Mindfulness 101
What is mindfulness?
Mindfulness is conscious awareness, and self-awareness, in the present. Right here and right now. It’s conscious awareness of your inner mindset/headspace/psyche self. That inner awareness leads to greater awareness of life, the Universe, and everything.
It is both stunningly simple and incredibly challenging. That’s due to resistance from without (society, culture, other people, and things) AND resistance from with (ego, habit, subconscious beliefs and values).
Thought + Feeling + Action = Mindfulness
Mindfulness is conscious awareness of yourself. It’s a product of the present, the here and now. Mindfulness is conscious awareness of your mindset/headspace/psyche. Overall, it’s engaged via Thought + Feeling + Action.
How does it work? To apply mindfulness to your life, you make a decision – you choose – to be aware of your inner self. To awaken that awareness, you just need to ask any one of these questions:
· What am I thinking? (Thought)
· What am I feeling? (Feeling)
· How am I feeling? (Feeling)
· What are my intentions? (Thought + Feeling)
· What am I doing right now? (Action)
By becoming consciously aware, you move out of rote, routine, and habit. This empowers you to make choices and decisions for who, what, where, how, and why you are. That, in turn, opens you to improve your health, wellness, and wellbeing.
What’s really cool about this is that the equation works both ways. Thought + Feeling + Action = Mindfulness / Mindfulness = Thought + Feeling + Action.
This is how you live more through your conscious mind rather than your subconscious mind.
Remember, also your health, wellness, and wellbeing are made up of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual elements.
How does mindfulness empower?
Knowing your own thoughts, feelings, and intentions gives you the power to make choices and decisions about actions to move your life along.
Many people don’t understand how much of what we need in this world begins within. Nobody but you is inside your own head, heart, and soul - and that’s something super-important to grasp. Because nobody is in there with you, what and how you think and feel about yourself is the basis for everything that makes up your life.
If you believe that you have no power and that you can do nothing to change anything, then that is exactly what you create. Most of the so-called powerful people are no different from you and me, with one key exception: They believe in themselves.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
This is a repeat with a slight variation.
At the start of the day, before you do anything else, ask yourself any one of these questions:
· What am I thinking?
· What am I feeling?
· How am I feeling?
· What are my intentions?
· What am I doing?
Please write down or type out the answer.
Repeat the process with any one question in the middle of your day (like around lunchtime.)
Finally – repeat this one more time, just before you go to bed.
Note how this impacts your present, conscious awareness. Do you feel the empowerment that comes from asking and answering these mindful, consciously aware questions?
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