Developing the ability to be aware of your thoughts. door to the present

In this article, I will share tips on how to how to develop mindfulness. The development of awareness sounds somehow painfully mysterious and mysterious. At the same time, there is little mysterious and mysterious here, this is quite a specific concept (I have already written on this topic in a more general sense, in the article, in this article I will try to touch on the specifics regarding awareness, based on an example, and I will also answer The question is how to develop awareness.

What does this mean by awareness? Let's try to figure this out right away. Awareness is the ability to rational, mediated by consciousness, detached from emotions adequate analysis of external reality and internal subjective state, the formation of behavior patterns based on the conclusions from this analysis, the ability to track emotions and unconscious impulses of the psyche and the ability to resist them. In other words, awareness precedes all rational evaluation and activity.

An example of mindfulness

I came up with the definition myself, so don't scold me. Of course, I will not leave it like this and will try to explain it on specific example. Before talking about how mindfulness can be developed, let's talk about the nature of this quality once again in order to come to complete clarity. The main thing to understand is that awareness in many situations can precede some kind of physical action. Let's take an example. You have an important meeting, a serious exam, or an important job interview.

In general, such a situation during which you experience nervousness. Here is a case of a mental reaction that is NOT characterized by awareness: when you came to a conditional meeting, nervous and on an emotional platoon, you understand that there is nothing to be done, because you think that you know yourself well and since in similar situations you usually worry about this and you will be in this one too. Due to nervousness, you get confused in the presentation / answers to the questions of the examiner / personnel officer (although before that you spoke in your mind and everything looked much more harmonious and logical).

You go astray and cannot retrieve the necessary information from memory, because you are worried. Your speech is confused and uncertain, your mind is not focused, you answer worse than you would if you were not nervous. As a result, the examiner / personnel officer / business partner did not receive complete satisfaction from your performance. HR concluded that you have low stress resistance, the examiner noticed that you were worried and could attribute it to poor knowledge of the subject. As a result, you have achieved worse results than you could get if you were collected and calm.

How does awareness manifest itself?

Now I will give an opposite example of a conscious reaction to what is happening and your competent behavior resulting from this.

So you came to an interview, a meeting, an exam. You began to worry because the event is responsible. You know yourself well and understand that almost any person will experience stress in such circumstances, BUT only if they do nothing and leave it like that. You are well aware that excitement is pointless, it does not give you any advantages, but only prevents you from achieving your goal. As a result, you may not get Good work or badly pass the final exam, just because they could not control themselves and thereby made a bad impression. So why should you worry? This is not only pointless, but it can also hurt! (That was the ANALYSIS).

You bring your breathing in order, calm your heartbeat, calm yourself, come to the conclusion that the outcome of the meeting will depend on how well you can keep yourself and how collected and focused you will be. You are already tuned in to such a calm way and an ideal model of your behavior appears in your head, which you plan to adhere to. You deeply appreciate your ability to hold on and pull yourself together, as you believe that this is a sign of your spiritual strength and psychological discipline. And you intend to use this skill.

Ignoring natural anxiety, you go to our conditional meeting if you have not reached inner peace, then you try to at least portray him with a cold-blooded expression on your face, because you know what not only your state determines your facial expressions, but vice versa: your facial expressions determine your state(I will write a separate article about this).

Hold on well, speak confidently, if you forgot something, pause, calmly remember and reproduce, and if you don’t remember something, then you don’t start to panic under the strict gaze of colleagues / personnel officers / teachers, but tactfully get out of the created problem. Even if your knowledge of the subject leaves much to be desired, you will produce pleasant impression on the topics around you, how confident, focused and calm you are.

Since you are relaxed and not showing signs of excitement, you can make up for your gaps in your presentation with good tactical tricks during your speech and good contact with the audience. (This was the very physical action) As a result, you got what you deserved, and maybe even more (if you managed to bribe the audience with your confidence and manipulate its attention in the presence of obvious errors in the presentation), successfully passed the exam or passed the interview.

Analysis and will

This is an example of awareness and the volitional impulse that followed it, designed to put into practice the pattern of behavior created in the head. Here we observed an adequate, sober and balanced analysis of our emotions. Our test specimen did not succumb to feelings and nervousness, he showed ANALYSIS: calmly and calmly laid on operating table and dissected the tension that had arisen in his mind, realized its nature, which consisted in utter senselessness and uselessness.

And then, having drawn conclusions from the ANALYSIS, he formulated a model of his behavior in his head (tune in to be calm and confident, or at least portray calmness and confidence) and proceeded to action, which was expressed in attempts to comply with the chosen model, when he calmed the nerves went inside premises and calmly defended his position as a student/applicant/employee.

There may be another outcome. Our subject realized that the unrest is meaningless, tried to calm himself, but due to lack of practice, he did not succeed. He was still nervous and fidgeting in his chair. And then, after analyzing it again, I saw this as a problematic place, which I would have to work on and promised myself to take measures so that this nervousness would not manifest itself in the future. Maybe here he failed or he did not achieve what he wanted, because he could not fully cope with anxiety, but in terms of self-development and awareness development he took a big step.

He realized the nature of his excitement, made absolutely correct conclusions about it and gave himself the attitude to help ensure that this did not manifest itself in the future. He succeeded distance yourself from their feelings and passions. And he intends to continue to work on himself and train willpower, strengthen the internal discipline of which he lacked in this situation. Even despite the fact that it was not possible to cope with emotions, the hero of our thought experiment I no longer identified with my feelings!

And this is the most important thing! So do not worry and do not scold yourself if at first you fail to resist your destructive, harmful emotions and in the end they will triumph over you. The main thing is that you should always be aware of these negative impulses, try to resist them and never give up, look for new ways to defeat character weaknesses.

This example clearly illustrates that mindfulness can also be understood as a skill that causes you to stop identify with your desires, emotions, passions and fears. You begin to perceive it as something extraneous that still affects you, has power over you, but is not part of your personality and therefore can be controlled and trained. This is the power of awareness! Can you imagine what useful skill you will gain if you put in the effort to achieve states of awareness!

You can have a habit of being carried away by feelings and excitement, completely surrendering to their power and thinking that these impulses are a logical continuation of yourself and they stem from characteristic features your personality. You allow these feelings to spin and rule you, confuse your life, confuse your understanding of yourself and others, take you away from your goal and move you away from its realization.

But you can sensibly and soberly fix the impulses that arise in yourself, which prevent you from living and achieving what you want. Be aware of them, make an effort of will to gain control over them and thereby live happily and in harmony with yourself, achieving the best for yourself, rejecting fears, anxiety and uncertainty!

What is awareness for?

In order not to be unfounded and not be limited to just one example, I will explain about some of these negative impulses that need to be aware and that need to be fought, I say, after which I will tell you how to train awareness.

What can cause lack of awareness?

• Nervousness, anxiety, restlessness
• Anger, irritability
• Envy
• Fear, anxiety, uncertainty
• Depression, a tendency to despondency, mental blues
• Shyness, timidity, shyness, isolation
• The impact of bad habits
• Inability to adequately perceive criticism and the opinions of others
• Other character flaws

Now I believe you understand that the need to develop awareness in order to analyze, and then cope with the above qualities, is not determined by my personal predilections. Above you can see a list of things that really interfere or can interfere with the life of almost every person and not only! On the scale of the whole of humanity, these properties manifest themselves as universal evil: social disasters, misunderstandings, conflicts, illnesses and deaths.

In order to be able to resist them, awareness alone is not enough (willpower, discipline, strength of character, spiritual independence and a developed critical ability are required, we will talk about how to develop all this in this blog), but this is a necessary stage that allows you to calmly evaluate the appearance of these feelings. , spiritually distance themselves from them and stop perceiving them as part of their personality.

Awareness reflects a person’s desire to live by reason, resist instincts, passions and vices, and make the right, balanced decisions, strive for well-being for themselves and others, pacify anger and envy, think rationally and cope with prejudice. Increasing the degree of awareness is one of the key stages of self-development.

How to raise awareness

Now, at last, my presentation brings me to the answer to main question this article about how to raise awareness. Please excuse me for the long introduction that precedes the transition to the practical part of the article. I would not put all this material here if I was not sure of its need for our understanding of what we mean by awareness is the same thing. After all, before talking about something, you need to define it and come to a common understanding.

So there is no better way to develop and train mindfulness than regular daily.
As well as best opportunity learning to swim is actually swimming, and there is no more reliable way to increase awareness than training it. Meditation can be defined as training, the practice of mindfulness. These are sessions in which you place yourself in a state of awareness and try your best to stay in it.

