Living In The Moment
What is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is our ability to pay attention to the present moment with curiosity and without judgement.
Mindfulness is a mental state achieved by focusing all one's attention on the present moment and being able to accept all the thoughts and bodily sensations which may be intruding at that time. By being somewhat dispassionate about these intrusions we cease to be a slave to them.
It is not easy but the rewards are worth it.
Mindfulness is an empowering activity: it enables the self-management of stress and anxiety. It makes us less reactive and more compassionate. It helps to manage anger, confusion and fatigue.
It can be done at any time, in any place and for many reasons. It is popular with medical professionals.
What Is Meditation?
Achieving a Higher State of Consciousness
Meditation is a tool to achieve a higher state of being and is almost always associated with Hinduism, Buddhism and the more ascetic forms of Christianity.
It includes and begins with mindfulness and a concentration on breathing until a calm state is achieved. Free from worries we are able to concentrate and find true happiness.
It comes in two stages: achieving calm and achieving insight. Our thoughts are not us: this is the Buddhist truth of impermanence. Thoughts come and go and because they are not us, they are a delusion. Meditation allows us to contemplate on a particular teaching and reach understanding.
Meditation is a tool to achieve enlightenment and a means to an end.