There are many different wisdom traditions that talk about winter and the New Year. Some honor the changing of the sun and the bringing of light with the Winter Solstice, some are more focused on starting new things and resolutions for the (Gregorian Solar) New Year, while (Indian) Ayurveda says winter is a good time to look inside…
According to Ayurveda, winter is a time of going back to the foundation, back to the roots and the trunk and the bare branches. Of noticing what is here, what is supportive and what is weighting us down.
It’s a time to get quiet and notice what you’ve cultivated over the past year… What of that do you want to keep and nourish? What of that do you want to prune away?
So if you’re “in,” grab your practice, a cup of warm tea and open into your roots.
Change can be destabilizing and difficult on every level. Our self-care practices, on the other hand, can help us recenter and navigate change with more ease.
What do you do that helps you stay centered or return to center?
And how can you encourage yourself to continue doing this during change? …right when you need it most and possibly when you feel you don’t have time or capacity for it?
Your answers will be unique to you.
For me, (during calm times) I’m making a point to notice how my practice helps me ground into myself, and be clear about what I’m thinking, feeling, etc. My thought is that during chaos I’ll more clearly remember these benefits and how quick and easy it is to do!
I can definitely say that I wasn’t when I started meditating! I was all over the place, and as I started to be self-aware enough to see the patterns I was running in my life, I realized that 1.) it was going to take a while to sort out my anger issues! and 2.) it was possible!
Self-awareness starts with training our attention.
First, what we start with in many kinds of meditation is training our attention, which 99% of us have totally lost control over.
How many times have you wandered off mentally during a conversation, maybe thinking about an email you didn’t send, only to come back and realize that you just missed everything they were saying?
Yeah. You are not alone, my friend.
Focusing our attention is key to being self-aware. At least it’s key to being self-aware for any appreciable length of time…
Self-awareness is simply being aware of yourself in time and space. This is a natural act or state that we’re all able to do, we just aren’t able to do it for very long and most of us don’t even realize its importance!
Self-awareness is easier to experience than explain.
Do this: First, notice your body: your feet pressing into the floor, your bum on your seat. Second, now that you’re aware of your body, take a look around and notice where you are… check out the space you’re in. Are you in London? Paris? New York? Delhi? At home? On the train? In a field?
Voila, you’ve just become self-aware. You can also call this being present to or mindful of yourself.
Pretty simple, right? Self-awareness is simply noticing yourself, your body in space. And can include noticing your thoughts, emotions, sensations and surrounds.
The Value of Self-Awareness
Where this gets interesting is that this is a type of meta-consciousness. “Meta” meaning bigger or larger and “consciousness” meaning thinking state or perspective.
We can see ourselves. We can see ourselves thinking, emoting, sensing, acting, reacting, etc.
Instead of just being down in our thoughts and emotions, we actually have a larger (meta) perspective on them. It’s the difference between being in a forest or being in a forest with a map. If I’m in the forest, I’m down here with the bushes and flowers, which is pretty great. If I also have a map I have a bird’s eye view as well… a bigger perspective on what’s happening. I can see the paths that led me here, and where I am in the larger landscape of my life and experiences.
As soon as I can see myself more clearly, I can make better choices. That’s the gold of self-awareness. Now, instead of just being lost in thought when that person is talking to me, I can see myself starting to drift off and decide, “Hey! No! I want to pay attention to what this person is saying to me!” or say, “Hey! You just reminded me that I haven’t sent you that email! Let me make a note of that, and I’ll send it to you when we finish this conversation.”
Or, you could decide to stop yelling at your lover/child/friend, because, really, you aren’t mad at them, you’re frustrated about work – and that’s where this anger needs to be utilized for change – not ruining your personal life!
The first thing that I noticed was that I stopped getting mad at waitresses in Thailand who kept bringing me the wrong order! “I don’t want that! What do you mean I have to pay for it anyway?!!” Instead of just getting angry at them, I began to see that the issue here was my terrible Thai, and what this situation really needed was Thai lessons! What a relief that was! I ate better, too. :)
It helps me in ALL of my relationships, especially my relationship with myself. I started all of this because I was so angry all of the time and had no idea why! Over the years I began to see that I had many habits that lead to anger like blaming others, being passive-aggressive (not being able to say what I wanted or needed until I things got so bad I exploded), etc.
