To Become Street Smart About Our Mind
When we practice mindfulness, we have the opportunity to become street smart about the mind, to see the functioning of the mind and to know the mind more thoroughly. To learn the ability to see our patterns, our reactivity and to see how we are coping in the moment & how we are coping in our life.
The guidance we receive in formal mindfulness practice points to ways to work with our mind. Even when we are in formal practice with the body and with breathing, still the mind is very active, making comments about how the body is and how the practice is. The mind is constantly turning, in a quite profound way.
We notice by experience, that the mind is untamed, constantly generating thoughts, emotions, sounds and visions. Constantly coming, going and turning in each moment. The mind turns with its surroundings, depending on the circumstances we are in and we watch the mind turn. We are interested in, how the mind patterns arise and fall away…
This is the practice of mindfulness, to be with this and to notice what is happening moment by moment. Therefore through our formal practice, we get a deeper understanding about our own mind and our own lives.
We can’t get rid of the mind activity. There is no technique to stop the mind. All we can do is to see it. Therefore to free ourselves from it, is not to get rid of this activity, but to become street smart of the mind, so that we can keep going down the road of our life in more skilful ways.