In this state, you achieve complete concentration, fix your attention on one thing. You relax and begin to see the internal processes of thinking and the movement of feelings, as if from the outside. All your attention stops at one point from which you calmly observe what is happening inside, you realize this is happening.

During meditation, you may be carried away by some thoughts or feelings, memories and the bustle of the current day, but you still try to concentrate on something and distance yourself from them. This distance, the distance between the point where your will and attention is focused and your internal processes, is the measure of your awareness!. And the longer and more correctly you meditate, the greater this distance becomes.

It should be clear and logical. I mean the very principle that I described above. I am not referring to tricky terminology, I am not trying to describe the process of meditation from the point of view of the work of energy centers, subtle vibrations, etc. I describe it as I feel and understand it, based on the conclusions drawn from the results of this practice and its positive impact on me.

And if you don’t believe me, then try it yourself, it won’t take much time and effort (strength will only increase), but I assure you in the course of practice you will feel the same as me, feel the beneficial effect of meditation and my reasoning will become fair for you. I consider the main advantage of my self-development system to be that many of its conclusions are not abstract. theoretical, and can be easily tested in practice, to which I urge you in every possible way!

But in order to develop mindfulness, it is not enough just to meditate! Yes, meditation is where to start, but then, when it bears its first fruits, you will need to undertake another set of mindfulness exercises, which include the following:

• Meditate!
• Try to be relaxed throughout the day. Maintain a calm state of mind.
• Do not rush to succumb to sudden mental impulses that lead to rational action. It is necessary to analyze the causes of these feelings. If it boils inside, you should not immediately express it in action. Get out, calm down, cool your head and think it over.
• Rest more often during the day, let the brain relax, think about something extraneous during such a rest that is not related to the realities of the current day. This will help you keep your distance and keep you from being carried away by the maelstrom of the routine.
• Everywhere try to include the mind. In every little thing concerning your behavior, habits and relationships with people. You will notice that many of your actions that you are used to doing from day to day are not rational. Evaluate their impact on yourself and your life and select those that interfere with you. Work on eliminating them.
• Constantly be aware of your well-being and condition, determine when you are tired, anxious or on a nervous platoon. This is necessary either in order to quickly take measures to stabilize my state of mind, or in order not to do stupid things (I’m on edge now, I’ll go out into the street, catch my breath and put my thoughts in order, or at the moment I’m in emotional anxiety, so I’ll postpone taking important decision later when I calm down
• Analyze the causes of problem situations, it often happens that in problem situation you pulled yourself in and there is nothing to complain about the circumstances
• Be honest with yourself about your motivations and motives

The development of mindfulness in practice is discussed in the second step, there are exercises that you can do to develop mindfulness.

Don't be discouraged if you can't complete all of these steps. Learning to be relaxed and not give in to emotions is a very long and painstaking work, which you still need to accustom yourself to. But as you practice meditation, you will find it easier to follow these recommendations. Also on this site, I promise to reveal in more detail the components of this awareness-raising program.

The implementation of these points not only helps to deal with difficulties and realize the reasons for their actions, but also teaches you to analyze, to the habit of looking at what is happening in oneself from the outside, which greatly contributes to the formation of awareness.

Don't take on too much! There is no need to strive to immediately overcome all your shortcomings and cope with the strongest and uncontrollable spiritual impulses. Start with little things, with trifles: don't get nervous and don't get angry when someone steps on your foot in the subway - close your eyes, focus and calm down, think about something pleasant. And gradually move from such trifles to the global, most serious problems when you feel ready to solve them.

It's something like gradual increase weights when training in the gym: when you start exercising, you don’t start exercising with large weights, but start with small ones so as not to get injured and not ruin the effect of the workout. Also in raising awareness, start small! And meditate, as you practice, you will begin to discover in yourself amazing abilities of self-control and introspection that you have never had before!

In the previous article, we talked about what causes most of the emotional suffering of a person, where it comes from and what it is. awareness. And now I will describe several specific techniques that develop awareness and allow you to deal with your emotions in a timely manner.

Navigation on the article "How to Become Mindful: Practice and Techniques"

Concentration is, in fact, the possession of one's own attention and the ability to move it within one's own psyche and body, depending on one's own needs.

Concentration is the basis of almost all mindfulness techniques, but in itself it can already give a lot. To begin with, learn to be aware of your body, to focus on the processes taking place in it.

You can start with breathing. Just keep your attention on your own breathing, whatever it is. Then learn to keep your attention on your own muscles, for a start - separately, then - on large groups muscles (the whole back, all legs, etc.), then - on the whole body at the same time.

It will be good if you learn not only to be aware, but also to relax the muscles. To do this, you can first tighten the muscle, and then “release” the tension, and feel, continuing to keep your attention on what is happening, the process of relaxation.

You can also train the senses. Focus on the visuals you see individual items, on some particular color or on movement (for example, water or fire, or tree branches). natural objects for such cases they are very suitable, but for lack of it, you can use any others.

Similarly, you can train your ear by concentrating on some individual sounds, recognizing individual details in the general sound of the world around you, or focusing your attention on the entire sound background at the same time.

And in exactly the same way you can do with the study of your ability to touch, smell, taste. The more processes that are able to capture your attention at the same time - the deeper your awareness.

What we pay attention to is much more controlled by consciousness. Agree, while you did not pay attention to breathing - you could hardly control it. But as soon as the breath is in the center of your attention, you immediately discover the ability to influence the depth and pace of breathing.

anchoring

This technique is needed in order to:

• To fix the constant presence of the observer in you, to teach him to be awake all the time, to accompany you through life at every moment, to help you decide what to do with specific emotions, how exactly to live them and how to respond to life situations

• Destroy any autopilots, help stop automatic reactions, such as resentment, anger, feelings of insignificance, fears, anxieties, avoidance reactions, withdrawal, etc.

Actually, first you need to choose an anchor. It can be very different, only one thing is important - that it catches your eye as often as possible. It can be a picture on the refrigerator and on the desktop (it is best if it is a simple and understandable sign), an item that you wear on your hand, a piece of clothing or accessories that is always with you.

I will give examples of such anchors. I often offered my clients an image as an anchor road sign"brick". It is bright, noticeable, its meaning is clear to everyone - "stop, you can't come here." AT this case“stop, don’t react on autopilot, give yourself time to become aware of yourself.”

Or, for example, a bracelet, a ring, a watch. They are on your hand, your hands are often in sight, you will often stumble your eyes on your anchor, and it, in turn, will remind you of the same - “do not forget to ask yourself the right questions, do not react automatically.”

Some laid a similar meaning in a mug from which they constantly drink (moreover, they bought two identical ones for themselves - home and at work, so that the anchor always worked), someone used a keychain on a bag for this purpose ...

In general, the full scope of your creative fantasy. There is only one condition - you must see this item as often as possible. And it should be filled with meaning for you: to remind you that you can become aware at this very moment.

How to achieve this, how to “attach” an item to this reminder? Sometimes a simple internal attitude is enough: “every time I look at this object, I will remember awareness, the presence of an internal observer.” Remembering several times, the connection "subject - state" will be fixed.

But, to be sure, it is better to do the procedure as deeply and in detail as possible. Sit in a comfortable position. Try (see point about concentration).

Then, when the feeling of the whole body can be more or less kept in consciousness, add to this the perception of colors in that room or in some place where you are. Then - sounds, smells. Try to sit and perceive. Look at the object-anchor.

And then try to remember some situation that bothers you. Name the feelings first - take your time, list everything you can find in your verbal repertoire. Decide on the names of the feelings. Keep looking at the anchor.

Now ask yourself why these feelings happened to you. “I feel hurt and annoyed because I had expectations that he would appreciate my efforts in cleaning the house, and he didn’t seem to notice.”

Remember all those points that we discussed in the last article. Is it important to you, and if so, why? What is really important? Is this the only way you could get it? Try to answer these questions for yourself. Look at the anchor.

Further, suppose you find out that it's not about today's cleaning of the house, but that you lack kind words and attention. Now ask yourself a question - what would you like in essence? To be told kind words? Showed attention? How could you convey this to your partner without provoking a scandal with your grievances?

Another option - you name your feelings, and understand that you are offended and angry at all about this. When did these feelings first arise today? In the morning? What happened in the morning? And in the morning, my stomach hurt a lot, and not for the first time, and it turns out that you have been worrying about your health for days ...

And the unspoken words of praise from the partner only added fuel to the fire and intensified the resentment that had already taken place against your own body, which, for some reason you don’t understand, everything hurts and hurts, and you feel more and more unhappy, since “and he didn’t notice, what I tried….

