By the end of this video you're going to know how
to use mindfulness in your life. You're going to experience mindfulness with two quick activities,
and you're going to learn how mindfulness can help you calm your body and your mind. The skill of
mindfulness shifts your perspective on emotions. You'll learn how to get better at soothing
anxiety, you'll learn to process sad feelings, and you'll learn to quiet negative self-talk.
Mindfulness combined with CBT has been shown to work as well as medication at treating depression
and anxiety, but without the side effects - and it's more effective in the long-term. Mindfulness
actually helps rewire your brain. It helps improve connectivity between neurons and the part of your
brain that processes emotions. In skill number five we looked at how avoidance and struggle
with our emotions tends to make us miserable, or at the very least keeps us from living the
life we dream of. So what's the alternative? Is it just suffering? No! Today we'll look at mindful
acceptance as a step toward resolving emotions. When things get stressful, do you find yourself
coping in unhealthy ways, like overeating, venting, or just avoiding things altogether?
These strategies may work in the short term, but eventually they'll end up causing more problems
than they solve. Imagine what'd it be like if you had the skills to work through tough emotions
without losing it. My online course Coping Skills and Self-Care for Mental Health takes you through
the process of creating your own healthy coping and self-care routine. You'll learn to identify
triggering situations, manage intense emotions; you'll learn to calm your stress response and
build your own personalized coping skills list so that you can handle different situations.
By the end of the course you'll show stress, anxiety, and depression that they don't run
your life because you'll have the skills to manage emotions in healthy ways. If you want to
learn more about coping skills and self-care, just click the link in the description to learn
more about this cool course. When we're mindful, deeply in touch with the present moment, our
understanding of what is going on deepens, and we begin to be filled with acceptance, joy, peace,
and love. Have you ever had an experience where you were intensely aware of the moment? Maybe
it was a beautiful sunrise or even a frightening experience. And suddenly you started noticing the
tiny details of each thing around you. Perhaps you noticed the way the light was hitting the
trees or the feel of the dirt beneath your feet. Maybe you heard the sound of the birds or maybe
even of your own breath. Everything felt real, crisp; the moment felt magical, you felt alive.
Write about that experience in your workbook. Or if you're on YouTube, you could write about
the experience in the comments section below. On the other hand, have you ever felt like
you're just numb? You're plowing through the day; you're trying to just not think about your life
or just waiting for it to get better. Maybe you felt that way for weeks and months on end. Now,
we often attribute these feelings of joy or misery with the outside circumstances. So for me,
I remember a time I felt like the world was alive, when I was hiking in Hawaii. So we might think,
Oh, the beautiful sunrise gave me joy and my daily grind gave me misery. But there is another
way to look at that. So what if it was the state of awareness that brought joy and the habit of
distraction and avoidance that brought misery? Our minds, our hearts, and our bodies have an innate
healing ability. We have a natural drive to heal and resolve problems, to find joy and to grow.
When we stop interfering with that natural drive, when we stop distracting ourselves endlessly and
we start acknowledging instead of avoiding all of our feelings, we give ourselves the freedom to
come back to ourselves and to find peace and joy. Our brain has a natural ability to file away
our problems and to resolve them in the in the downtime, but if we never give ourselves quiet
time then it creates this backlog of issues to file away. So some indications that you
might have a problem with distraction are: you have a hard time sleeping -
and that could be because your mind is finally getting a chance to sort through
your thoughts - or if you always need music on your phone or if when you sit still
with nothing to do you feel sad or anxious. This can all be caused by being kind of addicted
to distraction and busyness. On the other hand, we can train our minds to feel joy and vitality
by developing our present moment awareness. So instead of needing to escape, right, to
feel different experiences to feel happy, like a vacation or winning the lottery, we can create
joy in the present moment by waking up and living. Acceptance, in my opinion, is the key to convert
momentary happiness to enduring happiness. It helps you move from feeling happy to actually
being happy. So what is mindfulness? Mindfulness is just being aware. That's it. It's being aware
of what we're experiencing in the here and now. So, for example, are you aware of the chair
pressing against your legs, right now? Well, now you are mindful of that. Another way to
describe it is to be awake to the present moment. We can practice mindfulness, we can
actively work out those mindful muscles, by focusing our awareness on our bodily
sensations, our thoughts, and our emotions. If we do this while actively accepting the present
moment, thoughts, sensations, and emotions, we can develop more internal power. Now there's
that word again. I actually wish there was a better word in English than acceptance
because acceptance has this connotation of giving up or just saying "Well, I'm just
gonna accept that life sucks and it always will" or some, you know, crap like that. But that's not
what it means at all, at least when it's used in the therapeutic sense. Acceptance as we use it
here is simply acknowledging what is here in the present moment, and it's choosing to allow it
to be there and choosing to be awake to that. That's it. It's getting grounded in the
here now and noticing what it feels like. Now another way to describe it is willingness
- choosing to be willing to feel. It's starting with where we are and going from there.
