Questions & Responses on Mindfulness
Taking common questions about mindfulness and meditation and providing responses.
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Impatience
Impatience is a way of life in our culture. Looking for a quick fix is the default method of approaching most challenges we face. We are always looking for an immediate solution to make the discomfort go away, to get the thing we most desire, or to correct a health issue. Making discomfort disappear is Continue reading
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I can’t control my mind during meditation. What should I do?
Mind wandering drives more people off meditation than any other variable. Probably more than falling asleep, being disturbed, or feeling physical discomfort, not being able to “control” the mind seems to be the most discouraging. Newcomers to my meditation classes report that they have tried meditation in the past and couldn’t get their minds and thoughts Continue reading
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Distractions
There are two main ways that distractions take hold of us, or we take hold of distractions, in our lives and our meditation practices. In our daily lives, we find that we seek distractions, especially when we are tired, hungry, aroused, frustrated, and experiencing strong emotions. We use distractions to take us away from where we Continue reading
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Beginning again. Starting over. Returning.
There are so many things in our lives that we start, leave and return to again and again. Meditation is like that as well. Take dieting – one most of us can relate to – we start a diet with super good intentions and a plan. A few days or weeks in, we forget and abandon it, Continue reading
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What is an “anchor” in meditation?
An anchor serves as a home for us during our meditations and acts as a steadying mindful home as we move through our days. Just as we seek out the same comfy chair each evening for relaxing and decompressing, we also seek a comfortable place to cultivate our attention and concentration during meditation. Cultivating an Continue reading
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Why should I consider setting an intention for my mindfulness practice?
“Intentions are the primary or underlying motivations for what we think, say or do.” Gil Fronsdal Setting an intention solidifies exactly what we would like to have happen. It might be an overarching life desire such as intending to be happy, successful, or wealthy. Or it can be something simple such as wanting to listen Continue reading
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What got me started with mindfulness meditation?
I always thought meditation was cool. It was something that seemed out of reach to me. I didn’t know anyone who did it, except those I saw on television. I never had a class or had a teacher talk about it. My parents were neither introspective nor spiritual so such things were never brought up Continue reading
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How do I strengthen my practice? Essential Practice II
In the blog about Essential Practice I I talked about how to start a basic foundational practice of following the rise and fall of the breath in the belly. This first stage of practice asks us to follow our breath and the sensations of breathing occurring in the rise and fall of our belly with Continue reading
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What practice should I start with? Essential Practice I
Two foundational or basic practices are often taught in an introduction to mindfulness meditation course. The first is a body scan, and the second is mindfulness of breathing. There are many guided examples of both of these. I like to start with mindfulness of breath as calming the breath turns down our fight or flight Continue reading
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How do I build a meditation practice?
Building a strong regular meditation practice is like building any other habit. We build all kinds of habits through repetition, attention, and, experiencing some reward. For instance, we build the habit of brushing our teeth starting when we are children. First, because we are told to by our parents, reaping the reward of pleasing them. Continue reading
Being Present 