But there’s a dark side to everything, and failure to acknowledge and anticipate the starker potentials in mindfulness are a big reason many people’s practices hit a wall long before opening their deeper transformative potentials.

What do you do when your mindfulness practice inevitably brings those starker inner realities to the surface? [Photo courtesy: J Perez Imagery]

The Problem with Mindfulness

There’s a honeymoon period when you start to expand your awareness and deepen your attention through mindfulness. You realize, “Wow, I’ve never really tasted that protein shake before! I never really felt these shorts! I can honest-to-god feel my feet inside my shoes!” Your whole inner landscape gets drenched with an enhanced sensory awareness that’s always been there, but that you’d somehow never quite paid attention to before. You’re in the moment, in the flow, in the zone.

But before long, that expanding awareness slams right into all the stuff you’ve been trying not to pay attention to: your inner critic, your self-judgement, your worry, your insecurity. All the little habits and rationalizations you let yourself get away with; all the memories that make you wince; all the unacknowledged, unresolved stuff churning away in the background of your mind; the whole ocean of inner storms that’s just waiting to be stirred up.

And when it does get stirred up—which, if your practice is effective, it will—it’s all too common for a beginner to skitter back into unconsciousness, shut the sensory gateway back down to a more manageable slice of reality, and forget the whole thing ever happened. It’s like the soreness and suffering in the early stages of an exercise program. If you haven’t worked out for most of your life, there’s likely going to be a pretty rough transition period. And if you’re not aware of that ahead of time, the shock can be enough to short-circuit your efforts before you get even close to the good stuff.

That’s why it’s so important to set realistic expectations about what might come up during your mindfulness practice. You’ll have to retrain yourself, bit by bit, to recognize discomfort as a positive indication that you’re one step closer to a breakthrough. If you recognize it when you see it, you’ll be less likely to try to block it out, and more likely to see it for what it is: a sign, albeit an uncomfortable one, that the process is working.

One Awareness, Multiple Levels

In order to anticipate the challenges that come with a mindfulness practice, it can be useful to separate your experience into different levels: mind, body, and emotions.

There is some basis for separating your experience into these categories, as the brain can be divided into its three main areas: the brainstem, which mostly governs the body; the limbic system, which deals primarily with memory and emotion; and the neocortex, which deals with language and abstract thought. But we’re not dealing with brain science here. We’re dealing with the raw data of your own direct perceptual experience—that’s the main material for mindfulness, not interpretations. And as long as you recognize that these different levels are just for convenience, you’re unlikely to get stuck in a rigid belief system that might limit your practice later on.

Of course, these different levels are not really separate. They overlap, they influence each other, and the lines between them blur. That’s one thing you realize if you stick with a mindfulness practice long enough: although it begins as a chaos of conflicting desires, thoughts, and sensations, you’re still a single entity, expressing yourself in a variety of ways. Getting to a deep state of integration and wholeness in your moment-to-moment experience is one of the great payoffs of mindfulness. All of your energies align, multiplying and assisting each other’s power, instead of warping your inner experience into a battlefield of contradictory impulses.

One Awareness, Multiple Levels: The Body

Each of these levels—mind, body, and emotions—has its own unique potential to show you things you’d rather not see, and to put the brakes on your mindfulness practice if you let it. We’ll start with the body, since that’s the most solid anchor in your awareness. Unless you’re asleep or dreaming of being a firefly or something, your body is always right there in your field of perception, easy to focus on. But despite its constant presence, there are many ways to be deeply and distressingly out of touch with your body, and just because you’re fit and healthy doesn’t mean you’re off the hook here.

As you start to tune in more and more to the signals the body is actually sending you (and not just evaluating it based on the reflection in the mirror, or metrics like weight or body fat), you may be in for some surprises. You may discover pains that you’ve been ignoring, though they’ve been there for years. You may suddenly become aware that you’re pushing yourself too hard in your training, or not hard enough. You may detect layers of tension you’d never really paid attention to, wrapping you like a mummy from head to toe. You may find that you’re unable to take a deep a breath, or that your breathing is fitful and shallow.

You may also have some pleasant surprises. As capacity for mindfulness deepens, it’s common for people to notice sensations like tingling in the skin, electricity in the spine, or feelings of nonspecific “energies” moving through the body in sometimes very surprising ways. These sensations can be not just fascinating and informative, but extremely pleasurable, though they’re usually hiding under a big pile of chronic tension and habitual unconsciousness.

