Mindfulness without meditation
I recently listened to a fascinating episode of my favourite podcast: People I (mostly) admire titled: Pay attention! The host interviewed Ellen Langer, a psychologist at Harvard who studies mind-body connection. She’s published some of the most remarkable scientific findings proving that we can really improve our physical health by changing our mind.
Ellen Langer, aka the mother of mindfulness, defines it with counterintuitive simplicity, as the act of actively noticing things, with the result of increased health, competence and happiness. Her take on mindfulness has never involved contemplation or meditation or yoga. It comes straight out of her provocative, unconventional studies, which have been suggesting for decades what neuroscience is pointing at now: Our experience of everything is formed by the words and ideas we attach to them.
Why is it important?
It proves that the power of a single thought can heal or make us sick, can create or destroy relationships and can free us up to be alive, creative and content or throw us to the prison of shame, guilt and fear.
Our experiences are formed by the words and ideas we attach to them. Naming something play rather than work — or exercise rather than labor — can mean the difference between delight and drudgery, fatigue or weight loss.
“It’s possible to become physiologically younger through a changed frame of mind, to find joy in what was experienced as chore by renaming it as play. One should question labels and diagnoses that limit potential and promote a fixed mindset. By seeing possibilities rather than limitations, individuals can achieve greater health and vitality because many aspects of aging are not inevitable and can be reversed or slowed through mindfulness and positive thinking.”
We don’t need to meditate to live a mindful life. It’s all about paying attention - an immediate process of noticing which results in neurons firing - it’s literally enlivening for us!
If you ask someone: How much of your day are you noticing? How aware are you of what’s around you? They probably would think - Most of it, all the time! Sadly, the research has shown that all of us, much of the time are mindless. We’re not there… What’s scary about this is that - When we’re not there, we don’t know we’re not there! When we’re not paying attention the system is shutting down, we’re cruising through lives on autopilot.
The host of the podcast, Steve Levitt, shared an interesting observation that when we are in a mindless state we are typically in Error but rarely in Doubt. Ellen elaborated on this further by saying:
“When we are mindless, it’s not even that we are saying to ourselves that we are certain. We just proceed without any doubt. And people have run away from doubt without recognizing that when we don’t have doubt, we don’t have choice! The most important way to become mindful is to appreciate uncertainty. With everything changing, everything looking differently from different perspectives it’s not possible to know. The most powerful position one should assume is one of being confident but uncertain. ”
Not knowing therefore is not a personal attribution but a universal one. Nobody knows, so everything is there for us to find out!
How can we fix it?
Being there is so easy! You sit up and you pay attention. And when you do that you become engaged and it’s exciting. There are so many findings of the advantages of being mindful. The neurons are firing, you end up happier and healthier and you light up! Other people find you more appealing, charismatic, more authentic and trustworthy.
The studies also show that paying attention leaves its’ imprint on the things we do - mindfully vs. mindlessly - everything seems to change for the better!
“We come alive when we are engaged - and becoming engaged follows from our knowing that we don’t know and the fun in finding out. ”
DO try this at home!
Here are a few simple exercises suggested by Ellen to open yourself up to the mindful state of being:
Appreciate and respect the uncertainty - look into yourself to ignite the curiosity and see the world as a place full of things and people to get to know and discover.
Notice new things - observe your surroundings: when you walk out your door, about your partner, the things you do at work.
Look for alternatives: try to find three different ways of doing the things you are doing, try to find multiple answers to question that you are asked.
When learning something - try a different approach - not with absolutes. The best way to learn is - conditionally: rather than IS you should learn COULD BE, WOULD BE, POSSIBLY. When you know that it could be you are open to possibilities that otherwise wouldn’t occur to you.
I hope you enjoyed the read and found the topic interesting.
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