Mindfulness or being mindful is a simple tool for being present with what is appearing. At the most basic level, mindfulness is a necessary tool and practice for discovering freedom in our lives while helping us feel more centered, stable, and able to accept what is currently arising in our experience.
Humans enter life with a natural ability to be completely present to the sensory experiences of being within a body. Sadly, this natural way of experiencing life disappears when the thinking mind comes online at about the age of about 18 months and claims all experiences, as though they originate within an individual center of reference. This is a false belief.
I’ve been a spiritual pilgrim for more than 40 years, teaching adults and children the paradoxical stories of Jesus the Christ. Since 1991 I’ve had a daily practice of meditation, yoga, and mindfulness, and in 2005 I participated in the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program offered through Duke Integrative Medicine.
I’ve come to understand that the sensory wisdom of the body will always be a more accurate and authentic guide towards uncovering inner peace than any thought, belief, or fact conjured by the mind.
Mindfulness is a wonderful tool to help us see or perceive life from the filters and lenses we carry inside our brain and mind, seldom understanding the chains with which we bind ourselves. Once we see these unfounded and groundless filters and beliefs, we are able to unlearn the concepts and beliefs which cloud or cover deep inner peace. Mindfulness allows us to notice our thinking patterns and limiting beliefs. Mindfulness practice uncovers the beliefs and concepts keeping us constricted and tight with anxiety. Using the tools of self inquiry we begin to uncover an inner tranquility that never moves or changes, and is ineffably alive as our true nature.