What is mindfulness? As this practice and Buddhist teachings
have attracted more and more attention, the simple definitions once offered
have been challenged by Buddhist scholars and dharma teachers, creating a bit
of confusion about something that seems quite simple: the application of our
attention to our mental and physical experience, moment by moment. I’m not
qualified to enter into an academic debate on the topic, so I will give you my
sense of the meaning of the word, and then encourage you to explore other
sources if you’d like to understand more.
Mindfulness
starts with being present, being aware of what we are experiencing through our
five physical senses and what’s happening in our mind. Our natural tendency is
to get caught up worrying about or planning the future or remembering the past.
The first thing we try to do with mindfulness is notice these tendencies and
start to train ourselves to bring our attention back to what is happening right
now. This alone is a huge task because of our deep conditioning. Planning the
future based on our experiences in the past is a survival strategy developed
eons ago by our ancestors. Our capacity to do this is what sets us apart from
other living things, and so our instincts resist any effort to act otherwise.
Nonetheless, these habits take us away from a direct experience of life and
obscure a whole range of truths, from the psychological conditioning that
drives our behavior to the elemental realities that Buddhists call “the Dharma,”
Truth or Natural Law.
With
mindfulness we not only observe what’s happening in the body and mind, but how
we react to things, how a sound triggers a thought and a thought triggers an
emotion and an emotion triggers a physical response. We begin to see the bigger
picture, the process by which we construct our understanding of our world and
who we are. This deconstruction of our experience is vitally important for
addicts in or trying to get into recovery because it allows them to see how
their addiction works and that there is a way out, that it’s not inevitable or
unstoppable. The process by which we become addicted is a mind/body process
that can be reversed, and awareness is the first stepping-stone in that
process. That’s why Step One of the 12 Steps starts with the words “We
admitted,” because that admission is the bringing into our awareness the truth
of our condition. Until we are aware of our condition, until we come out of
denial, no recovery is possible. Step One is, essentially, an act of mindfulness,
a clear seeing.
One
of the things that’s always struck me as unique about the Buddhist teachings is
that the Buddha started out by talking about the difficulties in life, the
suffering. This doesn’t seem like the best marketing technique. If you want to
sell a product, you shouldn’t start out by being such a downer. And maybe
that’s one reason Buddhism seems to take hold slowly in a culture: it doesn’t
start out by promising paradise.
The
practice of mindfulness then has a role in building from this recognition of
suffering. The Buddha asks us to sit down (literally) and start to watch our
experience unfold. If you sit still for a little while what you’ll discover is
that your mind is restless and filled with plans and memories that are agitating;
your body doesn’t want to sit still and often will begin to hurt or at least
get itchy or tense; you start to fall asleep when you’re trying to pay
attention to the breath; sitting still becomes boring and tedious, not to
mention frustrating as you try to follow the meditation instructions but fail
repeatedly.
So,
the first effect of mindfulness is to see the truth of the first Noble
Truth—the Buddha was right, it’s hard to be a human being. If we keep watching
carefully, tracking the process moment-by-moment as we notice the mind
wandering and gently come back to the breath, we see that when we let go of our
obsessive thinking, we get moments of relief. Thus, we see the truth of the
second and third Noble Truths: our discomfort is caused by our clinging and
ends when we stop clinging. We also see, as Step One says, that we are
powerless, in this case over the arising of thoughts, feelings, and sense
experiences—not that we can’t do anything about them, but that, just as with
our addiction, they are going to keep coming up and if we are not going to
suffer as they arise, we are going to have to change our relationship to them.
When
an addict sees this meditative process clearly—and usually it helps if a
teacher or guide clarifies what’s happening—the logic of letting go becomes
indisputable. We see in microcosm the process of addiction and recovery.
I
know a couple of people who say that seeing this was enough for them to get
clean and sober. They didn’t have to go to rehab or AA or any other recovery program;
all they needed was to see their addiction with mindfulness, and they were able
to quit. But this is the rare exception. Before I got sober I seemed to be
engaged in a pretty serious mindfulness meditation practice, even going on
extended silent retreats, but still didn’t make the connection between the
microcosm of moment-to-moment letting go and the habitual patterns of drinking
and using that persisted between retreats. The power of addiction and denial
was just too great for my mindfulness practice alone to penetrate. There simply
wasn’t the willingness to go that far, and there wasn’t the clarity to
understand the problem and the potential that sobriety might bring.
Nonetheless,
today I regularly teach mindfulness in treatment centers and to newcomers who
attend my workshops and retreats. And I find that, if people are willing to
learn and are engaged in trying to deal with their addiction, the mindfulness
practices are a powerful support to the process of recovery. I think it helps
that I guide them to understand what they are experiencing. Sometimes the
non-verbal meditation experience is difficult to interpret at first, and this
is one of the main jobs of the meditation teacher, to illuminate what is
already happening, to understand the felt experience.
When
I’m introducing mindfulness at a treatment center, I feel the need to explain
why we’re doing it. After all, when someone forks out money for rehab, it’s not
with the desire to learn to meditate. They might wonder, “What does this have
to do with recovery?” I tell them that mindfulness meditation has two key
values for the recovering addict: one, it helps them to de-stress. Recovery is
stressful, in the beginning especially, and having a method by which you can,
on a daily basis, get some quiet, calm, and peace, is invaluable. Two,
mindfulness practice helps us to become aware of our mental habits so we can
start to catch thoughts like, “I need to have a drink,” or “What’s the point of
this, I might as well get loaded.” Getting in the habit of watching and
questioning our own thoughts is vital to maintaining recovery because the
addict’s habitual thoughts are so often self-destructive, or just simply
destructive.
Mindfulness
isn’t magic or religious. Developing and applying mindfulness takes
determination and effort. Nonetheless, it can have a powerful, liberating
effect on our lives. All change starts with awareness, and when we cultivate
mindfulness our awareness deepens far beyond our common way of experiencing
life.
1.
Set up a place in your home devoted to meditation.
This can just be a corner of a room, or a small extra space or alcove. Put your
chair or meditation cushion in the corner, and perhaps a small table with some
special objects. Having a space devoted to meditation acts as a reminder to
practice, and reinforces the practice when you sit there.
2.
Schedule meditation into your day. Before you go
to bed at night, decide when you are going to meditate the next day. You might
have to get up earlier or leave some gaps in your schedule. You can meditate on
a break or at lunchtime at work; you can meditate before dinner; you can even
meditate before bed, though that’s not ideal.
3.
Commit to meditate every day, even if it’s only
for 1 minute. This commitment helps you sustain your practice. It reinforces
the idea that consistency is the most important thing, not perfection.
4. Find a meditation group
and/or teacher. Nothing reinforces practice like regularly joining others to
meditate. Just as with recovery, it’s hard to do it alone. Take advantage of
the support that’s out there.
