Let me just open by saying that the way I really believe change happens with us is in our daily lives. Having a space to remind us of that is enormously helpful.
For most of us, the changes we want to make are not supported by the people we spend most of our time with. There may be groups or pockets of people we connect with that help us stay-on-the-course of living the lives we want, but otherwise it’s really hard to make change.
Kagan and Lahey (2009) found that only 1 in 7 heart disease patients told by their doctor to change habits or face death, actually change their habits.
So thanks to the advent of the internet, we now have more opportunity to engage with groups that are supportive to living the life we want and more opportunity to engage with groups and media that go in the opposite direction.
I created the Mindful Living Twitter feed to allow people to get popped in a mindful place or exposed to mindfulness-based material on a daily basis. How might this help?
With this new concept of neuroplasticity, the ability of our brains to be reshaped throughout the lifespan, we have come to understand that how and what we pay attention has a serious impact on us. In other words, if we are entertaining anxious or depressive thoughts, those pathways are laid down in the brain. So the next time a thought comes up, it is more likely to go down the anxious road because it has been paved so many times.
The Mindful Living Twitter feed found at http://twitter.com/Mindful_Living, or any feed that you find that is supportive to living the life you want is meant to surround you with the type of instruction and material to help you lay down those tracks of a mindful brain.
You are also welcome to the Free Mindful Companion Book to sift through during moments when you’re needing a mindful companion.
The point here is to surround yourself with the type of people, information and practice that you want more of in your life.
Try it out!
As always, please share your favorite twitter feeds, thoughts, stories, and questions below. Your interactions provide a living wisdom for us all to benefit from.
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To support mindfulness during the day, I have purchased a watch with a vibrating alarm (which no one else hears). I set this to go off every 30 minutes and then, whatever I’m doing, I stop and change my focus from the running internal narrative to experiencing information coming into my senses in real time (sensations in my body, noticing thoughts and feelings in my mind, etc.) I try to become as present for this moment’s experience as possible, rather than my default of tumbling forward into the next moment.
While I try to be mindful throughout the day, this watch has been very useful in helping me to set the habit of mindfulness because it catches me in the middle of things in which I would not otherwise mindful!
What a great idea!!!Thank you for sharing Martha.
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