And here is the time to switch to the techniques of working with own body rather than cultivate resentment against a partner. Moreover, when due to awareness own feelings you will understand the source at least in the first approximation - you will already lose the desire to automatically respond with reproaches against your partner.

In general, a psychologist at a consultation helps to ask yourself the right questions in a timely and competent manner. This is in a sense learning by doing, it is faster and deeper than trying to learn the theory first. But you can achieve a lot on your own.

Yes, not all questions will be answered immediately. And you won't be able to right away. become conscious enough to stop responding automatically. And yet, the more you practice on different situations, trying different questions, the higher your awareness will be in the end.

If during all trainings you look at your anchor object, it, in turn, will not let you slide into automatic reactions later and will remind you that it would be nice to first become aware of yourself in space, and then ask yourself the right questions .

In addition to such “meditations” on your own acute situations, you can try to do all this right at the time of emerging negative emotions. It just seems that technically it is very cumbersome - first to feel your body, then to name feelings and ask questions ...

But in fact, it is better to practice mindfulness of the body as often as possible and in general, in the end, try not to lose touch with it, but regarding feelings and questions, our brain actually works very quickly.

The only question is how to use it. After all, he can quite quickly draw scary pictures for you about “how everything will be” or whisper “how everything should be.” Why then, in order to become aware, do not teach him to ask questions just as quickly?

Perhaps, in the first moments of mindfulness practice, you will “slow down”. And who said that you must immediately merge your resentment towards your partner? Perhaps if you "slow down" - you would save the situation rather than worsen it?

To ask questions

You can do this without an anchor, if you are able to remember about it. The main list of questions looks like this:

• What do I feel and feel? How is it experienced by my body?
• When did it start?
• What was going on in my life when this feeling started?
• What expectations did I have from this reality and why?
• For what reason do I believe that only meeting these expectations will make me happy man?
• What do I really want from the situation/myself/other?
• Can I see something positive in what is happening that can teach me?
• Why do I need this experience, what should I understand now about myself and others?

All this does not mean that you will “slow down” any situation. Perhaps you will come to the conclusion that your partner humiliates you, and for a long time and systematically. And that it is in your interests to let him understand this and firmly defend your boundaries.

But if this was preceded by an awareness of everything that happened to you around the situation with your partner, it is unlikely that your words and actions will be chaotic and unconvincing. More often, on the contrary, momentary emotions seasoned with a lack of understanding of what is really happening are unconvincing.

That is why children’s “grievances” are funny to us: from the height of an adult, we can clearly see how a banal conflict of expectations and reality (I wanted a toy, this one now, but my parents didn’t have money - they didn’t buy it) turns into literally suffering with a roar and screams.

We are well aware of how much a child still needs to understand in order to be able to measure his “wishlist” with different processes in the world, which he will have to take into account in the future. But at the same time, most adults sometimes behave in exactly the same way. Only the "Wishlist" is more difficult and the suffering is much more acute.

And therefore, often the conflicts of two adult “children” lead nowhere - they only hurt each other, but do not ask themselves questions leading to understanding, do not know what this conflict should teach them and are not able to isolate the essence of their wishes for peace.

The picture changes when at least one of them tries to become conscious. And either, thanks to this, he can not inflate a scandal over a trifle, or, if it is already clear that this is not a trifle at all, having understood himself, such a person can competently convey the essence of his wishes and feelings to a partner and offer constructive solutions.

This method implies the maximum strengthening of the position of the observer and, at the same time, the complication of this position. In order to be able to cope, for example, with those emotions that absorb you too much, with panic, obsessive thoughts.

Imagine you have a screen in front of you. Dissociation of the first level means that you kind of transfer your experiences to the screen and start looking at them from the side. At the same time, it is important to transfer the “I” point to the one who sits and watches the movie as much as possible.

At the same time, continue to look at the screen, seeing your feelings and panic there, concentrating on the fact that you are, first of all, the one who watches the movie, who sits in auditorium, and at any time, if desired, can stop the movie or leave the hall.

Further, when you are more or less familiar with this state, imagine that now you are the one who is sitting at a distance, for example, in the last row of the cinema or standing at the entrance to the hall, and looking at the one who is sitting and looking at the screen.

Due to this complication of experience, emotions become further away from you. This does not mean that you suppress them or do not notice - they are just in the center of your picture, they are on the screen. But the degree of your preoccupation with what is happening is noticeably reduced.

You begin to see details, nuances, and pretty quickly you start to look at what is happening with different parties, to see previously invisible details, and perhaps immediately ways out of the situation.

Incidentally, the emphasis on detail can be independent technique. One of my clients during unpleasant conversation I noticed with my boss that he often uses the phrase "so to speak."

Paying attention to this detail of speech, the man was carried away by counting - and how many times the boss will say “so to speak” in the next minute? Turned out to be twelve. In this perspective, the boss appeared to my client as a rather insecure person who had difficulty with wording in speech.

Is it necessary to say that the aggressive emotional message that the boss wanted to bring down on the man simply disappeared into the air and did not reach the address? On the contrary, looking at the boss through the prism of details, my client stopped feeling automatic fear of him, and as a result, he was able to defend his boundaries and requirements.

The second version of dissociation can be done by helping yourself with the body. For example, if emotions take over you too much and spiral heartache unwinds at a frantic speed, you can take a step out of an imaginary circle, leaving in the circle the one who is experiencing, and shifting the focus of attention to yourself-observer.

It is important to physically take a step. And continue to look from the outside at someone who is captured by unpleasant emotions. You can enhance this effect in the same way as in the first case - taking one more step, placing yourself in the position of a person who is already watching the one who is watching the first.

The important thing is that you do not "distract" from your emotions, do not try to pretend that they are not there, do not bombard yourself with heaps of unnecessary information, just to "not think about it." And in doing so, you do not allow the flow of emotions to completely erase critical perception and drown you in panic, exacerbating an already difficult situation.

These are far from all the techniques that help to become conscious. I have described the most effective of those that can be conveyed through words. Some, for example, can only be shown in practice. But already this knowledge will be enough to significantly improve relations with oneself.

To understand more deeply what is happening to you, why, and most importantly, to begin to see solutions and change your attitude to the situation already in the course of what is happening, and not “in hindsight” and in hindsight, which everyone is strong, but, as a rule, when it's harder to change something.

Mindfulness helps to change a lot here and now, and sometimes it helps to prevent an unpleasant development of events, avoid unnecessary suffering and simply save one's strength. After all, there is enough in life that it really makes sense to spend them on.

There are two ways to live: when you think that everything depends on other people and circumstances (in this case, if something goes wrong, someone is always to blame, but not you) and when we ourselves take responsibility for our lives, realizing that what we have, in what world we live in, largely depends on our thoughts, intentions and actions.

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The second way involves developing awareness as a state of presence in everything we do. The human mind is arranged as follows: it sends our thoughts either to the past, re-experiencing what has already happened and cannot be changed, or to the future, worrying about what may not be. At the same time, we lose the only thing we have - the present ...

Yoga, as a system of knowledge, includes many exercises to develop awareness. Some of them are performed in the form of a formal practice - various meditation, contemplative exercises, observation of sensations during physical practices. At the same time, yoga offers to maintain a state of awareness even after the end of the class, practicing mahamudra - the presence here and now in Everyday life.

I will prompt you simple options development of awareness.

Method 1. Physical sensations in the body

Right now, turn your attention to your left hand. Clench it tightly into a fist and hold until you feel a slight tremor from fatigue, then instantly relax your hand and track the difference in sensations. Now slowly lift right hand through the side down and then also slowly lower. Watch the movement, feel the density of the air, its resistance. It is easiest to develop awareness through physical sensations in the body, because the body is always here and now. One has only to direct attention to the sensations, and you will hear many signals from your body. You will begin to understand what is comfortable for him and what is not; which exercises and foods are healthy and which are harmful.

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Method 2. Breathing

Another tool that is always with you is breathing. Whatever you do, you can always find an opportunity to be aware of the in-breaths and out-breaths. Feel now the tip of the nose, the nostrils, the point above upper lip. Feel the movement of air, its temperature, density, smells. Watch how you breathe - slowly or quickly, deep or shallow, belly or chest. Try to lengthen your breath, exhale twice as long as you inhale. Conscious breathing helps to direct attention inward, calm nervous system and focus.

Method 3. Mindful eating

Take an apple or other product. Consider it. Smell, feel the density. Take a bite slowly and, as if you are trying for the first time, follow the whole gamut of sensations. During any meal, take your time, hear the smells, examine the product, feel its texture, slowly enjoy the taste and then monitor the state after eating.

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Method 4. Alarm clock

For pedantic persons, this method is suitable: set an alarm for every hour and at the time of his call, direct your attention to what is happening inside you now.

