If we are able to watch our mind when someone is talking to us, particularly if they are asking us to do something, we can see our thoughts forming barriers and counter arguments. Can we resist the desire to disagree verbally? Can we watch our mental and physical attitude to things that we may be averse to doing and say yes anyway?

Instructions

Over the course of this week say YES to everyone and everything that happens. When you notice the impulse to disagree, consider whether it is really necessary. Could you just nod or even be silent but pleasant? Whenever it is not dangerous to you or others, agree with others and with what is happening in your life.

Why Practice Saying Yes?

Not expressing opposition helps us to let go of self-centred views and see that our personal opinion is actually not so important after all. It’s surprising how often our disagreement with another person is actually unimportant and only serves to increase our distress and the suffering of those around us. Saying yes can be energising, since habitual resistance is a persistent drain on energy.

Image courtesy of renaissancechambara

Week 20 – Say Yes is a post on the Embrace website

Advocate of the simple life, champion of emancipation, and fervent opponent of government interference in the lives of citizens, Thoreau’s 19th century ideals have inspired civil rights leaders from Mahatma Gandhi to Martin Luther King.

He is also much revered in mindfulness circles for his belief in simplicity and the presence of spirituality in nature; a philosophy woven throughout his books and essays.

We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us even in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavour. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts.”

You can listen to the programme by clicking on the following link Something Understood – Henry David Thoreau

The programme lasts 30 minutes. It’s available only until 11.59pm, Sunday 13th May. I hope you enjoy it.

Henry David Thoreau lived at Walden Pond from July 1845 to September 1847. His experience at Walden provided the material for the book Walden, which is credited with helping to inspire awareness and respect for the natural environment.

Image courtesy of timhettler

Something Understood – BBC Radio 4 on Thoreau is a post on the Embrace website

Moreover, it also gives a brief overview of the efficacy of research to date in the UK and a glance towards future challenges in terms of delivery to a wider audience, specifically implementation within the NHS.

It makes for interesting reading and all in the space of a couple of pages to boot!

You can access the article by clicking on the below link.

Williams JMG. and Kuyken W.(2012) Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy:a promising new approach to preventing depressive relapse

MBCT in the May Issue of British Journal of Psychiatry is a post on the Embrace website

When we deliberately try to relax our hands, the rest of our body and even our mind will relax and soften too. Relaxing the hands is a useful way of releasing tension and thereby quieting the mind.

Body and mind work together, when we can settle one, the other often follows suit. As a result the health of both is improved.

Instructions

Consciously try to bring your attention to your hands several times a day with the intention of letting them relax completely. For at least a few seconds keep them completely still by placing them in your lap and focusing your awareness on the subtlety of sensation that is present in your hands when they are at rest.

Reminding Yourself

Write the words ” REST ME!” on the back of your hands.

I look forward to hearing your experiences over the course of the week with this practice and may I also take this opportunity to offer a very warm welcome to all the new subscribers to this blog. Please do post a comment, it’s easier than you think!

Image courtesy of orphanjones

Week 18 – Rest Your Hands is a post on the Embrace website

Far from being just another self help book, Ryan is determined to pull all the disparate elements of this ‘quiet revolution’ together by showing what’s happening with mindfulness in the classrooms, medical schools, hospitals, boardrooms, research labs, and army bases across the country. By sharing his interactions with experts in education, defense, health care, criminal justice, and the environment the hope is that mindfulness will get a higher place at the policy making table in Washington.

The rationale being: tackle the root cause of stress, anxiety and depression within society and you save on healthcare costs further downstream.

These are exciting times for Mindfulness and I look forward to seeing one of the UK’s politicians taking up the mantle. The video clip and quote below reveal what Congressman Ryan has to say on the subject….

As a policy maker, if we start teaching all of our citizens these techniques, we can prevent a lot of the (stress related) problems, we can heal quicker and save our healthcare hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars, in the long run.

Congressman Tim Ryan and the Politics of Mindfulness is a post on the Embrace website

Instructions

During this week become aware of the trees around you. There are many aspects you can attend to : e.g. the different shapes of trees, their various heights, ways of branching, colours and types of foliage. Don’t let the mind begin to analyse or evaluate (I like that tree, don’t like that one…) but just notice and appreciate trees as trees.

If you have a chance try to walk among them in a forest, wood, park or tree lined street. Examine the leaves and bark closely. Trees are the living testimony to our interconnectedness with all things in this world.

Every creature is better alive than dead, men and moose and pine trees, and he who understands it aright will rather preserve its life than destroy it.”

Henry David Thoreau

Image courtesy of John-Morgan

Week 17 – Noticing Trees is a post on the Embrace website

He talks to Mark Williams, Professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of Oxford who teaches ‘Mindfulness’ techniques and whose research has shown that daily meditation can reduce the occurrence of severe depression at least as much as anti-depressants do.

