5 ways to bring Mindfulness into your day

I often hear how hard it is to fit a meditation practice into everyday life. No time, no motivation, no support from home. Mindfulness doesn’t only have to be meditation on the cusion or lying down. It can involve other activities as well.

Bringing attention to doing the dishes, brushing your teeth or changing a diaper etc. are ways of supporting presence in your life. A lot of those activities are things we often hurry to get over and done with. It might create tension because we would rather be doing something else. A challenge this week is to bring mindulness into those activities. Let me know how it goes. : )

Here are 5 exercises that may inspire you to ways of mindfulness in your everyday life.

1. Before getting out of bed in morning, spend 3-5 minutes just following you breath. Feeling your inbreath and your outbreath. Bringing attention to your body and the sensations that arise. Keeping your eyes closed just taking a few minutes to tune in before continuing with your day.

2. If you are waiting at a red light. In your car, or as a lot of people here in Denmark, on your bicycle. Touch base with your breathing, feel the wind against your face, the sounds around you. Observe what is on your mind, how you feel right there in that moment. The key word is observe not change.

3. Eat a meal or a snack in silence. Taste, smell, feel what you are eating. Try not to sit in front of the computer or TV while you eat. You could also do the same with a cup of tea. Take it all in. Bring awareness to the fact that you are eating or drinking.

4. Pick a routine activity you do everyday. How does your body feel, while you are doing it? Is there any tension, relaxation? Do any feelings arise - resistance, annoyence, happiness or any other feelings. Do any thoughts occur? Observe your mindstate and body. Being present with what you are doing eventhough you might want to be doing something else.

5. While waiting in line, on hold with customerservice, waiting for the computer to turn on, on the bus. Close your eyes and follow your breath for a minute. Allow yourself to take a few minutes of silence. You are stuck there anyway. Use the time for meditation.

Why India Weirds Me Out

I am very lucky to have Kimberly Johnson guest blog here. I hope you enjoy her post. You can also visit her site and blog here. Kimberly has been practicing yoga for the past 17 years and teaching for the past 11. She has studied personally with the carriers of the Krishnamacharya lineage- Pattabhi Jois, BKS Iyengar, and Desikachar. After years of practicing traditionally from New York to California to India, she went through the initiation to motherhood. The energetic rearrangement of pregnancy, birth and motherhood, brought her to a new phase of self-inquiry. She realized she needed a whole new approach to her yoga and movement practice, her health, and womanhood itself. She brings in-depth anatomy studies, an incurable love of India, and a love for helping women navigate the waters of modern life guided by ancient wisdom. Pretty much every time I come back from India, I am weirded out.

I hold eye contact a little too long.

Lots of long pauses in conversation.

I eat ice cream because I figure if I am going to have diarhhea anyway, why not just eat what I want and what I didn’t have? So bean burritos and ice cream.

I thought it was just the last time I came back from India – the time when I was seriously f*ed up from a guru thing—that I was acting like a Moonie. But then I remembered a time when I was 19 and came back from my first trip. My mom took me to her therapist who handed me a magazine and I said, “no, thanks, I’ll meditate.” I was serious. And I did.

After being in the inner world for a long period of time, the outer world is jarring.

In retrospect, I think it was genuine introspection sprinkled with a tad of affect/pretension. I am grateful to my parents and friends for accepting me in all my sancrosanct namaste-ness.

However today I realized there was some wisdom in my post-India behavior.

This morning, I taught a class, sent my daughter off with a friend, changed clothes to receive a new Rolfing client, brought in chairs and a table to the yoga room so that I could sit and talk with the client, gave the session, called the client a taxi and realized I hadn’t eaten yet today. So I had three amazing Brazilian bananas and went to try to “get something done” before my daughter came back. I wasn’t sure how long it would be before my friend would bring her back. Those periods of time are always the hardest because I can’t seem to get deep into anything, like projects or practice, when I am not sure of the time frame I have.

