TUNE IN TO Mindful

Let go of self-judgment. When you meditate, you may immediately start thinking, “I’m not very good at this” or “I don’t meditate often enough.” This guided practice lets you reflect on such areas in life where you feel judgmental toward yourself. Simply notice where your thoughts go when experiencing self-criticism. Try this practice to recognize what that feels like and then let it be, while also offering kind thoughts to yourself.

Tune in to resilience. Discover deeper care and compassion for yourself, despite the ups and downs that we all experience. This practice gives you a quick break in your day to tune in to your emotions, take note of how you feel, and ask yourself where you feel the emotion in your body. When you increase your mindfulness, you gently build more resilience to stress, even when unwanted circumstances are present in your life.

Understand your emotions. Naming or labeling difficult emotions helps you disentangle, or “unstick,” from them. This gentle practice helps you realize what you’re really feeling without getting trapped by the passing emotion. Although being honest with yourself about how you’re feeling isn’t always easy, this practice reminds you that you can always find refuge in your breathing, and most emotions can be made more workable by labeling them.

MINDFULNESS Where It Comes From and What It Means

Sarah Shaw • Shambhala

As part of a series known as Buddhist Foundations, Sarah Shaw, a lecturer at the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies, does a thorough job of tracing the history of mindfulness within Buddhism, dissecting all the strands associated with the word and the practices it represents. Shaw is noticeably astute in how she discusses the English word mindfulness. She demonstrates the understanding that once an existing word in a language acquires new meaning when used to translate a word in another language, a whole new life has begun. And words, just like offspring, cannot be controlled.

Appreciating this fact, Shaw eschews the doctrinaire. “Words do not need to be institutionalized or static,” she writes. “The word mindfulness is, one hopes, always ongoing, always susceptible to new interpretation and new enactment in literary forms and teaching methods.” In so saying, Shaw admirably places herself in the company of those for whom actual experience in mind training is of paramount importance when it comes to describing events of the mind and ascribing meaning to them. Nevertheless, she could easily still make a blanket statement that Mindfulness is Buddhist. End of story.

Instead, she shows herself to be more ecumenical, declaring that her approach to mindfulness “does not, however, suggest that any one tradition, even Buddhism itself, owns the franchise on it, or is the only one that gets it right.” While many mindfulness practitioners promoting secular versions similarly don’t believe the practice to be owned by Buddhism, few would argue that Buddhism has not made the largest contribution to this form of contemplative practice.

Shaw’s excellent survey of mindfulness from its earliest days to the present is well worth the trip. Sadly, it may be used by some as a stick to brandish in defense of mindfulness practice as valid only within the one true faith of Buddhism. That would be a shame. It would do a disservice to a top-notch treatment that has much more to offer than paranoiac polemics.

Stay Woke

A Meditation Guide for the Rest of Us

Justin Michael WIlliams • Sounds True

Many “spiritual” writings give only incidental mention of the social and material struggles people face. They imply, “Inequality, marginalization? That’s an out-there problem. Ignore it and meditate.” Having reckoned with homophobia, personal trauma, and stress rooted in poverty and domestic violence, Justin Michael Williams has no time for that: “You need a different type of meditation. One that doesn’t pretend the struggle doesn’t exist.” He demonstrates real strength through the honesty and vulnerability of his first book. With “Freedom Meditation,” he offers you 10 steps to create a meditation (and life) practice that’s about fearlessly embracing all of who you are, to explore both your inner and outer worlds: “Meditation is not about relaxing. Meditation is about becoming more alive.”

The Monkey Mind Meditation Deck

30 Fun Ways for Kids to Chill Out, Tune In, and Open Up

Carolyn Kanjuro • Bala Kids

With exquisite illustrations by Alexander Vidal, this pack of 30 cards mixes many images: We find weather (rainbow, gentle breeze, hurricane), natural features (tree, mountain, rushing river), and anthropomorphized animals (cranky crab, burrowing bunny, loyal dog) on one side, and simple, playful meditation practices on the other side. The result is a stunning variety of short, insightful practices that can be, according to the accompanying guide, “a source of invention and play, a safe way to reflect on difficult topics, and a form of nourishment and support for children navigating an increasingly complex world.” The instructions are very clearly expressed, and (best of all) the teachings embodied here avoid the extreme earnestness that can ruin meditation for people of all ages. ●

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Chris Gooding chris@mindful.org