Featuring music by Edward Elgar, Arvo Part and Jules Massenet, and words by Rainer Maria Rilke and Octavio Paz, this programme looks at how regular contemplative sessions can enrich our lives in an increasingly busy world. For some it is a way of experiencing God, for others a means of coming to terms with their own failures, and for many it can produce profound changes in their lives.

You can listen to the programme by clicking on the following link BBC Radio 4 – Something Understood – Mindfulness

The programme last 30 minutes. It’s available only until Monday 23rd April. I hope you enjoy it.

Something Understood – BBC Radio 4 on Mindfulness is a post on the Embrace website

Instructions

The shorthand for this practice is ‘mindfulness of doors’, but actually the practice involves bringing your awareness to any transition between spaces, namely when you leave one kind of space for another. Before you walk through a door, pause even for just a second and take one breath. Try to bring awareness and a sense of investigation to the differences you might feel in each new space that you enter.

A key element of this practice is to pay careful attention to how you close a door when entering a new space. We often move into a new space without finishing up properly with the old one, forgetting to close the door or letting it slam shut.

Reminding Yourself

I suggest putting a sticker or notice on the doors that you open and close frequently at home, just to get you into the groove first thing on Monday morning!

Image courtesy of David Paul Ohmer

Week 16 – Entering New Spaces is a post on the Embrace website

At first sight the invitation appears deceptively simple, just three breaths…but actually it is a tremendously tricky practice to do well, precisely because it is so difficult to remember. It is about pausing in the midst of the hustle and bustle and gathering our attention around this thing that we do, that is always present and with us, our breathing.

Instructions

As many times a day as you are able, pause with whatever you are doing, thinking or feeling and give the mind a short rest. Move the focus of your awareness to your breathing, give your undivided attention to three whole breaths allowing those inner voices to settle and be silent. Then expand your attention outwards, opening all your senses and just be aware – of colour, sound, touch and smell.

Image courtesy of Ernest Vickne

Week 15 – Just Three Breaths is a post on the Embrace website

Instructions

Each day for the next week, engage in a secret act of virtue or kindness. Do something nice and unexpected for others, but do so anonymously. These acts can be very simple, the little things like washing someone else’s dishes that were left in the sink, picking up trash on the sidewalk, cleaning the bathroom sink (when it’s not your job), making an anonymous donation, or leaving a chocolate on a coworker’s desk.

Reminding Yourself

Place a notebook on your bedside table and use it to make a plan each night for what your secret act of virtue will be the next day. It’s unexpectedly fun to plan and do nice things in secret for people. Once you take on this task in earnest, you begin to looking round for new ideas and the possibilities begin to multiply……

We can afford to open ourselves and join the rest of the world with a sense of tremendous generosity, tremendous goodness, and tremendous richness. The more we give, the more we gain – although what we gain should not particularly be our reason for giving. Rather, the more we give, the more we are inspired to give constantly. And the gaining process happens naturally, automatically.”

Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche

Image courtesy of Mr. Kris

Week 14 – Secret Acts of Virtue is a post on the Embrace website

Just like our mind, our eyes can often slip away from the object of our attention, seeking something to distract ourselves from the intimacy of the present moment. This intimacy and connection is what we desire, but it can also make us uncomfortable, particularly in relationships, causing us to communicate indirectly and evasively.

Instructions

This week, endeavour to look at things and people with more loving and friendly eyes. Notice any changes that occur in your eyes, face, body, heart/mind, visual field and overall demeanour as a result of this practice. See if you can be more curious about the quality of the interactions you have.

Reminding Yourself

Find and create some images of eyes and put them up in your house – bathroom mirror, refrigerator, back of front door etc.

Let me know how you get on.

Image courtesy of eye of einstein

Week 13 – Loving Eyes is a post on the Embrace website

Each person is born with an unencumbered spot, free of expectation and regret, free of ambition and embarrassment, free of fear and worry, an umbilical spot of grace where we were each first touched by God. It is this spot of grace that issues peace. Psychologists call this spot the Psyche, Theologists call it the Soul, Jung calls it The Seat of the Unconscious, Hindu masters call it the Atman, Buddhists call it the Dharma, Rilke calls it Inwardness, Sufis call it Qalb, and Jesus calls it The Center of our Love.

To know this spot of inwardness is to know who we are, not by surface markers of identity, not by where we work or what we wear or how we like to be addressed, but by feeling our place in relation to the Infinite and by inhabiting it. This is a lifelong task, for the nature of becoming is a constant filming over of where we begin while the nature of being is a constant erosion of what is not essential. We each live in the midst of this ongoing tension, growing tarnished or covered over only to be worn back to that incorruptible spot of grace at our core.”

Mark Nepo

I came across this passage by Mark Nepo and was moved by its erudition and simple beauty. It speaks to me about the essence of meditation, the gentle returning to the pure unsullied quality of non judging awareness that rests constant and deep within.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Image courtesy of wonderlane

A Spot of Grace is a post on the Embrace website