Wherever You Go, There You Are - Mindfulness Meditation for Everyday Life
By: Jon Kabat-Zinn
Find out more here: https://jonkabat-zinn.com/
"... meditation really is the only human activity in which you're not trying to get anywhere else but simply allowing yourself to be where and as you already are."
This is a book I'd really recommend a lot of people reading!
It gives a very down-to-earth explanation of why and how mindfulness and meditation can benefit your well-being -- mentally and physically.
Without too much philosophical mumble-jumble or big hard-to-relate-to metaphors it tackles very real issues and gives tips on how you can start working on them - not to change your whole belief system, or to make you a better, grander, more perfect human being, but simply to offer space for you to be more at peace with who and what you already are.
Kabat-Zinn writes with humor, empathy, and once in a while a sharp edge to make you ponder yourself and your little corner of the world. The writing is engaging, borderline beautiful, and the whole book sectioned into to small very manageable bite-sized chapters.
For someone who's never tried mindfulness, I think it's a wonderful guide to the baseline "theory" behind it.
It's not a religious belief, it's not spirituality, it's a way to allow yourself to grow, to be, and to thrive. Whether you want to practice 30 min a day, or just 5 min it doesn't matter. Whenever you make time for yourself and your mind that's when your practice matter.
As someone who's practiced mindfulness longer than I realized (I've now recognized a pattern of my own way of being that started while I hiked in The Sierra Nevada back in 2016) this was a really great way to get into the depth of it. In my profession as a physiotherapist, I use it almost on a daily basis when encountering patients with pain. Here, the main focus is mostly on the breath. Whether it is to help overcome a sudden, acute and overwhelming pain, or to deal with long-term problems with aches and stress. It all comes back to the breath, to calm the mind right there and then, take control of the often uncontrollable fear and worry that is related to living with pain. To force the body to calm down (we trigger or parasympathetic nervous system when we breathe deeply) and thereby allowing our reasonable part of the our mind to take over - not our 'reptile' self. And in my practice, I see it work!
So yea, I believe strongly in mindfulness as a discipline and could keep writing about, ha!
For anyone curious about it - and how it may help ease pain - you can always reach out to me! (I'm no guru, but I'm happy to offer what tips I can).
If it's something that's been ruminating in your mind already, I'd highly recommend you to check out this book and get a more in-depth explanation of the ways to implement it everyday.
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