WHAT’S SO GOOD ABOUT MINDFULNESS ANYWAY?

Mindfulness is no longer the flavour of the month. I’m not entirely sure why that is the case but, as the Bible says, ‘To everything there is a season’ (Ec 3:1).

Now, don’t get me wrong. Mindfulness is still very popular and it’s taught and practised everywhere. Anyway, to get to the point, some people say to me, ‘What’s so good about mindfulness anyway?’ Hence, this post.

Mindfulness is really nothing extraordinary. It is certainly nothing mystical or otherwordly, whatever the latter means. Mindfulness is simply living with awareness—and with the awareness of one’s awareness. How often do we get in our car and drive from place A to place B. We drive along certain roads. However, is it not the case that all too often, when we get to our destination, we have no recollection of going down Road X or Road Y. Our awareness while driving was intermittent and there was little or no actual awareness of our awareness.

Mindfulness is being grounded in the here-and-now.
Golden Jubilee Bridges over the Thames. London, United Kingdom. December 2018.
Photo taken by the author.

Mindfulness is the direct, immediate and unmediated perception of what is. By ‘direct, immediate, and unmediated’, I mean that our perception of both internal and external reality is no longer filtered (‘mediated’)—and in the process distorted—through such things as our beliefs, conditioning, analysis, interpretation, and judgment. Mindfulness helps us to not identify with, or build up a resistance to, those mental images in our brain that deflect us from the task of being and remaining in direct, immediate and unmediated contact and relationship with what is happening in us and outside of us.

Mindfulness is being grounded in the here-and-now, in what is. Mindfulness has nothing to do with ‘expanded consciousness’, so-called higher orders or levels of reality, and supposed notions of transcendence. Mindfulness is grounded firmly in everyday reality—the only reality that there is—that is, in the one order or level of reality in which we all live and move and have our be-ing-ness. I am sure you have heard of the words, the ‘eternal now’. We have our presence, our very be-ing-ness, in the eternal now. The eternal now is that ‘present’ which is forever renewing itself in and as each new moment. The regular practice of mindfulness enables us to live more fully—and, yes, more mindfully—in the eternal now.

Mindfulness is a journey in self-discovery.
Rovaniemi, Lapland, Finland. December 2018.
Photo taken by the author.

To the extent that the practice of mindfulness is concerned with knowing and understanding what is, and observing (among other things) the content of one’s consciousness—that is, our thoughts, feelings, desires, and so on—the practice is a spiritual one. By ‘spiritual’, I mean non-material or non-physical. The English word ‘spirit’ comes from the Latin spiritus meaning, among other things, breath, breathing, air, inspiration, character, spirit, life, vigour, and courage. Spirituality does not require or depend upon notions of ‘supernaturalism’. On the contrary, spirituality is all about the development of the mind, the emotions and the will.

Mindfulness is not a religion or even a philosophy but rather a way of being, a way of life, a journey in self-discovery, and an education. Mindfulness, being devoid of all notions of religiosity, is entirely experiential and unlike most if not all religions it is empirically based. When the Dalai Lama addressed the concluding session of the International Congress on Mindfulness in 2011, he reiterated that mindfulness is not a religious practice. He also made the point that all of us, whether religious or non-religious, needs to practise mindfulness every day. In saying that, the Dalai Lama is simply urging us to live with non-judgmental, choiceless awareness, from one moment to the next.

Of course, there are many tangible benefits in the regular practice of mindfulness. Changes in the body associated with the practice of mindfulness include but are not limited to a reduced heart rate, reduced blood pressure,  lowered cholesterol, reduced muscle tension, increased cardiovascular efficiency, improved circulation of blood and lymph, improved gastrointestinal functioning, reduced sensitivity to pain, an enhanced immune system, improved posture, and an overall relaxation of the body and sleep. Changes in the mind include an increased cortical thickness in the grey matter of the brain, a calmer, more patient, stable and steady mind, overall relaxation of the mind, an enhanced feeling of wellbeing, an improved ability to cope with and release stress, enhanced cognitive functioning and performance, improved concentration and attention to detail, faster sensory processing and increased capacity for focus and memory, increased learning and consciousness, increased openness to new ideas, greater responsiveness in the moment, reduced mental distractedness, increased verbal creativity, and delayed ageing of the brain.

