Mindfulness - Looking at your present life

Mindfulness – The Present is a Gift

The Past is gone and the Future is unknown. The only thing we have is the present of the Present. Everyday life presents us with new opportunities and challenges. However, we often squander the gift of the present, as we are either rooted in the past or speculating about the future. What does it take to be a little attentive to the present moment? How can you practice Mindfulness and discover a new way of looking at your present life? Vidisha Tripathi shares her thoughts on being mindful.

Related Read: Saying YES to Life

Mindfulness: A way of looking at your present life

We as humans usually have a lot on our plate, and even more on our minds! This often makes us vulnerable to intrusive thoughts, which are mostly negative and help us in no way. But wouldn’t we want to mend this problem? A problem which otherwise is called, “overthinking”. Mindfulness is one of the ways of living your present without any worries.

Mindfulness in our daily lives

Imagine a memory of you selecting your favorite ice cream flavor. You would, of course, be completely focused on thinking about which flavor would taste good. Here you were completely focused on ice cream flavors, even though it was a matter of 2 minutes you weren’t thinking about what to eat next or any other activity in the back of your mind. You were completely enjoying your life in that moment.

Let us take another example of you being in the middle of a table tennis game. Currently, you would be thinking about the speed of the ball or the tricks that the other player is using. You are heavily concentrating on the match and on nothing else, since that’s just not allowed at that moment. You are poised, you are focused and taking your eyes off the game would amount to throwing it in the hands of your opponent.

This is a normal human tendency of being focused on your present but this happens only in a few cases, where the external stimuli are excessively dominant for us to focus on anything else.

Related Read: Mindfulness and Me

Mind Your Studies

Now let’s take another example. When you are trying to study and focus, but your mind is wandering about and not allowing you to do so. We all just accept how boring it is to study. At that moment, you might be thinking about whether to upload a new post on your Instagram, or chat with your friends, or think about what you would eat today for dinner.

In this busy world, we humans are not able to put up our best everywhere. We tend to make a lot of mistakes in our daily lives, and then we mostly end up not getting the result we expected from ourselves. This causes irritation and frustration.

We can say mindfulness is about how focused you are on your present or how you are enjoying it. “To err is human” as we already know, but we can try our best to avoid it.

Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.
Thich Nhat Hanh

Related Read: Learning from Failure

Ways to stay Mindful

We have seen how important mindfulness is in our daily lives, but how do we put it in action? How can we absorb the positive energy around us that helps us to become a better version of ourselves? Mindfulness requires:

Positive attention towards your work
Energy for your work
Peace of mind
Positive environment
Organized and consistent effort
Setting priorities

As much as one needs to focus on their work and priorities, it is also necessary to take breaks in between. It is a natural function of our brain to seek recluse when we are preoccupied or tired, it begins to drift. Therefore, staying in top mental and physical condition is also necessary in your quest to gain mindfulness.

Mindfulness and Meditation

Meditation has been an effective practice to obtain peace of mind since ancient times. It is the easiest and one of the few guaranteed ways to gain mindfulness. These are a few steps to follow if you’ve already decided not to let your mind wander.

Find a quiet and good place to start your meditation journey
Sit straight and keep the spinal-chord stable
Relax your body
Slowly focus on breathing, the up and down movement of your chest
Keep your eyes closed
Focus on a positive thought, and don’t let it falter
Feel the positivity surge through you

Importance of having a positive environment

The environment and surroundings affect us deeply, more than we know and acknowledge. Your behavior and your activities mostly depend on what company you shake hands with.

Let’s say you are in a friends circle where you neither get importance nor you are comfortable being in it. However, you still don’t want to leave the company, because of peer pressure. If you think that being in such a company is cool, then you are probably having insecurities, forget what people tell you, it’s you who has to take your own life decisions. The more you try to fit in, the more you lose parts of yourself.

How can one stay focused in situations like that? You should never let your thoughts die because of what other people tell you. Its sometimes necessary to take a step back and see things from a different perspective and choose self love over peer pressure.

Now imagine yourself in a group where you are feeling valued and respected. The people around you help you grow and understand yourself better. When you see others being focused towards their lives you tend to get some inspiration from them and that force helps you stay focused as well.

Try to create an environment where people want to hear each other’s notes even when those notes are challenging, and where everyone has a vested interest in one another’s success.
Edwin Catmull

Related Read : A Friendship Lost

An Energetic Mind is a Strong Mind

Concentrating on something requires energy and also requires positivity. If you think that mindfulness only requires a good state of mind it’s not wrong, but it’s not the whole truth. Mindfulness also requires a good state of physical health, this depends on your diet and how ‘mindful’ you are of your body. Hygiene and Health are above everything.

Having an unhealthy diet with an excess of anything doesn’t only make you feel sluggish, it also saps your overall mental health. Dietitians and nutritionists all over the world first and foremost recommend everyone to regularly check their diets for a happy and healthy life. So we might do well to take their advice. The food we eat impacts our moods and behavior. People with well defined diet plans live significantly happier lives than those who don’t. Therefore, having a balanced diet is very important.

This doesn’t mean that you’ll always have to eat salads and can never eat your favourite fast-food again – Of course, you can. After all, treating yourself with little rewards at times is also extremely important. But, so is keeping an eye on whether you’re crossing the limit with those rewards. This way your inner being would be at peace and you will be able to focus better without any distractions.

Related Read : How to Stay Positive and Productive

Physical and Mental Balance

Another way of balancing your focus levels is exercising. Exercise not only helps us keep our body fit, it also prevents your thoughts from going amok. If you are involved in any kind of physical training, your mind readily focuses all your attention on that particular activity. Especially, if we vary the exercise routine. Variations help with re-focusing and makes the overall event more interesting.

Exercising is a good way to vent the frustration one keeps within. You feel your stress, anger and fatigue burn out as you continue to physically exert yourself. Doing certain activities like playing badminton, table tennis, football or any other sport with all your heart is another way of practicing mindfulness.

Related Read: SUPER Physical Fitness and Mental Health

Conclusion

Our mind is a wondrous space. We still have so much to know and learn, as the things around us are ever-changing. We don’t want to miss out on anything. I hope you have a better understanding of how to live in the present moment and why it is so important. Let mindfulness be the answer to all your problems and provide you a new way of looking at your present life.

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Vidisha Tripathi - From The Experts Mouth FTEM — Vidisha Tripathi

About The Author

Vidisha Tripathi is a student in middle school, who is interested in writing essays, articles and poems. She is also an Indian classical singer, learning music from Akhil Gandharva Mahavidyalaya. Vidisha also likes participating in debates and MUN’s.