Mindfulness

Tigger45 said:

My friend it’s because Catholic mindfulness natural encompasses sacramental theology.

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Your exchange points to an important question. In the video you posted--which was very constructive--the author distinguishes between mindfulness and prayer. I probably agree with him, but he never defined prayer.

Are we going to say something like this: mindfulness of one's environment is neutral mindfulness, whereas mindfulness of one's environment as the creation and revelation of God is a form of Christian prayer? That distinction between mindfulness and distinctively Christian prayer is going to be at the heart of many of these disagreements.

zippy2006 said:

Your exchange points to an important question. In the video you posted--which was very constructive--the author distinguishes between mindfulness and prayer. I probably agree with him, but he never defined prayer.

Are we going to say something like this: mindfulness of one's environment is neutral mindfulness, whereas mindfulness of one's environment as the creation and revelation of God is a form of Christian prayer? That distinction between mindfulness and distinctively Christian prayer is going to be at the heart of many of these disagreements.

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I agree and my guess is he was making a distinction between prayer and mindfulness as maybe how focused your attention should be to relax your brain so it can rest and gather itself in our hectic world we live in. But saying that at least within our study group and maintaining a catholic understanding of the universe both physically and spiritually we go in with the understanding that God is not only with us but He is omnipresent. And also to repeat, creation itself being sacramental without allowing any pagan teaching to creep it. So I hope that makes sense.

Akita Suggagaki said:

How and why did we let Buddhism secular methods claim Mindfulness?
When I say "we" I mean Christianity.

Vigilance, wait for the Lord, Keep watch, our Christian lives have an inner dimension as well as outer active dimension. We begin with scripture, Lectio or even just gazing at the beauty of nature. Psalm 62:5-6 "My soul, wait in silence for God only, For my hope is from Him. He only is my rock and my salvation, My stronghold; I shall not be shaken."

Perhaps Mindfulness is incompatible with Christian spirituality in that it calls for nonjudgmental acceptance of the thoughts and feelings that come and go. One just sits there observing until stillness comes.

Brain scientists tell us that the brain has 2 modes: Self referential and other referential. Self referential involves our default Mode Network with its ruminations and thoughts of past and future. Other referential is a more attentive to what is happening. Self referential can result in all our worry and sadness. Other referential brings relief. If our "Other" is the ineffable presence of God it can also be prayer.

But we seem skeptical and wary of anything that is associated with non-Christian tradition.

I think mindfulness is within the Judeo-Christian tradition but is alike a stepchild we feel free to ignore. But it seems to me that awareness of God's presence requires attentiveness without the distraction of our own ruminations.

I claim "Mindfulness" Christian requirement.

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I hate this technique. Why? Because, I just don't get it. I can't do it and when you have to go in and out of mental hospitals like I do, they make you feel like crap when you don't get it claiming "A child could get it." well thank you for telling me I don't have the intelligence of a child because I honestly don't understand what it is or how it works.

I didn't know mindfulness came from Buddhism but, I don't get that mental hospitals the world wide try to push it on mentally ill patients since it's our "Inability to calm down" that makes us have psychosis (Apparently).

This and that therapy where they try to get you to identify 3 things in the room and then concentrate on them? I don't get that one either. I always freak out because I don't find the "right" three things in the room. Then they tell me "There is no wrong answer." and that just makes me freak out even more.

So what is my point? These "cures" for psychosis don't work for every single patient and they need to stop acting like everybody needs to be cured in this way. Especially the mentally ill like me. They don't understand that when you're mentally ill and are experiencing a Psychotic or Manic episode (I get both) there's NO calming you down. You could say that Jesus Christ came back and the New Heavens and the New Earth have come and we probably still won't calm down. In theory anyway.

Your best bet at curing people like me is knocking us out with sleep meds and letting us sleep for several weeks. Then the episode is over and we can leave. But, trying to tell that to them is like trying to tell them that 2+2 =7 THEY don't get it and it doesn't compute. *sigh*

So when they don't get something its ok. But when a mentally ill person doesn't get something it all of sudden becomes "So easy a child could do it."

Akita Suggagaki said:

Mindfulness 'letting go of" maybe can be viewed as casting down and bringing into captivity because we do not get entangled in them.