Mindfulness is the choiceless awareness of what is.
Easter cactus (Hatiora gaertneri). Bilgola Plateau NSW Australia. November 2016.
Photo taken by the author.

As a spiritual practice, living mindfully makes us more aware of who we really are. By self-observation we gain invaluable insight into our thoughts, feelings, and actions. We become more directly aligned to the flow of life of which each one of us is a part. That can only be a good thing. Let me read these words from Sayadaw U Janakābhivaṃsa, a Theravada Buddhist monk from Myanmar and a leading authority on meditation and mindfulness:

Why should we observe or watch physical and mental processes as they are? Because we want to realise their true nature. [That] leads us to the right understanding of natural processes as just natural process. ... When our body feels hot, we should observe that feeling of heat as it is. When the body feels cold, we should observe it as cold. When we feel pain, we should observe it as it is—pain. When we feel happy, we should watch that happiness as it is—as happiness. When we feel angry, we should observe that anger as it really is—as anger. When we feel sorry, we should be mindful of it as it is—as sorry. When we feel sad or disappointed, then we must be aware of our emotional state of sadness or disappointment as it is. 

In short, mindfulness is simply living naturally and realistically—and with choiceless awareness of what is … from one moment to the next. The influential Indian teacher and lecturer J. Krishnamurti spoke of 'meeting everything anew, from moment to moment, without the conditioning reaction of the past, so that there is not the cumulative effect which acts as a barrier between oneself and that which is'. That, my friends, is what living mindfully is all about. So, if you're not into mindfulness, you're not truly living from one moment to the next.

RELATED POSTS

IS MINDFULNESS A RELIGION?

MINDFULNESS IS SIMPLE: JUST BE THE PRESENT MOMENT

ERNEST HEMINGWAY AND THE ART OF MINDFUL LIVING

Ernest Hemingway went out in style—with a double-barrelled shotgun. In saying that, I don’t wish to be seen to be making light of suicide. In my own family, I lost a grandmother, a great-aunt, and a great-grandfather, and possibly one or two others as well, to suicide. Those left behind after the suicide of a family member or close friend ordinarily struggle with a particularly difficult grief, yet I learned long ago that it is always wrong to pass any form of judgement on the deceased in relation to their decision to end their life.

In his final years Hemingway was beset with physical and psychological troubles and was not helped by an American government that incessantly trailed him with FBI agents, in both Cuba (where he lived in the 1940s and '50s) and the United States, and which in 1960 basically told him to denounce the Castro regime and leave Cuba or face the consequences, namely, being declared a traitor by Washington authorities.

Hemingway refused to denounce the Castro regime. He had declared his solidarity with Cuba in January 1959. He wrote that he believed completely in the 'historical necessity' [sic] of the Cuban Revolution. He knew that the Castro regime was far from perfect but he had also lived through the years when, for all intents and purposes, the American Mafia, in cahoots with the CIA, ran Cuba. At least Castro got rid of the Mafia from Cuba, even if they went elsewhere, and he gave the Cuban people universal health care—a damn good thing—and a decent education system. (No, dear reader, I am not a Commie. I simply believe in giving credit where credit is due—and putting the boot in as well when that is necessary.) 

Anyway, Hemingway and his fourth wife Mary left the Cuba they loved for good on July 25, 1960, leaving behind thousands of books, personal papers and memorabilia. Hemingway found his own solution to his troubles on July 2, 1961. Even on that last fateful day, the dreadful J Edgar Hoover’s agents were located just 150 metres from his house in Ketchum, Idaho.

Fidel Castro and Ernest Hemingway.
Havana, Cuba, May 1960.

Local fishermen erected this monument
in memory of Hemingway at Cojímar,
a town east of Havana.

