Beginning Your Mindfulness Practice
By: William Hazel
Tags: Fitness, Self-awareness, Health, Mental Health, Nutrition

Beginning Your Mindfulness Practice

Your kitchen is the perfect place to start

Photo by Anne Nygård on Unsplash

Practicing mindfulness is a wonderful way to reduce and alleviate the accumulated stress of our daily lives. Through a simple awakening to the beauty of each moment, we can use the power of focus to enhance every day experiences, both great and small. Thankfully, being more mindful does not mean we need to spend vast sums of money on courses, retreats, or certifications.

I struggled through first attempts with mindfulness and meditation and had enormous difficulty in the practice of clearing my thoughts for any length of time. My first steps towards genuine meditation was practicing being more mindful in every day tasks of my life. I still use this pursuit, with much joy and great effect on my well being. The first place in my home that I was able to truly become more mindful in my thoughts and actions was the kitchen.

When was the last time you slowed down enough to cook a full meal? Preparing a meal from scratch is one of the true pleasures of being at home and offers a perfect chance to practice being more present.

Think of meal prep as a time for self care. Photo by Ayda Oz on Unsplash

When I read the following passage from the Echhart Tolle’s, The Power of Now, it makes me think of cooking:

“Instead of watching the thinker, you can also create a gap in the mind stream simply by directing the focus of your attention into the now. Just become intensely conscious of the present moment. This is a deeply satisfying thing to do. In this way, you draw consciousness away from mind activity and create a gap of no-mind in which you are highly alert and aware but not thinking. This is the essence of meditation.”

This becomes available through cooking. Completely focusing on the task of creating a meal brings a clear break in the ongoing noise in my head. I’m applying my conscious self to this little corner of culinary joy and, yes, I’m going to describe the action as both meditative and deeply satisfying. I disagree with Tolle’s phrase of no-mind. I think of this time as high-mind. I try to address myself as approaching times of higher thinking when I’m able to achieve a meditative state.

I emphasize the idea of creating the meal from scratch.

Slow down. Take your time. Photo by Katie Smith on Unsplash

I suppose one could be mindful of how the frigid cardboard box feels coming from the freezer, how the sticky plastic peals away from the top, the sound the tray makes hitting the microwave’s carousel. I’m going to go out on a limb, though, and state that I don’t think your experience is likely to be extraordinary, lower your stress levels, or benefit your health in any way. This invitation to cooking means preparing your dish, not heating it up.

I prepare for my time in the kitchen in much the same way I prepare for a yoga class. I create the space to be more inviting, more deliberate for fostering an act of self care.

Create the space for self care. Photo by Conscious Design on Unsplash

And let’s face it, we all need to embrace the idea that when we’re holding that very sharp knife it’s a good idea to pay attention. I enjoy putting my prepared ingredients in little bowls, much in the manner of the TV chefs. I savor the satisfaction of seeing my prep work in a colorful celebration of fresh ingredients. I love to sharpen the knife just ahead of cutting, the energized sound of crisscrossing the blade with the steel serving as focal point. Again, the smallest of acts, every day acts, become my starting point for letting go of my thoughts, my distractions, and bring focus to the task.

The carrots all looked the same when I put the bunch in my cart, but in my hands at home, I can see the uniqueness of each. The colors, the lines, the bumps and bruises from having traveled from the earth to the market to my counter top. Feeling the knife moving through, the sound of the food’s fibers giving way, hearing and feeling the cutting board’s acceptance and rebound; being mindful of each step. Simultaneously tedious and satisfying, I never tire of this kind of self care time spent with the cutting board.

Make cooking about more than eating. Photo by Hermes Rivera on Unsplash

The meal, of course, begins with your planning. That’s a first place to become more aware. What would you enjoy making for yourself or for your loved ones and family? Chances are you already have an excellent cook book at home for ideas. Or search your favorite dish to discover making it from scratch may not be as complicated as you once thought. Click through the various recipes and pick the one with the photo that’s making your mouth water.

Be mindful in the market. Again, this is about making something from raw ingredients. Stay clear of the redundant sections filled with frozen and processed concoctions. Temptation will be powerful in the market, so keep a close eye on the shopping list you so mindfully and carefully curated before leaving home. Take your time looking through the produce. Notice the colors and the textures. Put yourself in the moment to enjoy the simple actions of bringing all of your ingredients together.

Getting back into the kitchen, or cooking for the first time, will not only offer a chance to practice being more fully present in the moment, it will also bring a boost to your overall well being.

Savor mindfulness. Image by Divily from Pixabay

Be of service to yourself by approaching the time as something more than ordinarily piquant. And just to be clear about my suggestion; the idea of being mindful while preparing your meal means you’ll need to put away your phone. Okay, maybe you’ll need it for following the recipe you’ve found, but make a quiet pact with yourself to not start taking photos for your social media. This practice is about self care. About giving some time to yourself.

Notice how Jon Kabat-Zinn describes this important time for the self:

“Learning how to suspend all your doing and shift over to a being mode, how to make time for yourself, how to slow down and nurture calmness and self acceptance in yourself, learning to observe what your mind is up to from moment to moment, how to watch your thoughts and how to let go of them without getting caught up and driven by them, how to make room for new ways of seeing old problems and for perceiving the inter-connectedness of things — these are some of the lessons of mindfulness. This kind of learning involves turning toward and settling into moments of being, and simply cultivating awareness.”

This is from Kabat-Zinn’s book, Full Catastrophe Living. By the title you may think it was written last month, but his publication is from 1990. The volume describes his cornerstone work in mindfulness though his Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction program at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center.

I explore my journey with mindfulness through Yoga. Bringing my body, mind, and breath to the yoga mat is an absolutely perfect place to foster self awareness. Bringing mindfulness to my running is another wonderful way I expanded my practice. The simple, every day activities, though, still stand as pillars of daily awareness. I offer preparing your meals as a perfect place to practice settling in, as Kabat-Zinn describes, into simple, perfect, wonderful moments of being. I offer the kitchen as a good place to practice mindfulness and meditation.

And be careful with the knife.

Thank you for reading. I was gifted mindfulness techniques during a long struggle back to health and wellness after trauma. I believe in ghosts, running, yoga, and really great coffee.