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Introduction to Mindfulness Meditation


Marcello Spinella, Ph.D. Richard Stockton College of New Jersey
What is Mindfulness? Mindfulness meditation is a technique that has been receiving more public attention in recent years, both in terms of research and the popular press. However, it's an ancient technique that was developed around 2500 years ago in India by a person named Siddhartha Gautama, more commonly known by the title "the Buddha," which literally translates as "the Awakened One." While many consider Buddhism to be a religion, it was essentially an early but quite advanced form of psychology. Mindfulness is a psychological technique for training the mind in order to alleviate suffering and enhance well-being. As will be evident in the description here, it does not require or conflict with any particular religious beliefs. Just as its not necessary to convert to Hinduism to benefit from Yoga, or to worship Greek gods in order to appreciate Aristotle, its not necessary to be a Buddhist in order to meditate. In fact, most of the major world religions have historically incorporated forms of meditation, including Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, and Hinduism. Nonetheless, mindfulness is a secular technique, and a person doesnt need to have any religious beliefs at all to benefit from it. Mindfulness meditation is synonymous with two other terms, Insight meditation and Vipassana. It is essentially a technique for exercising awareness, which researchers are now finding to develop certain areas of the brain1,2,3. Some psychotherapists are also starting to teach it as a way to alleviate many forms of mental illness and suffering. Three Elements of Mindfulness Meditation: 1. Concentration What is it? Concentration is the ability to mentally focus on something, temporarily filter out unrelated things, and keep that focus. In other words, it's selective and sustained attention. Normally, our minds tend to bounce from one thing to another throughout the day. We all have some limitations to our attention span. However, attention is not a fixed characteristic. It is an ability that can be developed and strengthened with exercise, no matter where youre starting from. Modern western culture readily acknowledges that if you want to develop an ability, there are exercises that would help you do it, whether it be drawing, dancing, or learning to read. However, when it comes to attention, we most likely to resort to a using stimulant drug like caffeine, nicotine, or Ritalin. The problem is that we do that instead of exercising our attention ability as well. Fortunately, exercises for developing attention do exist and practically anyone can do them. Why do this? There are at least two main reasons to strengthen concentration. One is

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that it is a tool that extends your awareness. It's analogous to a microscope. If you look at a leaf with your bare eye, you will see the shape of it, the color, and some lines. However, if you look at it under a microscope, you will see a great deal of detail that was not apparent before. Concentration allows us to do the same thing with our subjective experience of our mind and body. There is much going on there that we are not aware of. But when we develop better attention, we can see it with more and more detail. Concentration also slows down our sense of how fast the events occur in the mind and body. Many of our thoughts and feelings are so quick that we barely even notice them. But with concentration, it's like we can watch them in slow motion and get a better look at what is really going on. A second reason to develop concentration is that it benefits every aspect of a person's life. We use our attention in everything that we do, including things like work, school, recreation, social interactions, listening to music, having sex, and eating. I once heard an example of a man who visited a respected Tibetan meditation teacher. The man said he felt like he was the most important person in the world to this Tibetan teacher, despite the fact that they never even met before. But the reason, he realized, was that the teacher had total command of his own attention, which he fully focused on him as they spoke (as opposed to wandering to a ringing telephone, an incoming email, etc.) Imagine if we could apply even a fraction of that to our own personal relationships. Concentration also enhances the satisfaction we receive from pleasure: simple foods taste even more delicious when we give them our undivided attention. Who enjoys sex more, someone who is focusing on physical sensations or someone whose mind is wandering to thinking about bills that need to be paid? So overall, developing a concentrated mind creates a sense of serenity, since the mind becomes less and less scattered and frenetic. How is it done? Simply put, one chooses something to focus on (an "object"), and keeps one's attention on it. The mind will inevitably start wander and think about other things. That's understandable because our attention is not used to being put in one place and staying there for long. However, the technique is to re-focus, to gently bring one's attention back to the object of focus. The mind will wander again, and again it is gently brought back to the object of focus. This is done repeatedly throughout the meditation session. On what does a person focus? There are many possibilities here, but they all lead to the same goal of increasing concentration. One could keep the eyes open and focus on an external object, like a picture or the flame of a candle. This works well, but the disadvantage is that it means needing certain props in order to meditate. The most common object used in meditation is the bodily sensations of breathing. For example, one could focus on the rim of the nostrils, feeling the air brush in and out as one breathes. It's convenient and simple, and it also gives us feedback about what's happening in the body. However, in mindfulness one does not try to control the breathing, such as by taking deep breaths or forcing them to be slow. In yoga, people exercise the breathing process through pranayama. That's very good, but it's a different technique. In mindfulness meditation, one only watches the breath whether it's shallow or deep, short or long. Eventually it slows down by itself. Some people use a mudra, a hand position that is maintained during the meditation

