Being Mindful
June 28, 2020
What is mindfulness ?
Mindfulness is a form of “thoughtlessness.”.
If you have no thoughts going through the mind to distract you from your experience of any moment, you are present and being mindful.
In some ways, the opposite of “mindful” is “thoughtful”- full of thoughts. When you are distracted, your mind full of thoughts, you are incapable of experiencing the present moment in full richness.
An analogy strikes me here- Imagine you are in front of a TV watching a Movie. You are trying to concentrate on the dialogues and the drama unfolding. Unfortunately, you have your kids jumping around in front of the TV. Your wife is calling out to asking you to do something and there is blaring music coming through from your neighbor’s house. When these distractions happen, can you concentrate on and enjoy the beauty of the movie? Obviously not.
Our life is like the experience of watching the movie. The distractions that I describe above are the thoughts that keep flitting around in our heads. These thoughts prevent us from experiencing the richness of life.
Mindfulness is the process of paying attention to the movie with all your senses, eyes capturing the visual image, ears catching the dialogues, and keeping the distractions at bay. When you do that, you enjoy the experience of watching the movie.
If you can find a way to make your mind thought”less”, you become mindful, and the movie of life is there for you to enjoy !!
