Author: Jim Walsh

The foundation of mindfulness meditation practice is to bring directed attention to some aspect of our experiencing.  Breathing is simplest; always there, noticeable at the tips of the nostrils very viscerally, or in the rising and falling of the belly, even in the movement of the chest muscles.  Attention can also be paid to any number of mental objects, including thoughts, images, sensations, sensory objects, or emotions.  The mind that notices its activity, brings focused attention to that activity, without judging, is the mindful state we seek to develop.

What’s the point of this ongoing practice?  Simply to strengthen the mind’s capacity to be fully present, in this moment, with acceptance.  Why bother?  There are a lot of good reasons, some of them psychological, many of them religious/spiritual, and still more related to our physical health.  This practice is associated with psychological well being, spiritual peace, and stress reduction.  In a nutshell, spending 10 or 15 minutes every day in mindfulness practice is good for you in any way you can imagine.

Today’s (January 19, 2014) NY Times magazine has an excellent article about mindfulness meditation.  Here’s the link to that article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/19/magazine/breathing-in-vs-spacing-out.html?ref=magazine&_r=0

The author, Dan Hurley, makes many of the same points I’ve made about the benefits of mindfulness, but he raises an interesting and important issue about a drawback to the practice.  It turns out that the focused state of mind promoted by mindfulness practice is contrary to the “spaced out frame of mind” that many, including me, find conducive to creativity.  I agree.  My experience with the creative moment is that the mind is free of any fetters, wandering a bit.  There’s a line in the Beatles’ song “Across the Universe” (a John Lennon composition) that captures this perfectly:  “Thoughts meander like a restless wind inside a letterbox, they tumble blindly as they make their way across the universe.”

I don’t think that mindfulness practice inhibits or hampers creativity.  To the contrary, I think it enhances the creative process after the initial stroke of insight that initiates, at least for me, creative work.  I’ve noticed over the years that as my mind has developed the capacity to maintain an evenly divided attention, there’s an underlying awareness of thoughts meandering, without in any way trying to dampen the emerging looseness of associations.  In my counseling work this state of mind seems valuable as a tool to help me to make connections that may be helpful to my therapy clients.  So, in a somewhat paradoxical way, that state of “spacing out” that is associated with creativity seems to combine seamlessly with a noticing mind that makes space for the spacing out.  So as I’m in full blown “wandering mind mode” I’m noticing it mindfully.  Sometimes I notice some novel way of understanding things in that attention to mind wandering.  If I  choose to pursue that novel idea, then being able to concentrate on that idea facilitates the ensuing creative process.

In a way the spaced out mind and the sharply focused mind are two sides of a mental coin, and both can be noticed mindfully.  That seems a bit odd to say; if your mind is wandering or sharply focused, what exactly is doing the noticing?  It’s your own mind noticing of course, your own mind in the act of self awareness; “I am aware that I am aware.”

Well, I hope that makes sense.  In any case, I think this article in the Times is essential reading for those of us who practice mindfulness.  Happy reading!

Peace,

Jim

When I was in sales (17 years, the first 9 in territories, the last 8 in management) I came to the conclusion that the decisions my customers made whether to buy a product or not were not predictable.  I always made my sales quotas, but I had a terrible track record predicting which accounts would close and when they would place their orders.  I became adept at giving my superiors sales forecasts that came true, but only on the bottom line.  I could generally guess how much income my territory would generate, but your guess was as good as mine concerning which prospects would account for the revenue.

I am not embarrassed to make this observation.  It has been my experience that people make decisions based much more on how they feel about the choices they have than what is the most logical action to take.  Years ago I came to the conclusion that one could divide the world into two camps.  First, there are the people who make decisions quickly but can apply rational thought to the issue after the fact so they can amend or alter that decision, as they see fit.  The other group of people are the ones who paid for my kids‘ college education:  quick deciders, with no after the fact rational process.  I really liked selling to that second crowd; once they’re on your side they won’t budge (conversely, of course, if they’re not on your side at first…).  But in the long run the better customers were the first lot, who were able to backfill their feeling-driven decision with solid logic and rational thought.  The second group may have led to a lot of good commissions, but the first group were the repeat customers that helped pay the bills month after month.

