Decidir V. Decidido
Posted: October 8, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout, Yoga | Tags: blogging, crossfit, cycling, Facebook, family, fitness, free range, freshly pressed, friends, gluten free, happiness, health, hipster, kindness, Learning, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, mind, Mindfulness, motivation, musings, natural, nature, Omaha, paleo, passion, perspective, philosophy, pilates, running, Thought, trail running, walking, whole foods, WOD, writing, yoga 9 CommentsIf someone comes along and shoots an arrow into your heart, it’s fruitless to stand there and yell at the person. It would be much better to turn your attention to the fact that there’s an arrow in your heart-
If through practicing mindfulness, we practice letting go of thoughts – hopefully? We need another practice for letting thoughts in, getting comfortable with threats from soccer moms, the risks associated with yoga class, discouraging and difficult thoughts during a recent early morning run. We need to exercise our ability to comprehend the tedious, harsh and more discouraging thoughts we encounter during the day more so than blasting reps and sets in a gym. Without ever practicing letting thoughts in? We tend to interpret the world through the lens of easy, wishful thinking …
We need to be brave enough to take our shoes off, expose our knackered and worn toenails to step confidently into dark, discouraging and confusing waters in our quests for uncertain gratification.
It’s not enough to be able to dismiss all the “thoughts” we process and return to the here and now as “mindfulness” practice encourages. Seriously folks – Please read the last sentence again. This is where many people get mindfulness wrong, horribly wrong: Mindfulness practice is most attractive and helpful to people who succumb to the weight of negative thoughts and feelings.
Consider that most often mindfulness is meant to discourage, discouragement.
You may be able to tell I am clearly frustrated with the current view, adopted by so many in regards to mindfulness. The power of neutral-thinking, an ability to, in effect pre-grieve the possibilities of not having the latest yoga fashion(s) so that we aren’t scared of living without them, limbering our minds much the way we learn to breathe into and surrender to the searing burn of a stretched hamstring during chair pose.
Notes:
By letting thoughts in, we have already visited failure, humiliation and injury. We are prepared to contemplate deeply even when it’s not cool or trendy. Here’s the harsh truth that many yogis, blog posts and tired yoga magazine articles fail to provide us: Mindfulness practice is not believing you can ward off undesirable outcomes by not thinking about them.
CultFit 
Many new age, positive thought, etc. gurus seem to say you should live life saying “cancel, cancel” and avoiding any negativity. Personally, I believe it is more powerful to really move into seeing it, feeling it, allowing it, then blessing and transforming it. I am willing to step into the fire and the muck as I have seen the value in facing stuff as when I then am able to move beyond it, I have made a deep shift in my being. Otherwise, I would just be living in fear of negativity, and that is giving it more power.
Thanks for this post!
My apologies for being a tad bit more snarky than normal with this post. I feel, deeply, that when we ignore and turn away from the darker side of life we leave a void within us. I’m all for positivity and being a free spirit, with out a care in the world – however, as you passionately know, we can learn so much more about ourselves when life gets messy and goes sideways. 🙂 May your heart be filled with happiness this evening, take care!
I didn’t read the post as snarky. I enjoyed it as I feel the same way. So many metaphysical people I am around will chide me if I mention some negative feeling or reaction, as if I need to keep all that inside and only focus on the “positive” or what it is I desire instead. But I feel that it is important to face what is coming up, as only then can I truly own it and transform it.
I’m trying to absorb all of this is a very tired mind and body. So I returned to your first statement and it speaks so loudly, and clearly, to me. Thank you. Peace to you this evening.
I’m glad you were able to take some meaning from this meandering post! To save you the long story, it was a collection of thoughts from a crazy four day weekend. A conversation I had with myself you could say. 😉
Ah….sometimes we must clear out the clutter in our heads and let the meandering do so freely. 🙂
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For me, mindfulness is not about positive or negative – it’s about impact. Recognizing that my thoughts and actions have impact on myself and on others. And that if I see where my thinking may be changed to influence the impact for the better, then I can start thinking differently about a thing.
If I am seated in meditation, I just let whatever thoughts I’m thinking come along, not dismissing them, but rather just taking note of what they are. What topics are on my mind. So that I can devote some focused time to those topics later. When I’m seated…
I think there’s a predisposition in the yoga world to tell people what they should or shouldn’t be doing in meditation – that there are rules to it. In my view, the only rule to a meditation practice is that time be made for it. How that time is spent – seated, moving, laying down, running – and what thoughts come from it along with how much time is spent on those thoughts is up to the thinker. I know people who tell me they’ve never meditated but then will tell me that they run 40 miles a week and it really helps them clear their head, get clarity, etc. It’s not that they don’t meditate, it’s just that they meditate 40 miles a week.
This whole “yoga” thing of late is bugging me. Like an itch I can’t quite seem to reach …
It ties into my posy today of placing labels on “things”. Meditation, is just that – Meditation. Yoga – Is simply yoga. Its how we define each one, to ourselves that matters the most. Ugh – I’ll get myself all fired up over this 😉
Be well this afternoon!