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This is obviously not the sense of the words Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 10:3-5. He did not recommend letting go of certain thoughts but of taking them captive - the very opposite of what you're suggesting one should do with them! Your idea of not getting entangled in certain thoughts is you-centered where Paul's approach is Christ-centered. He commands believers to bring their thinking to Christ, into bondage to him, the Way, the Truth and the Life (John 14:6), not merely to release attachment to one's thinking and let the thoughts simply drift about in one's mind. Paul's goal is submission and service to Christ, not merely being unattached to one's own thoughts (which I don't believe is actually possible).

Akita Suggagaki said:

When I come to some inner stillness it is for me an intimacy with God rather than "emptiness".

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In "stillness" I may encounter God but He is not the stillness I may achieve within myself. God is revealed in Scripture as intensely active: creating, loving, watching, teaching, protecting, comforting, ordering, judging, punishing, and so on. God communicates to me best when I am still and quiet, undistracted by the world, but stillness and quietness are not ends in themselves, but merely aids to the clear transmission of God's "marching orders" to me and to undisturbed contemplation of Him (as opposed to my inner stillness/detachment).

Akita Suggagaki said:

From time to time I like to read St Bonaventure's Itinerarium:

"So it follows that, by the act of observing, the mind transcends and passes beyond not only the perceivable world, but equally its own self: and Christ is the way and the gate through which this transcendence is achieved, Christ is the ladder and the vehicle...

"If this transcendence is to be perfect, all intellectual activity should be relinquished and the entire apex of affection be transferred to and transformed into God.
http://faculty.uml.edu/rinnis/45.304 God and Philosophy/ITINERARIUM.pdf

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Sounds like the temptation of the devil offered to Eve, packaged in a Roman Catholic version of eastern, pagan religious thought.

Genesis 3:4-5
4 The serpent said to the woman, "You surely will not die!
5 "For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God..."

None of the language or the goals outlined in the quotation from Bonaventure above appear in the New Testament. The Christian isn't called in Scripture to "transcendence," nor to relinquishing all intellectual activity, and Christ is never referred to in Scripture as a mere "ladder" or "vehicle" but as Saviour, Lord, Creator, God and King. Christ isn't a means to an end but the End itself, the Alpha and Omega:

Revelation 1:12-18
12 Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands;
13 and in the middle of the lampstands I saw one like a son of man, clothed in a robe reaching to the feet, and girded across His chest with a golden sash.
14 His head and His hair were white like white wool, like snow; and His eyes were like a flame of fire.
15 His feet were like burnished bronze, when it has been made to glow in a furnace, and His voice was like the sound of many waters.
16 In His right hand He held seven stars, and out of His mouth came a sharp two-edged sword; and His face was like the sun shining in its strength.
17 When I saw Him, I fell at His feet like a dead man. And He placed His right hand on me, saying, "Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last,
18 and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of death and of Hades.

Christ doesn't sound to me, here, like a mere ladder or vehicle!

Akita Suggagaki said:

This for me is refreshing. Some of us need the inner silence, inner stillness to just observe, rest and let Christ do what he will do. And sometimes that seems to be nothing...boring.

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Oh, he never does nothing. His goal is always to make us more and more like himself which involves loving, yielding, trusting, believing, confessing, repenting, receiving, and acting! When one is truly interacting with Christ, it is not boring at all. But mere stillness within, a Self-occupied effort at some detached inner state, would, I think become very boring - and generally spiritually useless, too - as a goal in-and-of itself.

Akita Suggagaki said:

Life is not bout being a perfect world for me. It is not all about me. My life in time is the unfolding of God's will and plan. My ego may not always like it.

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Amen! Double Amen!! Now this is truth I can fully endorse!

Matthew 16:24-25
24 Then Jesus said to His disciples, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.
25 "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.

Philippians 1:21
21 For to me, to live is Christ ...

Then the LORD said: Go out and stand on the mountain before the LORD;* the LORD will pass by. There was a strong and violent wind rending the mountains and crushing rocks before the LORD—but the LORD was not in the wind; after the wind, an earthquake—but the LORD was not in the earthquake; after the earthquake, fire—but the LORD was not in the fire; after the fire, a light silent sound.

When he heard this, Elijah hid his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave.1 Kings 11-12

God was in the light silent sound, not the loud intense crashing.