Our minds have many processes occurring simultaneously, most of them remaining hidden from our active, day to day awareness.  The process we notice most easily is discursive thought.  It has the feel of intentionality, is usually goal directed, and seems like the final word on how we live each moment of our lives.  But in our mindfulness practices we begin to notice that there’s much more going on underneath the radar of our awareness than discursive thought.  There are emotions arising, urges and desires, bodily sensations, memories in images and sounds and other sensations, feelings of boredom, and the inevitable need to go to the bathroom.  I think the sub rosa processes that are the most interesting to me are the urges and desires, which take on the aura of a command.  Sometimes those urges are a command to move, or stop meditating, or to think about some problem or make plans for the tasks to come later in the day.  My desires may command me to focus on some pleasant memory or person or event.  The urge may be as mundane as the command to scratch an itch, and I never ceased to be amazed at how many there are.

This non-rational part of your mind truly commands many of the actions you engage in during the course of a normal day.  Sometimes you might call it your intuition, sometimes you may say “I just felt like it,” and sometimes you might wonder “why did I do THAT?!”  But the bottom line, it seems to me, is that the non-rational processes in my mind dictate much of what I say and do and I want to become better acquainted with them.

When you sit in mindfulness meditation pay attention to the coursing of the mind.  Like a stream meandering through the wilderness, its twists and turns come as a surprise, but when viewed through a rear view mirror they may seem logical and even inevitable.  Your mind will seem, ironically, to have a “mind of its own,” though that idea raises some existential dread!  But as you become more closely aware of your non-rational mind, approach it with this intention: “you cannot make the irrational rational, you can only experience it.”  That is a quote from Neil Genzlinger, the New York Times book reviewer and theater and television critic, from his article (in the Sunday Times Travel section on 11/10/13) about the first time he ran in a Ragnar, an insanely fun way to run an extraordinary distance in relay with friends over the course of several days.  Here’s the link to the article; it’s well worth reading:

And, as always, may your life be filled with the blessings of living mindfully, with the intention to accept life as it emerges, considering every possibility, questioning nothing.

Peace,

Jim

I recently was invited to give a talk to a group of people in the “Helping Relationship” field on the topic of Resilience.  This is an issue for those of us who choose to be helpers, as we frequently find ourselves helping others to be resilient but not paying much attention to our own well being.  I know I’ve found myself getting into low spirits, physical exhaustion and emotional diminishment from not taking care of myself.  As they say on any commercial flight: “First, put on your own oxygen mask…”

Some of the people at this conference found my talk helpful.  So I decided to post the PowerPoint slides I used with an embedded narrative.  Perhaps you’ll find the material helpful for you.

In the meantime, if you want to read a good book on the topic of Willpower and self-regulation, which are the heart and soul of Resilience, try “Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength” by Roy Baumeister and John Tierney.  It’s a great read filled with excellent information.

And here’s my presentation; it’s a little under 40 minutes long: Resilience and Ego Depletion With Narrative

Peace,

Jim

So, why be forgiveness-centered rather than justice-centered?  I think there are three good reasons that argue for forgiving as the go-to response to any act of meanness or neglect on the part of another person.  But before I articulate those three reasons, I want to be completely clear on one point: forgiveness does not mean you allow a perpetrator to violate you again!  If someone is dangerous, you keep a strong boundary and, if it is appropriate, make certain that others are protected as well.  But most of the violations we experience day to day do not have such an existential threat, and it’s the day to day violations that can cast us into the downward spiral of anger and retribution seeking.  With that in mind, here are my three reasons for making forgiveness your go-to response to those day to day violations:

First, having a basic orientation toward forgiveness is good for your body.  Our friends whose primary focus is on getting justice have more frequent health problems in many areas including hypertension, digestive system problems (ulcers, IBS…), fatigue; basically any health issue related to chronically elevated stress levels.  The second reason is that forgiveness is good for your mind.  People who are forgiving by nature are much less likely to struggle with a host of neurotic disorders, beginning with depression and anxiety and including addiction and problems with impulse control.  Finally, forgiveness is good for the soul.  While we can certainly define the conditions that tend to reduce suffering, we struggle sometimes to understand the conditions under which people report deep satisfaction with life, finding serenity and tranquility that transcends body and mind.  Try forgiving unconditionally and see how it changes you.  Your body will be more relaxed, your mind will be at ease, but you’ll also feel something deeper, something that makes you feel more alive.

