Mindfulness: What it is, Why it Works, and How to Use It
Speaker: Roger Nolan, M.A., LMFT
Summary:
Mindfulness can be defined as the awareness that emerges through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally to the unfolding of experience moment by moment. We are usually not paying attention to the present moment. We go on auto pilot, and are often thinking about the past or worrying about the future. Mindfulness practices help us to disengage from all the thoughts and worry about the past and future to concentrate on the present moment.
Mindfulness has been around for thousands of years, as it is a staple in the Buddhist philosophy, which is a 2,600 year old practice. Although mindfulness comes from Buddhist philosophy, it is important to understand that mindfulness is not a religious practice. Mindfulness can best be described as secular interventions with many great mental and physical health benefits that can be incorporated into daily life.
Mindfulness works by helping us to cultivate a new relationship with everything that happens in our lives, thoughts and events alike. So when we change our relationship with our thoughts, they change and cause us to have less unnecessary distress in our lives. In the human brain, the amygdala is constantly looking for threats (both actual and possible threats) around us with the purpose of keeping us safe, which is known as the fight or flight mechanism. Mindfulness allows us to tune into the amygdala, and get the prefrontal cortex back to thinking clearly.
Objectives:
To enable participants:
1. To more clearly understand what mindfulness is.
2. To comprehend the mechanism of mindfulness that makes it work.
3. To immediately use at least two safe, practical and effective ways to apply mindfulness in one’s clinical practice.
4. To be familiar with major mindfulness-based interventions, particularly the use of Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy with a depressed client.
Bio:
Roger Nolan, M.A., is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in private practice in South Pasadena. A meditator since 1973, Roger currently leads groups in Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) for depression and anxiety. He helped develop Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention (MBRP) for addictive behaviors. An alumnus of Pacifica Graduate Institute, he is a member of the Adjunct Faculty at Antioch University Los Angeles, where he teaches the adaptation of mindfulness practices in clinical settings. Roger has been leading meditation groups in the Pasadena area for more than 10 years, and in 2006, his classes were named “Best for Beginners” by Los Angeles Magazine. He facilitates MBCT and MBRP classes at Insight L.A. in Santa Monica and Pasadena. In recent years, "mindfulness" has become a hot topic in psychotherapy, especially as more and more studies validate its effectiveness as a therapeutic tool. The workshop will combine useful information and experiential practice in a lighthearted and engaging format.
Mindfulness: What it is, Why it Works, and How to Use It - Synopsis
In our May IE CAMFT meeting we had the pleasure of hearing from Roger Nolan, M.A., about mindfulness. Roger is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in private practice in South Pasadena. Roger currently leads groups in Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) for depression and anxiety, and helped develop Mindfulness Based Relapse Prevention (MBRP) for addictive behaviors. He facilitates MBCT and MBRP classes at Insight L.A. in Santa Monica and Pasadena. Roger has been leading mindfulness groups in Pasadena area for more than 10 years, and in 2006, his classes were named “Best for Beginners” by Los Angeles Magazine. In his presentation, Roger did a great job of answering the following questions about mindfulness: (1) what it is, (2) why it works, and (3) how to use it.
What it is: Mindfulness can be defined as the awareness that emerges through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally to the unfolding of experience moment by moment. We are usually not paying attention to the present moment. We go onto auto pilot, and are often thinking about the past or worrying about the future. Mindfulness practices help us to disengage from all the thoughts and worry about the past and future to concentrate on the present moment.
Mindfulness has been around for thousands of years, as it is a staple in the Buddhist philosophy, which is a 2,600 year old practice. Although mindfulness comes from Buddhist philosophy, it is important to understand that mindfulness is not a religious practice. Mindfulness can best be described as secular interventions with many great mental and physical health benefits that can be incorporated into daily life. A man by the name of Jon Kabat-Zinn was the person to make the concept of mindfulness acceptable to Westerners.
Why it works: Mindfulness works by helping us to cultivate a new relationship with everything that happens in our lives, thoughts and events alike. When we change our relationship with something, that something changes. So when we change our relationship with our thoughts, they change and cause us to have less unnecessary distress in our lives. This distress is primarily caused by human nature. In the human brain, the amygdala is constantly looking for threats (both present and possible threats) around us with the purpose of keeping us safe, which is known as the fight or flight mechanism. Mindfulness allows us to tune into the amygdala, and get the prefrontal cortex back to thinking clearly. Breathing from the diaphragm is the key to making this process work.
How to use it: While there are a variety of ways to use mindfulness in therapy practice, Roger discussed a handful of ways in which he incorporates mindfulness into therapy. The common theme of all mindfulness practices is that they tune the mind into the body because the body is always in the present moment. As discussed above, the mind is usually not in the present moment, so we tune our mind into our body in the present moment; therefore, forcing the mind to focus on the present moment.
Mindfulness Meditations: One of the most common and beneficial mindfulness practices is mindfulness meditations. In mindfulness meditation, the mind remains very active. We give the mind a sensory object to focus on (often times it can be the breath). The breath is a great object to focus on because it is portable, and if we cannot pay attention to our breath, what else are we missing? Part of the mindfulness meditation process is the inquiry that follows which helps the person to be in tune with their thoughts and how they were able to come back to the present moment. It’s not about trying to figure out what is going on; it is just about recognizing what is happening in the present moment without analyzing it.
- Eating Meditation: For an eating meditation, it is a good idea to use a food that most people are very familiar with, such as a raisin. To perform this, one can have a client investigate the raisin by looking at it, touching it, smelling it, listening to it, eating it and investigating how it tastes, what it feels like, etc. This practice provides a new relationship with the raisin and a new state of mind for something we usually do without thinking. This practice can be done for up to 20 minutes.
- Body Scan Meditation: In this practice, clients focus on moving slowly through the body and tuning into how it feels.
- Yoga: Yoga is a great practice to tune one’s breath into the body in the present moment. –
- Homework: One common homework assignment Roger will give his clients is to ask them to bring mindful attention to their everyday activities, such as brushing their teeth, getting into their car, or taking a shower. –
- Awareness Checking: A common dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) mindfulness practice is to have a client sit down with a piece of paper or journal. Tune into breathing and ask the following three questions: (1) What am I thinking? (2) What am I feeling? (3) What are the physical feelings I am feeling in my body right now?
Overall, mindfulness is a great tool to incorporate into therapy because of all the great benefits it provides. Obviously, there’s something great about it if it has been around for 2,600 years! Mindfulness practices can help clients with many of common problems we see in therapy including stress/anxiety, depression, addiction, trauma, emotional dysregulation, conflictual interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships, and many other problems. For more information about mindfulness, you can visit Roger Nolan’s website at https://www.mindfullivingla.org/roger-nolan-ma/ You can also contact Roger by email at or phone at (626) 371-0048. Thank you again Roger for your interesting and educational presentation about mindfulness!