So with difficult emotions, this can be really hard because we don't necessarily want
to feel sad or we don't want to feel anxious. But what's the alternative? I do feel anxious,
so I'm going to try and pretend like I'm not? I do feel anxious, so I'm going to try and make
that go away? Well, that makes things worse. In football they start each play where the
ball is, not where it could have been or where it should have been or where the team wants it to
be. Willingness is about starting where we're at. So imagine how a football game would go if every
play, the players spent time arguing about where the ball ought to be or where they want it to be
or wishing they had done better the previous play or worrying about the fourth quarter or trying
not to think about where the ball is because they don't like it, right. That would not be a
very enjoyable game. Same thing goes with our emotions. Acceptance or willingness doesn't mean
we aren't trying to move forward; it just means we know where we are starting. It's amazing how
much of our lives we spend not noticing being mindless. We regret about the past or we long
for the past; we worry about the future or we daydream about the future. All the while we're
just trying to escape the now. We keep our minds distracted by music or TV or Facebook or work. We
try not to notice the pain that we feel, all the while not realizing that if we just accept that
it exists right now, it tends to not hurt so much Mindfulness is pretty simple to learn and
practice, so let's try a little experiment. For this you're going to need a little bit
of food, like it could be some trail mix or a raisin a chocolate chip or a piece of bread,
whatever, right. Just pause the video. Go find a little piece of something to eat. Eating is one of
those things that we often do while multitasking. We might eat while we watch TV or talk on the
phone, or we just keep working while we down a sandwich. Distracted eating is associated with
weight gain, overeating, and decreased enjoyment of food. So go ahead; get out your little piece
of food - but don't eat it yet. Just take a moment and look at the food. Really see it. Pretend that
you're an alien who has landed on a strange planet and you get to describe food for the first
time ever. What do you see? Notice the texture, the light on it, its shape, whether
it's soft or hard, coarse or smooth. Now feel it in your hand. Is it light, heavy,
warm, or cool? Notice any thoughts that come up, like "Why am I doing this?" and just let those
thoughts be there. And then shift your attention back to the food. What do you notice in
your body? Are you starting to salivate? What does that feel like? Bring the piece of
food up to your nose. Does it have any smell? Bring it up to your ear. Does it make any sound? Bring the piece of food to your mouth. Isn't
that interesting that your hand knows exactly where to go? Now I'm going to ask you to gently
place it in your mouth - but don't chew it yet. What do you notice about it? Feel it on your
tongue, its weight, its temperature, its size, its texture. Roll it around in your mouth
and explore the sensations of it in there. Now when you're ready, intentionally bite into
it. Did you automatically pick a side to chew on? Notice when you start to taste the food. Slowly
slowly chew the food, and notice when you feel a desire to swallow. What does that feel like,
the desire to swallow, what does that feel like? When you swallow, notice what it feels like
to swallow. Can you feel the food moving down toward your stomach? Congratulations; you've
just had your first taste with mindfulness. You noticed what it feels like to do
something that you often do mindlessly. Now let's talk quickly about the difference
between mindfulness and meditation. Meditation is an activity; mindfulness is a state of awareness.
