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Mindfulness has this quality of intimacy and connection with all aspects of our life’s unfolding drama. In fact, one of the most direct effects that come with the cultivation of mindful-awareness is the phenomenon of sensory enrichment; as we look more closely at things with an openness of mind, we naturally see and experience more – more sensory detail. Literally, our experience is transformed from black-and-white into vibrant color. Our experience becomes more dynamic and alive; we feel more alive. Contrast this with the sensory depravation that results from the habitual reactivity of the state of unawareness and un-mindfulness. Such un-mindfulness, being out-of-touch with experience and lacking intimate contact with our experience is in Buddhist psychology regarded as the realm of death, personified by Mara – the one who keeps us in a state of ignorance and dissociation from reality.

The second part of this particular dimension of mindfulness is openness of heart. This is described by terms such as friendliness, warmth and compassion. This is where we warmly greet each and every aspect of our experience with a smile; we learn to smile at whatever arises, pleasant or unpleasant, beautiful or ugly, big or small, significant or insignificant. Nothing is excluded; nothing is abandoned. We choose to turn towards our experiences: painful as well as joyful, and greet each as having the right to exist, greeting each as something to be valued and cared for with kindness and compassion.

Mindfulness begins with opening the mind and opening the heart and choosing to be completely present with whatever arises in our experience, quite different that the blind reactivity of the unaware mind. This quality of engaged-presence is perhaps one of the most important dimensions of mindfulness. It is not just about opening to experience, not just about seeing what is happening as it is happening, but of choosing to be fully there with our experience, or with the experience of another person, or indeed with the world in general. This can be described as the difference between being and becoming. When we are mindful, we enter into a relationship with the object of mindfulness characterized by being, a state of inner stillness and non-reactivity where there lots of space to receive and to respond. The state of becoming is a characteristic of the reactive mind, the contracted mind that is never able to be fully present with whatever is happening now such a mind is forever moving away from the now towards something other.

There are many other dimensions of mindfulness, which may become the subject of future articles, but suffice it to say that learning this simple response to our emotional suffering characterized by openness of mind and openness of heart is the beginning of the healing process. It produces an inner spacious dimension in which change can happen. As I frequently say to my clients and students:

‘Reactivity inhibits change; mindfulness promotes change. The Path of Mindfulness is the empowering choice of creating the fertile space in which beneficial change can take place’

Peter Strong, PhD is a scientist, author and Buddhist Psychotherapist, based in Boulder, Colorado, who specializes in the study of mindfulness and its application in Mindfulness Psychotherapy for healing the root causes of anxiety, depression and traumatic stress.

Besides face-to-face therapy sessions, Dr Strong offers Online Mindfulness Meditation Therapy through Skype and email correspondence. Teaching seminars are available for groups and companies.