“People are hard to hate close up. Move in. Speak truth to bullshit. Be civil. Hold hands. With strangers. Strong back. Soft front. Wild heart.” — Brené Brown

You brought darkness back into my life
cut me off from my joy, my spiritual union,
you, the leader of the pack, the loudest voice
posing as wise, knowing, compassionate, a self
declared healer of all who come near you, yet I found
you care not a jot for anything but your reputation.

You accosted me twice, forcing me to make
physical contact with an energy field I know to be
hate…

As within so without.

Mindfulness practice leads to a marrying of these two aspects of self, the inner and outer, to find a point of balance, a calming relationship between who we want to be, our best self, and who we are in reality, flawed and confused.

One of the ways to master this skill using mindfulness practice and the psychological wisdom of its teachings, is to locate your inner voices and listen to them. Mindfulness enabled me to hear the various influences, especially the negative ones ( aren’t they all negative anyway).

These voices control our lives in so…

This title of mine is a quote from an article by Cindi Lee in this weeks Lions Roar and it struck me as a wonderful and succinct summary of what we should all consider in ourselves. This article was written relating to partner yoga, where two people work together to achieve poses and to encourage each other and be present with each other.

I want to explore it further though.

The buddha taught that we all suffer, in one way or another we are all struggling somewhere in our life. …

Mindfulness is a way of life for me. Mindfulness means I am the ocean and the droplet in the ocean. This is true of everyone, if we choose to recognise this.

Mindfulness and being fully present is an ebb and flow constantly through life — it is up to us to ‘catch the wave’.

Not only do I write about mindfulness in various guises, I seek to incorporate it into every single aspect of my life. It is an outlook on life, a paradigm to help unpick and make sense of life. It is a joyful contribution to my life…

Most people talk about mindfulness in terms of concentration and being present. These are indeed important aspects of the practice of mindfulness, but say little about the experience of it on a day to day basis.

I have been practising mindfulness for over twenty five years, so not that long really but long enough to know I am committed to this way of life. However I am not rigid in this matter, it is not a fixed thing, not a religion.

Instead I am fluid with it, and I experience it as a flow throughout my life.

For me mindfulness…

I first came upon the term when I was reading one of Carl Jung’s memoirs or biographies — I forget which one now.

It is a word I have seen so much since then, as if it has become the most used word in the English language, in psycho-spiritual fields anyway — well not quite but you know what I mean, I am sure.

The basic meaning is when random things come together to create something that appears to have meaning, but were not related previously to each other.

The Webster Merrium dictionary online states it thus:
‘the coincidental occurrence…