CMP's 8 Key Attitudes For Practicing Mindfulness

Community mindfulness project’s 8 Key Attitudes for Practicing Mindfulness

Items 1-7 adapted from Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Full Catastrophe Living;  Item 8 is a CMP core value.

1. Impartial Witness (aka Non-Judgment) • Taking the stance of an impartial witness to your own experience. • Observing the constant stream of judging .. good / bad / neutral… not trying to stop it but just being aware of it • Accepting that what is happening right now is happening. • Bringing an attitude of kindness toward oneself. 

2. Patience • Letting things unfold in their own time • Giving ourselves room to have these experiences-we’re having them regardless • There is just this moment

3. Beginner’s Mind • Too often we let our thinking and our beliefs about what we ‘know’ stop us from seeing things as they really are. • Cultivating a mind that is willing to see everything as if for the first time. • Being receptive to new possibilities… not getting stuck in a rut of our own expertise. • Each moment is unique unto itself.

 4. Trust • Believing in your own authority and intuition  •  Recognizing and honoring the authenticity of your own experience. • Taking responsibility for yourself 

5. Non-Striving • Meditation has no goal other than for you to be yourself. • Paying attention to how you are right now – however that it is. Just watch. •  Less is more “Just don’t do something-sit there.”  •  With regular practice, movement towards your goals will unfold by itself

 6. Acceptance • Seeing things as they actually are in the present •  Now is the only time we have for anything. You have to accept yourself as you are before you can really change.

7. Letting Go • Non attachment- we just watch • Notice the grasping and pushing away mind • If we find it particularly difficult to let go of something because it has such a strong hold on our mind, we can direct our attention to what ‘holding’ feels like. Holding on is the opposite of letting go. Being willing to look at the ways we hold on shows a lot about its opposite. • You already know how to let go… Every night when we go to sleep we let go. 

8.  A Sense of Play • Engaging with a sense of lightness • Being willing to experiment and try new approaches  • Not seeing the practice as “work” or a task to be checked off a list.