I still get angry, I’m just better at using it properly.
And this is why self-awareness is so useful. It makes our lives better! We make better decisions. Everyone wins, our friends, our partners and children… even our waitresses.
I mean that you’re not able to focus on anything for more than a few seconds at a time before your attention wanders away, and you aren’t able to keep it from wandering even if you try.
I totally didn’t believe this at first.
You probably don’t either, so I’m going to give you an example and a simple exercise to test it out for yourself.
— Definitely don’t just believe this craziness! Find out for yourself! —
Then I’ll share why it might matter to you, and what you can do about it.
— Ok, first up, an example. —
Have you ever been listening to someone and something they said reminded you of something else? … “Email!'” you start thinking, “Oh no! Did I send that email?! Oh, crud! I forgot! Ok, first thing in the morning!” You finish this thought, and then return your attention to the person in front of you… and they’re still talking. Oops.
You don’t know what you’ve missed, because you were busy thinking about email. And if you’re like me, you hope they keep talking so that you can try and figure out what you missed!
Not a comfortable or respectful place to be (of self or other).
Everyone can relate to this. I’ve not yet had a single person who couldn’t.
Why? Because we aren’t in control of our attention! Even if we are talking to a best friend, boss/client, lover or beloved child we still do this! Yikes!
— Next, an experiment to test out your attention control for yourself —
When I heard about this, I thought, “But that’s silly! I can watch a movie for 2 hours and not have my thoughts wander away!”
Well, sure you’re able to focus on movies, TV/Netflix shows, Facebook, YouTube, etc easily! And, my friend, those things are designed to grab your attention and keep it – over and over and over again. Ever wondered why these things are constantly changing every 3-7 seconds? (New angle, new sound, new topic, etc.) That’s because they know that modern consumerist humans have the attention span of gnats, so they program that way!
Try this:
Focus on your breath, and only on your breath, for 3 minutes. Don’t let your attention wander to anything else. I can guarantee you that you can’t do it. (If you can PLEASE email me! I want to meet you! you’ll be the first person I’ve ever met that can! And my first question, will be, how long can you focus? Now, back to 99.9999% of us…)
Even if I promise you 1 billion dollars or to meet the person of your dreams, you won’t be able to. Seriously, test it out for yourself. (It’ll only take 3 minutes.)
It’s crazy, right?!
You can’t control your attention, and keep your mind from wandering away, for just 3 minutes.
— Why you might care and what to do about it. —
So why do you care? Well, maybe you don’t. But if you do, if you want to be able to control your attention, to direct your focus towards what ever you’re interested in for extended periods of time, then mindfulness is a great tool for helping with that.
Part of the point of mindfulness is to be able to focus our attention for long periods of time, first so that we’re aware of what’s happening in front of us (hello person speaking to me!). We want to be able to enjoy our lives!… The birthday party or wedding we’re at, the moments with our loved ones, our vacations, etc. Otherwise we’re only partly there and the rest of the time we’ve wandered away in our minds… lost in thought.
There are many ways to regain this ability. If you do anything that asks for your attention (that doesn’t cultivate a gnat like attention span) you can commit to paying attention for longer and longer amounts of time. (Start with 30 seconds and work your way up!) Mindfulness is one great way to do this, and regaining focus is just one of the many benefits!
Eckheart Tolle wrote in The Power of Now about our many paths to consciousness. He calls them portals and reminds us that they’re doors (in)to ourselves.
One of these portals is breath, as is (physical) sensation, intense focus on an object, etc.
Breath is great because not only is it always with us, we generally don’t have a lot of thought associated with it, unlike sensations (pleasure and pain), and objects (like / don’t like this flower).
He also reminds us that one conscious breath is enough to connect us with ourselves.
What’s a consciousness breath?
Simply focusing on the sensations of breathing, i.e. focusing your attention fully on what it feels like to breathe in and breath out.
I know, for most of us the idea that we’re not our thoughts, emotions and sensations sounds ludicrous at best.
Someone telling you that is either insane or trying to sell you something. Or maybe trying to get you to join something (which is the same thing really).
I mean, for most of us we are our thoughts! That is completely our experience. And saying it’s not is irrational – it’s denying reality!
