About this Service
Mindfulness meditation is used for relaxation as well as treatment for stress reduction, anxiety, panic attacks, emotional trauma and pain control.<p>Mindfulness meditation draws upon the 2,500 year legacy of mindfulness teaching within religious/philosophical traditions including Buddhism. Indeed for many the thought of mindfulness meditation brings up images of monks in flowing saffron robes sitting cross legged and seeking enlightenment. I’ve had people say to me ‘Oh I could never do with that sitting and doing nothing – it would drive me mad! Nevertheless most people seem to embrace mindfulness as a completely benign and non-threatening way of achieving change. </p><p>Essentially mindfulness encourages us to be aware, or pay attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgementally. This means being aware of everything, including distractions and discomfort. </p><p><br></p><p>Pete teaches the two primary forms of Mindfulness, Formal and In-formal. Both hold an intention for us to encourage awareness and focus on, for example, our breathing, or our physical sensations, or of our emotional feelings. We may learn to do this formally within structured and regularly repeated meditation sessions, or in a completely informal way, becoming more ‘present’ in our relationships, our eating, our day to day work etc. When we engage in truly being ‘in the now’ then this is where we really are, not stuck in past guilt or trauma or anxious about the future. The highly respected author of many mindfulness books, Jon Kabat-Zinn says, ‘you have only moments to live’, and he’s right is he not? This moment, and this one, and this one. We can only really <strong><em>live </em></strong>within each moment – the rest is all remembering or imagining! </p><p>Rather than ‘fighting’ unwanted feelings such as emotional and physical pain. Elisha Goldstein, Ph.D, a clinical psychologist and great advocate of mindfulness says ‘The last thing we want to do is pay more attention to our pain. But that’s the premise behind mindfulness. Goldstein describes mindfulness as “paying attention to something on purpose and with fresh eyes.” This is why mindfulness is so helpful. Instead of focusing on how badly we want the pain to stop, we pay attention to our pain with curiosity and without judgment.’ Stress will be present in the lives of most of us and the management of stress is something which we can learn to achieve.</p><p><br><br></p>