The goal is to achieve a deep state of consciousness during the session, and several concrete techniques are used to achieve this. We aim to get our consciousness to relax and not to make judgments about our sensations, feelings or thoughts. To know what is happening in our inner self at every moment through the management of the attentional processes.
Mindfulness manages to separate the person from his or her thoughts in order to recognize them and question the mental patterns, giving great weight to the here and now through total attention to the present moment.
When to practice it?
Ideally, Mindfulness should be practiced for half an hour a day, although it is recommended to start with shorter sessions, of no more than ten minutes, to acclimatize the mind to new sensations and gradually build up mental states of meditation.
Therefore, learning to do Mindfulness may require some time of practice until we are able to meditate in almost any circumstance.
Where to perform Mindfulness?
We must try to find a place free of noise, with a temperature between 18 and 25 degrees and where we feel comfortable. Don’t forget to turn off phones, alarms, electronic devices and all kinds of noises and waves that may disturb us or interfere with our meditation. If we put music in the background, it is important that it is relaxing and repetitive cycles to prevent it from monopolizing our perception.
Some people prefer to do their meditation in an open environment, in their garden or in a public park. Wearing comfortable clothing will always be a positive element in meditation, and it is recommended that you take off your shoes and any other accessories that may press on your body.
In what position do you practice?
The position for Mindfulness is simply to sit comfortably on the floor; not necessarily in the lotus position, but it is essential that the position leaves the back at a right angle to facilitate breathing. A cushion, mat or towel can be used to make you more comfortable. If the cushion is quite thick, it is advisable to tilt the pelvic area forward, sitting on the end.
The vertebrae should remain in a straight position, supporting the weight of the chest, neck and head. The legs and arms should remain relaxed but without destabilizing the line of the spine. Basic exercises. We must concentrate our attention on breathing. Listen to it, feel it as it goes through the body… but without thinking about it. Strictly speaking, we must focus on recognizing it and letting it flow through the body. At the moment when all our attention is immersed in the awareness of the breath, we can continue to emit a «mantra»: a short word or phrase that, repeated constantly, induces relaxation. It is usual to use the sound «ohm», or other formulas such as «I am well», «always here», etc. Depending on the place where we are, we can emit it out loud or mentally.
Advanced exercises
Having trained the mind to concentrate on one aspect of perception or mental image, we must exercise it to allow it to empty and we can have a blank mind. Much discipline is needed but this is the final point of meditation.
It is essential to maintain a neutral attitude towards thoughts or images, not to judge them as good or bad, but simply to perceive them, to observe them in an impersonal way. It is possible that, during the first attempts, we will not be able to keep the mind blank for more than a few seconds, but this is habitual and it will be the time that will allow us to achieve a state of deep meditation.
Why should we practice Mindfulness?
Research published in the Journal of Internal Medicine revealed that practicing half an hour of Mindfulness daily relieves the symptoms of disorders such as depression or anxiety. In addition, they found that centered meditation (derived from Buddhist practice of concentration on the present and absence of judgment) could have positive effects on the perception of pain. The results were validated even controlling for the placebo effect. The increase in well-being was reported to last for up to half a year.
Meditation also reports improvements in memory, ability to concentrate, self-awareness and emotional intelligence. It is also associated with the optimization of the immune system resources, as well as with the improvement in the perception of loneliness in elderly people.
A different philosophy of life
Beyond the concrete techniques used in Mindfulness, there is a philosophy of life based on what is meant by living in the here and now. Despite the fact that some people understand attention simply as something that leaves out information about what is happening in the present, from the philosophy of Mindfulness, attention is seen as something whose management allows us to free ourselves from situations that block us and make us lose control.
In the end, the simple fact of not falling into obsessive ideas is a way of thinking and feeling in a freer and more consistent way. There are memories and unpleasant sensations that have the property of returning to our consciousness again and again, but knowing how to be in the present is a way of distancing oneself from this type of experience.
«And when we adopt a wiser and more appropriate way of seeing, knowing and accepting what is, the dynamics of what is also changed and a transformation of consciousness takes place, which is usually accompanied by very interesting things that are only possible when we discover a deeper truth that used to go unnoticed because of the stories, usually false, that we used to tell ourselves and prevented our senses from dealing with other things. Jon Kabat Zinn