Method 5. Anchor system

Choose some action or object that will return you to this moment: for example, whenever you see something red, ask yourself the question: where is my attention now? Or put some kind of talisman in your bag and every time you bump into it, keep track of where your thoughts are now.

Method 6. Conscious walking

During a leisurely walk, feel how the sole touches the ground, how then the foot rises, how the step with the second leg occurs. Watch how your hands move, hear your breathing. A simple walk can turn into a mindfulness practice. You will never be bored.

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Method 7. Mindfulness during regularly repeated actions

Always, for example, while washing your hands, remember where you are now, what do you feel, what are you thinking about? Or do this every time you close and open doors in any room.

You can come up with your own ways, your own anchors of awareness. One principle is to direct attention to the moment here and now. I want you to be the captain own life! Remember, where attention is, there is energy, direct your energies to what is really important to you!

Alexey Zharkov

How to get to the present?

Beforeone fleeting pro is enoughshine to initiate an irreversible awakening process.

Eckhart Tolle

Greetings

My dear attentive reader!

I suggest you read this collection of knowledge about YOURSELF not in vain, but when you are calm and open to internal changes. There is nothing new in it. You already know all this in the depths of your soul. It’s just that this knowledge is hidden under a layer of your and other people’s thoughts, ingrained habits, established views, the opinions of others, fuss, anxiety, problems and much more. I will give you the keys with which you will open the caskets with answers to many important issues. And then a clear understanding of the many problems that have so far prevented you from living sincerely and joyfully will ease your step and open up your life. The world is much larger than the framework in which we drive ourselves. But nothing prevents you from marrying them and entering the present to stay in it forever.

So, take action: find a calm, quiet corner at home or go to the park, to the forest, to nature and read this book. Just do not try to comprehend it with the mind or logic. Treat this text like a "message in a bottle" - tune in to more than just thoughts and words. And, after reading everything to the end, be happy, that is, be at one with life and its Moment!

First step

To begin with, you just need to start observing your thoughts - tracking their trajectories, noticing repetitions, seeing which situations attract them like a magnet. And immediately a lot becomes clear - why your life turned out this way and not otherwise, what priorities and values ​​\u200b\u200bdirected it. And also comes the realization that where there is a dominance of thoughts, there is no FREEDOM! And then another desire arises - to stop disappearing in your thoughts and start being PRESENT IN YOUR OWN LIFE! You become attentive to what you used to consider trifles, from which every day becomes almost rubber, rich in events and new experience. This is a completely different world in which you have never lived before ...

The present moment is alive, fluid, real. Change the habit of living in your thoughts to the habit of living in the NOW. In the present there is sound, light, color, sensations and, most importantly, a FEELING OF JOY from being in it. Watch your thoughts. They come and go like clouds on a windy day. Don't follow them! Don't become your own thought! Tell yourself it's just a thought. If it can be of any use to you, use it and RETURN TO THE PRESENT. We do not know the nature of thoughts - where they come from and where they are born. They appear in us due to internal processes that are not tracked by our consciousness. But, no matter how many these thoughts are in my head, you are much more than them. Thoughts are just a SMALL PART of the BIG you. By practicing this outlook on life, you know exactly what to do and what to avoid.

Here are some practical tips for becoming more fully present in the present moment…

Olust for power

Imagine that you are a hunter and your prey is the power of the present moment. From now on, wherever you are, constantly add a quantum of power to yourself with each new "connection to the moment." With practice, you will make sure that all objects and things in each place have their own order. And the same order is in you. And this is already a decent force!

Mscribe

We already know that our attention is included in the process of what is happening only from time to time, like a pendulum at its highest point. Experiment with the pendulum of your attention. Here you are included in the present - you hear sounds, feel smells, temperature and air vibrations, see objects and things, and your attention is focused not on thoughts, but on what surrounds you ... PENDULUM AT ITS HIGHEST POINT. The next moment you say to yourself: “Let the thoughts come”… AND THE PENDULUM STOPS. Repeat this cycle several times.

Toamushek

Practice happens all the time - it's a natural and non-stop process. But it happens that a small pebble blocks the river flow in a narrow part of the channel, and in order for the water to flow again, it needs to be found and removed. Often he hides in the relationship between you and people close to you ... Mentally take a large magnifying glass and look through it at what surrounds you. Or imagine yourself as a map of the world, dotted with notches and scratches in places of old grievances, negative emotions and outbursts of aggression, and look for your stumbling block there.

Warik

Observe yourself throughout the day, trying to identify the most tense part of the body. Most often, these are the muscles of the face, neck, back, feet or palms. And at the moment of falling asleep, suddenly feel this tension! And with an exhalation, relax it, deflating like a balloon.

ATwithoglasia with moment

Actions based on internal agreement with the present moment come from a deep level of consciousness. They do not involve the egocentric center and reactions based on desires and fears. On the contrary, they contain the power underlying the creation of the world. The same power is in everything we do with enthusiasm and pleasure. Only we get pleasure not from the actions themselves, but from the deep feeling of life that fills them.

Greatthe equation

We talk about the present moment as something else, as if there is "we" and there is "he". But, fortunately, this is not so, because we are the PRESENT MOMENT! We also talk about life - our life, my life. We attribute it to ourselves, while we are LIFE ITSELF! Neither the present moment nor our life belongs to us. But they are us! There is a sign of equality and complete similarity between us. But we really own thoughts and emotions. But only they are not us, although we are used to identifying with them so much that we consider them to be ourselves. This is the great confusion, the basis of all misfortune and suffering. We are so deeply entangled in the substitution of real values, which give us the joy of life, with an illusion that brings only troubles and problems, that we are forced to re-examine, observe and practice the PRESENT MOMENT as something separate somewhere out there, outside of us. And this is the main paradox of our life. It is overcome through presence in the PRESENT. Presence is a feeling of space. In itself, around, everywhere. Get involved in the NOW in literally- like a lamp, like a light bulb! Feel the absence of thoughts and, as a result, the boundless fullness of sensations ... inner light ... a touch of peace ... Gradually, the inner light goes out, giving way to the rustle of thoughts. It does not disappear forever, but only goes out - like the sunset sun that filled us with its warmth. And very soon it will rise again!

Without words

Truth is comprehended only through the experience of revelation, it cannot be clothed in words: the essence of the word is a symbol, and the symbol is far from reality. It is only a pointer to WHAT REALLY IS!

VkuwithaboutbpuppiesIinmoment now

Communication in the NOW MOMENT is a special beauty of relationships between people in any place and at any time. It doesn't matter if you knew this person before or not. In the NOW MOMENT, essential, non-verbal contact is established instantly. And the topic of communication is important only in the first minutes of the conversation, after which its place is occupied by the space in which the process of communication unfolds. You open to the interlocutor that area of ​​conversation where there is silence and unhurried universal wisdom. And together you are filled with them, bypassing any words ... Didn’t each of us communicate like this with a seemingly unfamiliar person in everyday life? Of course it was. It’s just that we don’t fix this event in our minds and don’t call it in any way, jumping with attention to the “box” with thoughts and rushing further in the untracked stream of everyday actions and deeds. Accentuate these significant events in your memory and use them later as a guide in communicating with people.

The joy of presence

Joy is possible only where nothing prevents it from being - neither fragments of annoying thoughts, nor the heaviness of old emotions, nor past grievances, discontent and disappointments. In this soft and calm emptiness there is no personality attached to thoughts, no references to the past and future. Any thoughts and experiences fade into the background here and become just human attributes. LIGHT and inimitable MOMENTS OF LIFE come to the fore! Being present in them, we become its co-creators.

There are only three ways of life:

• in the awareness of one's human nature;
• in a cocoon of illusions;
• neither there nor here, but somewhere in between.

Now, as I write these lines, I am surrounded by trillions of snowflakes - only the huge windows of my house separate us. Where do snowflakes live? In the same space as me. Let's call it the space of CONSCIOUSNESS. He has one important quality: it is only NOW. But thanks to the properties of my MIND, I can disconnect from reality and move into a “cocoon state”, or I can LIVE the present moment as it was given to me by nature, and as she does it herself. The mind “helps” me to disconnect from the real eventfulness with the help of thoughts or mental images about the past and the future. If we cannot immediately discard its illusory constructions, and it is uncomfortable and hard for us to live in them, then we should turn to those bridges-connections that “turn off thoughts” and take us to a place where there is neither fear nor pain, - in SEIT- HOUR. Let it be just for a moment.

Duel

To challenge yourself is to challenge your ego. And you will be the only witness to this. But if you win this duel, the whole Universe will applaud your victory!