My wife, youngest son and I were recently in Cuba for a holiday. It was a great trip and we travelled all over Cuba. I loved the people, the architecture of the buildings, the mountains and valleys, and the music. The hotels we stayed in were grand and we also stayed with some delightful Cuban families in their own homes. The people we met were happy for the most part, despite many problems, made much worse by the American embargo. That the latter continues to this day, after almost 60 years, is a disgrace. It does not speak well of the United States. The embargo, which has been condemned by the United Nations with overwhelming support every year since 1992, has been called a sustained act of genocide against the Cuban people—and it is. The accumulated cost of the embargo to Cuba over almost 60 years amounts to close to 934 billion United States dollars. The purported aim of the embargo is 'regime change'. Well, the embargo has failed miserably in that regard and others.

The Cuban people, especially in Havana, revere Ernest Hemingway, and while we were in Havana we went to Hemingway’s former home and farm Finca Vigía (now a museum), the Hotel Ambos Mundos, where he resided in 1939, the hotel La Terraza de Cojimar at Cojímar, the little port town 9.6 km east of Havana where Hemingway kept his fishing boat, the Pilar, which was the inspiration for the village Hemingway depicted in The Old Man and the Sea, and the restaurant-bars El Floridita and La Bodeguita del Medio, where Hemingway ate and drank (mostly the latter, its seems). In all these places, and many others, there are photos and other memorabilia recalling Hemingway’s presence in Cuba. Books or parts of his novels were written on the island. Copies of those books, as well as many biographies of the man and his life in Cuba, can be purchased in Havana book shops and elsewhere in Cuba.

Entrance to Finca Vigía

My wife and son outside Finca Vigía

Yours truly at the top of the tower at Finca Vigía

Hemingway’s writing style has been much written about and discussed. A former journalist and war correspondent, Hemingway is the master of the short, unadorned sentence, direct speech and simple dialogue. He uses no unnecessary words. His vocabulary is often tight but expressive and charged with meaning, even when reduced to only a few words. Sentences tend to be arranged in sequence rather than in a logical pattern. Take, for example, this exchange from chapter 10 of For Whom the Bell Tolls. (Some of that novel, which arose out of Hemingway's own experience, was written in Cuba.)

‘What are you going to do with us?’ one asked him.

‘Shoot thee,’ Pablo said.

‘When?’ the man asked in the same gray voice.

‘Now,’ said Pablo.

‘Where?” asked the man.

‘Here,’ said Pablo. ‘Here. Now. Here and now.’

‘Have you anything to say?’
‘Nada,’ said the man. ‘Nothing. But it is an ugly thing.’

Hemingway's study in Finca Vigía

Hemingway's study in Finca Vigía

Vestibule and room where Hemingway
received his family and friends at Finca Vigía

In Hemingway’s famous short story ‘The Killers’, the author makes effective use of tight, machine gun-like exchanges such as the following to create an atmosphere of impending doom:

‘What's he going to do?’

‘Nothing.’

‘They'll kill him.’

‘I guess they will.’

‘He must have got mixed up in something in Chicago.’

‘I guess so,’ said Nick.

‘It's a hell of a thing.’

‘It's an awful thing,’ Nick said.

They did not say anything. George reached down for a towel and wiped the counter.

‘I wonder what he did?’ Nick said.

‘Double-crossed somebody. That's what they kill them for.’

‘I'm going to get out of this town,’ Nick said.

‘Yes,’ said George. ‘That's a good thing to do.’

‘I can't stand to think about him waiting in the room and knowing he's going to get it. It's too damned awful.’

‘Well,’ said George, ‘you better not think about it.’

His themes and ideas arise from and out of the story and its imagery, as opposed to being thrust upon the reader as is the case with many writers. The emphasis is on action rather than introspection (although the latter is there as well). His aim, in his own words, is to record 'the way it was'. He is a master of mindfulness, recording what happens more-or-less as it happens or as it happened not that long ago. Even when one of his characters recalls something that has already happened, the remembrance of the event generally takes place in the context of the character remembering in the present moment what has already happened. That is the essence of mindfulness, along with remembering to stay present in the present moment, from one moment to the next, and remembering what is present.