As St Teresa of Avila wrote, God speaks to us best in the depth of our being. It is there
that no words are necessary, just His presence.

And today's Liturgy of the Hours, the 2nd Reading is from St Ignatious of Antioch, who BTW audited the Gospel of John along with St Polycarp.

Nothing is hidden from the Lord, but even our secrets are close to him. Let us then do everything in the knowledge that he is dwelling within us that we may be his temples, and he God within us. He is, and will reveal himself, in our sight, according to the love we bear him in holiness.

When we are mindful in the present moment, we are with God dwelling within is, for He himself is in the present moment, for God is timeless. The only thing that exist is the present moment where God is.

Akita Suggagaki said:

I can understand that. And I don't think it is for everyone. Entering inter into your own head and thoughts can be a wild ride for anyone. I think also what few people tell us, at least my own experience is that is that even skilled meditators spend most of the sitting in meditation is making the journey through thoughts to stillness. And then it goes in cycles. Like 30 minutes will be maybe a total of 5 in stillness that comes and goes. The rest is thoughts and images. That is why, for me it is prayer. The thoughts and images are from my tradition.

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Yeah like I get the basic idea. You accept that things are going to happen to you and you "live in the moment and not in the future."

It's the living in the moment part that I don't get if I remember right I haven't had to go away in several years. But I think that's what I find hard when my brain isn't working right. Like well in the present moment I have all these racing thoughts in my head, I'm scared to death, and I'm having intrusive thoughts and stuff. I can't live in the moment or I'll be here forever and never get out".

I get that these things happen because my brain is messed up lets say. But, I can't accept that they're still happening every time you have to "go away for a while" you're afraid of being put there permanently like happens sometimes and when you're married or have a family to go back to you don't want to never see them again or even worse understand that they're there or really there or even worse who they are.

But this is like telling a Schizophrenic "it's okay that things are happening to you. Don't be afraid." How many Schizophrenics do you know that are actually calm during an episode? I'll tell you, a majority of people in a mental hospital are NOT calm. Many of us have freakouts and can't calm down. I've seen people attack nurses and doctors that work there and I have attacked nurses before.

There was one time when I was in Utica and there was this schizophrenic there that I became friends with for my whole stay there. Constantly everyday he would freak out and the nurses would try to calm him down with all of these "techniques" that are supposed to calm people like us down and not one of them worked and he would shout and carry on and it was just really sad to watch.

I mean, a majority of us believe in God (sometimes we even believe we are God. Oops. lol) so they are like "okay so you're eternally secure and you have nothing to worry about because you trust Jesus." and we are like "We know that in our hearts but we are still freaking out and afraid." Or like this one guy who shared my name "I love Jesus and I'm eternally his and I'm going to spend eternity with him." I only got to meet him for like 5 minutes because I was in the middle of being released but, I wish I could have been like him because he just loved Jesus so much.

Honestly at hospitals I wish they would just give us our antipsychotics and some sleeping pills and let us sleep for a week or two until we're better. Because every person that has to stay at a hospital whether its for mental reasons or health reasons, just wants to go home lol. That should be doctors end goal. Not "lets try these brand new mental techniques that sometimes don't even work on the sane let alone the insane and treat them like lab monkeys." Idk.

Neostarwcc said:

Yeah like I get the basic idea. You accept that things are going to happen to you and you "live in the moment and not in the future."

It's the living in the moment part that I don't get if I remember right I haven't had to go away in several years. But I think that's what I find hard when my brain isn't working right. Like well in the present moment I have all these racing thoughts in my head, I'm scared to death, and I'm having intrusive thoughts and stuff. I can't live in the moment or I'll be here forever and never get out".

I get that these things happen because my brain is messed up lets say. But, I can't accept that they're still happening every time you have to "go away for a while" you're afraid of being put there permanently like happens sometimes and when you're married or have a family to go back to you don't want to never see them again or even worse understand that they're there or really there or even worse who they are.

But this is like telling a Schizophrenic "it's okay that things are happening to you. Don't be afraid." How many Schizophrenics do you know that are actually calm during an episode? I'll tell you, a majority of people in a mental hospital are NOT calm. Many of us have freakouts and can't calm down. I've seen people attack nurses and doctors that work there and I have attacked nurses before.

