The reason why we want to do anything has less to do with our cognitive reasoning and far more to do with our emotional state – the energetic patterning of our mind and body.
If things were to remain only as thought within us, we would have no problem. After all, we are told that on average we cycle about 30 – 60000 thoughts a day. The problem for us is that some of these thoughts have a very unpleasant effect in the body as a result of the stress hormones that they generate. It is this physical/physiological state that we are most intolerant of, that we most want to avoid. We may describe this stressful state in any number of ways – fear, anxiety, pain, regret, guilt, shame, insecurity…
But while the stress is felt in the body, most of our problem-solving techniques and strategies are cognitively driven. The assumption is that if we can get our thinking right, we’ll solve whatever problem is at hand.
It is true that changing our thinking is critical but a true, qualitative change of thinking involves changing deeply embedded patterning. It is not a matter of simply having a different thought. It is a matter of creating a different energetic pattern, or as I prefer to think of it, of allowing for a different energetic pattern to replace an old, habitual one.
This involves somatic re-patterning and one of the most powerful ways of enabling somatic re-patterning is using attentiveness. This is a particular kind of attentiveness that disrupts the normal, conditioned/learned/embedded reactive patterning in the body.
Mindfulness: a state of consciousness that remains untroubled by whatever is happening but one that has the qualities of alertness and responsiveness or response-ability
Whereas the normal, conditioned/learned reactive patterning involves judgment, ‘This is right/wrong/good/bad/fair/unfair…’, attachment to what is valued or desired and aversion to what is not valued or feared, the kind of disruptive attentiveness that I am talking about is one of simple observation or noticing . It is an investment-free noticing of whatever is happening within the body or ‘outside’ the body. It is a state of consciousness that allows energy to flow freely, unimpeded, in a direction that we more consciously and freely choose rather than habitually/reactively and fearfully default to.
This kind of noticing happens in a state of consciousness that remains untroubled by whatever is happening but one that has the qualities of alertness and responsiveness or response-ability.
We may call this state of consciousness mindfulness.
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