Get Some Headspace: 10 minutes can make all the difference (18 page)

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Authors: Andy Puddicombe

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After a while of thinking and feeling this way the momentum of anger started to fade, and was replaced by a wave of sadness and guilt. I felt sad about indulging in all those angry thoughts, and guilty about where and to whom they’d been directed. This feeling remained for a while longer, again accompanied by thoughts that reflected this passing mood. Finally, the ball of ice-cream lost its battle with the midday sun and all that was left in the bowl was a pool of warm, yellow, sticky goo. As I looked at it, I found it hard to imagine why I’d got quite so upset about it. Or why I’d got quite so excited about it. It didn’t look nearly as appetising now. And with those thoughts came a wave of acceptance that seemed to transform my mood altogether. My emotional attachment to the ice-cream (the fact it happened to be food was incidental) had been so strong that I’d lost all sense of awareness. And this loss of awareness had resulted not only in endless, exhausting and ultimately futile mental chatter, but had also left me with the feeling of having been swept away on an emotional roller-coaster from which there was no getting off.
This may be an extreme example, but it highlights a common experience with food. It’s the sense that we’re so absorbed in our feelings, or in the constant mental chatter, that we no longer feel in control of our choices and actions. Have you ever found yourself halfway through a chocolate bar or a packet of crisps, only to think, ‘Why am I even eating this?’ Oblivious to the fact that we might not even be hungry, we mindlessly follow every impulse that arises. This isn’t helped by the fact that we’re so often distracted by other things at the same time. In fact, it just makes it all the more likely that we’ll remain lost in the world of thought. I know it sounds old-fashioned, but when did you last sit at the table to eat a meal? For most people, the sofa has taken the place of the table. In the past we’d have paused before food, whether that was down to etiquette or prayer. It was a time to acknowledge what was about to be eaten, to get a sense of appreciation for having food in front of us.
With this in mind, I’m going to suggest that this following exercise is done while sitting at a table. You may like to try it alone the first couple of times, as you’ll probably find it easier to concentrate. It’s best done in silence to begin with, free from conversation or background noise, so you’ll find it easier if you turn off the television, any music, and yes, even your mobile phone. You’ll also get more out of it if you do it without any reading material in front of you, so say goodbye to your laptop, books and magazines. This leaves just you and your food. People often say they feel either lonely or bored when they first try this exercise (an indication of just how rarely we’re undistracted in this way), but as soon as you throw yourself into the exercise, both of these feelings will fade quite quickly. You may also like to eat a little more slowly during this exercise (although not as slowly as in the Burmese monastery) so that it’s easier to apply the instructions. This is not the way (or the speed) I’m suggesting you eat
all
the time, but as a formal exercise it’s best done this way. It’s the difference between meditation and mindfulness that we discussed before. Meditation simply helps you be more mindful in everyday life, no matter how busy you are, or how many people you’re with. So once you’re familiar with what it means to eat mindfully, you can apply it to all your mealtimes, even if you’re chatting among friends or eating in a hurry.
Exercise 7: eating meditation
This exercise is also available as a guided meditation at
www.get someheadspace.com/headspace-book/get-some-headspace
Sit down at a table, preferably alone, and free from any external distractions. Don’t worry too much if there are external sounds that are out of your control as you can build these into the exercise, in just the same way as you did with Take10. Before you pick up the food to eat, take a couple of deep breaths – in through the nose and out through the mouth – to allow the body and mind to settle a little.
Next, take a moment to appreciate the food. Where has it come from? What country? Was it grown or was it manufactured? Try and imagine the different ingredients in their natural growing environment and even the types of people who would have been looking after the crops or animals. Over time we’ve become completely disconnected from the origins of the food in our diet. That may not sound particularly important, but in terms of having a broader sense of mindfulness around food, then it can be really very helpful.
As you do this, notice if there is any sense of impatience in the mind, of just wanting to get on and eat the food. Perhaps you’re thinking of all the things that you need to ‘get on and do’. Whatever the reaction, it’s most likely just conditioned behaviour, a habit, but one that you may well find surprisingly strong.
Now without going on some kind of guilt trip, take a moment to appreciate the fact that you actually have food on your plate. We can sometimes forget that for many people in the world this will not be the case at all. This may not be something you like to think about, but there’s something really valuable in this process, a sense of appreciation and gratitude is at the heart of a stable mindfulness practice.
As I say, this next part you may want to do a little more slowly than usual, but no matter how you do it, do it naturally and without thinking too much about it.
If it’s a food you’re going to eat with the hands, then notice the texture as you pick it up, the temperature, and perhaps the colour(s). If it’s from a plate, then notice instead the texture and temperature of the cutlery as you move it towards the food, but taking the time to notice the colours on the plate.
