are many ways people adjust their sails to deal with life and matters inside themselves.

Humour is an example. I recall one time feeling more anger and rage inside a particular female I knew. She would humour everything and I used to feel how icky it felt. Something was off. In the end I decided to address it as I couldn’t keep pretending with her. When I did, she was mortified I thought she was faking it, covering over other feelings. She lost it with me. Basically let it all out at me in defensiveness, of those underlying unaddressed strong emotions.

It was out now, in my face but she was in denial. Her reaction revealed them.

Most people just laughed with her and a couple felt it, but most weren’t aware.I just find that difficult to laugh with when all I felt was anger and rage streaming one with the humour. then they wonder why your not laughing. Then when your honest and address it openly, your the bad person.. lol ( it gets absurd in the end that you have to laugh)

Anyhow nowadays I flow with things like that, or discern where to put my energy more directly.

[FallingLeaves]

oh it is just supposed to be so wonderful of an experience, trying to get to joy/happiness by working hard to do _______ never works out for me though lol... and honestly im tired of listening when I'm told that...