While you may have heard of the term mindfulness, this does not necessarily mean that you understand its meaning. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, mindfulness is defined as the deliberate practice of being aware of your body and mind in the present moment, in order to adopt a more holistic and positive approach to life.
Overall, it’s thought that this can also trigger a greater sense of calm in individuals, as they look to organise their lives more effectively and cope with the trials and tribulations to come their way.
However, it’s one thing to understand the concept of mindfulness and another to introduce this into your life. With this in mind, here are some ideas to help you on your way in the New Year:
Quit Smoking By Becoming More Mindful
Quitting smoking is one of the popular New Years’ resolutions, although it’s also one of the hardest to achieve.
Mindfulness can potentially help in this respect, however, primarily because it makes you aware of the impact that smoking can have on your body and the dangers of being at the mercy of an addiction.
This theory has been borne out by various studies, with one in particular featuring 88 adults who were randomly assigned to eight sessions of either mindfulness training or a standard quit-smoking course.
Interestingly, the mindfulness group showed a far greater reduction in smoking, with 31% claiming they were still smoke-free four months after the study (compared with only 6% in the standard treatment demographic).
This, combined with the deployment of effective smoking alternatives such as vaping, can really help you to quit smoking and achieve long-term results.
Tackle The Symptoms Of Anxiety And Depression
If we consider mindfulness as a state of real-time awareness, this is likely to afford you a far greater understanding of your emotions and often unspoken thoughts.
In this respect, it has the potential to be used as a way of tackling the symptoms of anxiety and depression, particularly in terms of addressing your true feelings and the underlying triggers for your mental issues.
Over time, this can translate into positive life changes, as you begin to approach challenges from a more informed stance and create a healthier, more balanced mindset.
Develop Your Career
As individuals, we often define ourselves by our thoughts and feelings, which can govern how we react to live events and the key decisions that we take on a daily basis.
Take your career development, for example, as there’s often a tendency to be deterred from pursuing new jobs or opportunities, because we feel intimidated or lack the confidence to pursue these options.
Mindfulness can help with this, as this mindset helps you to separate your self from your feelings and take decisions from a far more objective vantage point.
This will encourage you to take calculated risks and make the most of the opportunities that present themselves in the future, while also negating the feelings of uncertainty that can hold back your career ambitions.
*collaborative post