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session. The natural tendency of the hand is to relax, so to keep it in a certain position requires maintaining attention. Similarly, a mantra is a syllable, word, or short phrase that a person may repeat during meditation. Again, it serves as a convenient object on which the mind can stay focused. When the mantra is repeated aloud, one not only focuses on saying it, but also on hearing one's own voice, and feeling vibrations in the body. This serves as a stronger feedback signal on which to keep focused. Another possibility is to expand your focus to cover the entire body, keeping your attention to any and all physical sensations. So one's focus may be narrow (e.g. air stimulating the rim of the nostrils) or broad (e.g. sensations of the entire body at once). Keeping focused just means paying attention to whatever is relevant to the chosen task, and disregarding what is irrelevant. For example, meditation can also be done while walking, where one pays attention to the physical sensations of the movement, such as the feelings on the bottom of the soles of the feet. Any simple task can be done as a meditation, like washing the dishes. In that case, one would focus on the sights, sounds, and touch sensations of the dish washing, while ignoring any other thoughts or sounds that pop up. A seventh century Zen master named Hui Neng reportedly achieved enlightenment while cutting bamboo mindfully. The process of developing concentration may seem tedious to do, constantly re-focusing on something that is so simple. There are a few things to keep in mind. One is that attention can be trained like a muscle. Each time one catches the mind wandering and re-focuses that is like doing one repetition with a weight in your hand. Each time it makes you stronger. So it's not just a long, pointless series of re-focusing, a waste of time. Each time one re-focuses, it is training the brain to maintain concentration a little better than before4,5,6. Over time, that adds up. Is watching television like meditation then? You are, after all, paying attention to it. The answer is no. The difference is that television is designed to grab your attention with its constantly changing images. Attention-grabbing is how television shows survive economically. However, your ability to voluntarily direct your attention is not being exercised. To make a physical analogy, it's the difference between lifting your arm on your own and having someone lift it for you. Only lifting it yourself will strengthen the muscle. Excessive television watching is actually associated with greater risks of Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder. Conversely, there is research now suggesting that meditation can improve attention in adolescents and adults with Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder. Moderation in watching television s fine, but don't confuse it with meditation. Some forms of meditation heavily emphasize concentration. This includes traditional Yoga meditation (described in the Yoga Sutras), Transcendental Meditation, and the "Relaxation Response," a form of meditation adapted and studied by Harvard researcher Herbert Benson, M.D. Doing nothing but concentration meditation is itself very good. However, mindfulness meditation additionally incorporates the following aspects. 2. Clarity What is it? A second aspect of mindfulness meditation is that it involves making clear

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observations of what you are experiencing. The word Vipassana is from an ancient Indian language called Pali, and it simply means "to see clearly" or "to make distinctions." This means notice what you are experiencing in the current moment, but more as an observer. One way to explain this is to observe the process instead of the content of what you are experiencing. For example, suppose a particular thought runs through your head. Observing the specific content would mean getting into what the thought is about (e.g. "I have to remember to pay my bills."). Instead, observing that the general process of thinking is only noting that "thinking is occurring." In this way, one takes the role of spectator of the thoughts, emotions, and sensations that arise. You are the process of awareness that observes it all happening.

In a larger sense, this allows you to dis-identify from these experiences. You certainly do experience them, but they don't define who you are. Instead, they are observed as passing events, coming and going like a branch floating by in a river. Many of us become immersed in certain thoughts, even define ourselves in terms of them. But consider the possibility that thoughts sometimes turn out to be untrue, or maybe they are just a matter of opinion and we change our mind. Some beliefs (like politics, religion, etc.) seem so important that we cant imagine giving them up. Yet, people sometimes do. Even for those who do continue to hold those beliefs, their understanding may deepen and mature with time. In other words, when you rigidly hold on to

