Mindfulness Myth: "I Can't Meditate, My Mind is Always Racing"

Welcome to life as a human being. There are many misunderstandings when it comes to meditation but one of the ones I seem to hear a lot is, "I can't meditate...my mind is always racing!" It is the nature of the mind to race, to judge, to compare, to reflect, to bounce from one thought to another with every new sensory input. That said we all have the special ability to observe that racing, comparing, judging mind. It is in the simple witnessing of the race that we begin to harness the mind power of meditation.
If you can't get out of the rat race than start to become a keen witness of it, starting with your own mind. A busy mind is not a barrier to mindfulness, it is the why you need the practice in your life. With practice we can begin to shift our perception to become a little more connected with that witness and a little more detached from that monkey mind. Don't expect the mind to stop...in fact, don't expect anything and you are on your way with mindfulness.
One simple and profound meditation practice that I learned and would share with you is to observe your breath and each time you notice you are indulging in thought simply say, "Not Now" and come back to your breath. The truth is that each time we are following the fantasy of the mind we have slipped out of this present moment and it really is Not Now. Familiarize yourself with your own mind and body and you will take a major step in your health. Practice watching that racing mind and you may just discover a deep sense of peace awaits.

Be Mindful of Health,

Steve

Mindfulness Based Stress Relief (MBSR)

Working with yoga + meditation for over ten years has demonstrated to me how potent a tool mindfulness is in addressing the epidemic of stress in our lives. Perhaps I will take a moment to sort out how mindfulness relates to yoga for those new to the blog. I have to credit the growing interest in Buddhism with the proliferation of 'mindfulness' through our culture. Mindfulness is the practice of unconditional awareness of one's perception including thoughts, emotions, feelings and sensations. Most of what we call meditation practice could be called mindfulness meditation. I find the continuous segregation of spiritual disciplines and practices a consequence of our brand-happy culture. Call me a simpleton but as far as I can tell the Buddha was a yogi as sure as Jesus was a Jew.

It is always touchy to bring up religion and especially one's view of religion but if you find yourself reacting to my belief at least be mindful of your reactions.

The point I am trying to make is that mindfulness is an integral part of yoga. Mindfulness is what sets yoga apart from other forms of physical exercise. Yoga without mindfulness is just calisthenics. Now that I am working in Prevention & Health Promotion I have been delighted to discover that 'mindfulness' has made it to the mainstream. There has been a great deal of research into the positive effects of Mindfulness-Based Practices (MBP) on mental health. There is also great evidence that shows how MBP are a great complement to traditional talk therapy in combating addiction.

Now that I have made the leap into the healthcare profession I get to use acronyms like MBSR which is Mindfulness Based Stress Relief. MBSR is the application of MBP's to address stress in our lives. I work with four practices that are inter-related but will be discussed separately in our upcoming blogs:

1. The Body Scan

2. Visualizations

3. Yoga Postures

4. Meditation

Here is an MBP for you to practice right now, wherever you happen to be.

The One-Minute Mindful Foot Scan

Here is a micro-mindfulness practice for those that can not find anyone willing to rub their feet. Sit comfortably and take a few abdominal breaths, relax the body...inhale feel the belly fill and exhale let the belly move towards the spine. Now bring your attention down to both ankles, feel what there is to feel without judgement (remember...unconditional awareness). Now move your attention slowly down the tops of your feet concentrating your attention on only the area of focus. Move towards your big toes and then feel everything you can in the big toes. Next move to the space between the big toe and the one adjacent to it, notice especially where the two toes meet. Do the same thing through each toe until you get to the pinky toe and now move across the ball of the foot at the base of the toes down the sole of the foot towards the heel. Experience the arch of the foot and then all sides of the heel finishing at the ankle again.

Stress....what stress?

Namaste,

Steve

Yogi Jayanta

Yoga+Meditation for Stress: Thought, Belief and the Space Between

Those who develop a regular yoga+meditation practice soon discover the benefits manifesting in the places they need it most. Initially, the practice takes place on the yoga mat but soon we realize the practice extends far beyond into our relationships, home, school and work. One specific way to take the practice beyond the mat is through Self-Inquiry. Our last blog introduced us into the specific process shared by Byron Katie and known as The Work. Today, we will deepen our understanding of how to use The Work to target the enormous challenge of stress in our lives. There are many examples at the website, www.TheWork.com and they are so well done it seems redundant to repeat them here.

Stress is the result of an unmet expectation. The word "tension" implies there are two points that are at odds with each other. Imagine a rope and you are holding onto to one end; the other end is tied to a stake in the ground. The rope is your thought about how something should be, and the stake is your belief in that thought that is not supported in your reality. Yoga teaches that thoughts aren't the problem but rather our attachments to those thoughts, essentially our beliefs. You may have realized by now that you cannot change people. Ghandi has a great quote that is timeless, "Be the change you want to see in the world". How about, be the change you want to see at work.

