Two thumbs up for mindfulness

[NewKarma]

Perhaps this is a bit premature as I've only been practicing mindfulness for less than 3 months, but I'd like to go ahead and give it my two thumbs up for being the best thing that I could have ever done.

One of the principle motives that started me on the path to mindfulness was how I saw my anxiety and social anxiety. Well, despite battling with anxiety for all my life (and making sloooow progress over the past 10 years), it seems that I've now almost "cured" myself in one fell swoop. Don't get me wrong, I still have had momentary pangs of anxiety since starting my mindfulness practice, but these are contained, and don't even feel like a real problem anymore - especially since I know exactly how to deal with them when they arise. While I still have work to do with regards to my anxiety, it feels like it's no longer an issue in my life.

All that said, the effect of mindfulness on my anxiety is just the tip of the iceberg in how it has helped me over the past 3 months, and how I see that it can help me going forward, if I can persist (which I fully intend to; for the rest of my life if possible). I see myself and everything around me so much more clearly than before (and I believe I've always been a clear/insightful/introspective thinker). I am filled with confidence about how to proceed on my path, where before I would worry about messing up. And much more.

Ok, that's it for now; I don't want to get ahead of myself. These are the early days of my practice and I know that I have a long way to go/learn/grow/develop. I can't wait.

 

[Daniel E.]

Two thumbs up for your post :2thumbs:

 

[Modus.Ponens]

Where did you learn about mindfulness?

 

[NewKarma]

Where did you learn about mindfulness?

The practical book that got me started was The Mindful Way through Depression. I am not depressed, bu the principles are 100% applicable; in fact, little in the book was depression-specific. I found this to be a very good starter.

I've been on a bit of a mindfulness (and Buddhism) binge since getting started, and have read quite a bit since then. Another Kabat-Zinn book that I read was Wherever You Go, There You Are. I enjoyed that one quite a lot, but I'm glad that I had read The Mindful Way through Depression first; I found it to be a better practical intro.

Good luck!

 

[Daniel E.]

I liked that book, too. One of my favorite parts of the book:

What if, like virtually everybody else who suffers repeatedly from depression, you have become a victim of your own very sensible, even heroic, efforts to free yourself--like someone pulled even deeper into quicksand by the struggling intended to get you out?

The Mindful Way Through Depression - Google Book Search

 

[Modus.Ponens]

Have you ever read the Maha-satipatthana sutta? It's a buddhist scripture in which the Buddha instructs on mindfulness. Here it goes:

Maha-satipatthana Sutta: The Great Frames of Reference

 

[NewKarma]

Have you ever read the Maha-satipatthana sutta? It's a buddhist scripture in which the Buddha instructs on mindfulness. Here it goes:

Maha-satipatthana Sutta: The Great Frames of Reference

Thanks for that link! This is great stuff, though the language used makes it a bit slow for me integrate; I'll need to read it over again a few times I think. I'm enjoying my exploration of the Buddha's ideas, and I think that this is partially because of their deceptive simplicity, contrasted with the subtleties involved in the actual practice. I've learned quite a bit about myself over the past months. In terms of free/online resources, I really enjoyed the ebook What the Buddha Taught - a totally readable and easy to digest intro.

That said, if I were pointing a non-Buddhist in this direction, I'd still start them off with something more like the The Mindful Way through Depression. I don't know that I'd ever have got this far with learning about the Dharma had I not been eased in with something a little more mundane and limited in scope, but maybe that's just me.