Becoming aware of the more distressing bodily sensations can often be enough to dissipate their discomfort significantly. It’s natural to want to tune out discomfort, but if the body is trying to get your attention, the more you ignore it, the more it’s likely to act up. If you let it know you’re listening, it doesn’t have to yell as loud.

One Awareness, Multiple Levels: The Emotions

The same goes for emotions. We live in a culture with a long history of denying emotional realities, as though simply gritting and bearing every storm with stoic silence is the only way to get through tough times. It’s up to you whether you want to share your emotional experience with others, but if you’re not at least honest with yourself about what you feel on this level, it’s bound to become a stagnant swamp of unprocessed energies and arrested development.

Emotions aren’t a problem if they’re allowed to flow. But again, starting out, that can be tough, as you start to realize that you really are pissed off in traffic, that you really do get sad when that one song comes on, or that you really do feel a little bit of satisfaction when other people fail. And underneath those denied surface emotions are the great tides of unprocessed feelings from throughout your whole life, including early childhood, before you had any idea why you were feeling what you were feeling, or how to handle it. That stuff doesn’t just go away, and becoming increasingly mindful of your emotions can start out feeling like cleaning the world’s largest garage, filled with a lifetime worth of junk.

Beyond dealing with that backlog, the simple intensity of raw emotion can be enough to put a beginner back on his or her heels. But the more you become aware of your emotions in all their intensity, the less you become identified with them, and the less power they have over you. Paradoxically, it’s unconsciousness of emotions that leads to emotional compulsion.

One Awareness, Multiple Levels: Your Thoughts

Getting that kind of distance from your own inner experience is the name of the game with mindfulness, and nowhere is it more important than when you start looking at the third level: your thoughts.

We tend to assume that our thoughts are “ours,” but just a little peek under the hood reveals an almost entirely automatic process of perpetual rumination that goes on without your consent, or even your participation. It can be quite a shock to see that you’re not really thinking most of the time, but that your thoughts are simply happening to you. On this level, the great temptation is to get sucked into a perpetual stalemated negotiation with your thoughts. But as mindfulness will show you, you can never win that game, and ultimately, the content of your thoughts is irrelevant anyway. The only important thing is to get some distance from them, stop identifying with them, and stop feeding into their fickle tyranny.

That’s the beautiful thing about mindfulness: all you’re doing is noticing and becoming aware of your sensations, emotions, and thoughts, and that’s all you have to do. You don’t need to “fix” them or change them, and you certainly don’t need to judge them, or judge yourself for hosting them. Through the simple act of increasing and deepening awareness, most of those inner knots come untied all by themselves.

We want to see ourselves as strong, confident, intelligent, poised—never insecure, anxious, or dopey. [Photo credit: J Perez Imagery]

One Awareness, Multiple Levels: The Eye of Awareness

As long as we’re talking about levels, we may as well at least touch on this, because this is where all mindfulness practices end up if taken all the way: the final, invisible level of pure, unconditioned awareness. It’s hard to practice mindfulness earnestly and consistently without eventually asking this question: “If I’m observing the mind, the body, and the emotions, then who am ‘I’? Who is the one doing the observing? Who is aware?”

The answer inevitably is that you are the awareness itself.

This is the deeper level, the level that contains all of the content of your sensations, emotions, or thoughts, but is untouched by any of it. It is pristine, detached, and unaffected by even the most extreme negative experiences. And the more that you develop your mindfulness, the more your consciousness will rest at this level.

Of course, it’s one thing to understand that intellectually, and another to make it your living experience. To do that, you have to be disciplined in your practice, and work through all the challenges along the way. But remembering this baseline awareness can make the transition a lot easier. Looking at all the stark, unpleasant inner realities makes us so queasy because it tends to threaten our self-image. We want to see ourselves as strong, confident, intelligent, poised—never insecure, anxious, or dopey, which we inevitably are, at least some of the time.

Self-image is so easily threatened because it’s never really real. It’s only an idea. It’s not really who you are. And when you trade your self-image for reality, you’re always trading up. It probably won’t feel like it at first. It’ll probably feel humiliating to admit to yourself you’re not the idealized self you try so hard to be. But once that initial wince of humiliation passes, you’re left with a far greater virtue of humility.

The great irony is that a false self-image of strength and confidence is extremely vulnerable, and requires constant protection, rationalization, and self-deception to maintain as plausible. Humility, on the other hand, is effortless, and actually provides what self-image attempts to provide: a thick skin. Once you get real, reality is no longer a threat, and nothing can rattle your cage. That’s how mindfulness and humility lead to a foundation of mental toughness far more powerful than any you could create by forging a “positive” self-image and then trying to force yourself into its mold.

