"Your Next Big Idea - Mindfulness Unbound!"

Welcome to the 2nd piece in this limited series on LinkedIn Pulse that celebrates the freshly minted, all new updated 2nd Edition of my bestselling book ‘Uncovering Mindfulness’.

Mindfulness is a habit – It’s something the more we do, the easier it becomes – It’s accessing something we already have – And it isn’t difficult, what is difficult is to remember to be Mindful!

I wrote those words at the end of the 1st Edition of my book.

By then I’d looked at the social, personal, political, professional, all the science and much more – And I’d concluded that whilst Mindfulness is many things,

• Concentration in the present moment
• An acceptance of negative thoughts without being caught up in them
• A calming of the Mind with conscious breathing
• Enjoying and taking time over one thing, one task, at a time and not multitasking; &
• Applying the principles of Mindfulness to the more mundane aspects of our lives, such as walking, talking, cooking and cleaning.

 It is also just one thing – The space that exists between thought and deed!

 The true essence of Mindfulness

 In its true essence, Mindfulness is something small and quite simple to do.

It's about making little changes & by practicing these little changes daily, you bring within your reach an enormous potential and capacity to change and experience things differently & better.

Mindfulness though can also be both the Universal and the Particular, &, it's not something to packaged, placed in a box, labelled and sold as another business initiative, or vacuous self-improvement fad to which you sign-up on the dotted line.

There is no unbreakable regime to follow, burden to weight yourself down with, or contract to bind yourself to.

It's not something that must come first, taking over your life and forcing you to fit everything else around it.

It's not intolerant, it doesn't confer the moral high ground and it doesn't have to be in any way, shape or form, inconvenient.

 #UncoveringMindfulness

Mindfulness is to be uncovered and unbound.

My book is called, ‘Uncovering Mindfulness: In Search Of A Life More Meaningful’ for a simple reason and that is because I believe that Mindfulness is within each and every one of us to be uncovered and to be lived.

You don't have to go anywhere special to do it and you don't have to spend your hard earned money taking retreats, being immersed and feeling your pain, to be a nett beneficiary.

All can be achieved through simple daily practice, a kind observance to yourself, & a non-judgmental atitude – And living a Mindful life can have a very real impact on the day-to-day – Your day-to-day.

Do you know that feeling happy comes from feelings of Gratitude? You need to be able to recognise and feel grateful for things before you can feel happy, and the daily practice of Mindfulness can work on those parts of the Brain where Gratitude finds root.

Big changes from small beginnings

It can also boost personal resilience, emotional intelligence, compassion and empathy and big changes can come from small beginnings.

With only five minutes contemplative mindful meditation a day, the science unequivocally shows that we can benefit from some profound changes to our levels of stress, how we think about things and how we respond.

“Mindfulness is being fully in the moment and paying attention to the present without judgement”

Another way of thinking about it is making a shift in your head from the destination, to appreciating the actual journey.

Taoism describes Mindfulness as 'Non Doing' and it has also been described as knowing what is happening while it is happening, no matter what.

TS Eliot Wrote

The poet TS Eliot wrote "Every moment is a fresh blessing', and that's not a bad way to start to think about it and how you might approach living a mindful life.

Think of it also as a life skill that can deepen your sense of wellbeing and fulfillment.

And whilst Mindfulness can help you to gain control of negative thoughts and emotions, it doesn't stop you feeling emotion per se.

It does however, allow you to deal with those feelings more dispassionately and become more receptive, open to and aware of yourself in a non-judgmental way.

At its heart, Mindfulness is all about physically and mentally connecting and becoming aware of what is going on inside your mind and body, whilst also being aware of the outside world - It's not Zoning out but Zooming in!

It's not trying to ban the wrong thoughts or sitting with legs crossed on a mat, neither is it something that is only for followers of Buddhism.

In fact, Mindfulness is no more Eastern, than electricity is Western - and it's very much a secular thing: Many religions have been influenced by it and I talk more about this in Chapter 2 of my Book   – but Mindfulness itself is not religious.

Fact is, when we shut out all the extraneous noise (the constant chatter of Buddha's Monkey Mind or Steve Pinks Inner Chimp) in our heads, and refuse to engage with those negative thoughts, that’s when we are able to achieve a much needed mental calm, clarity and perspective.

Do you think it might seem too good to be true?

Maybe so.

But for those who will think that it's all just a little too good to be true – Why don't you give it a go – You've nothing to lose and if you wanted to get your body in tip top shape you'd go to the gym, so why not spend a wee bit of time building up your mindful pecs too?

And for some simple exercises and guided practices, Chapter Six of the book is the place to go.

So, What Next?

In the 3rd piece in this limited series we’re going to deep dive into the Mindful Brain and some of the science that’s been stacking up to make an unequivocal case over the past few years for the efficacy, cogency, inner agency and power of Mindfulness.

But I'll be writing about it all in a way that I hope makes sense and enables it to be understood, because I want you to be able to tune-in, turn-on and do it.

Wherever you are. Whenever you want.

So until the next time, try to Be Mindful and like Prometheus in Percy Bysshe Shelly’s epic poem ‘Prometheus Unbound’, feel “Joy, Joy, Joy”!

End Piece

Having written a million plus published words over the past couple of years on leadership excellence, navigating complexity, working with change, wellbeing, well doing and Mindfulness, I am all about making the complex less complex, the tough stuff not so tough and putting the unreachable within reach of everyone.

As well as being the author of ‘Uncovering Mindfulness: In Search Of A Life More Meaningful’ – All new updated 2nd Edition now available on Amazon and www.bookboon.com where there are a further 11 e-books in the ‘Uncovering Mindfulness’ series; the ‘Coffee & A Cup of Mindfulness’ and the ‘Mindful Hacks For Mindful Living & Mindful Working’ series – I am also a Contributing Author with The Huffington Post and a Contributing Writer with Thrive Global.

You can follow the continuing journey Uncovering Mindfulness on Twitter @TheMindfulBook and at @Paul_Mudd and check out my wider work here.