There was one time when I was in Utica and there was this schizophrenic there that I became friends with for my whole stay there. Constantly everyday he would freak out and the nurses would try to calm him down with all of these "techniques" that are supposed to calm people like us down and not one of them worked and he would shout and carry on and it was just really sad to watch.

I mean, a majority of us believe in God (sometimes we even believe we are God. Oops. lol) so they are like "okay so you're eternally secure and you have nothing to worry about because you trust Jesus." and we are like "We know that in our hearts but we are still freaking out and afraid." Or like this one guy who shared my name "I love Jesus and I'm eternally his and I'm going to spend eternity with him." I only got to meet him for like 5 minutes because I was in the middle of being released but, I wish I could have been like him because he just loved Jesus so much.

Honestly at hospitals I wish they would just give us our antipsychotics and some sleeping pills and let us sleep for a week or two until we're better. Because every person that has to stay at a hospital whether its for mental reasons or health reasons, just wants to go home lol. That should be doctors end goal. Not "lets try these brand new mental techniques that sometimes don't even work on the sane let alone the insane and treat them like lab monkeys." Idk.

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Sorry this is happening to you.

Living in the present moment, doesn't mean you're going anywhere, but where you are now.

It's not dwelling on the past, for whatever happened can't happen again.
It's not planning on the future, for you don't know if that will ever come.
The present is all that is real.

The ego is weakened when we're in the present moment, for the ego will dwell on the past by reliving events and trying mentally to change what we should have or not done. It looks to figure how we could've strengthened the false self we created.

When when we focus on the future, again the ego plans on ways to make the false self more impressive to others. How can I do this or that so others will see me as something great ?

The present moment however, the self realizes that it's all that exist there is nothing to dwell on or plan, for nothing other than what is in the moment exist. This is where God is, for God is without time and without ego. He is the I AM.

Akita Suggagaki said:

Yes, but this is exactly what many people find so difficult, sustaining focuses on the right now. Too many other thoughts begin to intrude. For most of us it is a discipline we practice and get better at it. It could be that for some people there is too much else going on for any number of reasons.

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Entering into mindfulness in prayer might be related to a specific kind of prayer. In particular, prayers of praise to God rather than prayers of petition.

There is certainly place for both--we should certainly be making petitions for what we need, as Jesus and the apostles instruct.

But in the Psalms we see prayers of pure praise, prayers absent of any requests, prayers that concentrate fully on who God is and what God has already accomplished. Those are prayers that are the release of self in the acknowledgement of Him, and are, I think, what Christian mindfulness should be about.

Neostarwcc said:

Yeah like I get the basic idea. You accept that things are going to happen to you and you "live in the moment and not in the future."

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One difficulty is that there is a kitsch quality to "mindfulness," and the term and concept itself is not at all synonymous with eastern meditative practices or Christian contemplative practices. That is, most branches of Buddhism and most Christian contemplatives would not describe their meditative practice as "mindfulness." If we are careful about this distinction then the thesis that mindfulness is religion-neutral becomes quite a bit stronger.

To elucidate, most forms of meditation and contemplation are not about living in the present moment or being mindful of what is going on. Those things are usually implicated, but the point lies elsewhere. Even the closest analogue, Buddhist "tathata", is about seeing reality as it is without the usual filters, biases, preconceptions, etc. There is a temporal element to it, but it is a rather small piece.

The popular Western adage about "living in the present" has a tendency to appropriate eastern religions under the umbrella term of "mindfulness" and oversimplify them a great deal for the sake of its own ends. There are a number of traditional Buddhist teachers who are very wary of the term "mindfulness" when they do not reject it outright.

It seems to me quite perilous to try to use an umbrella concept to capture such a wide variety of religious practices, but I suppose I would prefer the term "stillness" rather than "mindfulness." Then again, that term will also fail with respect to various systems. Even so, stillness or quietude seem to be more encompassing.

Akita Suggagaki said:

Yes, but this is exactly what many people find so difficult, sustaining focuses on the right now. Too many other thoughts begin to intrude. For most of us it is a discipline we practice and get better at it. It could be that for some people there is too much else going on for any number of reasons.

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Agreed, it's a discipline and not easy. But we continue to try and start over and over.

It's a life-long process.

RDKirk said:

Entering into mindfulness in prayer might be related to a specific kind of prayer. In particular, prayers of praise to God rather than prayers of petition.

