What is Mindfulness and how does it work?

Have you dismissed it or are curious to learn? It’s time to learn more about it!

The concept of mindfulness appears in more and more contexts and has today become a popular method of relaxation. Maybe you’ve dismissed it as something fuzzy that doesn’t suit you? Do you practice it yourself? Or are you curious to find out more about what it is and how it can work?

What is mindfulness?

The word mindfulness itself stands for the presence of the mind or conscious presence. In practice, it is a meditation technique. A technique where you practice paying attention, taking advantage of the moment and living in the present. Being able to control one’s consciousness and one’s own attention is the very foundation of the technique. This also affects the approach to what happens in our life. 

Great importance is placed on acceptance within mindfulness. An acceptance of yourself and those around you. You focus on building a loving or neutral image of yourself. How you look at yourself is important for how you then feel and experience your day.

Understanding yourself is therefore important and leads to being able to understand how you act and why. You see yourself from the outside in. The observation of yourself, your feelings and thoughts creates self-awareness about how you respond to different situations and patterns.

How does it work?

The body is a powerful tool. The more knowledge you have about how it works and how your body reacts, the better. It does, quite simply, what it is taught to do and can be controlled by deep rooted things. For example things from childhood or other events in our lives. The basic framework can be considered to be that what you think and experience also determines how you then feel. This is where mindfulness comes in. Because if you become aware of this, you can teach your body how it should react instead. Thus, you may experience a change in how you feel in specific situations. By actively working to find a presence of mind where you know you can find peace. Or where you can let go of what weighs you down and stresses you out. Then the body will also release the stress and relax. At our mindfulness therapy clinic, we provide mindfulness therapy, mindfulness based CBT and other psychotherapies.

Thoughts or facts?

Learning to distinguish between what is only thought and what is fact is important in mindfulness. Because once you can separate it, you will be able to accept your negative thoughts for what they are. Also, the fact that it controls you will cease to apply. Then focus on all those things that can make you feel good in life. Feel in, pay attention to your surroundings, appreciate the sun warming your skin, the kindness of a stranger or the birds chirping. Maybe it sounds a little fuzzy? But this is exactly the cool thing about mindfulness. Because if you choose to focus on all the nice, positive and joyful events in your life, you slowly teach your body and brain to more easily pick up precisely these elements in the future. You will therefore generally experience more happiness and satisfaction if you actively work on it.

But getting to this frame of mind obviously requires dedication. Through meditation and practice, you can thus achieve or increase the capacity for mindfulness. Maybe you will become so good that you will learn to feel when it is happening. And can, through technology, prevent it from blooming.

Important elements in mindfulness

– The breathing

Breathing is an important element in mindfulness and serves as a way to unite body and mind. Through breathing exercises, one directs one’s attention inward and feels the breath, without letting it control or influence it. The idea is that in this we can feel comfortable and put an automatic focus on the present. The attention causes the breathing rate to be lowered. This, in turn, brings relaxation and calm in the body or in the situation you are in. Our thoughts wander easily and that is okay. But the more you practice your breathing, the easier it will be to find that place of peace and quiet when you need it most. Here we usually talk about a breathing anchor.

– The thoughts

Within mindfulness, it is usually said that the relationship to things. As well as the thoughts that affect us and how we feel. Thoughts and feelings are based on patterns and associations we carry with us. We like to apply these things to people or situations. Then we automatically allow them to take control and rule us. Something that, in fact, originates within ourselves. You will never be able to control your emotions, but you can control and change your attitude towards them. Instead of letting them take over and wander off, you can choose to stop, accept them and observe them.

– The acceptance

Dare to stop and accept means that you tolerate what you feel and think. But instead of reacting to the experienced feelings or thoughts, you only observe them. This leads to one of the more central principles of meditation, which is to not judge or value what we observe. So it is once again about being in the present, stopping and finding peace.

– The meditation

During a meditation exercise, you increase your awareness of what is happening here and now. Bodily awareness also increases. And it becomes an exercise in accepting what happens within us. You then talk about things like thoughts, feelings and sensations – without valuing them. In a traditional breathing exercises, focus inward, relax and probably experience how your thoughts come and go. This is ok but again it is about your attitude towards your thoughts. Breathing guides you forward here and helps you constantly bring your focus back to the present.

– The body scan

Bodily awareness is a cornerstone of meditation, where you simultaneously try to be in the body and feel it as it is. Unlike relaxation exercises, such as the meditation we mentioned above, this is not about relaxing the muscles. Instead, the focus is on paying attention to body part by body part. Because when you focus on muscle tension, your attention is automatically directed there and then to relaxation. This is a method that for some actually works better than breath focus.

When to apply it?

Mindfulness can take place, among other things, through sitting meditation, breathing exercises, yoga or body scanning. Today, it is common in healthcare or as a private person to resort to mindfulness. For example, if you suffer from stress, anxiety, depression. And not least sleep problems are common today and many people testify to how it has helped and improved their lives. The research has also determined that mindfulness is good for people with the aforementioned problems. Although it is still unclear exactly what is good about it. Also what effects it has in detail.

The link to CBT

Using mindfulness in connection with CBT treatment is also common, and we at Learning to Sleep are no exception. We actively work with mindfulness and various relaxation exercises in our treatment and have seen good results from them. Probably the results are so good because the two techniques go so well together. Because just like mindfulness, CBT focuses on the present.

Like all other treatment techniques, you must of course also have respect for mindfulness. If you are unsure, you should always contact your doctor, instructor or psychologist for more help. Practicing your presence of mind and facing the present can, after all, feel difficult and troublesome. This is because it can cause both positive and negative thoughts and feelings to come to the surface. It is important to find a balance and a path that is right for yourself and your life.

Mindfulness for sleep problems

These are often thoughts that run around when you can’t sleep. Maybe you are thinking about something that happened during the day or something that is to come. This creates anxiety and stress and your adrenaline is pumping. The thoughts also wander off without control at the same time as the brain’s wakefulness system is activated and you cannot fall asleep. If you are unlucky, it becomes a vicious spiral that repeats itself and sleep problems become a reality. The very thought of the bedroom, the bed or sleeping can start a stress reaction within you.

At this moment, mindfulness exercises are worth their weight in gold and can act as a helping hand. Mindfulness is, as I said, about how you manage your thoughts. Either you do it by accepting without valuing. Or by directing the focus and your attention elsewhere such as breathing or how it feels in the body. If you learn techniques, you can therefore create a distance to all the thoughts that weigh you down or stress you out. THAT way you feel better. It is worth prioritizing to carry out some exercises. Find something that feels good to you and that works in your everyday life.

Mindfulness can be simple

Also keep in mind that mindfulness does not have to be a long process, but a short practice can be enough. Find the small moments in your everyday life, take a break, dedicate time to it. Everyone should be able to find time to spend 5-20 minutes on an exercise. Especially when you know that it would have meant that you had felt better overall and that your sleep quality had improved.