The Poison Is the Medicine

There are varying levels of “heat” that you can apply to your mindfulness practice, depending on how deep you want to take it, and how quickly. You can introduce more aggressive means, like Neuromuscular Release Work (NRW), my own preferred method, which includes a type of mindfulness meditation along with its more physical practices. With NRW, you get from point A to point B as quickly as possible by doing exercises that purge the blocks in the nervous system. When you do an inner power cleanse, you have no choice but to look at the stuff you’ve been ignoring—the good, the bad, and the ugly. But once it’s gone, it’s gone.

Or, you can go for a softer, more gradual approach, as with most traditional styles of mindfulness. My only caveat there is that you have to be truly vigilant and honest with yourself, or you risk simply spinning your wheels with surface observations and never truly challenging yourself. It’s all too easy to fool yourself and rationalize looking the other way when the shadow starts to descend.

But though there are many paths, there’s ultimately one destination, and regardless of which path you choose, sooner or later you’re going to have to face yourself. If you stick with your mindfulness practice, you will come across these challenges, sooner or later. Just remember, those challenges aren’t just unpleasant side effects. They’re the point. And by moving through them, you turn their poison into a medicine that will transform you, mind, body, and spirit.

So how do you move through them? What do you do when your mindfulness practice inevitably brings those starker inner realities to the surface?

Simply continue the protocol: welcome them, observe them, and allow them to just be there without reacting or resisting, however uncomfortable that may be at first. Because if you resist them, you’ll just make them more insistent. It’s like trying to push a beach ball underwater. Don’t fight them, and don’t run away from them. Just let them be there, in the full light of awareness, without judgement, rationalization, or identification. After a while, they’ll die of your indifference, and you’ll have conquered another big chunk of inner territory.

Easier said than done? Yup. But that’s why they call it a practice.

Become more mindful:

Meditation for Meatheads

Become more mindful with your athletes:

How to Coach an Individual in a Group Setting

The post The Dark Side of Mindfulness appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Feeling is Universal

Romance, violence, and drama flood all forms of media in an effort to draw upon the heartstrings of viewers. Emotions projected on the screen manipulate those felt by the observer. They pull out of us what we long to develop in ourselves. We plug into technology to feed our hearts and pull the plug on real relationships. No wonder there is loneliness. There are cries for attention, affection, and connection in our hearts. But the only way they can be truly satisfied is through sincere connection with those around us.

Men and women alike have wells of raw emotion bubbling inside. This is not only a feminine trait. It crosses gender and culture. Feeling is universal. Feeling is what makes us human and gives us the ability to relate with others.

It is time, my friends, to take a stand for what is really inside us. Have courage and perpetuate empowerment by growing sensitization inside. Reverse the ancient paradigms that feeling is a sign of weakness. The stifling of feelings is what causes weakness, illness, and disease. These emotions wreak havoc in our guts and bloodstream through rising tension and internal conflicts. The sensations we stifle will make their way to the surface, sooner or later.

The Origin of Emotions

Get turned on by what you feel inside and learn to elaborate on those feelings. Look at a dictionary or list of emotions and choose one to focus on. Recall an instance in your life where you felt this emotion. Listen to where the sensation arises inside you as you remember. Make this a consistent practice. What you learn will help with the next stage – communication and expression.

Once you’ve made this a regular practice, then when you are out in the world and the first hint of a feeling arises, you can listen intently to find the origin. Listen to your insides. Take a breath and choose words that best represent what needs to be spoken. Write them down or slowly speak them.

Make Better Connections With These Practices

Eye Contact

Notice how often you make eye contact. Notice how long you look into someone’s eyes. The time can vary depending on what you do or want to feel. The longer the eye contact, the better the connection. Eye contact silently relays the emotions from deep inside. You will notice certain people will feel comforted by it, while others turn away as they may feel shy, uncomfortable with their own feelings, or possess an inability to connect.

Practice seeing, hearing, and feeling the love you have for someone close to you. Meet with him or her and call up these sensations. Look into his or her eyes for at least five seconds. Don’t stare with hardened eyes, widen them and allow for the communication to transmit with ease. Then ask what he or she thought you were feeling when you looked into each other’s eyes.

Affection

Do you resist giving affection? Why? What are your deepest feelings about giving or receiving affection? I was born a deeply affectionate person. When I withhold hugs or eye contact, these are indicators of something going the wrong direction. If giving affection is new for you, start with a small, simple gesture. Shake hands, give a pat on the back, or offer a hug. Be willing to feel uncomfortable or shaky at first. This will evolve with practice.