It’s nuts!
Except that it’s crazy-making, all this stuff in your head, and you want out. Maybe they know something you don’t?
But how can that be?! You’re in the same reality that they are, how can you be missing something so fundamental?
Well, it’s not that you’re missing anything, exactly… It’s just that you’re so busy paying attention to your thoughts and feelings that you’re not noticing the rest of you. You’re just missing the larger picture because you’re busy focusing on a small part of it, and you’ve done it so well and for so long (most of your life!) that you’ve actually forgotten that you can do anything else!
You’re literally out of the habit of exercising the other parts of you. It’s like if you only used one of your two healthy arms. If you did that long enough, if you focused exclusively on the one arm that you used, you’d likely completely forget that the other arm existed. Now who’s crazy? :)
So, you don’t believe that huge parts of you are here because you’re not using them. Because you’re using your mind and feelings exclusively. Of course you don’t know what people are talking about when they tell you to use your other arm! It makes sense. Your other arm, your bigger self, isn’t part of your experience (anymore).
The good news, is that if this makes sense to you and you want to play with it, you can get it back. In fact it hasn’t gone anywhere! Just like your arm, it’s still a part of you. You just need to stop focusing exclusively on your thoughts and feelings and notice the rest of you.
I recommend short practices for all beginners. Short meaning 2-5 minutes per practice. And the inevitable question is, is that effective? Should I practice longer?
The real question here is how long should I practice in order to get the best results?
My answer is, as always, it depends. As soon as you know why you’re practicing, what result you want, then you can answer that question yourself. The tricky bit is getting clear about why you’re practicing…
If You’re New to Practicing
Are you wanting to feel more peaceful? Then you’re going to want to practice long enough each sitting to see changes in your life overtime. That would be super tricky to figure out, until you’ve done it long enough to know.
In these kinds of cases, when you don’t know (yet) how long you need to sit to achieve your results, I recommend that you decide to practice an amount of time that fits super easily into your schedule. If you feel that it’s easy to fit in 5 minutes of practice a day, you will feel more peaceful already with your 5 minutes than if you try to cram in 20 (feeling rushed and stressed the whole time.)
Have You Been Practicing for Awhile?
On the other hand, if you’re wanting to achieve inner peace and you’ve been practicing long enough that you can reach that state DURING your practice, then simply choose an amount of time long enough that you can regularly reach that state. If you’re generally able to reach that state in 5 minutes, you could practice for 7, knowing that touching it for a few minutes every day will carry it into the rest of your life.
Remember that 7 minutes may be a good average amount of time, and that some days you may need more or less practice to get there. If you have a flexible schedule, feel free to change it up. On the other hand, you can sit for 7 minutes every day knowing that most of the time you will achieve your desired result.
Why All of That Might Be Wrong
I can think of about a million reasons, why the above two things are are a bad idea… For the first one, you could argue that everyone should sit for at least 20 minutes because that is the amount of time it takes for your average person to calm their mind. (Are you average? Me, neither.)
This I would argue with because, most of us will not start a new thing if it is too much of a time commitment. Plus, it’s extremely boring and challenging in the beginning and I prefer you to go slow, take it easy, enjoy what you’re doing and build into a longer practice (if you want to) knowing what you’re doing and armed with lots of experience about what works for you and what doesn’t.
Longer is only better if you’re really into it, and ready for it.
For the second, you could argue that if we’re hanging on to our expectations while we practice we’re not actually practicing mindfulness. We’re not observing what’s happening with non-attachment because we’re attached to our expectations. If we sit with, “I want to reach a state of peace during this practice, and I’m not going to stop until I get there,” that’s a lot of expectation to take into our practice.
This I agree with. And I also think that I’m able to notice if I’m able to reach the meditative state I’m going for or not. And when I’m doing well, I’m able to let the attachment go and just notice, “I’m here.” or not.
I have theoretical issues with this. And in practice, I do it all the time.
I could keep going…
Stick to the Shallow End at the Beginning
In the end, I think that if you’re new, shorter is definitely better. Get good at the mechanics before diving into the deep end. If you’re fairly experienced, I think it’s up for debate how to measure what’s best for you. I used to stick to a set amount of time for a slew of reasons. These days, I’m going for sitting in the Witness state for a few minutes.