And a voice inside came, “just sit down and meditate.”

It felt so natural and obvious. Sit down until she comes.

My mind (and I am guessing your mind) always provides the excuse of “not the right time” or “not enough time”, but the truth is those “right times” are hard to come by. Our mind provides us with a million other things we could and should be doing. But if we run around trying to satisfy that manic voice, we miss out.

The truth is: We DO have time and time actually expands when we are present with it. We all have one minute at a stop light. We CAN go to the bathroom for five minutes. The shower. Boiling water to make coffee or tea. There are infinite moments in a day, but we mindfully “spend” them.

What is really the point if we are running around disconnected but fulfilling our roles as parent, worker, partner, friend, etc. but we are not really present or enjoying any of them? So we are basically taking care of business and getting things done but not depleted and exhausted by the end of the day.

Here are a few things that have worked for me to fit practice into my day.

1. Practice first. Right when the baby takes a nap, or the kids go to school, or while you water for tea is boiling, sit for five minutes first. There are a million things that might call (dished, phone calls) but before you “do” them, prioritize your practice.
2. Stop beating yourself up over not having a home practice and practice with a friend or carve out time for one class a week. (or more if that is possible- but we can all find 1 ½ hours once a week) We often have an ideal of what we “should” be doing. Bag it, and do what works.
3. Less really is more: 10 or 15 minutes is enough time to sit, enough time to do a few salutations, or a couple poses that you are now are specifically good for you. When you set out to do less, you usually do more. But when you set out to do more, you often don’t do anything at all.

Be overly forgiving with yourself. All the emotional backlash, judgements, and guilt just creates more junk to weed through later. You want to create a positive association to practice. Soon you will build momentum as something deeper than your thinking mind will crave the practice.

Every once in a while, just close your eyes and tune in. Listen. Feel.

Kindness in the trash.

As I have mentioned before, we live in the more colorful part of Copenhagen. When we look out of the window at night, we mostly see drunk people, young people being loud, sexshops, prostitutes... well you get the picture. Eventhough it sounds rough, I actually love this part of town. It is full of life and to see people live side by side like that is interesting to observe. The other night I was looking out the window. On the street there was a bike with a basket, someone had dumped some trash in the basket. A young guy in baggy trousers walked by, picked up the trash, and put in the garbagecan a few feet away. That was it, he just kept walking. It was really nothing, and then again it was a big deal. He didn’t have to, he wouldn’t get any credit for it, no one would really know that there had been garbage in the basket. Yet he did it anyway. What a man.

The selfless good deed has become a subject to research in the last 20 years. Stephen G. Post, PhD, a professor of bioethics at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, has says "There are ample studies showing that when people receive generosity and compassion, there is a positive effect on their health and well-being. Brain chemicals also enter into this picture of altruism. A recent study has identified high levels of the "bonding" hormone oxytocin in people who are very generous toward others. Oxytocin is the hormone best known for its role in preparing mothers for motherhood. Studies have also shown that this hormone helps both men and women establish trusting relationships."

I find that even seeing or hearing about someone who did something good for others, improves my state of mind. The urge to do something for nice myself is almost instant. I felt really happy, seing the guy pick up the trash. That expample only shows, that it doesn’t take a lot.

Stephen Post goes on to say “Two large studies found that older adults who volunteered reaped benefits in their health and well-being. Those who volunteered were living longer than nonvolunteers. Another large study found a 44% reduction in early death among those who volunteered a lot -- a greater effect that exercise four times a week.“

With those numbers, we should all do our daily exercise, and do something good for others. It just might be contagious. : )

Please leave your story of a an act of kindness you have done or received.

3 great online resources.

So where do you find your inspiration, for your meditation practice? Where do you seek information on how to get started? Of course it depends on what you are looking for I know, but I find that I sometimes spend a lot of time surfing, clicking, reading trough all sorts of useless stuff. I do a lot of research online, and there are a few sites I always come back to. They have something to say. I want to share 3 sites that I love, and that I feel are good contributers to the online mass of meditation info. These sites are not only for insiders, but also for people new to meditation and buddhisme. I hope that they can answer some questions or inspire you to ask some new ones.