In a sense forgiveness is a form of love.  When we choose to forgive we choose to turn the other cheek, to let go of the desire to strike back.  Why bother?  Martin Luther King, Jr. said it clearly: “Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.”  But it’s not only love extended to others; it’s love extended to ourselves.  Alexandra Asseily, a Lebanese psychotherapist who advocates for forgiveness between the warring communities in Beirut, has said that “If we let go of the pain in the memory, we can have the memory, but it doesn’t control us.”  This is our challenge: to love those who hurt us so that we do not condemn ourselves to being controlled by the pain they have caused.

This challenge encompasses adopting a different mindset than most of us have been taught.  Once again I’d like to quote Martin Luther King, Jr.:  “We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive.  He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.  There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us.  When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.”

I think we all love to put energy into discovering the mountains of good inside each of us, but alongside our self-esteem building I think it is also important to acknowledge the shadow side we all have, and lose any sense of self righteousness when faced with the shadow side of another.  And if you think about it, isn’t your shadow side really just a reflection of those areas of your life where you’ve been hurt the most?  Think about that for a second.  There are parts of you that hurt people, or can be petty or greedy or inconsiderate or, at times, even hateful.  When those little toads of ignorance come flying out of your mouth, isn’t that just the part of you that got badly hurt and doesn’t trust anymore?  Perhaps just wants to protect you from more hurt?  Well, if that’s true about you, then it’s true about the person who might have just hurt YOUR feelings!  Wouldn’t it be easy to forgive if you saw the hurtful actions of another as evidence of their suffering instead of as evidence of their defective character?  And if you recognized that this person in front of you who just hurt you is actually suffering, wouldn’t you want to respond with compassion, with forgiveness?

Why be forgiving by nature?  Because we all need to be forgiven!  Fred Luskin of Stanford University put it this way: “Forgiveness of self emerges when we understand that even with our own actions we do not have total control.  Everybody makes mistakes.”  If it’s OK for me to make a mistake, then the least I can do is forgive you when YOU make a mistake.

So here’s my advice if you want to be a more forgiving person.  First, set the intention early in each day.  Decide before you begin the work of the day that you wish to be forgiving today.  Second, notice.  Be aware of anger when it arises.  Pay attention to how it changes your body and your mind.  Then take a mindful breath, accept that your body and mind are in this state, and look outside of yourself for a moment.  See the person in front of you as someone who has hurts and suffering all his/her own.  Know that whatever that person just did, you might have done the same or something similar (it’s always dangerous to say “I’d never do that!”).  Accept that person as he/she is; it’s not your job to change them.  Then let this question guide you: “How can I help this other person to suffer less?”  Perhaps it’s a simple “Are you OK?”  Or maybe you simply say out loud that you can see that he/she is upset/angry/sad/afraid and “I don’t want to make this worse for you.”  Or maybe you simply return a kind word, gesture, or action for the slight or insult.

Often, when in the moment that hurts, we don’t have the presence of mind to make a skillful response like I’m advocating for in the paragraph above.  That’s OK; that just means that in our meditations or thinking through later on we go through the same process I’ve described.  The key is to see this other person as someone who thinks and feels and acts much like any other person, including yourself.  And then to remember that you have an opportunity to help through your kindness.  Small thoughtful acts of forgiving will change the world one person at a time, beginning with yourself.