Some of the 8,000 books in
Hemingway's library at Finca Vigía 

The 'Pilar' at Finca Vigía

Listen to these words from chapter 11 of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Hemingway contrasts the directness and immediacy of life itself, experienced mindfully, with an experience of life that falls short of that:

You only heard the statement of the loss. You did not see the father fall as Pilar made him see the fascists die in that story she had told by the stream. You knew the father died in some courtyard, or against some wall, or in some field or orchard, or at night, in the lights of a truck, beside some road. You had seen the lights of the car from down the hills and heard the shooting and afterwards you had come down to the road and found the bodies. You did not see the mother shot, nor the sister, nor the brother. You heard about it; you heard the shots; and you saw the bodies.

In chapter 13 of the novel, the combatant Robert Jordan, a young American fighting in the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War, and Maria, a young woman who has been captured by the Fascists, have just made love in the heather. Shortly thereafter, we get these words from Hemingway, words that are more openly philosophical than is usual for him:

You have it now and that is all your whole life is; now. There is nothing else than now. There is neither yesterday, certainly, nor is there any tomorrow. How old must you be before you know that? There is only now, and if now is only two days, then two days is your life and everything in it will be in proportion. This is how you live a life in two days. And if you stop complaining and asking for what you will never get, you will have a good life. A good life is not measured by any biblical span.

My wife and son at La Terraza de Cojímar

Hemingway lives on at La Bodeguita del Medio

A life-size bronze statue of Hemingway
at the end of the bar in El Floridita

Each one of us is an inlet and an outlet of life's self-expression. Life is forever renewing itself, and expressing itself, as the present moment—from one moment to the next and ever onwards. Life is this moment and life is the reality of our very selves. We are the action of life that is always taking place. We live in the eternal now—the present moment forever renewing itself. The past? It exists only as a present memory. The future? It exists only as a hope. 

Life is endless movement—from one moment to the next. Any meaning we find must be found in the moment-to-moment experience of the eternal now, which is that ‘present’ which is forever renewing itself in and as each new moment. Eternity—the eternal now—is not the present time plus all the past and all the future, nor is it a postmortem experience. It is a present—indeed, ever-present—reality. In truth, there is no time after time after time. The eternal now transcends time altogether. There is a ‘present’ in the present as well as a ‘present’ beyond the ‘present’. Of course, in a very real sense the eternal now and the so-called temporal now are one and the same! Everything is—here now! Life is eternal, and we are alive in eternity—now! Well, at least we should be.

So, cherish this present moment. It is more than enough, even though it is so fleeting and ephemeral. Nevertheless, seize the moment—and live.

RELATED POSTS

MINDFULNESS ON THE ROAD ... WITH A BEAT

DYLAN THOMAS AND THE ART OF LITERARY MINDFULNESS

ARE YOU A DREAM GIRL?

MINDFULNESS ACCORDING TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

LORD BUCKLEY AND THE ART OF MINDFULNESS

DYLAN THOMAS AND THE ART OF LITERARY MINDFULNESS

JAMES JOYCE: THE MASTER OF LITERARY MINDFULNESS

THE PRESENCE AND POWER OF ETERNITY

'For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place …'
Isaiah 57:15 (KJV).

There was once an Australian soldier and evangelist John G Ridley MC who preached a sermon titled ‘Echoes of Eternity’. Actually, he preached more-or-less that same sermon more than once, and perhaps many times. A copy of an audio file of one taped version of the sermon, preached by Ridley in his later years, can be found here. Ridley was a dynamic and powerful preacher. He painted the most wonderfully evocative word pictures ...

… Eternity … This word is a solitary word, wonderful word, just like a great mountain peak standing up and leaping above all its fellows and casting a kind of glorious shadow over the whole mountain range, an Everest of scripture, snowcapped in the purity of God. Eternity! Eternity! … Eternity. What a remarkable, uplifted, glorified word! Once uttered, because there is only one eternity, and the eternal God is in command of it. I seem to hear it coming out of the past like a distant sound of thunder, bursting with a clap in the present, and rolling on with mumblings and rumblings into the unknown future. Eternity. Eternity. How can you preach on eternity? Yet, if a preacher does not touch on eternity, he’s missing the great mountain ridge and glorious throne that God has given us in this verse, who inhabited Eternity. … [We] are travellers to eternity.

