30 Jan Mindfulness and being aware – of both sides, now

Joni Mitchell’s ‘Both Sides now’ is one of my old-time favorite songs. Beautiful, and somewhat melancholic text.

In mindfulness practices you are asked to be aware of any sensations present. Be it pleasant sensations or unpleasant ones… A student of Mindful Yoga said to me after class: “You know, I’m struggling with alot of physical pains and issues, and normally I just wanna go to yoga to relax. I found today that I’m very distracted, to the point where I almost wanted to leave the room.” That class, we did mostly body scans, just layered with a short yin asana sequense and seated breath-awareness. So without actually being aware of it, she had been asked for a whole class, to pay attention to her painful sensations… It is very understandable that she felt distracted, and not relaxed.

Its important to emphasize that mindfulness is not a manner of tuning-out/relaxation. It can give some ease to the nervoussystem, if any stress is stored making it tense, but it will not remove thoughts, feelings or bodily sensations. It might even feel in the beginning as if unpleasant sensations becomes even more intense. For years I’ve heard collegue yoginis talking about how they feel themselves becoming more sensitive toward the surroundings. From a neurologic persepctive it is explained by the enhanced neuronal (dendrite-level) contact as a consequense of attention-training. Meaning, where you move your attention, dendrite-connection will be stronger, thus can effect perceptual sensations.

So, if you feel more distracted, more unpleasant after yoga, perhaps it not what you do that has changed. Perhaps its how you feel, and how you interpret what you feel…

Just a mid-week contemplation:)