One final suggestion.  Archbishop Desmond Tutu wrote a book called “No Future Without Forgiveness” about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that then-President Nelson Mandela formed to begin the healing process in South Africa after the end of apartheid.  If you don’t think forgiveness is possible or important, then please watch Desmond Tutu’s conversation with the journalist Bill Moyers.  It’s only 10 minutes, but it describes the transfiguration that forgiveness brings about:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRDBWoV_hA0

Peace,

Jim

In my first post on forgiveness I focused on anger and its consequences.  I don’t want to give the impression that I’m against anger as a human experience.  Anger happens, it’s what our bodies do when we perceive an injustice.  The issue isn’t finding some magical way to never FEEL anger in our bodies but rather the issue is to find the most skillful means to work to relieve that anger.  Anger hurts; anger perpetuated hurts badly.  The health consequences (see the video link in the previous post) can become catastrophic.

I believe it is important to look at anger as a sign that your body gives you to act, in the moment, to correct an injustice.  But it’s important to know that there are many options to consider, not just to act aggressively through a loud voice or a pounding fist or a threatening stare.  If you think about it, learning to diminish your bodily anger will enable your mind to diminish its emotional reasoning, which inevitably leads to the adoption of a broader cognitive perspective.  So if you can diminish your bodily anger, not only will your body fare better from a health perspective, but you’ll be able to think more clearly and resolve the injustice with greater skill.  I’d call this a true win/win!

So, the first step in the forgiveness process is simply to notice when anger is arising, and adopting the intention to diminish its strength.  This is where our mindfulness practice is essential.  When the body gets revved up in anger it can be very difficult to begin to relax.  If you have a mindfulness practice you know that simply taking a mindful breath, perhaps with your eyes gently closed, and redirecting your anger-focused attention for a few moments to the peacefulness of your breathing can immediately help your body to stand down.  A simple mindful breath, for one who meditates regularly and has learned to be present non-judgmentally, will slow the body and the mind down to a manageable speed.

With our bodies and minds moving a bit more slowly, the process of cognitive widening occurs.  Now we are able to take perspective, to see a bigger picture.  We can look at the event provoking our anger and ask a few simple questions: Does this truly concern me?  Has this person intentionally acted to cause pain and suffering?  Can this problem be corrected?  Is it MY job to correct it?  Should this person be punished for what s/he has done?  Or should I let go of this and move on?

Notice something: I’m not talking about a major event, a lifetime transgression, something traumatic.  I’m talking about the day-to-day events that happen without warning, and cause annoyance.  The customer service representative who treats you rudely.  The boss who criticizes you publicly.  Your wife/husband who forgets to do something you needed him/her to get done.  Your son/daughter acting disrespectfully.  I could go on and on, but I think you get the picture.

It’s helpful if we can correct the transgression, and make right whatever has gone wrong.  But now I think it’s essential to decide, in the course of a day-to-day annoying event, do I put my energy into punishing this person, getting justice, or do I forgive instead?  We can spin our wheels and expend a lot of energy being the arbiter of justice, and God knows there are plenty of opportunities, if we so choose, to act as judge and jury.  But in this world of small annoyances, what good does this really do for you?  Has your day gotten better because you were able to tell the customer service representative what a jerk he is?  Or told stories about your boss behind her back to make her look foolish?  Or made your wife/husband feel defensive with a cutting remark?  Or made your child feel small and powerless by exacting punishment for every mistake he makes?  I can only speak for myself, but being focused on BEING RIGHT is exhausting and, frankly, not a very skillful way to living a life worth living.

If you’re like me, you want to be more forgiving than judgmental and punishing.  But it’s not always easy to do so.  It requires that you work at it, work that, in my opinion, is very spiritual work.  It requires that you see things from the other person’s point of view, understand how their actions made sense to them in the moment they did them, and make a conscious effort, set a mindful intention, to not act toward that other person with anger.  Instead, to act toward that person in kindness, with compassion, to demonstrate your caring and concern for them, over and above yourself.

Well, that’s counter-cultural!  And can be controversial if not fully understood and accepted.  More to come in my next post!  But until that time, please take a few minutes to read and watch about Forgiveness and Justice.  I think you’ll see where I’m going with this if you do.  Here’s the link:  http://www.thepowerofforgiveness.com/understanding/index.html#

Peace,

Jim

I think that “forgiveness” is one of the most misunderstood words I’ve encountered in my work as a pastoral therapist.  Sometimes the reaction is astonishment: “you want ME to let HIM off the hook!”  Sometimes the reaction is anger: “how DARE you suggest that HE is not responsible for what he DID!”  And sometimes, regrettably, the reaction is shame: “I guess it really WAS my fault.”  Each of these reactions comes from a common misconception about forgiveness: that it absolves the offender from responsibility for his/her actions.  Nothing could be further from the truth.