From words to deeds

If you really want to get in touch with the power of the present, you must not think, but DO, diving headlong into the energy of the moment. And the results will not be slow to tell! By devoting ourselves to what we do, we go beyond time, not worrying about what has already happened and not worrying about the future. We take a step to where there are no fears, problems, worries and other inventions of the mind. But there is life - genuine and unimagined.

ZhIVISHH!

Perception angle

Be who you are! You are not a person, not the story of your own life, not how you see yourself or how others see you. You are not a factor of time and not a part of fleeting events in the world around you. You are not a body of bones and skin and internal organs. Not a mind in a box of thoughts. Not the name given to you by your parents, and not a statistical unit in the census data.

BUT WHO ARE YOU THEN? YOU ARE PART OF A UNIVERSE WHICH IS ALL OF THE ABOVE

And this is the TRUTH, which must be felt, in which one must abide. This is not just another concept or idea, but your primordial nature - THE MEANING OF YOUR EXISTENCE. What will change if you accept yourself as part of space? At first, nothing! The momentum will still be very strong. But then, somehow imperceptibly to the mind, everything that happens to you will be filled with the freshness of colors and the aroma of smells. You will cease to be "drawn" into certain events, and an observer will wake up in you. You will stop being dependent on anyone or anything and gradually give up your social roles. There will be more satisfaction and pleasure in your life - FROM LIFE ITSELF! And you will always experience an incomparable feeling - the joy of being present in every moment of the events!

Conscious action

In the state of intense wakefulness, you are open to what is, you look and listen, you are one with the situation, you do not react to it, but are in it consciously. Then any solution comes from the situation itself. In fact, it is not you who hears it, but an intensely awake silence, and if an action is necessary, it is performed through you, and not by you. A right action is an action that is compatible with the whole. When it is completed, the same waking silence remains. BE AWARE: the action has taken shape, it has produced results. But this is not your merit! You just let it happen, aligning with the present moment.

Intraglow

Stepping into the present moment, we begin to glow from within. This also works in reverse side. By activating the inner glow, we turn on the present moment.

Observation

Thought images hover in the space of the mind one by one, together and in whole flocks. Outwardly, they may look quite harmless, but in fact they are hunters. Their prey is your attention, your energy resource. If you suddenly notice that you have plunged headlong into one or another mental image - so much so that you no longer see the boundaries between it and yourself - be aware of the position of your body and the direction of your gaze. Most likely, it will be directed forward and down. Move it to the horizon line and change your posture - relax, straighten your spine and smile a little. The dead grip of the mental image will instantly weaken, and if you do not gape, then you will have time to enjoy a smooth flash of no-mind between the end of one thought and the beginning of another.

Be in the process

Define goals, set tasks to be solved, outline the steps that lead to these goals, and ... BECOME THESE STEPS. When the goal is outlined and you have decided on the ways to achieve it, it should become secondary. The PROCESS itself should become primary. Dive into it with your head! Find the present moment as you move towards your goal. He can't be somewhere around the corner. He is only here, in the present, he is always at hand. Do not replace the living, joyful, present with an illusion about the significance of the goal. And then you will live not an illusion, but a reality. REALLY happy!

Talk

-Daddy, what is a happy person?

This is a person who does not expect happiness from life, because there is NOTHING to EXPECT here. Life for him IS HAPPINESS! At this very moment!

The main entrance

We already know that we need to live in the present moment. But how to get into it?

• THROUGH THE BODY. Be aware of your feet and hands, back, pelvis, neck, eyes, ears, tongue, and your entire body.
• THROUGH INTERNAL SPACE. As you direct your attention into the silence, ask yourself, “What is beyond it? And sink deeper and deeper.
• THROUGH THE SENSES. Simultaneously use hearing, sight, smell and sensitivity of the entire surface of the body.
• THROUGH THE BREATH. Take a slow conscious breath, trace it along its entire length, and distribute the exhalation throughout the body, thereby stopping the flow of thought forms.
• THROUGH TOTAL ATTENTION to what you are doing at the moment.
• THROUGH THE PERCEPTION of the poignant transience of every moment of life.

Alternate these techniques, choosing the best at the moment, and you will see how the internal dialogue stops, silence comes by itself, and attention flows inward, to the chest area. From there you can REALLY SEE AND LOVE the world around you!

Gate of love

In the end, it all comes down to aligning with your true self. When you allow it to manifest, love begins to flow from your eyes. Your heart sends a beam into space purest love- to ALL PRESENT here. It comes out from the transparent depths - from the very source of creation. He streams love through you, wherever you are, every moment. Passing this love through you, you allow it to spread freely in all directions. These streams of love awaken the memory of those who awakened this feeling in you at different moments of your life. And you again EXPERIENCE PURE LOVE in all its manifestations.

When you meet anyone, allow yourself to scan your memory and be filled with the love that is stored in it. In these moments, LOVE AND GRATITUDE flow through your heart chakra to our wonderful planet. Gratitude for everyone you love and who loves you. Scanning your being, you repeatedly enter this world through the wide-open doors of your heart.

advice for everyoneday

We are constantly waiting for some significant events, missing supposedly little things. But our life consists not only of great victories and accomplishments. It includes thousands of everyday activities that we do every day. We are the sum total of all these gestures, movements, sittings, lying down, steps. May they all be conscious! Freedom of the moment reality is free from any dependencies. As well as our consciousness! But is it always? No, only when we are in the present moment, that is, we OBSERVE and REALIZE the space inside and around. When we are at the mercy of our programs and emotions, our consciousness is bound hand and foot.

IS IT SO FAR TO GO?

Piggy bank of energy

Just as a hunter is looking for game, so a person striving to live in full force seeks and collects in his piggy bank high-sounding and strong-vibrating clumps of energies. Most of them are at the peak of the moment, on the crest of events, in the collected awareness of any action. When there are enough of them, a person is taken to another orbit of reality, where he invariably finds himself in the right place and in right moment, and synchronous coincidences begin to occur more and more often. At this energy level, you can solve absolutely any problem. Have a good hunting!

learning to be

Learn to move, speak and act in the field of the Present, in the mode of active awareness. Being in the field of the PRESENT does not mean looking around and noticing new interior details or a crack in the ceiling, which is already several months old, if not years old. To be in the PRESENT means to feel a subtle connection with inner silence and a wonderful freshness of all forms of the outer world. In this practice of returning to yourself, use the full range of bodily and sensory sensations. Notice every detail, every little thing! You can move to another level of life right now. To do this, you just need to recognize all your fears, resentment and guilt as an old illusion and every cell of the body, with your whole being to feel the present moment as the only possible one. This is all you have now. AND GOD IS ONLY NOW.

miracle cure

How to get rid of diseases that destroy the body? The main enemies of health are thoughts and emotions that obscure the PRESENT MOMENT from us. But the essence of the problem is not in them, but in ourselves - after all, it is we fanatically pumping them with our life force so necessary for us to create! The method of "treatment" is simple: having found the carrier of the disease - negative emotions and thoughts - in your body, as evidenced by the feeling of anxiety, dissatisfaction and fear, fix it as a FACT. This means that you are NOT totally present in the present moment. Next, create the intention to BE IN THE NOW - in THIS place and THIS moment. Now bring all your attention to the breath, the sounds, and any sensations that arise. See yourself and the space outside with your inner vision. And just watch as your energy starts to grow by itself. The key to success is not just to know it, but to DO it! Consciously, consistently and regularly. When you notice the emotions that destroy your health, fight them with the sword of your mindfulness. This will take only two or three minutes, and you can do it anytime and anywhere. BE HEALTHY!

Festival of light

Send a stream of light into your inner space. Illuminate every cell of your body. THANK YOU FROM ALL YOUR SOUL. And listen to what it says in response.

Fine moods

WHERE I AM? Inhale and inner smile. GOD LOVES ME. Expansion in all directions, eyes open in a smile. I LOVE MY MOST TROUBLE POINTS. Very slow breath and pause. BE NOW. Everything around seems to become sharp. I ACCEPT EVERYTHING AS IS. A wave of energy floods the back of the head and back. I AM COMPLETELY SATISFIED WITH MY LIFE. The chest expands, and the same thing begins to happen in the head.

Three miracles

In the life of every person there are three miracles:

• the power of the present moment;
• infinity of internal space;
• breathing as a daily need.

The only question is whether a person feels them and recognizes them as a great blessing or ignores them, living out of habit.

insight

I suddenly realized that as a person, as a small “I”, I can do very little. But as a spirit, as a true "I", I can do a lot! What do I choose? What is the present moment and how to learn to live in it? What is the worst thing to lose in the daily course of days? What are you left with, losing touch with your deepest nature, with the essence of your big “I”? Personal history is only thoughts, just THOUGHTS IN THE HEAD about past or future events described by the mind, which deftly and imperceptibly replaces reality with them. That is why it is worth taking seriously only the Present. It has no illusions about life, but only life itself. THE LIFE THAT "I" CHOOSE FOR MYSELF.