Asking Feeling Questions

You can become better at understanding your own feelings or how to communicate them by asking what others are feeling. Through your asking, the other person will become connected with you and can feel more at ease. In turn, this practice will help you feel more comfortable with your own feelings.

Turn Off the Phone

Have conversations with people who are physically present with you. Use your voice. Steer into the art of conversation by asking questions about details, listening and piggybacking onto responses with your own experiences.

Courage comes in all forms and for many reasons. It is not just for warriors going into battle. It shows up in small, but significant gestures like overcoming procrastination, resistance, or conflict. Feel freedom inside your self by overriding the social messages of “men don’t cry” or “women are overly emotional.” No one deserves these lies. These thoughts were instilled in us as methods of control, a way for others to keep us in check, ready to do as dictated to.

Instead, examine the truth behind your emotions and when you shut them down. Don’t hide in the phone, on Facebook, or on the computer. Pierce the veil of shyness, bringing about courage. Participate in life. You will be a happier, more fulfilled version of yourself. Living will be more like thriving.

This is a great message to spread, especially to loved ones with whom you long to have a deeper connection. This is a message worth going viral.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post 4 Ways to Make Better Connections With Friends, Clients, and Yourself appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

When thinking about this article, the Free to Be You and Me song “It’s All Right to Cry” came immediately to mind. Sung by Rosey Grier, a former defensive tackle for the NY Giants and the LA Rams, “It’s All Right to Cry” has a message clearly suggested by its title. And the choice of Grier to sing the song was probably quite calculated to reach men and boys, signaling that even though men are socialized to cry less than women, sometimes even the biggest and strongest of us do – and it’s okay. (Sure, the production values of the video are decidedly disco-era, and Rosey himself is no spring chicken anymore, but I still wouldn’t want to be the person who pokes fun at him for shedding a tear or two.)

For better or worse, I do not have difficulty turning on the waterworks, and sometimes I cry for fitness-related reasons. Both Brazilian jiu jitsu and CrossFit/weightlifting, my two main athletic pursuits in recent years, can be as demanding as they are rewarding. It got me thinking about when I cry and why. I’m not trying to encourage tears at the gym – as a matter of fact, when I cry, I try to do it in my own home, or at least make it to the car or the bathroom before I let fly, though this may not always be entirely controllable. But I am aware of the fact a good cry can be cathartic and can help me deal with my stuff and then move on.

I’m sure many of the men and even some of the women reading this are more than a little skeptical, and a lot resistant to the idea that tears can play an adaptive role our athletic progress, seeing them instead as something to be avoided in any situation other than eating super-spicy food. My point is simply that athletic pursuits require much of us, that they wear down our natural defenses as we work ourselves to and beyond exhaustion. Further, our stresses, fears, and disappointments are going to manifest themselves one way or another, and it turns out crying is actually a pretty efficient method for processing these.

So, bear with me as I list a few circumstances where even the strongest and bravest of us might succumb to a few “raindrops from your eyes,” as Rosey puts it, and where our teammates and coaches would surely forgive them, and maybe even join in:

When you have been injured. A scrape or a bruise is one thing. But something more serious might warrant some tears. None of us want to get seriously injured, which is why tearing up when we do is not a sin, or the sign of some kind of weakness. Especially if there’s a lot of pain.

When you have been frightened. This may go hand in hand with being injured. As with minor injuries, someone sneaking up on you and saying, “Boo!” is not a reason to cry. But if you fall off the rock-climbing wall or see someone you care about narrowly escape a dangerous situation, it might trigger an (understandable) emotional reaction, either in the moment or shortly thereafter.

When you are frustrated. You got spanked up and down the mat. You missed your PR attempt even though you felt like everything from diet to sleep was completely dialed in. You boffed the muscle-up again. You were the anti-Neo, where every attempt to dodge the bullet failed, and you got hit head-on time after time. Everyone has these days, and sometimes we can’t shake them off. (Not for nothing did The Band record a song called “Tears of Rage.”)

When you have accomplished it. You know what it is. The goal you had that seemed like an impossibility. The one that took more hard work and heart than you knew you possessed. The one that required you to put everything and everyone else on hold. When you have accomplished it, you get to cry, for joy, for relief, for exhaustion. You may not have a choice.

I’m not saying you’re going to cry if/when any of these things happen. I’m just saying you might, and if you do, you can use your reaction as an indication that something profound has happened, and you can just allow it to be profound.

When’s the last time you cried while pursuing athletic excellence? Post your stories to comments. We’ll pass the Kleenex.

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.

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