MOA - How to learn Mindfulness young.

Mindfulness is hard, especially if your mind is reluctant to slow down. Most of us teenagers or young adults have grown up with the development of technology and are used to the fast paced world it brings us. The hardest part about learning to be mindful is the fact that we almost have to start a new design process on our brain's hardwirings, reconnecting the dots to open up the passages we need to feel calm within ourselves. It is something that is extremely difficult to do, it requires a lot of patience and forgiveness within yourself, which we are often able to numb by watching our phones and switching off our anxious thoughts. Inside all of us there is a want and need to feel slow, calm and human again, there is this deep desire to search for the power inside of our energies, I call this my “Inner Intelligence”. My MI is the part of me that pushes me out of my comfort zone, that tells me I'm ok when I'm down and it allows me to make mistakes while being unbothered and untainted. A monk once told me that no matter how much we feel that our mind, heart and body is feeling the pain we feel in our minds, they never will. The life-giving organs and energies we utilize everyday are never harmed by our continuous thoughts, they are a part of our bigger picture and are guided by our inner intelligence. These passing thoughts that sometimes can be excruciatingly loud are the first layer of our consciousness, they can't physically hurt us, our bodies stay just as powerful holding them there, but our minds hold these thoughts and feelings as a physical puncture. That's the main reason I know that mindfulness truly works. It's why when we take the time to focus inwards, we truly understand how we are feeling, or how our bodies are being affected.

These next few steps will be some tips and tricks I have learned over time to come back to being mindful if I start venturing into my own personal Lalaland, or what I learned to get me to a place where I understand what mindfulness is to me.

To become mindful

Step one.

At any point that you start to feel a wave of anxiety or an uncomfortable feeling in your body, notice it, feel it and listen to it. Try not to push it away as your body is trying to tell you something. It has begun to send signals to your amygdala to fall into fight or flight mode. If you take a moment to focus inward and feel the way your breath speeds up, your heart starts to race and your head starts to spin, you will be present enough to hear your thoughts.

Step two.

Once you've entered your present moment and are now able to listen to your thoughts, hear them. Truly focus and listen to them. Sometimes your thoughts that make you panic will be something from the past that holds traumatic muscle memory, or it could be the fear with your lack of control of the future. So hear them out but don't attach yourself to them, just let them pass naturally and let them go. If they stay and persist, try and hug your thoughts, show the scary memory or anxiety some love. This could be affirming its a valid feeling to feel, virtually hugging it and telling it its ok or even imagine yourself in that memory in a new place, a place that you hold sentimental value to, a place of safety.

Step three.

Once you have understood, loved and let go of that thought, you will feel a little better but naturally your body will still hold its tensity for a little longer as it takes time to revert back to normal. So just allow yourself to be slow for a moment. If you were rushing to work when this happened and you can't really “slow down”, just internally notice the way you are breathing, the steps you're taking and maybe even a bird in the sky. When we enter into this discombobulated version of our reality, that gets clouded with anxiety, we lose our grip on our stable perception. The one thing to understand is that it's just as easy to bring yourself back to the centre as it is to fall off balance.

This mindfulness practice is one of the most important ones to me in my daily life. It's what taught me what mindfulness was. It's how I realized how the fast paced environment I put myself in was internally destroying my mental wellbeing. This tactic to slow yourself down is a form of meditation, it provides your inner intelligence to break its way through your surface level thoughts to guide you back to stability. Learning mindfulness isn't a one stop shop, it's a lifelong practice. It's a mastery of your own art. It’s the most beautiful way to understand what YOU need and what YOU know, not what the rest of the world is telling you to think. In my opinion, mindfulness is just that. Being YOU without the world steering you away from your centre point.

- Sabrina