Mindful.org

This site has everything. Reviews, articles and really good resource lists. There are also some really great audio and videos. It is a fairly new site that I came across, because they did a, one time only, printed addition. When you enter the site it, is very easy to navigate through and you can find things fairly quick. I must say it can answer nearly any question you might have regarding mindfulness. There are great stories about how mindfulness is entering schools, hospitals etc. Some awesome people contribute to the content.

Mindful.org is a project of Shambala Sun, which brings me to the next site:

Shambhala Sun

I it is orginally a best-selling printed buddhist magazine. Their online site offers loads of the articles that you also can find in the printed mag. They write about themselves: “Inspired by the wisdom and compassion of Buddhist practice, the Shambhala Sun is devoted to the principle that true human wisdom is not the property of any one religion or culture.” That’s is part of what makes it great. It opens up for all readers. As a part of the site they have a blog - SunSpace Blog. Again it is filled with great posts by some of the most respected teachers in the world. If you feel the urge to hit the BUY button at some point, you will not be disapointed with a subscription.

Elephantjournal

It might be a bit overwhelming when you enter the site for the first time. They have ALOT of content. That is also the upside, you can find almost anything on meditation, yoga, greenliving, organics, genuine spirituality and as they say “anything that helps us to live a good life that also happens to be good for others, and our planet.” I also like the fact they open up to “ordinary” people, so they can offer content. Which I find makes it very down to earth, and gives you a broad perspective on the various subjects. You can follow them on twitter as well. I don't know why but I almost always smile when I enter the site, there is a really happy vibe to it.

Good luck surfing. :)

Taking it all in.

I am going to continue the theme of mindfulness, parenting and children. I have heard a lot of comments about the 12 exercises for mindful parenting, and it seems to be something a lot of parents would love to work with some more. I know I do. So when the intention to meditate is there, but we lack space, time and motivation what do we do? A women I really enjoy reading is Diana Winston. What an inspiration. She wrote a blog post about meditating with toddlers.

“Well one night while meditating, I had the brainstorm of bringing back formal practice in toddler-friendly style. And thus we instituted “family meditation time.” My daughter is only one so we don’t have too high of a bar. We sit together, the three of us, for five minutes. We have one of those wooden pyramid timers that we set for five minutes; we all listen for the ding (extremely exciting to the one year old in all of us). Then my husband and I close our eyes and try to meditate. (Operative word: “try”). And what does my daughter do? She tries to nurse. She fiddles with the bell. She pokes us and giggles. She wanders about, not too far usually. Sometimes she whines and occasionally cries. Once she seemed like she was meditating along with us—for about two seconds. More often than not she’s jumping on us.”

I smile when I read it, I know it happens around here a lot.

I often hear, in classes that they couldn’t meditate because the kids were screaming, tv was on and there just too much distraction going on. No time, no space, and kids are awake. It is possible to commit to being aware of what is going on in this moment, without it being in silence. I believe that for us parents, that is a big part of the practice - in our everyday lives. Being present with chaos. As Diana goes on; "She bonked me with a book, and I just sat there and took it all in— spacious, open, wild-child mind..."

In my home we have a buddha statue. It is in my meditation corner with my cusion. Well... the cusion gets moved around all the time, when it’s in my daughter's way. I find it sort of symbolic, to remind me to take presence with me troughout my day. I walked into the living room the other day, to find the buddha over in my daughters play-corner with lip balm on, and hair bands around its head. He still had a big smile on its face, so I took that as a thumbs up... And she loved it. She was in peace and having the time of her live. True awareness and meditation. And I just sat there, and watched her observed her playing, with awareness of what was going on inside me, taking it all in. I love my meditation corner, but it goes where she goes and so does my everyday practice.

What do you do? I would love to hear your experiences.