Mindfulness: The Ultimate Practice for Taking Back Your Mind
Using The Breath to Reclaim Your Power
If you have ever wondered what it truly takes to reclaim your mind, you can rest assured that you are not alone. This piece will delve into reclaiming your power by using mindfulness to reclaim your mind.
Your History Is Not Your Destiny
There’s this prevailing misconception that our history, aka our past, predetermines or sets the course for our future. However, our past is not our destiny as we can create a lot spurred from the strands of our fears or the object of our desires.
So naturally, who wouldn’t opt to live at the center of their desires rather than the crux of their fear? Whether we accept the universal truth that abundance is our inherent birthright and not a nicety afforded to a select few doesn’t negate that our past history is not our destiny.
We each have the power to consciously reside in the space of lack, limitation, and scarcity based on our past. Alternatively, we can deliberately cultivate seeds of possibility to create a life of abundance.
Mindfulness is untethered awareness of how we move, interact, and have our being in the world. In other words, it’s a state of being that empowers us to be fully present and attentive to our intention. From the very thoughts, feelings, sensations, emotions, and everything else, it is a conscious awareness of where we place our attention at any given point and time.
One would think that awareness is the equivalent of being consciously awake. That couldn’t be further from the truth, as we can literally and figuratively be in one physical place engaging with one another. However, if one were to peer a little deeper, going beyond the mask of appearances, one could easily see that one individual’s thoughts and mind are in a completely different world. It’s just as easy to physically reside in one space in time and be in a completely different headspace. Hence, we often live more in our heads than in the present moment.
Far too often, we tend to get more caught up in our individualized ideals and conception of what and how things should be and less accepting of things how they are in the present moment, subjecting us to undue suffering. In other words, whenever our awareness is not rooted within the present, it’s likely to be found within a completely different space and tense of time (past experiences, reflections, future projections, and anticipations). Contrary to proper belief, our good (aka happiness and contentment) is not contingent on the past or the actions or inactions of anyone or anything outside of ourselves.
Hence the notion that we must persistently create, internalize, and attach expectations as prerequisites to what will make us worthy, is an illusion. Therefore one doesn’t need additional advanced degrees, certifications, licenses, or any other coveted external validations to pre-qualify oneself as worthy. Admittingly, attaining specialized training and certifications equips us to better navigate within the earthly plane. However, it is not a prerequisite that equates to our worthiness.
Whether one elects to journey through the path of higher education or not, it does not subtract from your worthiness. Hence you are enough wherever you are in your journey, as no form of external validation will ever change the universal truth of your sufficiency.
Know that from the moment you entered this incarnation (aka the moment you took your first breath), you have been enough, always have been, and always will be, and there is nothing you can do to change it. In other words, worthiness is your birthright.
As vibrational spiritual beings, you are innately equipped with everything you could ever wish, hope for, or desire, it is sourced from within, and no matter what the world would have, you believe there is absolutely nothing that will change this universal truth. Only an awakening and acceptance of the universal truth.
Transform Your Life with Mindful Awareness
Mindfulness is not just a practice that’s a one-off; that’s to be done as convenience permits. It’s a way of living that spans all aspects of life. From eating, physical motion, communication, and creativity to the mundane, it spans the spectrum to all aspects of daily living.
"Mindfulness is a reflective practice that empowers you to journey within to explore, unite, and unfold into your higher self.”
—Sonja Crandon
Somewhere along the way, productivity and the hustle mentality have been rallied, celebrated, and prioritized over tuning in, listening, and complying with our inner intuitive guidance. We have sloughed off our intuitive faculty in many ways, subconsciously regulating it as insignificant.
All the while, this faculty innately connects us with our higher selves, leading and guiding us to act in a manner that aligns with our highest good. This couldn't be further from the truth, as everything first originates from within and flows into our outer experience. In other words, tuning in to our intuition connects and aligns our higher selves with our physical bodies.
Mindfulness provides the resources, tools, and practices that support us to root ourselves within the truth of our being as we go beyond distractions to redirect our attention to what is occurring now. In essence, it’s a practice of singularly focused awareness that empowers you to exercise volition in where you are placing your attention at any given time.
Far too often, our attention is highjacked by the many distractions that threaten to deter us from our intended focus. We are not enslaved to the wayward unpredictability of distractions. Remember, we are each individualized, unique expressions of the divine, with the ability to take full volition over where we are placing our attention and think independently of circumstances. Mindful awareness empowers you to take your power back.
Using the Power of the Breath to Reclaim Your Power
Where our attention goes, our energy flows. Likewise, our true power lies within where and how we direct our energy and attention. Hence our attention (aka energy) is our most valuable asset. Likewise, the practice calls us to pull our attention away from the many things that may distract us from residing in the present.
Hence mindfulness is an endless practice, as there is no beginning and no end. At its best, it is a practice of increasing our awareness of where we are focusing our energy, releasing judgment, and redirecting it with the support of the breath anytime it is misaligned with the present moment.
Naturally, one may wonder of the many things one can focus on, why the breath. So glad you asked. The mind is inherently a static facility that is subject to wander in all manner of all tenses in time. From the past, and future, random to-do lists, obligations, and responsibilities, to all distractions that are liable to snatch our attention away from our intended focus.
The breath is the one faculty that can solely happen in the present. Naturally, one cannot breathe in the past, or reserve breaths for a future date and time, so the breath is the faculty that supports us to reside in the here and now.
So redirecting our energy to the breath helps us redirect our attention away from distractions and onto our intended focus. Likewise, there is no right or wrong way to practice, as you can sit, walk, lie down, or do any of the many commonplace activities of daily life. Hence mindfulness is an endless practice that supports you in taking back your power as often as needed.
3 Steps to Using the Breath to Reconnect to the Present
1. Notice Where You are Directing Your Attention
Our habits form the patterns of thoughts to the point where we unconsciously recycle the same series of thoughts. Over time these unconscious patterns of thinking become so habitual that we are not consciously aware that we are not present in our current activity.
Take the habit of mindlessly scrolling through social media. Within what may seem merely a couple of minutes of perusing through your feed can quickly evolve into half an hour or more of your awareness being redirected to all matter distractions. Knowledge is power. Hence the more conscious you are of where you are directing your attention, the more empowered you are to redirect it back to the present moment.
2. Pause and Release Any Judgement
The more you know, the more likely one is to judge and self critique one’s thoughts and actions. As a collective, we tend to judge anything that doesn’t align with our belief of what is deemed right or wrong, self-included.
Likewise, anything that is misaligned will indeed be judged, and with judgment comes blame, shame, embarrassment, and every other energetically charged emotion that can make one feel less than.
3. Redirect Your Awareness to the Breath
When you notice that your energy is not centered within the present, pause, take a few deep cleansing breaths to disrupt any thought patterns directed anywhere but the present, and redirect your attention to the present moment.
For instance, when scrolling through social media and not being present and attentive to what is unfolding, notice where you are directing your attention, release any self-critique (judgment) pause, take a few deep breaths, and redirect your energy to become present with your current activity.
Are you interested in expanding your mindfulness practice in a virtual community of like-minded individuals? We welcome you to join our growing Mindfulness Community Circle for twice-weekly live facilitated mindfulness sessions. We’d love to have you join our rapidly growing global community.
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Thank you
good stuff! Thank you!