Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., the founding director of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, has a lovely quote on practicing mindfulness:
In his book, "Wherever You Go There You Are," he writes:
Mindfulness practice means that we commit fully in each moment to being present. There is no "performance." There is just this moment. We are not trying to improve or to get anywhere else. We are not even running after special insights or visions. Nor are we forcing ourselves to be non-judgmental, clam, or relaxed. And we are certainly not promoting self-consciousness or indulging in self-preoccupation. Rather, we are simply inviting ourselves to interface with this moment in full awareness, with intention to embody as best we can an orientation of calmness, mindfulness, and equanimity right here and right now.
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I like to think of these mindfulness minutes as Sabbath rests... a deep immersion in just being...as opposed to doing...in the Martha/Mary gospel Jesus is telling us that in God's eyes BEING something comes before DOING something( see The Reed of God by Caryll Houselander). Martha's focus was all on her anger and impatiance with her sister... and haven't we all been there?
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