To forgive is to decide to seek relief from the consequences of your own anger at another person through engaging a process that includes letting go of some aspect, perhaps all, of your right to retribution against the offender, coming to a clearer understanding of this other person, and performing some act of kindness either directly toward the offender or, if that would be inappropriate, then indirectly in some symbolic way.  Allow me to explain.

When someone offends me in some way anger arises.  That’s what anger is about: my body’s reaction to a real or perceived offense.  The next time you feel angry (i.e. your body experiences this affective state) take note of exactly what is happening to provoke the feeling and meditate on how it is that you perceive that event as a violation.  If you cannot find the violation, then consider the possibility that anger may not be an appropriate response!  In any case, you’ve begun the journey to forgiveness with a simple, mindful action: you’ve noticed the feeling, and noted the provoking event.  Great start!

The next step on the journey is to notice the consequences of anger.  Some of them are good.  Anger generally is an energizing emotion, one that makes one’s physical response stronger and swifter.  For this reason football coaches have been getting players angry at halftime for as long as there’s been organized football!  But notice, also, the downside of the anger response: cognitive narrowing.  When you’re feeling angry at least two cognitive phenomena occur: the first is that it is very difficult to think of anything other than the object of your anger.  If this process persists you’ve entered into the act of “perseveration” (a $10 word if there ever was one!), meaning you’ve become preoccupied with the anger-provoking event.  This perseveration can be tricky: as a result of your preoccupation you may initiate a feedback loop.  The more you think of the event, the angrier you get.  The angrier you get the more you think of the event.  Now you’re really suffering.

The second typical cognitive phenomenon that occurs when we’re angry is “emotional reasoning.”  I’ve posted on this before; it’s simply the logic that proceeds from emotional states.  When angry, we think thoughts that illustrate and confirm that we’ve been violated.  But the problem with emotional reasoning is that it has a bias built into it.  If your body FEELS it, then it MUST BE TRUE, or at least that is what your body wants you to believe.

So there you are, some of the problems that anger can cause.  Something happens, you perceive it as a violation, your body becomes aroused, you start to get over-focused on the event, you start thinking “angry thoughts,” which cause more anger, and you conclude that you must be right.  All in all, a formula for suffering.  These are the consequences of anger if it is not managed with skill and self-compassion.  It’s a very seductive emotion; anger feels strong and if we have a history of being violated it can become the “go to” emotion, being felt when no violation has been committed.  Anger ruins relationships, cardiovascular health, digestive health, spirituality, families, and lives.  The prevalence of anger in our society (go ahead, watch an evening of network television, and see how much of what passes for drama and comedy is based on anger) calls for a commitment to forgiveness, the surest antidote to the suffering of anger.

In this series of posts I want to make the case for considering forgiveness as a process to embrace when you feel angry.  In order to do so you need a definition of forgiveness.  This definition is a good one in my opinion:

Forgiveness is a conscious, willful choice to turn away from the pain, hurt, resentment, and wish for revenge that arises from a betrayal, offense, injustice, or deep hurt. Forgiveness involves a willingness to see the transgression and transgressor in a larger context, and to replace negative feelings with compassion and tolerance.  (from Robert Enright, PhD)

Please note that this definition is not about the offender, and not about the offense:  it is about YOU!  Forgiveness is about a change to your perspective, your point of view, and as a result of that shift a change in how you feel.  Forgiveness is about finding relief, and being able to love in greater freedom.

I hope that you are able to see clearly how the anger process works in you and what price you pay when you hold on to that anger toward another person.  I’m sure it won’t surprise you to learn that people who hold on to anger suffer greatly, and that people who are able to forgive suffer less.  If you’re unsure of this, take a moment to read this information concerning forgiveness and health, and watch the three brief videos on this website page:

http://www.thepowerofforgiveness.com/understanding/health.html#

The journey to forgiveness will continue with my next post.