For many, the workplace is the greatest source of stress so begin noticing the relationship between thoughts and your beliefs about those thoughts. Apply "The Work" to your beliefs in order to realize, experientially, that these beliefs are not supported by reality. By practicing self-enquiry, yoga and meditation we can become more aware of this connection between thought and belief. Believing every thought that passes through your head is a recipe for stress and suffering. A student once asked a meditation master about the difference between the student's mind and the mind of the master, the Master replied, "thoughts that arise in this mind are like clouds passing through the sky".

Each time you feel the contractions or tightening characteristic of stressful moments, explore the thoughts and your belief about those thoughts that lead to that internal reaction. Practice is the key and withdrawing your expectations of reality in favor of being with your reality. The difference is subtle but profound.

Namaste,

Steve

Yogi Jayanta

Yoga Myth #8: "Relaxation is a Waste of Time"

We are nearing the end of our series to break through the many myths of yoga including who can benefit. One of the attitudes that I feel more from men, sorry guys, though it is certainly a pervasive mentality is that relaxation is not "productive". In these fast times we have lost the art and forgotten the import of relaxation. Many of the activities in which we participate do not serve as relaxation but rather build stress in other areas. Ideas like "Work Hard, Play Hard" and "No Pain No Gain" contribute to the cultural bias against relaxation.

I had the privilege of participating in a Skills for Healing workshop with Dr. Rob Rutledge who is a Radiation Oncologist on the Faculty of Medicine at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He spoke to a group of cancer patients, survivors and caregivers about the evidence relating to the Relaxation Response. The medical community is now understanding and documenting the benefits of relaxation on dealing with stress and its many adverse affects on health.

The World Health Organization has defined stress as a global pandemic. Relaxation is a major step towards vaccinating yourself against the harmful effects of stress. Don't let our need to be "doing" all the time rob you of your health. Take time to relax alone and quiet without any distractions, including television, the Internet, reading, etc. Too often we engage with a mental distraction as a defense against stress but we do not elicit the Relaxation Response which allows us to release stress more deeply. According to Dr. Herbert Benson, Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School, "The relaxation response is a physical state of deep rest that changes the physical and emotional responses to stress... and the opposite of the fight or flight response."

Everyone needs to start taking action to promote their own mental and physical health and relaxation is an important element of any preventative health regimen. Find a yoga class if you can't make it to Beloved Yoga at the Milo Boathouse in Yarmouth, NS, learning to relax may just save your life.

Namaste,

Steve

Yogi Jayanta

Stress...The White Plague

The new social rituals forming around H1N1 are incredible. People are confused about whether to shake hands, bottles of anti-bacterial gel everywhere and you may have seen that look of shame and guilt on people's faces as they cough or sneeze worried that people may label them as "infected". I can't help but wonder what things must have been like during the time of a really dangerous pandemic like the Black Plague. Imagine how every facet of life was impacted as millions became infected.

I see H1N1 as the first successfully "branded" disease of our time, they tried with the Bird Flu and that was pretty well done but nothing compared to the Swine Flu and then of course H1N1. It seems people of our generation are more responsive to a technical term than to animal-based nomenclature. As a former advertising executive I have a fondness for effective advertising although the novelty wears off when I see such blatant disregard for the fundamentals of health as I am witnessing in this day and age.

You may not even realize but there is another global pandemic that is affecting many, many more people than the latest and greatest H1N1. In fact, it contributes to the death of 4 times more people than all the deaths related to influenza and pneumonia combined, according to the Center for Disease Control. The World Health Organization identified STRESS as a global pandemic years ago. The real problem seems to be one of marketing. People do not realize that STRESS KILLS. In fact, I gave a presentation on stress just yesterday and it is amazing how people cling to their stress. People think that if we ever took it from them they would be unproductive couch potatoes, the lowest of the low in our culture.

I think we need to re-brand STRESS to something more flashy, more deadly, perhaps THE WHITE PLAGUE. The all-caps thing can be effective too until we get a funky, ominous but fresh logo. The WHITE PLAGUE is here and the scary and yet attractive characteristic from a marketing perspective is that everyone is a carrier for this disease. You can look at a room and tell them straight up that 25% of every person there will be helped to the grave by the WHITE PLAGUE of stress. We don't even have to make up statistics, just share them with people.

Of course we would need to create an expensive vaccination because just letting people know the incomprehensible power of simple breath-awareness would never fly. People need big-budget marketing and spoon-feeding by Big Pharma. I am sure we could create a placebo vaccination in the form of an inhaler to combat the WHITE PLAGUE we could name it DBN (Deep Breath Now) and make billions. Even better we could create a sugar pill that melts on your tongue but takes a couple of minutes and we could put on the label that you must remain relaxed and aware as the pill dissolves on your tongue. If your attention wanders a toxin is created that can do more harm than good. Is it ethical to scare people into mindfulness? Fear, it seems, is the only thing that motivates our culture. We could call this special tablet XALER...get it?

Well, I may not have the attention span for this marketing push but you can do your part by beginning to honor the role of relaxation and mindfulness in your own life. Observe the play of stress and try to educate your children on relaxation and mindfulness. Of course, the most effective way to educate the little ones is by example. There is no easy way out except the easy way in...through the breath.

Namaste,

Steve

Yogi Jayanta