Week one: Waking up to Autopilot

Summary of chapter 5 in “Mindfulness: An Eight Week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World”

In this chapter, the authors discuss how many of us tend to live constantly either thinking about the future or the past and that much of what we do ends up being on auto-pilot.  The exercises assigned are to help bring awareness and all our senses to what is happening NOW. 

A quote from page 86 “She began to think of her mind, its thoughts and its feelings, as a weather pattern, with her task simply being to observe the weather, even if it is stormy”…..she “was not trying to gain control over the ‘weather’.”

In mindfulness, we are strengthening our ability to observe our thoughts, rather than get caught and rushed downstream with them.

Click here for a printable homework log – there are several suggestions on what to practice this week.  If it is too overwhelming, just choose one or two things to do consistently.  Let’s work on consistency and support.  What do you need to get these pieces a part of your daily life?