Mindlessness vs. Mindfulness

Mindfulness is defined as the clear seeing and non-judgemental acceptance of what is occurring in the present moment.

Mindlessness: Your day starts by harshly banging your hand on our alarm clock, pressing yourself out of bed with a groan. Then you head to the bathroom, undress and turn on the water in the shower. Immediately you start ruminating about work, your to do list and your extra annoying work colleague. By the time you turn of the shower you are thinking about the current project you are working on. Then having dried our hair half-heartedly and returned to our bedroom, you look at your bed and you wish you could just jump back into it. “Just a few more seconds peace of mind and relaxation!” you think and mindlessly put on your clothes and then dry your hair. Then you run to the kitchen, make yourself a coffee drink it in fast sips. You glance on your watch and your mind immediately sais: “Gosh, you are late for work!”. You run out of the kitchen, grab your keys and bang the door.

Mindfulness: The alarm bell rings. You consciously let it ring for another few times, carefully listening to the familiar sounds it makes and then you slowly open my eyes. Immediately the thought “Stupid work! Fuck this, I'd rather stay in bed!” pops into your mind. But instead of taking this thought too seriously and frowning you forehead and then engaging in similar thoughts, you decide to take a deep breath into your lower belly, stretch your arms and legs out on the bed. Then you roll yourself over and gently push yourself out of bed. Sitting there, aware of your body posture and your heart beat, you glance over to the window. Within seconds you observe the sky and the familiar tree standing in the street outside. Although it's summer, it has been raining and the sky is full of tiny grey clouds. The pink blossoms on the tree look purple today due to the cloudy sky. “Ah, again it's raining! For gods sake! It's summer!” your mind has to say. Fully acknowledging this thought without further engaging in it, you lift myself gently from my bed and then consciously feel you feet touching the carpet with each step towards your bathroom. Glancing into the mirror, you can see your sleepy eyes. “Gosh, how fucked up my hair looks in the morning! I wish I had shiny hair, but instead I look like Einstein!” your mind says. Instead of taking of immediately reacting to this thought and grabbing a brush, you pet your left arm lovingly with my right hand. I gentle smile follows. You then take off your clothes, feeling their texture touching your skin and then you turn on the shower switch. Before you step into the shower, you feel the warm water on your skin, checking wether it's the right temperature. You now observe the warm steam slowly blurring your vision. Then you step into your shower, grab the shampoo and pour it into your hand, smelling it mindfully. It smells of vanilla and strawberry. Then you consciously rub the shampoo into your hair, feeling your fingers massaging your head. Whenever a thought pops into your head such as: “Ah, I can't be bothered to work today! And my today Claudia is it, I am sure she will make annoying remark again!”you recall with awareness, that it wont help you to think about Claudia for the hundreds' morning in this year, but instead you decide to thank your mind for this comment and gently return to the sensations on your hand touching your scalp. After the shampoo is fully absorbed by your hair, you close your eyes and move your head right underneath the shower head, letting the warm water rinse away my shampoo and falling over my face. Then you turn off the shower and grab a bath towel recognizing it's extra soft, new texture. Drying your whole body, you am fully aware of your movements and whenever another thought pops your my mind, you just let it float by and return to the place where the towel now touches your body. Then you walk back to your bedroom and again glance out of the window. Some of the clouds have now passed the sky and the pink flower is now pink again. The bird has left. You consciously pick your clothes, making sure they match each other and dress yourself. Then you blow dry your hair, feeling the warm air floating through your hair, listening to the different sounds the blow dryer makes while you move it around your head. When you are finished you walk over to your kitchen and make yourself a cup of coffee. Then, holding the coffee cup on your lips you feel the warmth of the coffee on your mouth. You close your eyes and consciously smell the coffee. Then your mind says: “Gosh, you are late for work!" You thank your mind for that useful remark, taking another slow sip f coffee and then gently place the cup on the table, taking a deep breath into your lungs. Then you walk over to the door, grab your keys, carefully listening to the funny sounds they make and then you open the door, leave the flat and close the door gently behind yourself. 

This Being Human is a Guest House

The boundary to what we can accept is the boundary to our freedom.

This being human is a guest house. Every day a new arrival - a sorrow or pain. Welcome them all at the door. Greet them and Invite them in! (shortened poem by Rumi).

My friend had been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. Since then I felt anxiety. It was as if the universe has thrown a bunch of fresh smelly shit into my face and said: "See Alex, life is not only about fun! Deal with it!

As a reaction To this traumatic event i suddently had this random stingy pain in my arms and legs and I also encountered these horrible nightmares in which I was diagnosed with all these horrible diseases. Every each of this nightmares increased my dis-ease and my resistance to what is so obvious: We will all suffer pain and will all die sooner or later.

"What about Children?" ,my mind said in a desperate attempt to grab hold of a safety strategy. I need to have children. That will give me comfort and lessen my suffering when I'm old and fragile. That will make it easier! Another day my mind said: "If I will eat very healthy from now on, I will suffer less when I'm old!" I thanked my mind kindly for each of these suggestions.

And I did look better after myself from that point on - physically and mentally. I started eating more beans and lentils and also started practicing more loving kindness meditation and felt more and more compassion for myself and some kind of forgiveness.

Never the less I had to realise that unless we truly accept the shit the universe daily throws into our faces, we will always resist the natural human pain and thus increase our suffering. Tara Brach writes in her beautiful book ,Radical self acceptance: "The boundary to what we can accept is the boundary to our freedom.".

This morning I woke up and again felt pain in my body. I felt exhausted of resisting it and started rubbing my feet in a very loving way and said to my feet: "it's okay if you are not perfect and even if you guys hurt a little bit, I accept you. In that moment I felt true acceptance and surrender for the first time in my life. It was a feeling of expansion and softness in my chest and my fear lessened.

I looked outside and realized that it was a beautiful, sunny day. I grabbed my blanket and walked over to the park and sat under my favourite tree. I closed my eyes and started repeating my mantra: "The boundary to what we can accept it the boundary to our freedom." Every time i said the words I thought of a person or a situation or anything else that I am unaccepting of. And with every sentence I felt more peace. Of course my mind had it's own way to deal with this situation and dropped sentences such as: "Alex, now you have gone mad, sitting like a hippie in the park and repeating a sentence!" or "this will so not work, don't waste your time! Better go home and clean up your apartment!" I again thanked my mind for its opinions amd suggestions and mindfully returned To my sentence..

After a while a big fat cloud passed in front of the sun and i felt the a cold breeze on my check. My mind wasn't happy about that. I observed the urge arising in my body to open my eyes and check on the cloud: How big was it, how fast was it moving? Basically: when will this fucking cloud be gone and I will be able to feel the comfortable sun again? I just had to open my eyes and check. And I did.

Once i had checked all aspects of the cloud and had calculated how long it would take for it to pass, i realized how my eyes immediatly wandered away from that very cloud in oder to check for more potential clouds wanderung into the suns direction.

I realized that while meditating and contemplating on acceptance i had not even accepted the clouds above my head. I had contemplated about non-resistance And was resisting a cloud!

Having realized that i started laughing and once more realized my sooo human nature with all its sooo human conditioned tendencies.

I put my hand on my heart, started smiling and felt so much compassion for this my being human and all other humans and animals whose biggest wish it To be happy and free from suffering. - and now I will get up and go clean my apartment ;)