to be mindful is to be alive

Mindfulness - why is it important to me? It's a virtue I've always felt attracted to. Part of it may be the allure of mysticism and spirituality. I think the part that makes it concrete for me is the science. Maybe it's because I've struggled with being mindful. I used to think of self-awareness as one of my strengths, but I wasn't mindful enough to know, while it was something I valued, it was not something I practiced. Similarly, I can value kindness and honesty, yet not practice them. I think it's this contrast between what I value and what I practice that arises in me a cognitive dissonance. For me, it's a blinding, head-pounding, heart-wrenching dissonance. The moments when I've aligned my values with my thoughts and actions are the times I've felt most proud to be me. 

I find that I become confused easily. I tend to become so distracted by thoughts unrelated to the present moment and the feelings which arise because of them. Or I become confused by which thoughts make me feel which feelings and why. For these reasons, I find mindfulness to be an absolutely necessary skill. It is a practice of awareness. I wish life could be that easy. This skill, for me, requires slowness and patience. A slowness that life often does not allow. When life goes by at high speeds, it's easy for me to lose sight of my values and why I hold them. It's easy for me to ignore the dissonance that tells me I am not being kind, though I value kindness. I am not being patient, though I value patience. I am not being grateful, loving, caring, social, present, honest, alive. 

This dissonance is drowned out by simple things, of course. Social media, TV, movies, sex, fantasies. At best, these things make us feel more connected, human, and alive. At their worst, they make us feel numb and alone. Whether or not they make me feel alive or numb has less to do with them, and more to do with the reason I am using them. I can only know the reason through being mindful. Which thoughts precede the feelings that precede my hand reaching for the phone? My depression has to do with an indifference to that question. 

When I am not considering the "why" behind my behavior, and I know that I am not aware of it, how could I possibly be proud of the actions I'm taking? If I am doing things randomly, at a whim, controlled by all competing emotions, and I do not know which ones drive my hand and which keep it still, how could I find any ground? I think there are practices which transcend this need for a reason, and they mostly belong in the category of art and self-expression. Why did I begin writing this, for instance? This is me guiding my hand in what I believe is a "better" direction. It's a reminder but also an explanation which I hope strikes the chords of a heart and engages the mind of an individual. I feel lost and my guiding light exists and I want to follow it. That is the antithesis of depression. That is the pursuit of life, living, love. I say none of this with irony or sarcasm and that liberates me. I speak honestly and it grounds me. I speak of transcendence and it lifts me. This is a hint of mindfulness. 

I don't think it's the mysticism of mindfulness that tricks me into thinking it's more special than it is. I believe that I can't be whole, I can't have a foundational identity, without the ability to be mindful. I'm tempted to call that a universal truth, but it's difficult when I see many people who tend to lack both depression and mindfulness. Some might say that those people lack even the hint of it that would allow for the dissonance to take over. I always come back to the idea that I can't know what's going on in somebody else's mind. What I do know is that mindfulness is important to me. It's what has allowed me to be confident, sophisticated, and happy. Without it, life becomes blurry, stressful, and confusing. The question I have about what "real" mindfulness is falls away when I allow myself to recognize my knowledge and limitations without judgment and without self-hatred. I can only use what I have in the present moment, and I can only prepare for what I know is coming. Everything else is a mystery, yet to be solved or forever kept secret. And that's okay.