Peace,

Jim

There are days in our life that can be remembered with one word.  For me, say “69 Mets” (OK, two words) and I’m transported to Linden Street in my home town, literally dancing down the street after hearing the last out recorded in the 1969 World Series, clutching my little transistor radio in my hand knowing that my beloved “Miracle Mets” had just pulled off the biggest reversal of fortunes in the history of baseball.  More tragically, say “Lennon” and I’m transported back to that terrible morning when we all awoke to learn that the “smart Beatle” had been shot down senselessly.  The best of times and the worst of times are often punctuated with a singular memory, a lone word that brings back all the images and thoughts and feelings.

For me, “Hamantaschen” has become one of those words.  In October of 2010 we lost a beloved man, my father in law, Tom.  I met him for the first time when I picked up my wife-to-be for our first date.  I knew I was getting into something special; he treated me like another son (he already had two) from the beginning.  He worked hard, helped anyone who needed a hand, took his faith and his family to his heart and never let go.  He lived with us for several years when his health began to decline, and when he died we all grieved deeply.

Hamantaschen are the sweet, triangular cookies traditionally eaten during the Jewish holiday of Purim.  I’m not Jewish, but when I learned about Purim I wished I was!  What a joyous holiday and what a story.  Esther and Mordecai, King Ahasuerus, Haman, who ends up on the gallows, and the Jewish people are delivered from annihilation.  Purim sounds like a blast, and I hope someday I’m able to partake in the festivities.

When my father in law died we were overcome by the outpouring of love from the community.  The viewing was held in the church of his home parish on the morning of his funeral Mass.  Hundreds of people came out to honor this man who died in his early ‘90s.  Middle aged men cried remembering their old Little League baseball coach.  Elderly parishioners recalled how many times Tom had shown up to help them, never claiming any special credit for his charitable nature.  Tears and celebration flowed all morning.

And then my good friend and fellow meditator, Judy, walked up the center aisle of the church with a box in her hands and a smile of comfort on her face.  “Here,” she said, “these are for you and your family.”  Hugs all around, and I opened the box and found Hamantaschen!  “You need something sweet in a time like this” she said.  And as quickly as she came up the aisle she was gone.

My wife and our family savored those cookies.  To this day all I have to say to her is “Hamantaschen” and we both break into a smile that says it all: dad has died and we miss him and we mourn him; but life is good and is filled with loving and comforting.  When I think of Judy and of Hamantaschen I am transported back to a sad time of celebration, indelibly recorded in my heart and soul.

You probably have words like these too.  Savor them; learn from them; allow yourself to be transported back to another time and place.  Some words will bring up great pain, unrelieved by any joy or love or satisfaction.  Sit with those feelings, learn from them, make sense of them, and allow that word to be just a word once again.  Some words will bring up great joy; savor the feeling, sit with it and allow that joy to become a deeper part of who you are.  And some words will bring up a mixture of joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain, happiness and sadness.  Words like Hamantaschen will do that to you, allowing you to own and embrace your memories, no matter how they make you feel.

This is our practice.  In mindfulness we are aware, awake, accepting.  All feelings can be learned, lived with, and let go if need be.  Sometimes all it takes is a word, mindfully recalled, to begin the practice once again.  For me, Hamantaschen is a great start to a period of meditation.

Thanks, Judy!

Peace,

Jim

Acceptance.  Seeing phenomenal reality, as it emerges, with great clarity.  Acceptance.  Letting go of our mental interpretations about emerging phenomena and choosing, intentionally, to experience each moment directly.  Acceptance requires self-knowing; we must be able to recognize the workings of the mind, understand which of those workings are based on true experience and which result from whatever residue of clinging remains after the hard work of our sitting meditation.  Acceptance.  Am I able to perceive the moment as it unfolds, know my own mental baggage, let go of that baggage and respond to the moment with the greatest of skill, based on my insight into what is happening and the degree of compassion that accompanies that insight.  Acceptance.

With the practice of acceptance comes great equanimity.  The emotional roller coaster ride begins to smooth out and slow down.  With acceptance we find ourselves becoming quite steady, at times rather unflappable.  Like a great mountain we endure when we practice acceptance.  Acceptance becomes the fertile soil that sustains my life.

