Mindfulness - The Art of Living Every Moment (Part 2)

If you want to read part 1 of this series, please click here.

Allow me to begin by asking you three questions. Do not rush to answer. Take a pause & ponder over them.

1. What were you doing yesterday in the evening?

2. What thoughts occupied your mind at that time?

3. How happy were you at that moment? 

(Rate yourself on a scale of 1–10. One denoting feeling saddest at the moment and ten denoting happiest at the moment.)

अगर आप यह ब्लॉग हिंदी में पढ़ना चाहते हैं, तो यहाँ क्लिक करें ।

Thousands of research papers have been written on Mindfulness across the globe. However, today we shall discuss one unique research paper conducted by two psychologists from Harvard University, Matt Killingworth and Daniel Gilbert, a few years ago. They selected a sample of two thousand people to participate in the research. The participants would receive three questions on their smartphone, which needed to be answered immediately. The items were sent any time of the day or night for a couple of times. Those questions were as follows:

1. What are you doing now?

2. What are you thinking right now?

3. How happy are you at this moment?

The analysis of this research was published in Science magazine.

The response to these questions yielded three essential results. They were as follows:

1. Forty-seven per cent of the time, participants were not focused on the work at their hands. Mentally they engaged in some other thoughts altogether. For example, while driving, someone was thinking of their boss; while sipping coffee, someone was daydreaming about his/her girlfriend.

2. The second and one of the interesting findings was when the hearts of participants were wandering while working, they felt sad and unhappy. On the contrary, when they were completely immersed in their work, they were more joyful. This means that while working when people engage in other thoughts, those feelings are mostly negative, making them gloomy. 

3. We are often told, if you don't love your work, you will be miserable. Every book on personality development teaches this basic mantra, "love your work, and you will achieve success." In reality, our happiness depends on 'what we think while working' rather than 'what we do.' Therefore, 'what are you thinking' is more crucial than 'what are you doing.' What mindset you have at the time defines your degree of pleasure. In fact, people whose thoughts are synchronised with their work are found to be more blissful.

In the end, five conclusions were drawn from the research.

1. Our mind wanders all the time and often experiences grief strolling in the unwanted lanes. For example, one day, in the morning, you notice a child going to school. Seeing this, you begin to reminisce about your school days. Various memories of school life begin to flood your mind. Gradually, you lose control over your thoughts and emotions related to the school. And it has been observed that during such scenarios, your mind drifts towards sad and negative memories. Thus, the wandering mind becomes the devil of our happy world.

2. The human brain is powerful to manifest any kind of life we desire. Unfortunately, the constant thought of 'what we don't have' becomes the cause of our sorrows. But it is essential to nurture the power of thought as it can help us to realise our dreams. The only requisite is to stop thinking 'what we don't have'. This constant negative approach ruins our lives, and sometimes we fail to understand its cycle.

3. Another important information has come to light from this research; we are happiest when we stop wandering and are aware of being. It means that when we are in a state of Mindfulness, we experience bliss. When we practise Mindfulness, we are present at the moment. We set aside the events of the past and the worries of the future. We are conscious of the very second we are breathing into and nothing more or less.

4. People very often complain that their life is miserable because they don't love their job. For example, some say that they like to trek but work on computers all day. Some want to teach but are engineers working in a company, some like to talk but are accountants by profession. However, the research points out that there exists no relation between your work and the wandering of your mind. There are so many people having a career they love, but eventually, even they get bored with it. 

In short, it does not matter whether you are washing dishes or dining in five stars, if your mind is hopping around, most likely you will not be happy. Our brain keeps roaming from one corner to another. Because there is no control over the wandering mind, and most of the time, it creates sorrow. That is why eating food in this world's best and most expensive hotel does not guarantee you that you will be able to enjoy that food. According to research, while dining in the extravagant hotel, it is most likely that you will be thinking about something, situation or people, rather than relishing the food.

5. Only one such activity was found in the entire research, where there was very little wandering of the mind, and that was sex. The good thing is that even today, most people while having sex, do not engage in anything else mentally or otherwise. Only 10 per cent of the participants admitted that even while coitus, they were thinking about something or another person.

After reading this research, don't you think it is very important to practice living in the present?

We will discuss in detail on Mindfulness in the next blog.

Hope you enjoyed reading this blog! Do share it with your near & dear ones. Let’s meet at the next Blog. Till then…….

‘Enjoy Your Life & Live with Passion!’

(This blog is originally written in Hindi by the Master Trainer Mranal Gupta and later translated in English by Zeba Ali, an NLP Practitioner & a psychology professor.)

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Summary:

What is Mindfulness? Part - 2

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