Why do we need to be mindful? and why mindfulness?

Look around, the world is in a state of panic and fear.  Fear is in the DNA of humans, wherever we look, everyone is stressed, depressed and  fearful, that is except the ones who have mastered the mind, through mindfulness.

When we become mindful, we show we have control of our reality, reality can be changed, is malleable, it is an illusion after all.

Mindfulness = focused awareness of our thoughts, noticing what the mind is doing in the present moment.  If we’re constantly aware of our thoughts, lows and highs, how our mind is reacting to outside triggers or events occurring in the world.  If we pay attention to how our body is reacting to our thoughts, how our outer world is,  what is going on within, our emotions, feelings, how fast our thoughts are racing, how our mind reacts to outside stimulus, then we’re in control of our mind, when we’re in control of our mind, we can then practice mindfulness.

When we take control of our mind, we notice all the thoughts, emotions and feelings. we acknowledge they are telling us something, sometimes they are telling us to fear, our life is in danger, to run away or to hide, when really there is nothing to hide or run from, but this is a learnt response from childhood, from the time that we didn’t get what we wanted, we didn’t feel loved, we didn’t feel nourished by our protectors (mother and father).

When we realise that the mind is playing with us, most of the things it is telling us is not real, like a child who is constantly scared of the big unpredictable unsafe world.  When we realise that when we become in control of our mind, life becomes easy.  The big bad wolf disappears, we accept that there is order within chaos, that things are happening as it should, for the greater good of all.

When we notice a thought, we acknowledge it, we honour it, we give it space then we release it.  If we fight a thought, it will fight us back, this isn’t mindfulness.  Mindfulness means being aware of our thoughts, every moment of every single moment, being at ease with it, accepting it, seeing the message within it and then releasing it in peace and a smile.

Mindfulness brings peace, love and compassion to the soul.  It brings unity, good health, it brings us back to our self, our divine self. If we have never tamed a beast, when we first try to tame it, it will fight us, the beast here is the untamed mind.  When we continue with taming the beast, over time it realises we are the master, the boss, then it starts to listen, to do as we ask.

That is what is required in mindfulness.  A mind that is under our total control.  Can this be achieved?  YES!  just like when we tame a wild beast, it is tough at the beginning, then gets easier and easier.

When we take control, we become in control of the engine in our brain, we take the driving seat, we become master of our mind.  When we become master of our own mind, we can tame the mind, we can tell it to do and not do certain things, we can tame the out of control beast.

Did you know that most of your life is run by your subconscious mind? Your thoughts, fears, reactions are most of the times due to outer stimulus, but the subconsciousness is triggered which goes into overdrive as we remember past experiences, which turns into extreme reactions, because we haven’t managed to come to terms with a lot of our fears.

Let’s say something horrible happens in the world, we judge it with our own tinted glass, i.e our belief system over the period of time becomes embedded into our subconsciousness and a lot of it is how we were looked after as a child.

A lot of our experiences are due to the mind telling us that we need to react this way, triggered by fear that’s been instilled in our childhood or pre-birth (in the womb), when we needed to be loved, hugged, cared for and protected.  If that did not happen, or there were traumas felt, we shift into flight or fight mode.  The mind goes into overdrive,  the nervous system send signals to react a certain way, this is due to unresolved traumas in our subconscious self.

Our mind is such a powerful tool, no one has ever taught us how to be in control of our own realities, we can all control our own reality, a lot of training and work  is required, but of course it can be done, many people are doing it especially yogis, monks and those who want to be free of pain and suffering.  It doesn’t matter which methods are used to train the mind, it could be Yoga, any kind of sport, discipline, writing, journaling, drawing, painting, gardening, walking or meditation.

The method of achieving this is the same, through the breath.  The breath is the connection of within and without, the inner and the outer, this is when we merge the two together.

Breathing and mindfulness go hand in hand.  They are best friends, when we breathe in our gut (connecting the second brain, which is found in the gut) we can master the two minds.  The thinking mind (head brain) and the knowing mind (gut brain) merge and we achieve the highest level of peace, balance and harmony.

With mindfulness, we can achieve anything, being mindful, being aware of our own thoughts (which is the place to dis-ease to manifest), a chaotic mind, untamed, undisciplined, bring chaos in life.  What is triggered in the brain, is usually a trigger from the child’s perspective.  This is the scared child, what others bring out of us, is what we have felt either in the womb, when we were growing up, if we felt abandoned, rejected, lost, always in danger, whatever it is we felt growing up, that is exactly what we feel with the world around us.

The thought is a gateway into dark caves and fears we have.   Life can be peaceful once we have tamed the beast.  Mindfulness makes life well worth it, when we know at all times what the content of our two minds are (head and gut brains), we thrive in this illusory world.

Kiran G