So mindfulness is quite a buzzword these days, which I find wonderful.
It derives from the old language in the time of the Buddha, and the word is sati, which
the root of it is actually memory or remembering.
So in a way you can say it's remembering of something, remembering of ourselves, remembering
of what is going on, who we are in each moment.
It is not just about a technique that is helpful for reducing stress and tension or pressures,
it is actually touches upon many facets in our lives, including ethics, including heart,
including mind.
And usually we speak about it as being mindful of something.
So we might want to pay attention and know and be mindful of our bodies, for example.
And sensations in the body will reveal to us often what is going on in the mind and heart
as well.
So the body might be an important way in to understand the inner life.
That's one way of practicing mindfulness.
We can be mindful of our thoughts, of our emotions, feelings, state of mind, and the
mere act, one might say, of shedding light upon something, putting our attention with
something, is already in and of itself an important step towards healing.
In some of the texts, in the Buddhist ancient texts, it is referred to many times as seeing
and knowing.
So knowing, or the deep knowing, comes from the contact with seeing, hearing, some kind
of understanding that runs deep in the psyche of how we are in the world, what is going
on inside of me, what is going on also in the other.
So in other words, you can also say that mindfulness is a beautiful act of love.
We touch with our hearts, we touch another, we touch the world, we pay attention, we give
our attention to something that is dear to us.
So the difference between mindfulness and meditation is that, one you can say is included
in the other, there are many ways of practicing meditation.
And mindfulness, as I said before, is an English translation of a word in Pali, which is sati,
and it's paying attention, knowing what is happening right now, just bringing that into
our awareness, and it can be something that is going on in the inner life, and it can
be something that is going on in the outer life.
There are many different types of meditation, really, there are so many.
It really varies and depends, and you can say that mindfulness that we are practicing
is one kind of meditation.
You're asking me what I would say to someone that is new to meditation, or new to mindfulness
and want to come and learn it, I would say welcome, wonderful, it's such a good thing
to have an interest in the inner life, in the outer life, and really people don't need
to know exactly why they want to practice or learn mindfulness.
The initial spark is there, usually it comes for many reasons, sometimes it's from pain.
This is a strong force for many of us towards inner and outer change.
Others come out of curiosity, others just stumble across and just appear in a meditation
or mindfulness group.
So it's very simple, you don't need to have any tricks down your sleeve, just sit comfortably
and pay attention to begin with what is going on in the inner life, what is going on outside
of you as well, not in a way of thinking about it, but much more experiential way.
What do you feel, what do you sense, what is the link between feeling, thinking, sensing,
another way of looking at that.
This is just one way of talking about mindfulness, there are many ways one can speak about it
and understand it and it is not necessary a one thing, but for me it will be important
to say that it is not just about technique and it is not just about rearranging the
furnitures in samsara, getting a little bit more comfortable in our lives, which is wonderful
and a good thing in and of itself, but mindfulness does not stop there, it can utterly change
a life and the life of others for the better in deep and transformative ways.
It is about engaging with life, it is about having new ways of understanding, experiencing,
looking, acting in life itself, it's not about sitting somewhere remote and just being
mindful of our own little self, our own little world.
After a short time, it has to come out also to the world and if practiced correctly, it
bound to make a difference in one's own life and in the life of others.
So it really depends how you refer to, when you refer to mindfulness, it does not have
to stay on a surface level, just as a lightweight trick to alleviate a little bit of the pain
or getting more comfortable in life, it can get very deep and it can contribute enormously
to insights and understanding and therefore action and transformation in one's life.
So it really depends on the way in which we take it and it's really an engagement with
life, it's much more than just one lens of alleviating a little bit of the discomfort
in life as important as that also may be, of course.
So I would say I'm really glad that many people are interested and it's like a buzzword and
it has, it can have the risk of shallowness to it but it really depends on the person herself
or himself.
You can go very deep with this understanding and practice.