As you move the food towards your mouth, shift the focus away from the hands and more towards the eyes, nose and mouth. How does it smell? What does it look like up close? And, as you put it in your mouth, what is the taste, the texture, the temperature? You don’t need to ‘do’ anything. You’re simply observing the different bodily senses at work.
In addition to the physical senses, notice how the mind responds to the food. For example, is the food met with pleasure or displeasure in your mind? Is there acceptance of the food as it is, or maybe some resistance to certain aspects of it? Perhaps it’s too hot, too cold, too sweet, or too sour. Notice how the mind rushes to judge the food and to make comparisons with previous meals.
Once you’ve taken a few mouthfuls you may find that the mind starts to get bored with the exercise and will wander off into thinking about something else. As with Take10, this is normal and nothing to worry about. In the same way as before, as soon as you realise it’s wandered off, just gently bring your attention back to the object of meditation – the process of eating and the different tastes, smells, textures, sights and even sounds involved.
As you continue your meal in this way you can start to notice whether there’s a strong habitual urge to eat more quickly, perhaps to move closer to dessert! Or maybe there are feelings of unease about what you’re eating, especially if you are body-conscious. Notice as these different thoughts arise in the mind and, if you can, also notice how the breath appears as you eat. The breath may well give you some indication of how comfortable or uncomfortable this exercise is for you.
As you move towards the end of the meal, notice if perhaps there’s a sense of disappointment at having nearly finished, or relief in having nearly finished. Maybe even take a little extra time to savour the final mouthful.
Before getting up to leave or moving on to the next thing to eat, take a couple of deep breaths again. Remind yourself of how the plate looked when it was full of food and how it looks now, empty with nothing on it. Notice how, in contrast, before you sat down the stomach felt empty and how now it feels full. By noticing these things, noticing how everything is always changing, how everything has both a beginning and an end, the mind tends to experience a greater sense of ease over time.
Headspace for walking
Have you ever started walking down a street, only to find yourself a few minutes later at the end of the street, but not really sure how you got there? This is a common experience and one that raises the question, if you were not present ‘in the street’, where were you? Almost inevitably you will have been caught up in the thoughts of the mind. Of course sometimes it’s nice to just let the mind wander and many people say this is when they are at their most creative. Only you truly know how much of the mental chatter is productive or pleasant when you’re out and about. Now walking down the street, the implications of drifting off into thought are usually not all that serious. But have you ever done the same with driving? Suddenly realised that you’ve driven a couple of miles down a familiar route with no sense of awareness whatsoever? It’s both funny and scary. Funny that we could ever be so absent minded, and scary because of the implications. But there’s a very good reason why this sort of thing happens to us, and it’s more obvious than you might think.
Walking is an established and habituated action that requires very little concentration. Because of this, it’s almost become autonomous, and it’s easy to slip into a semi-conscious state of walking, where the legs are moving but the mind is thinking about something different altogether. It might be thinking about things that are already on your mind (this includes all the little things as well as the big stuff), or it might be that new thoughts are triggered by external objects or other people in the street. This is especially true if you live in a busy city or a very crowded place with lots of activity.
Noticing these things is fine. In fact, from a mindfulness perspective you could even say it’s good, because it means you are, temporarily outside of the realm of thought. The problem arises once you engage with the thing that’s grabbed your attention and when you then start to think about it, to create a story around it. Perhaps when a noisy car goes past it reminds you that you don’t like living in a busy place and you start dreaming of where you might like to live instead. Or maybe when you see something in the shop window you start to think how nice it would be to have it, only to then start thinking about your money troubles. Whatever it is that causes the mind to wander off, it’s a movement
away
from the present moment, away from the direct experience of life. It can sometimes feel as though we’re so busy remembering, planning and analysing life, that we forget to
experience
life – as it
actually
is, rather than how we think it
should be
.
As with most of these exercises, there are two ways to approach training the mind to be present while walking. First there’s the formal approach, which I’ll refer to as ‘walking meditation’, which tends to be done a little more slowly. And then there’s the more general, practical application of mindfulness for walking in everyday life. It’s not necessary to do both and many people jump straight into the general application because it doesn’t require any more time out of the day. You probably already walk a lot throughout the day anyway, so all you’re doing is directing the mind in a different way as you continue to do what you’ve always done. The way I’ve structured the next exercise is a fusion of these two approaches. I would suggest, if you have time, that you try it more slowly at first, if only once or twice, just to get a better feel for the technique. It might also be worth trying it in a park or on a quiet street rather than in the middle of a busy town. It’s perhaps the equivalent of learning to swim in a swimming pool rather than the sea.
