mindfulness meditation – Rebel Bush Doctor

Mindfulness: Kill Your Thoughts or Let Them Pass?

Two illustrated human heads facing each other against a cosmic background, with the head at left nearly empty and the one at right filled with a nebula of activity.

From the point of view of mindfulness, the logic is not to care about any of the interesting changes and experiences that come as a result of practicing in this way, because the underlying goal is to be more and more equanimous with changes. So it’s not to grasp at what’s pleasant or interesting andContinue reading “Mindfulness: Kill Your Thoughts or Let Them Pass?”

Exteroception vs Interoception: Getting Out of Your Head

A cup of tea pinning down a napkin that reads "mind full or mindful" on a table

Most people have an interoceptive bias—they’re focused more on what’s going on internally [mentally] than on what’s happening externally. I think that this is an issue because we hear so often about the need to do a meditation practice that allows us to focus inward and that we’re getting yanked around by all the stressorsContinue reading “Exteroception vs Interoception: Getting Out of Your Head”

Panoramic vs. Tunnel Vision, Interoception and Inner-State

A distraught woman with hands pressed to her temples peers down at her laptop on a desk filled with documents and folders

Much like how our experience of life, whether we’re alert, stressed, excited or calm changes our patterns of breathing, our inner-state drives changes in our visual system—the aperture of whether or not we see the big picture or have a very contracted view of the world. When we are stressed or excited about something, theContinue reading “Panoramic vs. Tunnel Vision, Interoception and Inner-State”

Releasing Tension and Improving Flexibility through Mind in Body and Self-Applied Massage

For the longest time, I always viewed Qigong instructors saying to “relax the hips” as referring to the exterior lateral area. You know, like the top of the pelvis, or the ‘hip joint,’ where the femur and pelvis intersect. I had been practicing qigong regularly for over two years, with little improvement to show inContinue reading “Releasing Tension and Improving Flexibility through Mind in Body and Self-Applied Massage”