Mindfulness is calm awareness of one’s body functions, feelings, content of consciousness, or consciousness itself.
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In
choosing mindfulness as my word for the year I am not hoping for miracles, I don’t look upon it as the first step on the road to enlightenment, I just want it in its lowest common
denominator. I just want to be here right now.
I have a tendency to spend time in a rose-tinted past or an imagined future. Times when things were or will be better. A tendency that is not uncommon in people suffering from chronic illness or pain. One day things will be better and then life will be like it used to be. Meanwhile I am missing all the experiences that life is throwing at me right now. They don’t always have to be good experiences to be important.
So this year I want to be present in everything I do. When I write, when I eat, when I am with those I love, when I am at work, when I exercise, when I meet new people or try new things, when I am on my mat. Especially when I am on my mat.
This isn’t about hours of meditation every day, this isn’t about experimenting with different mindfulness techniques (not that there is anything wrong with that). This is about appreciating the life I have right now. Every damn moment of it.
We came back home to Surrey today after a lovely Easter weekend at my parents’ in Cambridge.
No matter how wonderful a break or holiday is, there is something very joyful about coming back to your own home, your own space (even if the cats have made a major mess whilst you’ve been gone!).
Coming home always reminds me of getting on my mat. It doesn’t matter where my mat is but that rectangle of pink (yes my mat’s pink), is my home and my space and when I lie down on it, as I do at the beginning of every practice, I always have a feeling of everything coming together; physically, mentally, emotionally.
By beginning each day with this feeling of coming home, I am always in a place to set forth on whatever adventure the day might hold!