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experiences (thoughts, emotions, or sensations) and cling to them as defining who you are, it makes you more rigid, less capable of adapting to the changing demands of life. However, some thoughts are useful and we don't need to throw out the baby with the bath water. But we can experience them in a more flexible and healthy way. We can experience them without being controlled by them. Why do this? If we observe, we see that our internal experience is composed of a limited number of components: mental self talk, images, emotional feelings in the body, physical feelings in the body, etc. In challenging situations, those elements can seem to become tangled together. As one friend of mine put it, distress is like a massive "ball of confusion." Experienced like this, the components magnify each other and we easily become overwhelmed. Its just too much for us. So, a strategy to deal with this is to disentangle our experiences by being aware of the individual components. With a little practice, experiences become more manageable. This strategy has been called "divide and conquer." How is it done? This starts with having the intention to be an observer of your experiences. A technique that facilitates this is called mental noting or labeling. It means thinking a simple, general label to note the experiences as they occur. This helps keep them distinct in our awareness rather than tangled up. It also helps you assume the perspective of an observing awareness, noting the process thats occurring rather than getting into the details of it (the content). So if youre thinking in the form of words, mental self-talk, that could just be labeled "talk." If youre thinking in terms of mental pictures or moving images (such as remembering seeing an event in the past, or imagining a future event) one could just label that as "image." Whenever emotionally-related feelings occur in the body, one could call those "feel." If physical sensations occur in the body (e.g. pressure, pain, temperature), we could label those "touch." If a person is meditating in a private setting, and having intense experiences (like a strong emotion), saying the labels out loud can help you stay in observing mode. Conversely, if one develops a great deal of experience meditating, then one can just observe and not use the labels. The labeling is only a convenient way to facilitate observing. Another aspect of clarity is to work with the bodily sensations associated with an experience. Suppose you feel a pain in the knee or shoulder tension due to stress. In this case, observe the shape and location of the pain, the area it occupies. Also notice its intensity and quality (e.g. a sudden, sharp sensation versus a dull throbbing). Further, notice if any of those characteristics (shape, location, intensity, quality) are changing. Does it move? Does it come and go in intensity? Sometimes when I experience tension, I notice it in my scalp muscles and the back of my head. Given its shape, it feels something like a "tension helmet." When I pay close attention, I notice it increases and decreases slowly in intensity, like a throbbing. In this sense, the changing in sensations (even unpleasant ones) can almost become like a massage. Rather than tension, the experience is more like a feeling of movement through the body. So the tension in my neck feels somewhat like someone is massaging it, kneading the muscles. Im still capable of dealing with the real-life situation that led to the tension, but let me tell you that it's a far better way to experience it.

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3. Equanimity What is it? Equanimity means having a sense of mental stability or balance despite external circumstances, the normal ups and downs of life. It means developing a sense of well-being that is progressively more and more independent on external situations. However, one is still able to function in everyday life in a normal and healthy way. It does not mean completely detaching from everything and becoming emotionally numb or apathetic. In any situation there are aspects that are within our control and aspects that are beyond our control. Life is guaranteed to bring difficulties to us all. So what can one do about that? In the words of the Serenity Prayer, it means having the courage to change the things you can, the serenity to accept the things you cant change, and the wisdom to know the difference. We could also call that the equanimity prayer. But instead of just having that as a general attitude, meditation allows us to practice it on a second-by-second basis so that it truly becomes second nature to us. Why do this? The greatest irony of our suffering in life is that we actively contribute to it. Perhaps the best way to understand this is with an equation, Suffering = Pain x Resistance. Pain, in this case, means either physical pain and/or emotional pain (stress, disappointment, irritation, etc.) A Zen teacher named Cheri Huber said, "Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional." In other words, the physical and emotional pain of life can actually be very manageable. What is problematic is that we often respond to it in a way that unnecessarily complicates and magnifies it: we resist it, we try to push it away, suppress it, or not feel it. Of course, we wish it would stop. This is all very understandable, but the problem is that it doesn't work. In the physical world, if something is unpleasant to us, like a smelly garbage can, we naturally move away or push it away. That works. However, in our mind, the same strategy doesn't work at all. There's nowhere for the unpleasant object to go. In our mind, the unpleasant things are thoughts, emotions, and/ or physical sensations. Modern psychological research actually confirms this: the more we try to suppress unpleasant things, the more we actually intensify and prolong them. By resisting, we take the experience of pain and magnify it into suffering. That becomes overwhelming and distressing. When not trying to suppress unpleasant experiences, many of us use avoidance instead. We distract ourselves with any number of things: food, shopping, alcohol, drugs, sex, gambling, exercise, movies, etc. Some of those activities are not necessarily harmful, and some like exercise are healthy. The problem occurs when we use them specifically as ways to avoid. Something like exercise may help us, but used as avoidance, it can also reinforce unhealthy habits. The problems will always be waiting for us when we're done. In the meantime, we may come to depend on that activity to even function normally, in which case it becomes an addiction or a compulsion. How is it done? So if neither suppressing nor avoiding unpleasant experiences works, then what other option is there? Well, if Suffering = Pain x Resistance, and the pain is a fact of life, then we can reduce suffering by reducing the resistance. Emotional and physical pain is beyond our control much of the time. It's going to happen to us all sooner or later. But we do