... Eternity, Eternity, I wish I could sound or shout that word to everyone in the streets of Sydney. You’ve got to meet it. Where will you spend Eternity? ...

When John Ridley preached this sermon in Sydney, New South Wales on what was perhaps the first occasion—this was way back in 1932—a man named Arthur Stace (pictured), who had been a soldier himself and who was a reformed alcoholic who had been converted to Christianity a couple of years earlier, was so moved by Ridley’s words that he went outside the church building and wrote the word ‘Eternity’ in beautiful copperplate writing with chalk on the footpath. He continued to do that on the footpaths of Sydney and even beyond Sydney and the State of New South Wales for about 35 years—some 500,000 times.

Now, Ridley and Stace had their own evangelical understanding of the word ‘eternity’. By the way, that word appears just once in the King James Version of the Bible, and it is in the verse set out above.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge lit up with the word ‘Eternity’.

What is eternity? Well, as I see it, we are in eternity now. We are immersed in eternity. We live, move and have our be-ing-ness in eternity. Eternity is not a ‘thing’ we enter into at death. No. Eternity is now. Everything is contained within eternity, that is, the eternal now. All duration – or time – is total and complete in the now. There is an eternal quality about the now. It is forever new. The present moment has its unfolding in the eternal now for it is nothing other than that which presents itself before us in and as the now, which embraces past, present and future. It is in the eternal now that we have our presence.

For me, God is the eternal now—omnipresence. There is only one eternity, one eternal now and it is both the medium in which all things have their be-ing-ness as well as Be-ing or omnipresence itself.

You may or may not share my understanding of the word eternity. That is your prerogative. The important thing is not to wait until you die in order to experience its tremendous presence and power.

HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE FOR ME TO BECOME ENLIGHTENED?

A young man approached his master and asked, 'How long is it likely to take me to attain enlightenment?'

'Ten years,' replied the master.

'That long?' exclaimed the young man.

'No, that was a mistake on my part,' said the master. 'It will take you twenty years.'

'Why did you just double the figure?' asked the young man.

'Alright, in your case it will probably take you thirty years,' replied the master.

 Seeking enlightenment on Mount Takao (Takaosan)
Photo taken by the author in Meiji-no-mori Takao Quasi-National Park, Japan

Never ask ‘how’ or ‘why’ questions, at least not when it comes to matters spiritual. Worse still, never ask ‘how long’ questions, because when you do you are still thinking in terms of time. Enlightenment---true wisdom---is not of time. It is timeless. It is eternal. And eternity is now---the eternal now. Enlightenment is above time and has no opposite. The state that is eternal is---right now! We live in both time and eternity right now. However, thought (‘how’, ‘why’, ‘how long’) is time itself. We think in time, but thought can never understand ‘something’ that is above and beyond time. That something is wisdom or enlightenment. It can be experienced, but never known or grasped or arrived at.

What, then, is enlightenment? It means waking up---not just once, but staying awake from moment to moment. As such, enlightenment is not so much a destination but the journey. It is also the means of travel. Yes, it is the means and the end.

Enlightenment is not a ‘thing-in-itself’. Indeed, it is actually a ‘no-thing’---no-thing-ness. It is the complete absence of thought, conditioning, materialism and all other limitations of time and space. It is living with choiceless, unadorned awareness. Yes, enlightenment is mindful living. In that regard, I am reminded of what Dr Jon Kabat-Zinn, Emeritus Professor of Medicine, and founder of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society, at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, had to say about mindfulness. He said, ‘Mindfulness is about falling awake rather than asleep.’ Falling awake. Yes, and also staying awake. That is mindfulness. And that is enlightenment.

A disciple once asked his master, ‘What is the path?’ The Zen master replied, ‘Walk on!’ Yes, the ‘meaning’ of life lies in the living---that is, the ‘walking’---of life from one moment to the next. Enlightenment is staying awake while you are walking your path. 

So, don’t ask ‘how long’. Instead, ask yourself this question, ‘What is standing in the way of my waking up and experiencing enlightenment right now?’