Let me tell you a secret. When I first heard about mindfulness I wasn’t impressed. As the kind of person who thrives on a bit of pressure, the thought of slowing down so much phased me! I remember an exercise about contemplating a raisin before eating it and I just thought life was too short!
So I’ve always been a bit dubious.
I felt the same way about meditation too. As a down-to-earth northern girl it seemed a bit out there and woo woo to me! But as I learnt more about neuroscience and the power of the brain, I realised that anything that helps refresh and recharge our greatest asset must be worth a try. I literally started with a one minute meditation and couldn’t believe how much calmer I felt after just 60 seconds. It spurred me on to try a few minutes, and meditation is now a daily habit. I like the Oak app (on iOS) but there are others such as Insight Timer that make it really easy to meditate in the amount of time you have available.
Anyway, I had the pleasure of going to a mindfulness workshop recently (run by another down-to-earth northern girl!) and I realised then that I actually do a lot of mindfulness these days! I still don’t contemplate the raisin (well life really is too short) but I’m present, I practice gratitude, I meditate, and I make active choices about what I’m doing and as a result I don’t fall down rabbit holes and spend hours on social media.
Some things are just not made for mindfulness though, and in my house, ironing is one of those things. I can’t think of anything worse than cleaning or ironing mindfully, I’d much rather put on a podcast and use my brain at the same time.
The way I see it is, if you find something that works for you, why wouldn’t you do it? And if it doesn’t work for you, then don’t. But if you never try, you’ll never know.
PS If you have trouble falling asleep on an evening, try a body scan. You’ll find lots of them on YouTube. Anything that can relax a brightly lit room full of people in less than five minutes is a winner in my book!