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have a choice over how we respond to it. So the strategy is to keep your awareness on the unpleasant experience (concentration), get a clear picture of whats going on in the mind and body (clarity), and don't try to interfere or resist it in any way (equanimity). Allow it to be, for now, without impeding it. Another way of saying this is to give yourself radical permission to experience whatever is coming up. Its unconditional acceptance of whatever you experience. Since suppressing the unpleasant experience doesn't work, we really have nothing to lose in trying to use equanimity. The direct mental and physical pain is often beyond your control, so why try to control something thats beyond your control? Instead, shift your efforts to something that will make a difference and observe it with awareness and complete acceptance. So we are not trying to control what we experience, but rather changing the way we relate to those experiences. Admittedly, this is not very easy at the outset. Most of us had long-standing habits of reacting with resistance to things we don't like. It's a natural, automatic reaction. However, it's not inevitable. Little by little, we can develop the skill of equanimity. With some practice, we get better at it and it gradually starts to generalize to everyday life. In doing this, we are undoing many of our automatic and unhealthy mental habits. The features of resistance and equanimity are compared in the following chart: Experience Thoughts, Attitude Emotions Body Result Resistance Rejecting, judgmental Negative Tension Suffering Equanimity Accepting, allowing Neutral, curiosity (investigate) Relaxation Serenity & insight

So equanimity in the mind means an attitude of allowing and accepting. You may not agree with certain things that led up to the experience, but the fact is that the experience is here right now and resisting it does not make it go away. Instead, we watch it come and go, as it naturally will. There's no reason to push away something unpleasant if it's going to go away on its own. Resisting only complicates the process. Rather than feeling negative toward the experience ("I hate this feeling, "I wish it would stop!"), equanimity means adopting a neutral or even curious attitude towards it ("Let me take a closer look here and see what is really going on.") In the body, rather than tension, equanimity means relaxation in the muscles. Resistance creates suffering, but equanimity creates a more peaceful sand insightful state. A common question asked is whether having equanimity will make a person apathetic and passive. If we don't get worked up, then how will anything get done? Equanimity doesn't mean not having any emotions, it means allowing them to take their course without trying to control or interfere with them. So normal emotions occur, even to the most advanced meditation practitioners. However, they experience the emotion differently, without exacerbating and further complicating it. Also important to understand is that equanimity is separate from whether or not one takes

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action, which depends on what is appropriate to the situation. The equanimity is applied toward internal experience. It does not mean being apathetic or not taking action when problems arise. If one has equanimity and no action is not needed, then one feels peaceful. There's no point in stressing when there's nothing else that can be done at the moment. However, if taking action is appropriate and one does it with equanimity, then the action is more graceful and efficient. Without equanimity, our actions are fretful and clumsy. We grind our own gears.

Some Other Helpful Hints Making Progress Two general things happen in making progress in mindfulness: it deepens and broadens. Deepening means that it becomes easier to concentrate, and the mind goes into a deeper level concentration. The body becomes very relaxed and the mind is more peaceful but still very alert. One's awareness of what is passing through the mind and body increases, and finer details become apparent. We all know the feeling of pushing something unpleasant out of our minds. While we may not be thinking about it, there is still a vague and nagging feeling of uneasiness. With mindfulness, we move in the opposite direction: better awareness means that we are better able to see what's going on and let it pass without worsening it. Broadening means that it becomes more and more possible to maintain concentration, clarity, and equanimity in the situations of everyday life. In the beginning it's mostly done in the meditation session. Then one is able to shift into mindfulness while doing simple tasks, like vacuuming or folding laundry. Eventually, one is able to do it in complex and challenging situations, like during a meeting or a disagreement with a loved one. Remember how hard it was to drive a car or a bicycle the first time you tried? Now its second nature. With practice mindfulness also becomes so automatic that you can do it while going about daily life. Essentially, one's entire day becomes like a meditation. That is a change worth working towards. Change is Gradual

