“What we plant in the soil of contemplation, we shall reap in the harvest of action.”
-Meister Eckhart
We’re once again in the final throes of another holiday season and approaching a new year. While this season of lights can create feelings of joy, love and connectedness, it can also create stress, strife, loneliness and/or feelings of overwhelm.
When we find ourselves in times of stress, our thoughts are generally not supportive in how we want to feel or in moving us toward what we want to create. Rather, most people automatically default (usually unconsciously) to negative thinking and negative thought patterns. In fact, our brains are wired and now culturally designed to defer to the negative. According to the National Science Foundation, 80 percent of our thoughts are negative, and 95 percent of all of our thoughts are repetitive!
Research shows that these negative, repetitive thought patterns generally arise through pessimism, in which our mental filters focus on the negative and we assume that the worst will happen; rumination, in which repetitive thoughts get our brains stuck in negativity, making it hard to let things go and move on; and perfectionism, in which we place high and/or unrealistic standards on ourselves, becoming hypercritical and feeling like a failure when often impossible standards are not met.
If you find yourself staying up late at night—or at any time during the day—engaging in negative thinking, you are far from alone, as the statistics above so aptly demonstrate.
However, it is possible, through awareness, strengthening attentional capacity, focusing on what is good and visualizing your best self and what it is that you’d like to foster to create new neural pathways and literally change your brain—and your life! How great would it be if in 2023, on those nights that you find yourself staying up late, that it is not because you are focusing on all that could go wrong, but rather because you are envisioning something WONDERFUL happening?
Shifting Perspective
As we were approaching and in the full swing of the holidays, I offered a few blogs with the intention of helping the people I work with in a psychotherapy context, the meditation students in my biweekly, donation-based, online mindfulness meditation class and those of you who follow my blog to enter into reflection as we close out 2022, exploring our thinking, emotions, lives and practices. With an intent of fostering curiosity, positivity, gratitude, forgiveness and taking action—all with compassion and the understanding that we ALL experience suffering—there becomes an increased possibility to relieve some of the suffering that we all, as humans, experience and move into a more connected and peaceful way of being in this fast approaching new and fresh year.
These posts focused on:
Approaching meditation and our lives with a beginner’s mind and a fresh perspective (5 Practices & A Meditation To Help Lead And Live With A Beginner’s Mind).
An invitation to feel into all that is good and infuse a meditation practice with gratitude (Focusing On The Good: Insight And Practices Into Goodness, Gratitude & A Guided Gratitude Meditation).
And, most recently, the three directions of forgiveness, which include asking for forgiveness from those we have harmed, offering forgiveness to ourselves, and forgiving those who have hurt or and harmed us (A Forgiveness Practice: A Gift That Keeps On Giving).
When we explore our lives through a new lens, focus and give thanks for all that is good, and allow ourselves to forgive and be forgiven, opportunities, possibilities and even an increased sense of freedom can arise. We might allow ourselves to open to the mystery unfolding in each moment without feeling the need to direct, control or manipulate a situation or circumstance that we believe that we know well. We might experience a newfound sense of joy, connection or peace when we focus on goodness and gratitude. And, we may release resentments that we’ve been carrying toward ourselves and/or others, experiencing a little more lightness as we begin to practice releasing some of the suffering that has been pulling us down through the powerful act and gift of forgiveness. Essentially, through these practices, we allow ourselves the ability to see our lives and the world from a new perspective—one that is open to learning, exploring, giving thanks, forgiving and being curious about what is and could unfold in any given moment.
Setting New Year Intentions With Attention
In order to improve our lives and live with compassion, peace, increased ease and, ideally, awe, wonder and joy, we need to become aware of what we’re thinking, feeling and doing in the present moment and develop and maintain the attentional capacity to stay present with what we want to create.
Dr. Rick Hanson, psychologist, Senior Fellow of UC Berkeley's Greater Good Science Center, New York Times best-selling author, and a colleague who I am continually inspired by, has done a lot of excellent work around steadying the mind and increasing attentional capacity.
According to Rick, given the process of neuroplasticity, meditation can change the actual structure of the brain. As Rick has said, “We can change our mind, to change our brain, to change our mind for the better,” and “We can pull weeds, and plant seeds in the garden of the mind, as we clear out what is no longer of value and cultivate what we are wanting to grow.”
The following practice is designed to help you with setting new year intentions—or intentions at any point—with attention, awareness and other qualities that can strengthen our meditation practices, lives, wellbeing and even our brains!
Five Ways To Steady Your Mind And Increase Attentional Capacity
Setting Intention
By utilizing what is called “top-down” intentions—that come from thinking—we activate the prefrontal cortex, which houses all of our executive functions, including attention, emotion and action. This approach requires effort and can lead to the overuse of willpower, however, it’s beneficial to activate this region of the brain.
On the flipside, it’s also beneficial to utilize a “bottom-up” approach, in which we access a more emotional and somatic (body-based) aspect of being. This approach includes activating the felt sense of what it would feel like to already BE the person we want to be. In doing such, we signal these feelings to the brain and encourage ourselves to become that person. What we believe, we can become!
Encouraging Relaxation
When we focus on relaxation and allow our bodies and minds to unwind, we down-regulate the sympathetic nervous system, which is the part of the nervous system that gets us revved up and activates stress hormones, such as adrenaline and cortisol. When we are in stress, we can’t really stay focused as we are continually scanning for danger. So, calming the mind and body is important to steadying our overall attentional focus.