The zombies
During a stay in Australia I was lucky enough to spend some time working in a retreat in the Blue Mountains. The retreat house was set among the most beautiful countryside, just on the edge of a small, but fairly well-populated village. It was used by all sorts of different people, monks, nuns and lay-people alike. What with Australia not being a ‘Buddhist’ country, it was funded largely by donations from the local Sri Lankan and Burmese community. They would even bring the most incredible freshly cooked food for everyone to eat during the retreats. As one man who was staying there on retreat remarked, when asked how he was finding it all, ‘Well, the bits
in-between
mealtimes are quite difficult, but the rest of the retreat is fantastic!’ Being in the tradition of the Burmese monasteries, there was a strong emphasis placed on this formal style of walking meditation. People were usually given lessons on how to do it inside the retreat house, but because the grounds were so big and so beautiful people would often go outside to do it.
Now you probably need to see it to get a real sense of what this might look like, but let’s just say that the scene wouldn’t have looked out of place in a mental asylum. Wherever I looked there were people pacing backwards and forwards, very, very slowly, as they applied the instructions they’d been given. This scene was exaggerated by the fact that they’d been taught to look directly ahead, not making any eye contact with anyone else and certainly not talking.
A lot of visitors really enjoyed this exercise, as it meant they were not in the meditation hall, as they tried to last another hour with their legs tangled up in the lotus position. It also meant that they could be outside, enjoying the sunshine. But for many people it was the simple fact that walking meditation seemed to provide a much greater sense of ease and spaciousness than the sitting practice. And there’s a good reason for this. When most people start to meditate they usually find it quite hard to get the amount of effort right. Try too hard and the meditation feels uncomfortable, but don’t try enough and you fall asleep. It’s that balance of focus and relaxation that I mentioned before. As a general rule, however, walking meditation seems to more naturally lend itself to the spacious element, so for many people this feels a lot more comfortable in the early days. I should add that walking meditation should not be considered a
replacement
for the seated meditation. Both have their place, but the sitting practice has its own particular importance.
All of the retreat participants were given strict instructions to only practise this walking technique
inside
the grounds of the retreat. But then as humans we’re not always so good at following instructions and, sure enough, come lunchtime three or four of the students decided that it was time to expand their horizons and journey beyond the gate. Now just imagine you live in a lovely sleepy little village in the mountains, where you know all your neighbours and everyone knows you. And then one day you’re staring out of the window, admiring the view, when you notice a man on the opposite side of the road, seemingly walking in slow motion, dressed in casual clothes, eyes fixed forward, oblivious to you standing in the window. Then you spot another one, this time a woman. She’s not far behind the first man, in fact it looks as though they could almost be competing to see who can walk the slowest. And then you see another one, and another one. You don’t recognise any of these people, and yet each one looks the same, as if they are in some kind of trance, zombies who don’t have the strength to hold out their arms in front of them.
Now if you were to see this, you’d be entitled to be a little concerned. In fact, if you were of an anxious disposition, you may well lose it altogether. So it was no surprise when a local resident spotted this very same scene one day, and decided that the best course of action was to call the police. She figured that there must be some kind of brainwashing technique going on in the retreat and that people were just wandering out into the street in a semi-comatose state. The local police now have arguably the best understanding of walking meditation of any police department in the country.
This brings me to an important point. Walking meditation, even when done as a formal, structured practice, should not be done in some kind of robotic way. It simply requires you to walk
naturally
, but at a slightly slower pace. And if you’re in a monastery or a retreat, then that pace might be very, very slow. But it’s still a
natural
movement that doesn’t require a lot of thinking. You know how to walk, you don’t need to think about it. But for some reason (in just the way some people will inevitably ‘over-think’ the breath while doing their sitting meditation), some people will feel the urge to
think
about the process, rather than simply be aware of it. And this is when you can start to look rather strange. So don’t try and walk in any special kind of way – it’s just walking. The fact that you’ll probably be doing this at your usual walking speed and possibly while talking to another person will hopefully dictate that you maintain a natural style. And that’s part of the reason I’d encourage you to focus your efforts on mindfulness of walking in everyday life as soon as you are familiar with the exercise below.
When people come to the clinic, no matter whether they come for high blood pressure, insomnia, addiction, depression or anything else for that matter, they all learn how to apply the qualities of meditation and the principles of mindfulness to the act of walking. If you’re going to make meditation work for you throughout the day I can’t emphasise enough just how important this is. When people first try this technique they nearly all comment on how surreal it feels. A common phrase is ‘I felt as though I was
in
life, but not
part
of it’. At the same time, acknowledging the paradox, they say they felt less separate from the world around them, a greater awareness of being interconnected in the world. Others comment on how vivid everything appears, how ‘alive’ the technique makes them feel. If we step out of thoughts for long enough to notice and appreciate the richness of life around us, then undoubtedly that’s going to feel quite vivid compared to our usual dull state when we are lost in thought.

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