Zig Ziglar, a well-known motivational speaker says that the failure to plan is to plan for failure. Goal setting is a routine part of the business world. We try to instill achievement motivation into our children. So what does it mean when mindfulness practitioners talk about non-striving? Like many truths, the value is found in the balance. There are many times when it is good to be goal directed. For example, you might even set a goal to be more mindful in your daily life. And there are other times when it is helpful to let go of goal directed activity and be as fully present to the moment as possible, with no expectations. The practice exercises to increase mindfulness are more fruitful if they are done without striving for a particular goal. During these exercises, we allow for awareness of many experiences, usually including some that are a surprise. The pursuit of a goal involves setting a direction and pursing that path with disciplined attention. As a result, those aspects of experience that would derail us from the path would be perceived to be "obstacles" or "problems", rather than different aspects of experience. Cultivating an attitude of non-striving allows us to be open to all aspects of life. The acceptance of experience even when it does not seem to be related to the path we choose for ourselves is a balance to the many other times it is necessary and important to be single-minded toward an important goal. John Weaver, Psy.D.
One of the components of being mindful is to pay attention to your experience without judging. That is because the act of judging an experience will cause the attention to be changed.
One way this happens is that what is judged positively will be attractive, while what is negative will be resisted. This attraction and resistance then changes the experience. Some aspects of the experience are amplified, namely that part of the experience that is generating the judgment. The decision to want one part of the experience or to not want another aspect of it draw attention. Other, less emotional aspects of the same experience will be over looked.
A second way that judgment alters experience occurs when the judgment assigns a label to something. "It is a bird" or "It is a sunset" tricks the mind into thinking that it knows what the experience is, so it moves on to the next experience. Yet no two birds are alike. And no two sunsets are alike. Letting go of the label allow for an attentiveness to experience that is richer and deeper.
Letting go of judgment occurs at the experience level of our awareness. Good judgment occurs within the decision about how to act because of our richer awareness of the experience. John Weaver, Psy.D.
The practice of mindfulness is the practice of paying attention to your life, as it is unfolding in the present moment. This seems like a very personal, even self-centered, activity. Yet the experience opens up to an awareness and a connection with other human beings. Paying close attention to your experience reveals the many subtle ways your experience is connected to a much larger experience. The interactions between people and the mutual influence you have on others and they have on you becomes more evident. You start to become aware of the connections you have to the natural world, and the rhythms of seasons. When you approach these experiences with "loving kindness" you are able to stay directly in the experience. Too often, we are distracted by our busy mind or we are trying to avoid an aspect of our experience that seems uncomfortable and clinging to something that we hope will be pleasant. The attitude of loving kindness is a challenge to be open to the real connections in all of life. There is opportunity for you to learn and grow from every experience, even those that are the most difficult for you to face. The practice of approaching experience with loving kindness is an way to be even more mindfully open to your connections with a reality that is bigger than yourself. John Weaver, Psy.D.
On Wednesday, April 16th the Dali Lama, who is the head of Tibetan Buddhism, experienced Buddhist monks and mindfulness practitioners will meet with Western Scientists to discuss the scientific research studying contemplative practices. (You can tune into the meeting through a website: http://www.mayo.edu/webcasts/ram/externallive.wvx that will be active from 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM (Central Daylight Time) on the 16th. These conversations between the Dali Lama and Western Scientists began in 1987 with week long meetings held in India. More recently they have been held in sites across the United States. The idea came from discussions between a physicist, Francisco Varela, and the Dali Lama and have broadened to include some of the most well respected scientists throughout the world.
When the Dali Lama as asked by a reporter what he would do if the scientific results contradicted the findings of the Buddhist beliefs, he paused and said, "Well then I guess we would have to change our Buddhist beliefs." This attitude has characterized these discussions, although there has been more change by the Western Scientists who have encountered surprising findings as a result of these studies than change in the mindfulness practices of the monks.
Many of these scientific meetings have resulted in books that summarize the conversations. If you are interested you can find descriptions of these books at www.mindandlife.org. John Weaver, Psy.D.
When I was in my doctoral studies for psychology, the accepted belief was that the brain was fully formed in late adolescence or early adulthood. Unlike every other part of the body, scientists at that time believed that when the brain fully formed you had all the nerve cells that you would ever have in your life. When nerve cells died, you gradually lost function until you began to be impaired in thinking skills, memory, etc. But new research that is available, through the development of better brain imaging tools, has demonstrated that the brain continually produces new cells to replace those which have died throughout the lifespan. This process is called neuroplasticity. What seems to happen that results in the loss of cognitive function is that we too often stop using parts of our brain as effectively as we did when we were younger. Like the muscular system, that gradually weakens with disuse, the cognitive system also needs use to be maintained. Mindfulness is an effective way to use the breadth of abilities available through the brain. As a result, it fosters neuroplasticity. Scientific research being done at the University of Wisconsin, Duke, Emery, and the Salk Institute are just some of the research that is confirming this potential for maintaining our psychological health. John Weaver, Psy.D.
There are normal fluctuations in mood that are common to every human being. Sometimes we are happier, sometimes we are sadder, and sometimes we are more fearful than other times. It is normal to hope that there is a skill we can learn that will lead to feeling better. But this hope can lead us to wishful thinking that all of our emotional distress can be eliminated from life.
In reality, the complete elimination of all sadness or anxiety would not be good for us. Emotions provide us with valuable information about ourselves and our place in the world. Sadness is a normal response to loss of something important to us. Anxiety provides us with a reminder that we must be careful. Each emotion has its place.
The problem we face with emotion occurs when we react to sadness, or fear, or anger without mindfully paying attention to the context in which they arise. We need to make choices that are in line with our deepest values. We need to think about how our choices will affect those around us. There are times when an emotion helps us to pay attention to some aspect of our experience that we might otherwise miss. There are other times when we need to make a decision that minimizes the importance of our emotions because there is a long range value that we choose to pursue rather than giving in to a transient emotion. Choices like these must be made with a mindful awareness of what is going on in the present moment and what we consider to be the deepest values that guide our lives.
Mindfulness does not eliminate our emotional states but the skill of being more conscious and aware makes it possible to change the relationship with our emotions so that we do not just react to what we feel, we notice it and make choices about how to respond. John Weaver, Psy.D.
