We know what you’re probably thinking: if one more person tells you to be “mindful,” you’re going to lose your goddamn mind. How is being mindful of the fact that you’re stressed (or angry, or want to burn down your boss’s house) going to help you actually be less stressed (or angry, or pyromaniacal)? Here’s the secret: it’s probably not. And according to Andy Puddicombe, co-founder of Headspace, the hyper-popular meditation app with a $320 million valuation, you shouldn’t expect it to.
“That itself is an interesting thing: the assumption that meditation is designed to eliminate stress or any unpleasant feelings or thoughts from our lives,” says Puddicombe, “It doesn't matter how much you meditate, difficult stuff still happens. And we're still going to experience it. It's how we relate to it when it happens, and how long we hold onto it afterwards.”
And this is coming from a man who spent nearly a decade in monasteries (and who’s also the soothing voice inside the app). But the 45-year-old dad, husband, author, and ex-monk says that even if meditation and mindfulness isn't the key to erasing your stress, it just might help you better handle it when it sets in.
“That itself is an interesting thing: the assumption that meditation is designed to eliminate stress or any unpleasant feelings or thoughts from our lives,” says Puddicombe, “It doesn't matter how much you meditate, difficult stuff still happens. And we're still going to experience it. It's how we relate to it when it happens, and how long we hold onto it afterwards.”
And this is coming from a man who spent nearly a decade in monasteries (and who’s also the soothing voice inside the app). But the 45-year-old dad, husband, author, and ex-monk says that even if meditation and mindfulness isn't the key to erasing your stress, it just might help you better handle it when it sets in.
1. Mindfulness makes it possible to do big things
You might be surprised to learn that #1 on Puddicombe’s daily to-do list isn’t meditation, it’s cardio. The morning we spoke, he’d just finished an hour of rowing.
“I actually count the strokes in the same way that I would count my breath if I was meditating, and I'm just with one stroke at a time,” says Puddicombe. “It doesn't feel like an hour on the rower. It feels like lots of one-strokes.”
This might sound like the type of advice you’d ordinarily roll your eyes at—especially if you’ve ever tried rowing for an hour without nearly dying—but it’s worth reiterating: every project begins with a single row step. Sixty minutes on a rowing machine for a first-timer can seem daunting; moving the oars once is manageable. But ignore the rowing, this isn’t about rowing. It’s about handling any task that, when taken in totality, seems daunting—whether that be an hour’s run, a do-or-die work project, or learning a new language. Break down macro goals into micro segments, and then stay as engaged in each of those smaller tasks as you can. Or, at the risk of plagiarising a motivational poster near you, turn your days into “lots of one-strokes.”
“Most people are totally focused on the destination with no recognising or acknowledging how important the micro-elements of that journey are,” says Puddicombe. “[If] you talk to elite athletes, it's actually about the little things that they do every single training session. You see someone winning gold at the Olympics—in a way, that's just an outcome. It's a great achievement, but it's all the little things that have created that effect.”
2. Mindfulness makes for a better workout
Speaking of athletic endeavors, let’s revisit Puddicombe’s rowing parable. There’s another lesson here: Mindfulness will get you swole. Yes, really. Take whatever exercise you’re doing and focus on doing it with perfect form. Chances are that your concentration on performing the platonic ideal of a plank—and your screaming core—will block out everything else entirely. You are singularly focused. In other words, you’ve just leveraged your desire to have Antonio-Brown-grade abs to trick yourself into being more mindful.
3. Mindfulness puts stress in the proper context
Managing stress, in all its insidious forms, is often a perception problem. Try this: Rewind six months and remember what - on that exact day — was your biggest source of stress. Can’t remember? What about the most stressful moment of that week? Month? In the moment, stress expands like a gas, filling every nook and corner of your brain. But once you’ve resolved the problem, you probably never think about it again.
"Rather than thinking about being mindful for the whole day, which is kind of impossible, do it at the beginning of each activity"
Next time you’re freaked out about something, step into the stress and assess the situation mindfully. Fast forward a week—is the issue so small that you probably won’t be thinking about it by then? Great, go forth knowing you can solve it and you’ll be free soon. If you foresee it being that big of a deal, go back to #1 up there and start plotting your first step. (Puddicombe says he often invokes the monastic teachings of "impermanence" in moments like this: everything is always changing, and whatever comes will—eventually—go, and that includes work-related angst.)
“[Mindfulness] doesn't negate the thing but it gives us an immediate sense of perspective, so we're not firing off emails to everybody,” says Puddicombe. “Instead [it’s] going, ‘Okay so what's the best way to deal with this? What can I do to be helpful in this part?’”
4. Mindfulness breaks the habit of creating empty habits
The human brain loves habits: they’re efficient, (hopefully) useful, and provide a calming sense of stability to your day. They’re also the death-knell of creativity and mindfulness. When an activity becomes routine, you cease actively thinking about it: you walk the same way to work and arrive not remembering a thing about the commute, or automatically turn the TV on when you get home, or eat three yellow Starbursts at exactly the same time post-lunch. (I may be projecting here.) Habits turn off your mind.
There’s a Zen expression called “beginner’s mind,” and the goal is to reclaim and maintain that sense of newness in whatever it is you do. And if that, too, sounds impossible, Puddicombe wouldn’t argue (and he’s probably been trying to practice it for a lot longer than you have).
“Rather than thinking about being mindful for the whole day, which is kind of impossible, [do it] at the beginning of each and every activity. Say, ‘Okay for this next half hour' — or hour, however long the activity is - ’I'm going to strive to present and attentive in everything I do.’ Then at the end of the activity, you briefly reflect, not to judge it or or be critical in any way, just notice: Did you get distracted a lot — or not that much? And then when you begin the next activity, you just do exactly the same thing. If you go through the day systematically bookending each and every activity, you start, over time, to become more present.”
Published in: https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/headspace-andy-puddicombe-how-to-be-mindful
See more at: Morisberacha.com
See more at: Morisberacha.com
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