The Power of Mindfulness
My life changed when I started practicing mindful thinking regularly. That might sound melodramatic, but it’s absolutely true--specifically around challenging negative thoughts. I’ve always been very good at judging myself. Unfortunately, harsh judgment causes me to shut down, so I don’t reflect on the thought. I don’t think, “Is that thought true?”, “What else is going on?”, or “Is there anything that I can do? Or should I just recognize it and move on?” When I stop shutting down, I reflect and accept where I am in that moment.
Here’s a link to a video of me talking briefly about mindfulness as a
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9PBhD0D-jY
Side note: I considered not linking to the video, because I don’t think that I look good in the video. I’ve definitely looked better. I’m tempted to list the things that I don’t like. But that’s the old familiar judgmental thinking. I like the content of the video, and I can recognize that I’ve looked better.
Autistic adults have written about how mindfulness strategies and thinking has been helpful for them. On the Art of Autism, Travis Breeding wrote How Mindfulness and Meditation have changed my life. He noted that staying in the moment has helped him to understand the positives of having autism. Becca Lory Hector is a Certified Autism Specialist and Board-Certified Cognitive Specialist and wrote Be Mindful, Be Present, Be You: How to Handle Crisis Anxiety on Spectrum Women. She writes and speaks extensively about living a self-defined life, gaining resilience, and creating joy. She has a seminar series and monthly newsletter.
I went down a bit of a rabbit hole with her site, and I’m super excited to read and listen more to her. She’s amazing, and I plan on writing more about her when I have the chance to do a deeper dive.
It’s helpful to remember that mindful living is a choice and a practice, meaning that it’s never completed, and some days will be better than others. You can recognize when the day got the best of you and be intentional about trying again. Thinking of it as a practice is a useful reminder to be patient with myself as I learn and grow.
There are a lot of other concepts included in mindful living;. David Steindl-Rast talks about gratitude in this TED talk and Dr. Matt Killingsworth shows the correlation between happiness and staying in the moment in his TED talk.
Mary can be reached at CORT@i-can.center.