Suffering

What is suffering and why does it take up so much space in a person's life? I'm weak, I made a lot of mistakes, but now there's nothing to fix - oh, life passes by ... Do you know these conclusions? Well, of course! Suffering is based on a single thought that was instilled in you by your parents, most often in early childhood. You were convinced that you are a separate inferior being, and this thought turned into a solid installation in your head: I am a separate, inferior and not free person, devoid of choice. Over time, it has acquired a mass of examples confirming its legitimacy. The most common misconception is that it will be possible to get rid of suffering sometime later, in the future.

For example:

• the son will grow up, marry, and conflicts will disappear;
• Here I will earn more money, and all my torment will come to an end.

Such a train of thought only strengthens the attitude to the imperfection of life, and hence suffering. The only way to put an end to suffering is to take it for granted at the moment it occurs. Sincerely say yes to suffering and wish yourself well through it. Now watch what follows. Sometimes suffering takes the form of anguish that comes from nowhere, from which the body becomes heavy and the mind becomes dull. Do not please neither work, nor children, nor family - nothing! A small, puny little man, who lives somewhere inside, suddenly begins to yearn, overwhelmed by dissatisfaction and resentment!

Can this be avoided? CAN! In two counts! Or rather, in two steps: ONE - enter the present moment. TWO - say yes to longing. Accept it as a fact and welcome it. And look what comes out of it! Suffering cannot live on its own. It's a leech attached to your energy body. Realize it... and thank her for purifying your blood! UNCONSCIOUSNESS IS THE BASIS OF SUFFERING. Every day you need to meet with infinity and let it in at the present moment! Suffering says that we have forgotten about the true purpose of our coming into this world. And it is very simple - WAKE UP FROM SLEEP!

Equal sign

Waking up from sleep in the morning on a day off, when you are not in a hurry, imagine your most transcendental dream. For example, that you live in the most beautiful corner of the earth among kind, cheerful and beloved people. You are free from all the problems and obligations that surround you in your everyday life. Feel this feeling of delight and freedom and ... transfer it to the present moment. Put an equal sign between them! This is the real feeling of how you can live in the present. At such moments there is a spontaneous separation of reality from the concepts of the mind.

So imagine...

Projection

Our deepest fear and guilt is much easier to see in the way we project it onto others. We blame the sinfulness not on ourselves, but on the “scapegoat” and shamefully expel him from our lives: psychologically or physically. Do not drive your fear away from yourself, but draw closer to the one who manifested it for you. This meeting can be a revelation for you!

Breath Formula

Three breaths - one freedom.

Attunement

Every present moment has its own energy charge and your momentum. Our task is to fix them with our attention and resonate at their frequency. This way of life gives a powerful impetus to awakening.

recipetjoy

Most of all, I appreciate in people the quality that allows me to catch glimpses of joy in every minute, in every, even the most insignificant action and state. A person who is established in the FORCE OF THE PRESENT MOMENT gets direct access to inner freedom and the joys of life. And with joy, as you know, wings grow. THE POWER OF ROUTINE AND EARTH GRAVITATION THEY DO NOT LIKE!

door to the present

Log into the present moment as in open door. Not in the thought of the present, but in its reality. Leave all thoughts and step forward. What changed?

Evolution

Feeding yourself with everyday mindfulness, watch the tree of consciousness grow through your body, words and deeds.

mind to help

You don't have to be someone to be yourself. And you need to remember yourself, AS YOU ARE, and not the name. Conditioning, education, habits, desires bind you to the mind. But the mind has no power. You yourself give him strength by directing your attention, energy and time to him. Become stronger mind. Direct all attention to yourself - to how you fit into the PRESENT MOMENT, how you resonate with it, what you give it and what you receive in return. And the mind will help you perceive all this!

Incommensurability

We do not know the nature of thoughts - where they come from and where they are born. They appear in us due to internal processes that are not tracked by our consciousness. I've said this before, but I'm not afraid to repeat myself. THOUGHTS are just a SMALL PART of the BIG you. With this scale in mind, one can avoid big problems and minor annoyances.

The installation is consciousnnews

Enough to run around the masters and buy books on the topic of awareness. If you are not lucky enough to rise to that peak of suffering that often leads to enlightenment (as happened to Eckhart Tolle), just check if the topic of liberation is at the top of your list of values. If not, do not fool the Mind either to yourself or to others.

Optional number with enlightenment does not work. If there is a stable understanding that awareness at any given moment is your most important thing on this stage, transform this understanding into the same urgent need as breathing. And breathe, breathe, breathe...

active consciousness

I AM. I AM THE VOID. I AM THE WILL. I AM THE POWER. I AM WHAT THE THOUGHT COMES FROM. I AM PURE CONSCIOUSNESS. I AM.

Binding thread

Our spirit passes like a THREAD through space, time, circumstances, through people and our body. Already nothing, no events can interrupt this thread. FOR IT IS STRETCHED WITH OUR CONSCIOUSNESS.

I'll start with the mistakes people make when they try to understand what awareness is; from the false ideas that arose in the minds of people about it. So, for example, it is believed that awareness is a kind of control, and a conscious person sits motionless, like a statue, moves slowly and speaks slowly. For some reason, it seems to people that self-awareness should slow down the body, that it takes some time to realize what is happening, and therefore a person in self-awareness should become slow and inactive. All this is a delusion of beginners who think that if you do not move, then it becomes easier to become aware of yourself. Mindfulness mimics try to look like sphinxes, they mimic high awareness by controlling their body. For those who practice sitting meditations, like murakaba or zazen, it also sometimes seems that stillness, control over the body is one of the conditions for their correct implementation. But the control of the body is the mind, and it has nothing to do with awareness. Mindfulness does not mean that the energy in the body stops moving and that the body must become static. Awareness means being present in what is happening, and one can sit completely still and be absent from oneself. Or move quickly, perfectly aware of yourself. At conscious person his nose may itch, and then he will scratch it, realizing his action. From the point of view of those who see awareness in control, such an action may be regarded as unconscious, but the real unconsciousness manifests itself in another way.

People who begin the practice of mindfulness believe that its indicator, among other things, is good memory. That is, if I remember what I did today, yesterday and other days, then I was aware of myself. This is another substitution of the process of awareness by the function of the mind. Consciousness is not connected with memory, and remembering everything you do is important only for the mind, for its assessment of its own effectiveness. It is not at all necessary to remember everything that you do, you must be present in what you are doing, this is quite enough. People who confuse self-awareness with the process of thinking also believe that when their mind becomes clear and they can think about something without being distracted by chaotically emerging thoughts, then at that moment they just become fully aware. But it's not. A lot of misconceptions about awareness arise only from the fact that people confuse self-awareness, presence in their actions, with the quality work of the mind. Since they cannot separate action and mind, they have the false belief that the better, purer, and more accurate their mind functions, the greater their awareness. This is a widespread mistake among beginners in practice, and if they do not get the real skill of self-awareness in time, they may remain in illusions about the nature of awareness.

Another misconception about self-awareness is that awareness should be used to stop the mind. Here the mind is perceived as the enemy and the main obstacle to enlightenment, and stopping it, on the contrary, is the greatest boon for the seeker. This is also another misconception put into circulation by unscrupulous teachers. Stopping the mind does not lead to enlightenment. There are ways to stop the mind, but nothing much happens as a result. Stopping the mind comes as a result of withdrawing attention from it, in the process, for example, meditation. Not receiving the energy of attention, he himself calms down and stops. And, of course, it will take a long time to sit in real, not imitation meditation. But there is no enlightenment at this moment, and the mind turns on again as soon as you start doing your daily activities. It is necessary to distinguish between being outside crazy and the notorious stop internal dialogue. In awareness, you live outside the mind, it ceases to be the center of your being, and you use it as needed. Attempts to stop the mind forcibly lead to the fact that at first you slow it down and it jams itself, and then you run out of energy, and you cannot continue to restrain it. Then he develops frantic activity, releasing through it all the energy accumulated during the forced braking. This, in fact, ends all attempts to stop the mind. The control of the mind over itself is also not a part of awareness.

Now let's talk about the nature of awareness. We would not be able to be aware of ourselves if we did not have Consciousness. Individual Consciousness is a separate body connected with the rest of our bodies through the channel of attention. In fact, it is an attribute of God, His gift, without which we could not exist. Consciousness is eternal and unchanging. His energy never diminishes, increases, or dwindles. Its energy revives any processes to which it is directed. In other words, the energy of Consciousness - main force our inner world.