There is certainly place for both--we should certainly be making petitions for what we need, as Jesus and the apostles instruct.

But in the Psalms we see prayers of pure praise, prayers absent of any requests, prayers that concentrate fully on who God is and what God has already accomplished. Those are prayers that are the release of self in the acknowledgement of Him, and are, I think, what Christian mindfulness should be about.

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St Teresa of Avila called it "mental prayer" when we are aware of just who it is we are praying to.

She said it didn't matter what type of prayer it was, praise, petition, or interior prayer. Being aware that the King is present is all that matters.

Call it mindfulness or awareness, it's about being aware of the erroneous thoughts that come into your mind and letting them go and being in the present.

All prayer requires a mindfulness or awareness which St Teresa called "mental prayer."

It's what helps keep us from singing 100 bottles of beer on the wall or some other useless thought during prayer.

Tigger45 said:

I agree and my guess is he was making a distinction between prayer and mindfulness as maybe how focused your attention should be to relax your brain so it can rest and gather itself in our hectic world we live in.

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True. It is interesting that in the West a common definition of prayer has been, "A raising of the mind towards God." Simon Tugwell says the better translation is, "A rising of the mind towards God." What you find in Eastern hesychasm as well as in the Western attempt to dispose oneself to infused contemplation is the idea that the Lord does not fail to visit the one who awaits while being properly disposed (though proper disposition can be a long-term endeavor). In the East there is the idea that once fetters begin to be broken and the nous begins to be purified, a spontaneous upward movement towards God occurs.

Mindfulness seems to me to be one of the very basic elements which leads to a proper disposition. I don't think it would count as prayer, especially when considered as mindfulness qua mindfulness, but it surely requires some nuance to tease out the difference. The difficulty is exacerbated with Christianity's distinction between active and passive prayer: prayer as an expenditure of effort as opposed to prayer as a gift from God.

Neostarwcc said:

Yeah like I get the basic idea. You accept that things are going to happen to you and you "live in the moment and not in the future."

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But the Bible repeatedly urges us to fix our attention upon the future, upon the eternity to come, and to live now in the light of that future. Here are some good examples:

Matthew 6:19-21
19 "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.
20 "But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal;
21 for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Colossians 3:1-4
1 Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.
2 Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.
3 For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
4 When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory.

2 Peter 3:11-13
11 Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness,
12 looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat!
13 But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.

Neostarwcc said:

Like well in the present moment I have all these racing thoughts in my head, I'm scared to death, and I'm having intrusive thoughts and stuff. I can't live in the moment or I'll be here forever and never get out".

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The Bible tells us that, when God is fully in control of us, when we have submitted completely and consistently to Him, we experience rest, peace, and joy, not inner turmoil, racing thoughts, and fear. You find this experience, not in eastern religious meditative practices, but by God's route laid out in Scripture and explained in the link above.

Matthew 11:28-30
28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

Neostarwcc said:

But this is like telling a Schizophrenic "it's okay that things are happening to you. Don't be afraid." How many Schizophrenics do you know that are actually calm during an episode? I'll tell you, a majority of people in a mental hospital are NOT calm. Many of us have freakouts and can't calm down. I've seen people attack nurses and doctors that work there and I have attacked nurses before.

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Is God not more powerful than your mental turmoil? Can He not bring you into the peace and rest He promises to those who love Him and walk in His way?

Neostarwcc said:

I mean, a majority of us believe in God (sometimes we even believe we are God. Oops. lol) so they are like "okay so you're eternally secure and you have nothing to worry about because you trust Jesus." and we are like "We know that in our hearts but we are still freaking out and afraid." Or like this one guy who shared my name "I love Jesus and I'm eternally his and I'm going to spend eternity with him." I only got to meet him for like 5 minutes because I was in the middle of being released but, I wish I could have been like him because he just loved Jesus so much.

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And here you see the avenue of escape from all fear: Love. God's love for you and your love for Him.

1 John 4:16-19
16 We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.
17 By this, love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; because as He is, so also are we in this world.
18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love.
19 We love, because He first loved us.

When you are really, fully convinced of God's awesome, staggering, mind-blowing love for you, the fear that grips you will dissolve. Resting in God's incredible love for you, your fears can't endure. In Him who is Love there is abundant joy and peace.