Acceptance is a state of mind that we can cultivate with our sitting meditation, and it is a trait of mind when it is practiced persistently with intention.  In becoming a trait, our acceptance permeates all of our days and all of our affairs.  It becomes a vital aspect of our identity, and is experienced by others as empathy and compassion.  It is the foundation of love.

I prefer to think of trait acceptance as active acceptance.  Too often I have heard acceptance described as a passive state, but it is quite the opposite.  To live in acceptance is to embrace life with great vigor, working unceasingly, but always working “with” life rather than “against” life.  For example, when in the midst of evil the person practicing acceptance can see clearly what s/he is facing, without denial or defensiveness, maintaining inner calm.  In this state of mind the right view about the nature of the evil emerges, and from that right view emerges right actions.

In the example I used in my previous essay a gentleman I called Fred encountered an unpleasant situation with a colleague who has lashed out verbally, seemingly unprovoked.  Fred recognized, in meditation, that his colleague’s outburst was evidence of suffering, suffering with deep roots emerging from his colleague’s experiences as a bullied child.  Fred let go of his own anger and recognized compassion emerging, and allowed himself to abide in this wave of compassion by practicing metta for his colleague.

The challenge for Fred, as it is for each of us, is what happens next.  What happens when Fred sees his colleague again?  How does he operationalize his compassion, make compassion an emerging phenomenon in his relationship with his colleague?  This is the work of active acceptance, since it is quite possible that Fred’s acts of kindness toward his offended colleague will be rebuffed or, worse, seen as patronizing.  Yet it is essential that Fred form the intention in his mind and heart to act with kindness toward his colleague, allowing himself to be vulnerable as if he had, indeed, offended this person.

This work is the work of Forgiveness, a form of lovingkindness that is powerful, perhaps the most powerful force within any relationship.  Active acceptance means we turn toward the difficult person or difficult situation with kindness, perhaps being careful to maintain needed boundaries in the case where the person or situation presents a threat to our welfare or another’s, but the firmness of the boundary is surrounded by the softness of our compassion.  The act of forgiving, which I see as the active part of acceptance, requires great insight, mindful acceptance, willingness to let go of retribution (to which we may have a right), and, in time, acts of kindness, if appropriate and safe to do.

More on that in my next post.

Peace,

Jim

I’ve posted on Acceptance on three occasions (twice in June, 2011, and once in October of 2011); I think it’s an important topic, and an integral part of mindfulness practice.  Jon Kabat-Zinn’s definition of mindfulness captures this perfectly: “paying attention on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally, to the unfolding of experience moment to moment.”  In summary, mindfulness is attentional, intentional, immediate, and accepting.  The first three can be learned through practice; the fourth, the acceptance, is more difficult.

Acceptance can only occur if we can perceive present moment reality with clarity.  Our meditation practice allows us to notice all aspects of mental activity, both the immediate phenomena that occur (i.e. sense perceptions, body sensations, thoughts and emotions) and our tendency to interpret those phenomena.  Our acceptance work begins with those interpretations; we have to notice them and realize which are distortions of the actual phenomena and which are not.  Once we’ve worked through the interpretation layer, we can then simply be in a state of attentional control, noticing the immediate arising of perceptions and sensations, not judging, just aware.

The work we do in our meditation practice enables our minds to become quite strong in their capacity to pay attention with intention in the moment without judging.  But what use is this capacity unless the internal process is manifest in some way externally?  Allow me to explain by example.

A person (we’ll call him Fred) feels anger toward a colleague who lashed out at him, unprovoked, while Fred was telling a story about a game of basketball he played a few days ago.  When Fred sits in meditation later that day he calms himself with a clearing breath, and begins some simple breath counting to focus his mind.  Within a short period he finds his attention to be sharp, and breath-centered.  He then begins to practice open awareness, allowing sensations and perceptions to be noticed, with breath awareness continuing as a backdrop.  So far, a pleasant meditation.  As his mind is relaxed his feelings of anger return, and he notices those feelings, both as angry thoughts and angry body sensations (tightened chest, increased breathing rate…).  He makes meditative space for these thoughts and sensations, not judging them, breathing and noticing.  Then a thought comes into Fred’s mind: “that guy is a jerk.  He had no business talking to me that way.”  Fred immediately recognizes his interpretation (“that guy is a jerk”) and his own hurt reaction (“He had no business talking to me that way.”).  Having had good meditation instruction, Fred refrains from judging his own judgmental thought, makes space for it, breathes with it, and notices its strength diminish in the process.

