December 2009 – Page 4 – Mindfulbalance

Melting our difficulties

December 16, 2009June 10, 2010 Karl DuffyLeave a comment

It has begun to get quite cold here and a lot of snow is forecast for the weekend. The barrel used to gather rainwater in the garden has a solid layer of ice on top. It reminded me of this passage, about how we can feel when problems and accompanying difficult emotions turn our warm heart – or our courage – into a solid frozen mass within us.

Our habits and patterns can feel just as frozen as ice. But when spring comes, the ice melts. The quality of water has never really disappeared, even in the deepest depths of winter. It just changed form. The ice melts, and the essential fluid, living quality of water is there. Our essential good heart and open mind is like that. It is here even if we’re experiencing it as so solid we could land an airplane on it.

When I’m emotionally in midwinter and nothing I do seems to melt my frozen heart and mind, it helps me to remember that no matter how hard the ice, the water hasn’t really gone anywhere. It’s always right here.

So I work on melting that hardness by generating more warmth, more open heart. A good way for any of us to do this is to think of a person toward whom we feel appreciation or love or gratitude. In other words, we connect with the warmth that we already have. If we can’t think of a person, we can think of a pet, or even a plant. Sometimes we have to search a bit. But as Trungpa Rinpoche used to say, “Everybody loves something. Even if it’s just tortillas.” The point is to touch in to the good heart that we already have and nurture it.

Pema Chodron, Shambala Sun, 1998

Let Go

December 16, 2009June 10, 2010 Karl DuffyLeave a comment

Sometimes we notice that we put a lot of our hopes into how we wish people, career or situations should be. We often project onto others, or onto the future, all that we unconsciously want to experience or feel is lacking in our own lives at this moment. We can build up stories around things fixed in certain ways. However, life, no matter how much we would like it to be, is never fixed, not even briefly. It is always changing. It can let us down. These changes have a way of loosening projections, and this allows us, even in the midst of disappointment and desolation, to take responsibility for our own happiness.

We need to recognize, let go and move on. Recognize the need for happiness which has been placed onto the person, the event or the future development. Let go of the projections and the unconscious baggage we have placed on them. Move on, letting the past take care of itself and keeping ones focus on the present. The easiest starting point to work on this is to notice the tendency to want things to be different from what they are and to practice giving up that strong preference.

By letting it go it all gets done.
The world is won by those who let it go.
But when you try and try.
The world is beyond the winning.

Lao Tzu

Memory

December 12, 2009June 9, 2010 Karl DuffyLeave a comment

A similar theme, in the greatest of the Irish poets.
I suppose we all have “mountain hares” that we struggle to let go of – people, events, hurts, childhood stories, family myths.

One had a lovely face,
And two or three had charm,
But charm and face were in vain
Because the mountain grass
Cannot but keep the form
Where the mountain hare has lain.

W.B. Yeats

Two Simple thoughts

December 11, 2009June 9, 2010 Karl DuffyLeave a comment

“Wherever there is a human being,
there is an opportunity for a kindness”.

Seneca

“Thousands of candles can be lit
from a single candle,
and the life of the candle
will not be shortened.

Happiness never decreases
by being shared”.

The Buddha

Born to help

December 10, 2009February 26, 2011 Karl DuffyLeave a comment

There was an interesting article recently in the New York Times
saying that generosity and kindness may be innate:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/01/science/01human.html?_r=2&emc=eta1

Innate or not they can certainly be cultivated. We are always practicing something, and in today’s rushed world it can often be impatience and fighting to get our own way. It is good to practice kindness and patience at times during the day because it strengthens our patterns of behaving in those ways.

It seems that reflecting on compassion may also help. Research at the University of Wisconsin used advanced brain imaging to show that meditation may increase the human capacity for empathy.

In the study, researchers compared brain activity in meditation experts with that of subjects just learning the technique (16 in each group). They measured brain activity, during meditation and at rest, in response to sounds—a woman in distress, a baby laughing, and a busy restaurant—designed to evoke a negative, positive, or neutral emotional response.

The researchers found that both the novice and the expert meditators showed an increased empathy reaction when in a meditative state. However, the expert meditators showed a much greater reaction, especially to the negative sound, which may indicate a greater capacity for empathy as a result of doing meditation.

Mindfulness Approaches and Depression

December 10, 2009 Karl DuffyLeave a comment

A study, published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, claimed that Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy was as effective as maintenance anti-depressants in preventing a relapse into depression and more effective in enhancing peoples’ quality of life. The study also showed MBCT to be as cost-effective as prescription drugs in helping people with a history of depression stay well in the longer-term.

Funded by the British Medical Research Council, the study was led by Professor Willem Kuyken at the Mood Disorders Centre, University of Exeter, in collaboration with the Centre for Economics of Mental Health at the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London, Peninsula Medical School, Devon Primary Care Trust and the Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit.

The study involved 123 people who had suffered repeat depressions and were referred by their doctors. The participants were split into two groups. Half continued their on-going anti-depressant drug treatment and the rest participated in an MBCT course and were given the option of coming off anti-depressants.

Over the 15 months after the trial, 47% of the group following the MBCT course experienced a relapse compared with 60% of those continuing their normal treatment, including anti-depressant drugs. In addition, the group on the MBCT program reported a higher quality of life, in terms of their overall enjoyment of daily living and physical well-being.

Professor Kuyken said: “Anti-depressants are widely used by people who suffer from depression and that’s because they tend to work. But, while they’re very effective in helping reduce the symptoms of depression, when people come off them they are particularly vulnerable to relapse. MBCT takes a different approach – it teaches people skills for life. What we have shown is that when people work at it, these skills for life help keep people well.”