There are traditions which have really strong opinions on this. Some of them are conflicting, and I’m sure they’re all correct.
I would love to know your experience! Feel free to share.
“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”
Lately, I’ve been noticing how helpful it is to be traveling this path of self-development with other people!
Practice In A Group
Today, I had a powerful practice with another person. It’s the kind of practice I do daily, and I had forgotten how powerful it is to practice together… When we’re moving in the same direction together, magic happens. Synergy is a real thing… one plus one is four. :)
This is why going to yoga classes, Tai Chi and mindfulness classes is so inspiring. Time and time again participants comment on how much deeper their practice is in class. It’s supportive. It’s inspiring. It keeps us going and reminds us why we practice at home.
Have A Journey Mate or Two
Also, having a trusted friend or two to share your more intimate things with can be invaluable! Yesterday, a friend and I did some reality checking together… Neither of us was being as clear with ourselves as we could be, and our friendship is such that we both felt ok to point that out to the other. “I think you’re asking way too much of yourself here.” or “I think you’re listening to your inner critic and not your deeper knowing.”
If you don’t have such a friend in your life, reflect if any of your friends would like to create that kind of relationship with you. Or open yourself up to that kind of friendship by becoming that kind of friend, first to yourself, and see who comes along.
We Thrive Together
If our external environment is a reflection of our internal state, we need all of the help we can get! I feel like the mess we’ve created on this planet requires us to clean ourselves up internally… At least enough that we can continue to live here.
If we work together, helping each other on our individual paths, I know we’ll get where (ever) we’re going faster.
Nor does mindfulness nor Tai Chi nor sitting in a cave.
I’m still crazy after 15 years of meditating. Ask my husband.
~
What makes you a better person is what you bring to these practices. Your willingness to change. Daily. It’s what do with the information you get from these practices that matters.
You could meditate for 50 years, not do anything with the information you get from your practice, and be the most raging arse on the planet. (You might understand the deeper truth that you’re more than just this jerk, but you’re still choosing to be the jerk.)
Seriously.
On the other hand, you could take, for instance, what you learn about your anger issues in these practices, apply a few self development tools and make great strides.
Even then, some things are easy to shift and others incredibly difficult. It’s not a perfect system by any means.
~
There’s no need to look up to people because they practice something.
Instead, notice if they’re doing their self development work. That’s the useful bit.
And then realize that you can do self development while washing the dishes. In fact, it’s possible that’s even better because there’s no cultural glitz attached and at least the dishes get cleaned!
~
If you were thinking you’d be a better person if you’d just start/keep practicing regularly, don’t. Don’t waste your precious mental energy.
Or your time.
If you’re really serious about being a better person, about living a better life, all you need to do is pay attention to yourself.
Notice what’s working and what isn’t, and do more of the first and less of the second.
If you need help adjusting the balance, find a short video or article about what you’re wanting to change and play with what they suggest.
Simple.
Don’t turn it into something bigger than you. No yoga pants or meditation cushion needed. Just you, your determination and attention.
~
Let go of what you’re not doing, or what someone else is doing. Let go of looking outside of yourself for something to fix you. Not your practice. Not your teacher. Not your precious future goals.
Grab a hold of what you have right now and do what you can now.
Go for it. One step at a time will get you a long, long way.
Enjoy the ride.
(Happily, you can’t miss it, cowgirl. You’re on it right now… which could scare you or excite you depending on what you decide to do right now.)
I do! And I’m doing a few simple things that you can play with, too…
Sleep.
Make sure you’re getting plenty of sleep, and know that according to Ayurvedia (Traditional Indian Medicine) we need more sleep in the winter.
Exercise!
We tend to go outside less when it’s cold and that can mean we’re less active than usual. If you don’t want to go out, get active indoors. Put on some great music and dance, do some yoga or body weight fitness (push-ups, lunges, etc ). Getting your energy flowing will help you flush out anything you don’t need.
Eat healthy.
Or, if like me you’re really feeling too full of everything, do a 1 day water fast (add lemon if you like). Fast with the intention of cleaning on every level and see what happens. (I’m feeling better already at 2pm, drinking lots of water, and letting things go!)
