A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO MINDFULNESS: TIPS & COMMON MYTHS

“Mindfulness” is a term that’s used a lot these days, and mindfulness-based programs are all the rage: in the workplace, in schools, in hospitals. But what exactly is mindfulness, and what is it not?

Here we’ll present an overview of the basics, debunk some common myths, and offer tips on how best to create a formal practice and/or incorporate mindfulness into the activities of your daily life.

What Is Mindfulness?

As you might guess from the word itself, what mindfulness means, most basically, is to keep something in mind—i.e. to maintain a gentle focus upon a particular object or field of inquiry. And in terms of etymology, the English word mindfulness is derived from the Pali word sati and the Sanskrit word Smriti.

Mindfulness is an attentional skill that goes hand-in-hand with concentration, clarity, and equanimity. It supports the cultivation of a spacious, precise, nonjudgmental way of attending to sights, sounds, feelings, thoughts, and internal images.

In the same way that cardio and weight training build strength and flexibility in your body, mindfulness practice enhances the strength and flexibility of your mind.

The opposite of mindfulness is a distraction—i.e. having your attention wander away from what you’re intending to focus upon. The key to mindful practice is to keep coming back to your chosen object of focus, whenever you notice that you’ve been distracted.

Once our mindfulness muscle is sufficiently developed, we can effectively turn our attention inward, to become more familiar with awareness itself—the space within which all thoughts and perceptions arise and dissolve. And we can discover this awareness (with its natural and effortless quality of mindfulness) to be our most essential identity.

What It Is Not: Common Myths

Now that you have a sense of what mindfulness is, let’s dispel a couple of common myths:

Myth #1: It is a magic wand that will fix all of our problems instantly.

The Truth: While the benefits of mindfulness practice can be wide-reaching and profound, they will emerge only with ongoing commitment and practice. If you expect instantaneous results, then chances are good you’ll end up feeling frustrated.

If we plant an apple seed in our back yard, we don’t expect a full-grown apple tree to be there the very next day. Sunshine, rain, fertilizer, and time are all required—in order for the seed to sprout, grow, blossom, and bear fruit. The same is true for our mindfulness practice.

Myth #2: It is super easy.

The Truth: While the basic technique is fairly simple, to do it well is not necessarily easy. Like any skill, it requires some cultivation.

Almost anyone can hold a cello and bow, but to play the cello with the virtuosic skill of Yo-Yo Ma requires many years of dedicated practice.

That said, being a beginner is wonderful too! And even brief daily practice (say 15-20 minutes) can, over time, yield some very sweet benefits.

Myth #3: It requires intense effort.

The Truth: A mindful practice tends to work best when it is approached in the spirit of artful endeavor rather than heavy-handed effort. Let your motivation be that of playful exploration and childlike curiosity rather than forceful obligation.

Think of how a butterfly gently alights and balances upon a flower. This is how our attention alights upon an object of focus (a sight, sound, thought, etc.) in skillful mindfulness practice.

Tips For A Successful Practice

The first step is to select an aspect of your human experience that you’re going to focus upon. This is sometimes referred to as the “object” of your meditation.

The four general categories of mindfulness meditation, as described in traditional Buddhist texts, are:

⇒ Mindfulness of the body (including the breath)
⇒ Mindfulness of feelings/sensations
⇒ Mindfulness of mind (including thoughts)
⇒ Mindfulness of perceptions (of external phenomena)

Once you’ve chosen your object of meditation, the practice is to maintain gently focused upon this object—and bring your attention back to it whenever you notice you’ve been distracted.

Let’s say, for instance, that you’ve chosen to be mindful of your breath. While breathing is happening all the time, you generally aren’t consciously aware of it. So to be mindful of the breath means to rest your attention upon the breath—its inhalations and exhalations.

If you find your mind wandering away from the breath quite a lot—e.g. thinking about what you’re going to have for lunch, or gazing out the window at a beautiful tree—then it might be useful to label each inhalation with the word “In” and each exhalation with the word “Out.”

Either out loud or silently to yourself, say the word “In” with each inhalation, and the word “Out” with each exhalation. This will help you maintain mindfulness of the breath.

You can do this kind of mindfulness practice in an officially designated meditation room in your home: someplace relatively quiet and secluded. But once you’re familiar with the basic process, you can also do a short practice while sitting at your work desk, or while riding the bus or train, or while walking outside in your neighborhood, or along a forest path.

Freshness & Vitality: The Deeper Rewards Of Your Practice

The heart of mindfulness practice is to perceive the phenomena of our human experience (e.g. sights, sounds, feelings, thoughts) with a kind of freshness and innocence that avoids spinning off into elaborate story-making about the phenomena.

When embraced with mindfulness, our moment-by-moment experience becomes deeply intimate and naturally infused with vitality. We see things as they are, rather than as they appear when filtered through our habitual beliefs, assumptions, or conceptual interpretations.

As our mindful presence matures, creativity, and spontaneity flower. We feel deeply satisfied and content—from the inside, so to speak—which tends to naturally enhance the quality of whatever activities we choose to pursue.

Support For Your Training

If you’re new to mindfulness, support is available via free online training programs such as:

The Unified Mindfulness techniques
Tara Brach’s guided meditations
Audio and video recordings of Pema Chodron
Lock Kelly’s effortless mindfulness

Choose a mindfulness system and/or teacher that you resonate with, and then commit to exploring the practice, with genuine interest and joy … and see what happens.

To your health and happiness!