As his meditation proceeds Fred notices that the image of his colleague arises, and a memory flashes through his mind: his colleague had once confided in him that he was bullied by the “jocks” in his high school.  Suddenly Fred has the insight that his colleague views him as a jock, and hearing him talk about playing basketball might have triggered some old memories and some thoughts and feelings that really weren’t about Fred at all.  Fred feels compassion for his colleague, and practices metta (lovingkindness meditation) for his colleague.

Wow, what a great meditation!  I wish all of mine were so fruitful!  But when I contemplate this scenario I realize it’s not enough.  Fred has used acceptance during his meditation as a way to allow his mind to make sense of the events of the day and to let go of his interpretations.  As a result of his acceptance he experiences compassion, which is good for him but not really helping his colleague very much.  Fred has experienced mindful acceptance; but he must take that further, with the practice of active acceptance.  More on that in my next post.

Peace,

Jim

With the conclusion of the “Mindfulness and Trauma Focused Treatment: Working with the Body” workshop today at the Summer Institute, I’ve uploaded several items for you:

First, a basic Mindfulness of Breath Meditation; all recordings are in mp3 format:

Second, the Body Scan:

Third, an Open Awareness Meditation:

Fourth, a meditation led by Dr. Jenna Tedesco titled “Joints and Glands Meditation”:

Fifth, a Breath Meditation led by Dr. Jenna Tedesco:

Sixth, a Lovingkindness Meditation:

And last but not least, the Mountain Meditation.  I mistakenly deleted the one I led in the class, but have re-recorded it:

For those interested in leading the Mountain Meditation, here is the script I used; you’ll note that I ad libbed a certain portion of it: mountain meditation

Many wanted contact information for our instructors.  Dr. Jenna Tedesco has a wonderful website, rich with information.  Here is the link:  http://www.presentcenter.net/   You’ll find Jenna’s contact information on that website.  Stay tuned to it for information for MBSR and other programs that Jenna plans on offering, as well as links to other websites and MBSR programs offered by other providers.

Dr. Steve DiJulio can be reached via email at sdijuliophd@aol.com.  I can be reached via email at walshjm54@yahoo.com

For extended mindfulness training you can contact either myself or Dr. Tedesco for guidance.  In the meantime, we would both strongly recommend getting additional training either through the University of Massachusetts Center for Mindfulness (http://www.umassmed.edu/cfm/index.aspx) or Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia (http://www.jeffersonhospital.org/departments-and-services/mindfulness).

Dr. DiJulio gave out a sheet with Gestalt References.  In case you would like the original file, here it is: Gestalt Therapy References  If you’re interested in getting more Gestalt training, Steve recommends the Gestalt Therapy Institute of Philadelphia (http://www.gestaltphila.org).  If you would like to talk to someone at the Institute Steve recommends you call either Mary Lou Shack (610-207-9930) or David S. Henrich (215-233-3994 x21).

Also, one of my colleagues, Cara Palmer, LCSW, will be offering an MBSR program beginning in September.  If you are interested you can download her brochure by clicking on this link: MBSR Tri-fold Brochure Fall 2013 Blue

If you’re interested in taking the Five Facet Mindfulness Inventory online it can be accessed at this website address:  http://www.awakemind.org/quiz.php

Ken Williams, one of the attendees of the workshop, found this NIH website with great research articles about Mindfulness:  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/?term=mindfulness+based+stress+reduction  Enjoy!

There’s still more information to add, which will get done over the next few days.  To those who attended this workshop, thanks for being such great and eager learners.  And to anyone else reading this post, I hope you find the information in this post and others useful.

Peace,

Jim