Meditation is when you stop doing what you're doing and you spend a certain amount of time
in in mindfulness or in a meditation activity. Now mindfulness can be done by stopping what we're
doing and focusing on it, but what I love about mindfulness is that it can also be done while
we're in the middle of whatever else we're doing, and it can bring joy and awareness to our task
at hand. Now I tend to suck at meditation. I find it really hard to do, I find it difficult
to set apart time to do it, but when I do it, it is beneficial. On the other hand, mindfulness
is a practice that's a lot easier for me because I can do it while I'm doing whatever else I'm
doing, and it brings vitality to the task at hand. So let's talk about what are the
characteristics of mindful acceptance? The first one is present moment awareness - you
keep bringing yourself back to the here and now. Number two is a non-judgmental approach - you
don't label your initial thoughts, emotions, or sensations as good or bad. Mindfulness is not
having a blank mind, making your mind go blank; it's allowing yourself to keep shifting your focus
to what you choose to focus on instead of letting your focus be pulled away by whatever your mind
wants or whatever's going on around you. The third characteristic of mindfulness is non-striving. We
aren't trying to force change; we're not trying to make our thoughts, emotions, or sensations go
away. This activity is about being where you're at while you are there. Another characteristic of
mindfulness is to have a beginner's mind, to be curious about your experience as if it's
the first time you've ever felt that. You ask questions like, "What does it feel like
to feel this?" And then another aspect of mindfulness is expanding awareness. So you might
be noticing that you're feeling anxious or sad, and then you expand your awareness and you say,
"What else am I feeling?" So an example of this is when maybe an elderly person who was suffering
has died, you might feel super sad - but you might also feel grateful that they aren't in pain
anymore. So mindfulness gives you a chance to explore the subtle emotions in addition to the
loud ones. Often mindfulness helps us feel a sense of calm or increased joy in the moment, but that's
not the goal of mindfulness. Sometimes mindfulness makes us feel worse, especially when we've been
chronically avoiding or distracting ourselves. The goal is not to make you feel better; the
goal is to get better at feeling - to, like a weight lifter to increase your emotional muscles
so that heavy things seem light, not because the nature of the weight or the emotion has changed
but because our ability to lift it has increased. Mindfulness is also not a relaxation technique.
We can do tons of relaxation techniques later, but that won't bring us happiness if we're just
using them to attempt to escape or avoid our emotions. So as you practice mindfulness, focus
your attention on what you are feeling instead of what you want to be feeling. When we're feeling
distracted or detached from the present moment, we can quickly return to the present by utilizing
our senses. So here comes exercise number two. So for our second activity we're going to
try a very short mindful breathing activity. So for a moment now just bring your attention
to your breath. Notice what it feels like for your breath to come in, your breath to go out. Now the purpose of this activity is not to change
your breathing; it's to notice it as it is. But there's something about noticing that leads to
feeling a more relaxed sense of whatever you're experiencing. So for a lot of people, their
breathing starts to get slower and deeper. But again, that's not the goal of the
activity; it's just to notice your breath. What does it feel like for
the air to come in your nose? What does it feel like for the air to go out? Now, it's normal for your mind to wander. Like I
said before, the goal of mindfulness is not that your mind goes completely blank but that you
practice returning your attention to what you choose to pay attention to. So for this activity,
your mind might wander. When you notice that your mind has wandered, just gently bring it back
to noticing what it feels like to breathe. Does the air change temperature
as it comes in and out? Pretend like you've never experienced
breathing before or like you're an alien from a planet where breathing doesn't happen.
Be curious about the experience of breathing. What does it feel like to breathe? If your mind
wanders, just bring it back to the present moment. And you've just practiced mindfulness.
That's the second way to do it. The breath can be an anchor for our attention
and our focus. When you find yourself feeling distracted or irritated or agitated, you
can bring yourself back to the present moment by simply paying attention to your
breathing. And this is one of the most simple, basic ways to practice mindfulness throughout
your day. So now that you understand the basics of mindfulness you can practice this throughout
the day or when experiencing a strong emotion. So take a minute to be mindful. As you scan your
body, allow those emotions or sensations to be there, and then check for what else is there.
What else is going on? Check in with your body, your mind, and your emotions as if you were
a curious scientist exploring and describing the experience for the first time. The full
course has many more mindfulness activities. Choose at least one of the following activities
to practice mindfulness while doing one of your daily activities. You can also check out my
grounding skills playlist if you'd like to try a couple of meditations. The practice of mindfulness
can help you reduce anxiety and depression, can help you get better at feeling your emotions,
and it can help you relax and feel more centered and more rich and more connected to your life.
Thank you for watching, and take care. This video is one skill from my 30-skill course: How to
Process Your Emotions, where I teach 30 of the most essential skills for resolving depression,
anxiety, and improving mental health. Emotion processing is an essential skill for working
through intense emotions, but most people have never been taught how to do it. I'm putting every
single main video lesson on YouTube for the world to access for free. You watching these videos,
sharing them, contributing to my Patreon and my sponsors make this possible. If you would like
to access the entire course in one place ad free with its workbook, exercises, downloads, extra
videos, live Q&A's, additional short readings and links to extended resources, the link to
buy the course is in the description below.
