What is Mindfulness?

There are many different schools of thought on how to define mindfulness. One of the most straightforward, and the one I use most often when talking to people who are new to mindfulness, is this:

Mindfulness is having our minds and our bodies in the same place at the same time.

It is not sitting down to meditate and having all thought disappear. Practice long enough, and you will get tastes of this spaciousness here and there, and it is incredible! But is it the point? Most of us don’t live in a world where being empty-headed for long spans of time is useful.

So why do we train our minds on releasing thought? Not so much so our heads can be empty, but because we know, inevitably, that they will fill back up. And without a release valve, we hit the point of overflow. Mindfulness teaches us how to let our thoughts come and go. When we loosen the grip of our attachment to our thoughts, our minds become more spacious.

When our mind are filled beyond capacity, it can look like:

• Anxiety

• Rumination

• Depression

• Irritability

• Future-Casting

• Obsessions and Compulsions

• Addiction

• Overwhelm

• Burnout

• Inability to Concentrate

• Perfectionism

Are Mindfulness and Meditation the Same Thing?

All meditation involves mindfulness, but not all mindfulness practices are meditation. Meditation is a tool we use to increase our mindfulness. For instance, young children are oftentimes exemplary mindfulness teachers, yet they rarely, if ever, engage it what we would call meditation. Have you ever watched a three-year-old on a walk? They squat down, fully engrossed in what is right in front of them — the ants get their full attention, as do the flowers, as does the dog poop.

As a mindfulness teacher, I meditate with my students, but I also take them on mindful walks, practice eating and drinking mindfully together, and offer mindful journaling prompts. If we work together one-on-one, I help you find accessible ways to increase mindfulness in your real life, not your perfect life, or your someday life, but the one you are currently inhabiting. Will it change your life? Maybe. Will it change how you relate to your life? Absolutely.

Who Do I Work With?

I teach mindfulness to humans of all ages and stages!

• Even a developing fetus benefits from mindfulness practice! Not their own, of course, but that of their gestating parent. Approximately 40 years of studies link the stress levels of gestating parents to pregnancy outcomes and the behaviors of newborns. Practicing mindfulness during pregnancy decreases stress and increases a sense of well-being. When a gestating parent experiences lower levels of stress hormones and higher levels of the feel-good hormones, it’s great for both parent and fetus.

• Infants obviously can’t practice mindfulness, but they certainly benefit from their parents’ mindfulness practices! I teach new parents how to mindfully feed, bathe, and massage infants in ways that are calming to the nervous systems of both parent and baby. Mindfulness practice can also help shore up your emotional reserves for colic, sleepless nights, and changing relationships within the household as a whole new person joins the fold.

• I work with toddlers, preschoolers, and early elementary students with their parents or guardians. At this stage, mindfulness practice comes in many fun forms! We make mindfulness accessible through story-telling, simple breathing and somatic exercises, sensory delights, and lots and lots of identifying and naming of emotions. Children who have the language and embodied understanding of their own emotions learn to have more compassion towards themselves and others, exhibit less perfectionistic behavior, and learn emotional regulation (both independently and through co-regulating with a trusted adult), and, depending on age and what is developmentally appropriate, longer attention spans.

• With older kids, mindfulness practices are still fun and lighthearted, but slightly more sophisticated. For instance, your twelve-year-old might not want to find the sadness in their tummy or do bumble-bee breaths, but they might appreciate identifying how interactions with peers made them feel. They will benefit from learning breathing techniques to use before they have to stand up in front of the class to give a presentation or to cool off when they’re mad. At this age, the parental role shifts as kids are moving away from the need for co-regulation and into the ability to self-regulate. Oftentimes, they appreciate 10 or 15 minutes at the end of a session to teach their parents or caregivers new skills, and this time gives parents a chance to ask me any questions they may have, too.

• For teenagers from 13-17, parental involvement is typically up to the teen. Giving them the autonomy to either share what they are learning on the spot, or to integrate it more fully on their own, encourages feelings of autonomy and independence, while still letting them know that their parents / guardians are invested in their well-being and interested in what they are learning.

• For young adults aged 18 and up, I do not speak with parents unless the young adult requests it (or if there are extenuating circumstances, such as significant cognitive delays). This is not to shut the parent(s) out, but to support healthy movement into adulthood. For more information on this, please see the “Are we a good fit?” page and schedule a free discovery call.

• I work with adults of all ages, both individually and in groups. If you are particularly interested in mindful parenting, I offer private sessions and groups geared towards parents with children of differing age groups from pre-conception through empty nesting.