Jump to content



Photo

Mindfulness


  • Please log in to reply
3 replies to this topic

#1 Ramona80

Ramona80

    Great Friend

  • Active Members
  • PipPipPipPipPip
  • 275 posts

Posted 26 June 2015 - 11:31 AM

Seems like "mindfulness" is a focus in therapy in recent years. In my own search for therapeutic reading materials, I've come across it quite a bit. I'm seeing a new therapist as well, and his main approaches are CBT and mindfulness.

 

The rollercoaster ride of what we go through on antidepressants (when they cause bad effects) and when we go off them -- could there be any better situation for practicing mindfulness?! 

 

At first when I would read about mindfulness, I could understand the descriptions, but still did not know how it felt. I think I have been "getting it" a bit more lately, how it feels and what it means to be in the moment. 

 

For me, I think I'm getting better at accepting the moment, with all it includes. It's facing whatever my current circumstances are, and allowing them. (Even if I'm planning and hoping for better days ahead.) It's taking one day at a time, and not trying to run away from anything. It's training myself to not rush through things so I can get back to obsessively worrying. It's learning to go more slowly and tend to things through my day, giving things their proper attention, and not giving worrying the center stage. It's knowing that things are temporary, and I can deal with whatever today presents. 

 

Anyone else work with this while going through the withdrawal process?


#2 fishinghat

fishinghat

    Site Partners

  • Active Members
  • PipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPipPip
  • 13,869 posts
  • LocationMissouri

Posted 26 June 2015 - 12:14 PM

This Moment is our resident mindfulness expert. I am sure he will respond to this later.


#3 gail

gail

    Site Partners

  • Site Supporter
  • 6,016 posts
  • LocationSherbrooke, PQ
  • why_joining:
    5 months on cymbalta, scary side effects, to get help and to return the favor if I can.

Posted 26 June 2015 - 03:37 PM

Ramona,

I did work with this around month 3 or so of withdrawal. For a few months. Then the anxiety was to extenuating to continue. I did see benefits while doing it.

I used the book of Kabbat-Zin, the best to my knowledge.

Titleāž” Full catastrophe living, using the wisdom of your body and mind to face stress, pain and illness.

One method, the same method applies to every situation. Be it cancer or anything else. Simple and easy to understand.

#4 thismoment

thismoment

    God-like

  • Active Members
  • PipPipPipPipPipPipPipPip
  • 2,514 posts

Posted 27 June 2015 - 12:47 AM

Ramona

Gail is right: There could be times during withdrawal when one is too agitated, too pre-occupied, and too psychotic (externalization of emotion) to allow even a moment of focus. Therefore, Mindfulness looms threateningly like some opaque and diabolical Eastern esoterica that is just too obtuse to grasp. Wait a while; be still and heal-- forget about Mindfulness until you feel tiny windows begin to open in that wall of admonishing internal dialogue.

Mindfulness is about you only.

Mindfulness asks that you accept your thoughts as they are, without judging them.

Mindfulness means maintaining a moment-by-moment awareness of your thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and the surrounding environment; there is nothing to 'do'. There is no right or wrong way to think or feel in any given moment-- there is just the flow of thoughts from your mind, and you are the watcher. You neither engage the perspective nor participate in the storyline; you just let it flow.

Focus on what you are sensing and feeling in the present moment rather than getting swept into past failures and future uncertainties.

There is no goal, there is only the exercise. The gift of peace will emerge in tiny unfettered emotional holidays. Just do the drill.

Neither the past nor the future are real-- you have only this moment, and the next, and the next, unfolding in front of your astonished toes. The past is dead and the future may never arrive. Just let thoughts flow; don't judge the content of your thoughts; don't engage the storyline; openly accept everything that is flowing out of your mind.

It's all real.

You are a part of all you have met; you didn't build your own mind, and you bear no guilt for what emerges from it. And while it is you, you didn't create it-- so you cannot blame yourself for its function.

While it's true that you must strive to make better choices in the future, you bear no guilt for the last one you made.

Take care.



0 user(s) are reading this topic

0 members, 0 guests, 0 anonymous users