Attention is a function of Consciousness, which we can use at our discretion. We manage it with the help of the mind, which serves as a kind of sewer, directing it either outward, to external objects, or inward, to sensations. If, for example, we want to feel the sensations in the hand, then the ray of attention to it will be directed by the mind. Or, if we have a pain in the hand, attention will automatically shift there, because any strong stimulus immediately attracts it, and the mind then remains aside.

Consciousness is never or almost never present in us in pure form, because our attention connects with those objects to which it is directed. We are watching an interesting movie, and our attention is completely absorbed by what is happening on the screen. We experience fear, and it dissolves into his energy, amplifying it. Our attention is always identified with something, it never remains free. Even if we have absolutely nothing to do, it immediately merges with the flow of thoughts and associations. This, in fact, is the whole situation described as human unconsciousness. We are not present in what is happening, we are absorbed in various kinds of processes with which our attention merges. We live as if in a dream, in a haze, completely unaware of the causes of our reactions and states, because we do not have free attention to see them, because it is always absorbed by something. When we are seized with fear, we are not, there is fear. Of course, we think about it, and the mind creates the illusion of our presence in what is happening, but this is just its reaction to fear, which has no reality behind it. The mind simply names our states, but it cannot see them because it has no corresponding function.

Let's say you are afraid. Your attention is immersed in it, and it intensifies, you are embraced by it. You try to distract yourself, but nothing works, because fear is currently the strongest irritant of all available, and attention automatically returns to it. Your mind reacts to the situation with a stream of habitual thoughts and begins to suppress fear, pushing it into the inner space and into the muscles of the body. Thus, fear ceases to be the main irritant and attention is freed to be immediately identified with the mind and its anxiety. At the same time, the mind thinks in terms of “I”, maintaining the illusion that all this happened not just like another uncontrolled reaction, to which you have practically nothing to do, but that it happened with you. It turns out that you are the sum of your reactions, which your mind either can control or cannot, they just happen to you, that's all. That is why mystics talk about the mechanistic nature of people, because for the most part they live like machines, in which some reactions happen all the time, the same states arise, and absolutely beyond their will. Most people can do nothing with their day-to-day states, and in fact they are, although the mind diligently maintains the illusion of a whole “I” in them. But this “I” does not really exist - as long as the reactions alternate one after another, each of them, supported by the energy of your attention, replaces the “I” for you. And therefore each desire or the feeling temporarily becomes your "I", and the mind is busy maintaining the illusion that a certain "I" that unites all states beyond your control exists.

There is only one way to interrupt this hopelessness: you need to get rid of the mechanistic nature of your reactions and learn the causes of your states. Reading books on psychology will not help with this - even correct descriptions of the causes of what is happening cannot affect your mechanicalness. In order for major changes to occur, you need to regain freedom in your attention, which is identified with the newly emerging reactions and gives them strength. There is only one way to do this - through the acquisition of awareness, through the separation of attention from external and internal objects.

In our inner space, the energy of Consciousness has the quality of light. It is only thanks to him that we can realize (and in fact - see), what and why is happening inside us. And also, due to the power of the energy of Consciousness, we can change the situation, getting rid of any of our mechanistic reactions and any states. But in order for this to be possible, we must learn divide your attention.

The Body of Consciousness is connected with the rest of our bodies by a thin channel, through which its energy enters them, becoming attention. In the normal state of a person, the amount of attention energy he has physically limited due to the narrowness of this channel, and, no matter how hard you try, it is impossible to take and cover with attention, for example, your entire physical body. Attention is only enough for awareness of sensations from its individual parts. The essence of mindfulness practices is that the ray of attention should be divided into two parts - of which one will be directed to the implementation of actions, and the other - to remain free, not identified with anything. The effort to divide attention is carried out at the expense of the conscious part of the mind - that layer of it where the process of thinking takes place, which we can control. The technique of dividing attention is quite simple - at any given time, we should strive to ensure that part of our attention is always directed to the sensations in the body. For example, you are washing the floor. Part of your attention will definitely be directed to the external - the floor itself, the rag, the bucket of water and the washing process. The second part of attention should be directed to what you feel while performing the action. That is, on the sensations of the body - on the arms, legs, perhaps, or on the back, which also receives a load. Then you will become present in what you are doing now. In the state of identification, you will wash the floor mechanically - performing the usual movements, but at the same time being in the mind and surrendering to the flow of associative thoughts. Part of your attention will also be given to the process of washing the floor, but the part is very small, and then it will turn on only when it’s impossible to do everything on reflexes. Attention will be distracted from thoughts for a second, and then return to them again. You will wash the floor in half-forgetfulness. And this - standard situation for all actions that do not require active thinking from you, when you are doing something familiar and long mastered. It is these actions that constitute most everything you do in life. Developing awareness requires a different approach. You need to be present in what you are doing, which means that while acting through the body, you need to leave attention in its sensations. This is the key to widening the channel of attention and generally starting the path where you can come to full self-awareness.

The main difficulty in dividing attention is with the mind; with the amount of energy he can expend to keep his attention divided. The amount of this energy is limited, and therefore it is quite difficult to be aware of yourself at the very beginning. When you start the practice of dividing attention, you manage it more or less decently at first, but then there comes a moment when you would like to continue to keep your attention on the sensations of the body, but for some reason this becomes impossible. There is only one reason - your mind has spent all the energy that keeps attention divided. And until he rests, and the energy that controls attention does not accumulate, you will not be able to return to practice.

You need to understand that awareness is growing only in the division of attention and nothing else. If, for example, you are sitting watching the breath while doing Vipassana, then by doing this you are training your ability to keep your attention in one specific area of ​​the body. You make your attention disciplined, you train the mind, in which, as a result of constant efforts to keep attention in one area, more energy begins to be generated that allows them to be controlled. But your awareness will only really grow when you continue to observe your breath during your daily activities. Then the same division of attention that I am talking about will appear. Your attention will be divided between action and internal surveillance, and constant effort in keeping it divided will bear fruit. First, you will be able to be aware of yourself longer, because the energy needed for this in the mind will become more. The mind in this case is like a muscle - if you train it, it becomes stronger and more resilient. The effort of dividing attention brings the same results, only at the level of the mind. Secondly, your awareness will begin to grow due to the fact that the initially narrow channel of attention connecting you with the body of your individual Consciousness will begin to expand.

Anyone who practices mindfulness knows that mindfulness grows in leaps and bounds. That is, at first your basic level of self-awareness is zero, and as soon as the mind loses the ability to divide attention, you again plunge into a state of semi-forgetfulness and identification. Then, after some time devoted to efforts in dividing attention, you suddenly find that even when you completely drop out of the practice, a certain presence remains in you, that is, the basic level has changed. For me, for example, the first change in the level of awareness manifested itself in the fact that I began to feel a certain point in my chest, a certain center, which was not there before. This point did not belong to the heart or any other centers, it existed on its own and gave me a feeling of constancy, previously unfamiliar to me. Prior to this, any clouding of the mind or a strong emotion "demolished" me completely. Now a point appeared inside me that did not change along with my states. She became like a lighthouse in the darkness and an anchor in a storm. Even when I was very ill, this pinpoint constant presence gave me strength to survive and endure everything.

Awareness never grows gradually, from week to week. You may have moments when it rises and you realize yourself better than usual, but after a day or two everything returns to normal. The growth of the basic level of awareness occurs in jumps, and this change is usually not perceived by you. You state it in hindsight, when you suddenly see that even in the most difficult states for yourself you do not completely disappear, that a certain amount of attention remains free. This happens precisely because in the efforts to divide attention, the channel of attention expands and the amount of its energy inside you increases. Awareness always grows in leaps and bounds, and each leap means an expansion of the channel and an increase in the amount of attention available for use. With each such change of effort, less effort is needed to realize oneself. Once you reach the state of full awareness, they are not needed at all. Everything that happens to you always is in the field of your Consciousness - effortlessly, quite naturally.

Dividing attention is a skill that should be mastered. Of the sitting meditations, Sufi muraqaba or Buddhist zazen are the best for this. In them, attention is divided between the external and internal almost equally, and they are very suitable for preparing for self-awareness in daily activities. Practices of listening, body awareness, or observing one's own internal states, like vipassana, they train the ability to hold attention, but by themselves, in isolation from the external, they do not cultivate awareness. Any of them, being applied in everyday life, leads to the division of attention and is beneficial. Done as seated practices, they prepare you for the practice of dividing attention, but they are not.