Encourage Warmheartedness
We are profoundly and inherently social mammals. Rick believes that what truly separates us from other mammals is the LONG dependency we have on and with others. Babyhood lasts a very long time, and in that time, both the mother—as the primary caregiver— and the baby must be cared for by the larger tribe, which in today’s world usually includes a partner, other members of the family and dear friends.
It’s also been proven that the amygdala—the part of the brain that assesses danger—has receptors, meaning it will activate our fight, flight freeze response when it senses danger. However, when we feel close with and trusting of others, it produces oxytocin, the bonding chemical, instead and helps us to feel connected, soothed and relaxed. So, as we give and feel loved and feel able to trust others, we reduce or even eliminate that fight-flight-freeze response, allowing us to focus more fully with a calm steadiness.
Increasing Our Sense of Safety
We are generally anxious beings so it’s important for us to continually stoke the inner sense of calm and safety, when that is appropriate. Especially as the world bombards us with threats that may or may not come to pass, we MUST do what we can to reduce our conditioned tendencies toward anxiousness.
We live in a very different world than our early ancestors did. Our early ancestors were designed to scan for very real physical danger—think lions, tigers and bears. However, they also generally lived in small tribes with people they had known and lived among their whole lives and not the ENTIRE world that we now are being asked to keep hold of. In doing this practice, it can be helpful to focus on those people—those in your tribe—who you trust and feel safe with and let the rest go, at least for a few minutes. Doing so can also help to settle the sympathetic nervous system, promote feelings and safety and calmness and keep your attention focused on what is occurring right now.
Use Your Mind to Foster Feelings of Gratitude and Contentment
From a neurological perspective, when we consciously and continually dose ourselves with contentment, our brain releases dopamine, which is what brings a sense of reward in the brain, which then leads to a steady attentional focus. Too little dopamine and we lose focus. If we swing up and down with dopamine, rather than foster a steady stream, our mood and attentional focus can feel all over the place. Interestingly, studies show that when we cultivate an ongoing gratitude practice and remind ourselves to “take in the good,” we are actively growing more contentment and more attentional focus. The Focusing On The Good: Insight And Practices Into Goodness, Gratitude & A Guided Gratitude Meditation post mentioned above can help with this!
Unraveling Negative Thought Patterns In the Present Moment
When we really become aware that each moment is here for just a moment, and on the edge of that moment is the next one, it brings into focus the mystery, the magic, the joy and the sorrow of NOW. As Rumi says, “If everything around you seems dark, look again, you may be the light.”
As mentioned in the beginning of this blog, our thinking patterns are designed to pull us out of the NOW and into thoughts that are almost always worse than what will and does actually happen. We need to be aware and quite careful to not fall into and believe those “movies of fear and trepidation.” We need to pull back and stay grounded. We need to pay attention to the negativity bias, which is said to be five times more severe in feeling tone than it is when things do go well.
So, again, how great would it be if in 2023 that you find yourself staying up late at night because you’re envisioning something WONDERFUL happening?
The invitation for this new year is to practice making a shift when fear and negative thinking arises—as it will. Allow yourself to notice it, label it, thoughtfully move away from it and then imagine something much more wonderful happening instead.
Setting New Year Intentions: Reflect, Visualize, Plant, Nurture And Grow!
As we move forward into a new year, perhaps we can do so with a little more conscious intent and increased attentional capacity than we had this past year. With the winter solstice just past, daylight increasing and a new year approaching, this is a wonderful time to reflect on what 2022 revealed to you. Have you seen your mindfulness practice or your intentions grow? What did come into fruition?
Moving into 2023, I also encourage you to pull out any old vision boards and make a new one this year with clear intention, relaxation, warmheartedness, safety, gratitude and contentment in mind.
What is it that you truly want to cultivate this year? And how can approaching these intentions, goals and preferred outcomes with a steady mind and increased attentional capacity help you bring these seeds into fruition?
With that in mind, with a steady mind and focused attention, what do you want to plant, tend to, grow and harvest in 2023?
There are many ways to approach and make vision boards. Personally, I love the MY SUNSHINE VISION BOARD style. It’s designed to help you focus your attention by honing in on three or four areas that you want to really delve into this year. I also love that this design encourages you to create active “I am” statements, signaling to your brain that you already are those things. And, it’s a lot of fun to make a sunshine style collage over these focused areas, rather than randomly placing pictures and words throughout your board.
Here’s a template that you can work from.
A Meditation For Setting New Year Intentions
To help you in feeling into and setting your intention(s) for 2023 with attention, awareness and peace, I offer you two meditations – Discovery and Strengthening Your Intentions and the other is Your Future Self – found on the recording meditation page.
And, may we dedicate the merit of this practice to the ending of suffering for everyone, everywhere.
It feels right to bring my last blog post of 2022 to close full circle, ending it where it began with Meister Eckhart’s quote.
“What we plant in the soil of contemplation, we shall reap in the harvest of action.”
May all beings be filled with peace.
May all beings be safe from inner and outer harm.
May all beings be happy.
May all beings be free.
New year blessings to all,
Karen
If you’re interested in beginning a meditation practice, reconnecting with your meditation practice or deepening your meditation practice in community, I offer an online, donation-based meditation class every other Monday night at 7:30pm EST in a relaxed setting on Zoom. The only requirement to join is an interest in increasing mindful awareness and skill through practice and growing your inner wisdom. Get more details and register here.