What is mindfulness and Meditation?

Mindfulness and meditation are frequently talked about these days, and are known as ways to find inner peace in our busy lives.  Both have many similarities and can overlap, but they're not the same.

Mindfulness

Mindfulness is all about being aware and being actively mindful and paying attention to your thoughts, feelings and behaviours.  We can practice mindfulness anywhere and at any time, and is basically defined as being present in whatever you are doing.  When we go about our daily lives, we tend to let our minds wander from what we're actually doing.  When we're mindful, we are actively involved in the activity with all of our senses, and keep our minds from wandering.

A simple mindfulness exercise could be paying attention to whats going on around us when we're walking outside. Notice the colours, smells and sounds. It's amazing what we experience when we focus on what's happening around us, rather than looking down at our feet!

Meditation

Meditation is a more formal, seated practice.  During meditation, we focus on expanding our awareness, calming and clearing our mind, and experiencing inner peace.

One of the first things we try to achieve is to stop distractions and make our mind clearer.

Seated meditation starts by sitting in a comfortable position, bringing your awareness to the breath as it enters and leaves our nose.  The sensation of breathing through our nose, it known as the object of meditation  We try to concentrate on this feeling to the exclusion of everything else.

To begin, try this simple breathing meditation for 5 minutes, and build up to 15 over the course of a few weeks.

Some of the benefits of regular meditation include better focus and concentration, improved self awareness, and lower levels of stress and anxiety.