Dividing attention, you cannot leave it free - at least in the beginning, when you have little of it. You have to “hook” it for something, direct it to a specific sensation. If you walk, you can look at the sensations in your legs, if you work with your hands, then at the sensations in them. This will be the practice of body awareness applied in everyday life. At first, you just need to hold on to some specific sensations inside or direct your attention to a specific part of the body, otherwise, without catching on anything, it will “collapse”, merging with another part of itself directed outward, and the separation will stop. If you are working with energy centers, you can direct your attention to one of them, for example, to the heart. The benefits of this will be twofold: on the one hand, you share attention and work with awareness, on the other hand, with your attention you activate energy center contributing to its accelerated development.

At first, without attaching attention to inner feelings not enough. Later, when your awareness skill gets stronger, and the energy of attention increases, you will no longer need to hook it on anything. You just need to keep it inside, and then, remaining free, it will turn to what is happening inside you here and now. At this point, the phenomenon begins to appear. inner vision, which can only be created by free attention and nothing else: in real time, you begin to see your emotional and mental reactions. That is, your attention moves from the sensations of the body to the perception of what has always been hidden from you or realized in hindsight. Thus, there is an opportunity for self-exploration, getting rid of the mechanical reactions of the mind and liberation from repressed emotions and feelings. And accordingly, you can clear your inner space and begin to move inside yourself, to the knowledge of your nature and the discovery of a connection with God. This is natural development events, if you divide your attention correctly and work hard with what is revealed to you as awareness grows.

You should start the practice of awareness when you have developed a firm intention in yourself to become aware, to change your internal situation. Trying to be aware of yourself two or three times a week will not lead to anything, the effort in dividing attention should be constant - daily and hourly. You need to start being aware of yourself as soon as you wake up. Do not put off the effort for later, in the morning you have the most energy, and therefore the practice is easier. At first, the habit of identifying with the mind, "jumping" out of the sensations of the body, will again and again return you to the old rut. Don't despair, no one became aware quickly. Falls are inevitable, and they need to be treated that way - they will be, but this is not a reason to quit what you started. You will run out of mental energy needed to divide attention, you will simply forget that you were going to be aware of yourself all day - this cannot be avoided. Mechanistic habits and reactions do not disappear without a struggle. But having forgotten yourself or having lost the strength to keep the attention divided, each morning start a new entry into this practice. Gradually, your falls will become more and more rare, and the periods when you are present in your actions will lengthen, and sometimes you will spontaneously return to a conscious state, without even putting much effort into it.

Sedentary mindfulness practices certainly help. You will not become conscious on them alone, unless, of course, you sit in meditation all day long. And as a help in working on a constant division of attention, they are very useful. Many beginner seekers try to make themselves alarm clocks to bring them back to awareness if they suddenly forget and re-identify with the mind. Experience shows that alarm clocks are of little use, because the mind quickly gets used to them, and they cease to work. Nothing, except for a real strong desire to wake up, to manifest Consciousness in oneself in all its fullness, does not help. You can attend a group where people also practice mindfulness, and meeting them will motivate you to a certain extent. But if you do not have your own motivation, nothing can replace it. But if it is, then all the obstacles on the way to higher levels awareness becomes surmountable.

When you have enough free attention, then you can already begin to solve your problems. internal problems. It is both an application of mindfulness practice for one's own specific benefit, and a way to keep growing mindfulness. When you have it quite low, then its strength is only enough to see the grossest things - strong tension or equally strong anger. It should be noted here that the amount of attentional energy available to us is directly related to its power within you. It's like an impact sunlight- when one of its beams falls into the room, nothing much changes. If it is all flooded with sunlight, then the whole room heats up quickly. Therefore, when you have more light of Consciousness inside, then, firstly, you see more subtle things that would have simply remained undetected before, and secondly, it is easier for you to free yourself from repressed energies, work with fears, desires and other internal rubbish accumulated over the years of your unconscious life. When you have little energy of attention, you look at fear and you cannot do anything about it, it does not disappear. You have to spend a lot of time and effort to at least reduce its amount. If there is a lot of attention, then this process is significantly accelerated, and fear dissipates quickly, and the causes of its occurrence are realized as deeply as possible. The wider the channel connecting your Consciousness with other bodies, the more attention you have, and the higher the power of its influence on your internal energies.

If you have reached a certain level of awareness, and then quit practicing, then the situation will not change - you will remain exactly at the same level that you have. You don't move on, but you don't degrade either. I have observed this many times, and this phenomenon can only be explained by the fact that, once expanded, the channel of attention no longer narrows. This is the distinguishing feature of the practice of awareness. You can stop at any stage, and therefore you can meet those who stopped at the very beginning, and who - in the middle of the path. The stop occurs for the same reasons - a person either loses motivation, having achieved compensation for his dissatisfaction with life, or is faced with something that he does not want to realize, and then he stops out of a desire to remain in the compensation that he has already earned for himself. Among the spiritual coaches and teachers there are many who have passed the path of awareness to half and even a little further. Therefore, they seem to be present in themselves, but not completely; therefore they sometimes behave quite consciously, and sometimes suddenly fall into a semi-conscious state. This is due to the fact that the unconscious part of their minds is not completely cleared and there are fears, desires and other repressed things that manifest themselves in certain cases. Nevertheless, they may well have a certain level of awareness, because it is not lost by stopping efforts and stopping moving inward.

The increase in the amount of attention is not very much manifested outwardly, more precisely, it is not spent on external activities any more than before. All of it remains inside, making your presence in yourself and in the world more complete. I have already said that the energy of Consciousness animates everything, acting as a catalyst. The more it becomes inside you, the more alive you become - your perception sharpens, the energies move faster and easier. And you feel completely different.

When the channel of attention expands to its fullest extent, your individual Consciousness enters your being. If before that you operated with a narrow beam of attention, now all bodies are permeated with the energy of Consciousness. Now you do not need to pay attention to the mind in order to observe its movements, because they are already in the field of Consciousness and are perceived as soon as they arise. You see everything in yourself, at all levels. Imagine a security guard in a supermarket who sees everything that is happening in the store thanks to the signals coming from video cameras on his computer screen. He has a dozen small screens there, on which the movement of buyers takes place. He can observe them as a whole - all at once. He can display one of the small screens in full size to better see what is happening in the department of the store to which the camera lens is aimed. When you are in a state of full awareness, everything happens in much the same way. Your attention is the same at every point of your physical body, you feel them equally well. You feel just as well any change in the energies emitted or perceived by your etheric body. All the movements of your mind are open to you, on all its layers. If you need to, you can look somewhere more closely, but, in principle, your attention is already present everywhere. I don't think it can be adequately imagined, but the situation of full awareness is just that.

There is a well-known recommendation that is given to all those who desire enlightenment: observe the witness or - be aware of your awareness. Good advice, but fundamentally unfeasible. Let's start with the fact that there is no witness in us, although, if you try, you can, of course, come up with one. The feeling of witnessing occurs when the mind divides attention into two parts. That is, in the process of doing the practice of awareness. The feeling of witnessing arises in the mind, and it is that witness. Even when you start watching the mind, the energy of attention is still shared by itself, otherwise there is no other way. Then the feeling of witnessing is born out of it too. When we observe the mind, our attention seems to rise above it, which is quite possible, because the body of the mind has a volume almost equal to ours. physical body. A point is formed there, which can be felt as a kind of higher self, from which, in fact, the mind is observed. This is a temporary fixation, and later, after the next expansion of the channel of attention, it disappears. It can be felt, but not observed. This is such a temporary fixation of the point of division of attention in the mind. Now imagine that the mind divides attention in such a way that it drives it back into the channel through which it comes to us. Even if it succeeds, what will happen is that there will be no awareness of awareness, but you will most likely die. In general, all these recommendations are practically useless, because the witness appears in the mind and nowhere else. After Consciousness enters your inner space in its entirety, then there is no trace left of the witness, but it is replaced by presence. The witness appears due to the fact that the mind shares attention, but it is not there as an independent entity. This needs to be understood by everyone who is trying to do the impossible.

There is no center in the Consciousness, its energy is even and equal in strength at each of its points. There is a presence - even and unchanging. The mind can change, but Consciousness is not affected. By doing self-awareness practices, you come to experience that "I" exists only as a fixation in the mind, as its way of designating the source of a person's actions. And when your awareness is extremely small, you, in fact, have nothing but this fictional “I”. When the energy of Consciousness fills your being, when its light permeates your entire being, then you experience yourself as a presence in which there is also no center, although there are bodies through which it manifests itself. Everyone who has reached the fullness of Consciousness comes to this. You will come to this too if you put enough effort into the practice of mindfulness.