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Another thing to remember in meditation practice is that change is both gradual and subtle. You may feel refreshed after a meditation session, and thats good. But that is not the only benefit from meditation. If feeling refreshed were the only benefit, then you might as well just take a nap. But while we go about the task of applying concentration, clarity and equanimity, something else is changing without our awareness. On a very deep level, you are re-training your habitual responding to events. Youre undoing some very automatic and unhealthy habits, and replacing them with healthier ones. Current research suggests that changes in the wiring of the brain are taking place and you are training yourself to deal with experiences in a fundamentally different way. Studies where people meditated regularly for only eight weeks show improvements in mood, brain activity, and immune system function7. These changes are often noticed in retrospect. Certain situations in life occur, and we find in retrospect that we were a little more patient, or that we handled certain challenges more smoothly. These are very welcome changes. Judge Not The bottom line is that you apply concentration, clarity, and equanimity, as much as one can manageno more and no less. The attitude "I should be doing this better" is completely useless and even counterproductive. We do apply some effort, but however much you can manage at any given moment is exactly where you need to be. This is a learning curve, and unrealistic expectations do not speed up the learning process. All we need is to persist over time and the rest will take care of itself. If we keep at it, progress is inevitable. If you have a lapse, no problem. Just get right back in the saddle. It is also very common for people to get frustrated with themselves when the mind wanders a lot, or they don't seem to understand some aspect of meditation yet. While it's understandable, it's also not useful and in fact counterproductive to progress. I don't know where the idea came from, whether Mr. Miyagi or Kung Fu re-runs, but there's this popular idea that the mind has to be constantly blank during meditation, and if it's not, then youre not doing it right or not good at it. In this mindset, people naturally feel frustrated when they catch the mind wandering. It's understandable, but it's not helpful. It's just based on a misunderstanding. It's true that, with practice over time, the mind will quiet down more and more. If you experience a quiet mind, then that's good. But if not, then it's not a problem. It's par for the course. In fact, not only is a wandering mind inevitable, it's necessary for learning. Only through the process of catching the mind when it wanders and bringing it back can we strengthen the muscle of attention. Without that exercise, they cannot get stronger. It's just part of the normal learning process. Rather than being your enemy, a wandering mind is your teacher, creating the conditions that allow you to learn and develop. So a wandering mind is not a failure, but catching it and re-focusing it each time is a success. All of those little successes accumulate. They add up over time. Boredom & Restlessness

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These are big issues for most of us. People who live in modern western cultures live very fast-paced lives. We have large amounts of information coming at us, and many things call for our attention. We have work, school, families, cell phone, the Internet, email, etc. Many of us are always on the go, even when on vacation (!!!) So to sit still and do seemingly "do nothing" for even a few minutes can seem excruciating for the average person. When I started meditating years ago, I remember that doing 10 minutes was like sitting on broken glass. My mind was screaming for something to do. Again, this is normal and understandable. However, the trick is to have an effective strategy for dealing with this. Otherwise we are just struggling against ourselves and will burn out with frustration. The instructions for mindfulness are 100% consistent. Whatever comes up, apply concentration, clarity, and equanimity. No matter what happens, just be as aware that its happening much as you can. So when you feel bored or restless, take a closer look at it. Where exactly in the body does boredom show up? What does boredom physically feel like? Most of us have never stopped to ask ourselves that. But there will be some pattern, and the more you look at it, the clearer it will become to you. What general kinds of thoughts accompany this? Wandering thoughts, excuses to get up, etc? If I asked you to sit in a room and observe a blank wall, it could quickly get boring. There's not much to see. However, if I gave you a powerful magnifying glass you could look closer and see little details. You would see an ever-changing landscape across the surface of brush-strokes, dust, nicks, and variations in shade and color. We can do the same thing with boredom or restlessness: observe it closer. Precisely what is being felt in the body and where? Paradoxically, if you take enough of an interest, then the process of boredom becomes interesting. It will either go away or it will become interesting: either way, problem solved. And we will have learned something in the process. Recent research Studies done in recent years show that mindfulness helps reduce stress, anxiety, depression relapse, anger, substance abuse, binge eating, pain, and fatigue related to illness. On the other hand, mindfulness practice increases beneficial qualities like self-awareness, acceptance, attention, positive emotions, immune function, empathy, sleep quality, and relationship satisfaction. So mindfulness is a very healthy skill to have, psychologically and physically. It takes a little practice, but the results are well worth the effort and persistence. Anyone can do it. Its just a matter of learning it well enough to make it work for you, and finding ways to overcome any obstacles that eventually come up.

Further Resources:

Readings Shinzen Young, http://www.basicmindfulness.org/ (click on Readings)

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Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, Mindfulness in Plain English Gil Fronsdal, The Issue at Hand

Talks

Shinzen Young (Youtube channel: expandcontract) Other vipassana teachers: dharmaseed.org (free mp3 downloads) Instruction/Retreat Shinzen Young, http://www.basicmindfulness.org/ (via tele-conference)

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