Welcome to January, a new start to a new year. Only a few days past the winter solstice, our days are still short, dark and cold. Winter is in full swing. So, what can we do to help our minds, our bodies and our spirits feel whole and healthy in the middle of this dark and cold time? Let’s talk about mindfulness therapy and how it can benefit your mental health.
What Is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is a practice and an amazing way to maintain strong mental health and emotional support in even the most adverse times. This is a term that covers a huge variation of practices and techniques. This is also a term that is thrown around a lot and maybe isn’t really clear. What is it, what does it mean and what does it do?
Mindfulness and mindfulness therapy are simple really. It’s the ability to focus on the present moment, it’s the ability to take your brain out of the past, out of the future and into this moment in time.
For example, if you’re reading this blog, your brain is making sense of the words and turning them into meaning. You’re also maybe sitting somewhere – at your desk, on your couch, maybe you are using your phone or computer to read and research this topic.
But, what else is going on?
What is the light in the space you are in?
What do you hear right now where you are sitting or standing?
What do you smell, or taste in your mouth?
What would you notice if you took a deep breath in and a slow breath out? That’s mindfulness.
You just did it!
Mindfulness Training – What Approach Should You Take?
There are many ways to engage in mindfulness. Some people have a strong practice, while some people dabble. All ways to practice mindfulness are powerful, effective and beneficial. Some people do movement-based mindfulness, while other people prefer sitting meditation practices and still mindfulness practices. There is no wrong way to incorporate some level of mindfulness therapy into your daily routine.
Another important aspect of mindfulness is that it’s really not about the end result, ie: long moments of thoughtless stillness. Rather it’s about establishing the skill of directing your thoughts and feelings away from distractions and back to the present moment.
According to the American Psychological Association, mindfulness is the process of “learning to observe thoughts, emotions, and other present-moment experiences without judging or reacting to them.” From my experience, the key to successful healing and mental health? It’s the not judging part.
What Are The Benefits Of Mindfulness?
Mindfulness has been linked to reductions in stress, anxiety, depression, high blood pressure (hypertension) and more. Mindfulness training also has been found to help treat pain and insomnia, improve attention and reduce burnout. Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MSBR) is a type of wellness therapy that truly can transform your life.
Our brains can so often get caught up with negative thoughts, reliving, recycling and rehashing moments that have already happened. Whether these negative automatic thoughts include stressing about things we said or did, or just idly reliving memories or habits, they rob us of contentment and peace.
Additionally, our minds also often spend a lot of time in the future, stressing and worrying about what is yet to come. Both of these states, stressing about the future or past, induce cortisol production and can put our bodies in a stress response.
When this is a chronic state, which is true for many of us, then we are experiencing great amounts of cortisol which impacts our immune response, increases systemic inflammation and can lead to fatigue and poor sleep as well as issues with our metabolism and digestion.
Think of it this way, feelings like resentment, anger, frustration and grief are feelings associated with the past. Feelings of anxiety, fear, apprehension and nervousness are feelings associated with the future.
If you were to peel away both thoughts about the past and the future, and only focus on this exact moment, you free yourself of those heavy and energy-expensive emotions. You allow yourself a moment of liberation, of freedom to just “be” in this moment, exactly as you are. To feel joy and relaxation in this moment, no past to anguish over, no future to stress over, just this breath in and this breath out, your body sitting in this moment.
If we can bring our minds back to our current moment and pause all of the noise that is related to the past or future, then our stress response system can have a brief, but powerful reset moment.
Keep in mind, unless you are actively running from a bear, evading a fire, in a car accident, etc., you are likely safe at this very moment.
If you can take that deep breath, notice your immediate surroundings and identify that in this exact moment (not in 10 minutes when your boss’s email comes in your inbox, not yesterday when you accidentally said something to upset your loved one) but right now, right in this moment, when you notice what you’re seeing, hearing and feeling, you are safe. This type of stress therapy sends a powerful message to your nervous system.
Winter & Mindfulness Practices
So, what does this have to do with winter? When it’s quiet in our lives, it can be hard to distract ourselves from the internal world within. Sometimes in winter when there is less activity, less to do and less going on, we can feel anxiety when considering what it might feel like to just be, to just sit with ourselves and not be surrounded by delightful and fun summer activities.
We can feel anxious, lonely, and scared and sometimes use coping skills that aren’t helpful, like drinking, shopping, gambling, and most of all, more and more scrolling. Winter offers a perfect time to cultivate a capacity to exist in peace during those darker mornings and quieter evenings.
It offers us an opportunity to experiment and tap into mindfulness that helps us reach our New Year’s resolutions or perhaps helps us connect with our friends and family. Most of all, mindfulness helps us connect with ourselves. It helps us listen to what our internal world is saying to us so that we can meet more of our own needs and become the version of ourselves that is happy and healthy.
When it feels extra scary, or you know you prefer to keep the demons in the closet, I get it. That’s why we are here at Wildroots Collective. We offer comprehensive online therapy to support you in your journey to wellness. You’re not alone and if starting the process of either mindfulness or therapy feels too hard to tackle alone, we are here to help so give it a try!
If you are interested in mindfulness therapy or any type of holistic therapy, the team at Wildroots Collective offers a safe and welcoming space for women from all backgrounds. Whether you need a trauma therapist, a therapist for anxiety, a therapist for depression (including post-partum depression) or perhaps you simply want to shed the pain of the past and work toward rebuilding a brighter, happier future, virtual therapy offers a convenient way to access the care you need. Don’t wait another day to reboot your life, contact us at any time.
