{"id":31088,"date":"2017-03-22T16:06:18","date_gmt":"2017-03-22T20:06:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/?p=31088"},"modified":"2017-03-22T16:06:18","modified_gmt":"2017-03-22T20:06:18","slug":"my-mindfulness-journey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/2017\/03\/22\/my-mindfulness-journey\/","title":{"rendered":"My Mindfulness Journey"},"content":{"rendered":"Three years ago, I was going through a rough semester and my boyfriend's mother gave me a book called Wherever You Go There You Are<\/em> by\u00a0Jon Kabat-Zinn, a stress reduction and mindfulness expert. Prior to this point, I'd thought of meditation as an\u00a0abstract, somewhat wishy-washy concept. My grandfather would sit, seemingly unresponsive, for hours a day, meditating, and I neither had the time nor desire to pursue that. However,\u00a0Kabat-Zinn is great at approaching the practice in a pragmatic, matter-of-fact tone that will appeal to anyone who doesn't have patience for mysticism, which mindfulness definitely isn't despite what many may think.\r\n\r\n\"Wherever<\/a>\r\n\r\nFrom what I understand, practicing mindfulness simply means going through the day's activities with a sense of purpose and awareness of the present moment. This awareness can include tuning in to the sounds, smells, and sights around us; focusing our thoughts on the present moment rather than dwelling on the past or future; and slowing down to consider each step of our actions instead of just brainlessly going through the motions of the day.\r\n\r\nFor those who see the world through a\u00a0Harry Potter\u00a0<\/em>lens as I do,\u00a0I like to compare this process to how Harry practices clearing his mind before bed each night when he's taking Occlumency lessons in\u00a0Order of the Phoenix.<\/em>\r\n\r\nThe main point I took away from reading Jon Kabat-Zinn is that mindfulness can happen anywhere, in any activity, for as long as we want. We can eat mindfully, sit on the subway mindfully, or walk to class mindfully. I bought an audiobook of Full Catastrophe Living<\/em>, also by Jon Kabat-Zinn, that includes guided meditations and deep breathing exercises that I listen to when commuting or winding down before bed.\u00a0Five minute (or even one minute) guided meditations are also available for free all over the internet.\r\n\r\n\"Board<\/a>\r\n\r\nThe other important point to note is that\u00a0there's no wrong way to practice mindfulness. One of my friends finds meditating in quiet spaces very uncomfortable. I took part in a free eight week mindfulness series offered through Planned Parenthood and just fell asleep every single class. Typically, I still don't get anywhere without a guide either. However, I'd definitely encourage not giving up on the concept altogether without experimenting with different settings and methods first.\r\n\r\nAt U of T, free mindfulness drop-ins <\/a>are available weekly, held at the Multi-Faith Centre, the Athletic Centre, Hart House, and various colleges and faculties. A new series at\u00a0Victoria College<\/a>\u00a0just started running on Wednesdays from 4:30-5:30 p.m.\u00a0Though I haven't used one before, I know apps, such as Headspace, exist to help with this practice as well. When I was in counselling, my counsellor recommended recording a guide yourself, or getting a loved one to do so, if that would make you more comfortable than listening to a stranger's voice. In any case, there are many options to play around with so you can make mindfulness fit your life in whatever way works best.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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\nThree years ago, I was going through a rough semester and my boyfriend's mother gave me a book called Wherever You Go There You Are by\u00a0Jon Kabat-Zinn, a stress reduction and mindfulness expert. Prior to this point, I'd thought of…\n<\/div>
Continue reading “My Mindfulness Journey”<\/span>…<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>
Continue reading “My Mindfulness Journey”<\/span>…<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"author":295,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7204,62,58,67],"tags":[9307,1882,1439,6686,25506,696],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31088"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/295"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31088"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31088\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31195,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31088\/revisions\/31195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}