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Is your mind full? Mine is. I realize that when most people use the term “mindfulness” they define it as being fully and undistractedly in the present moment. But I think of it somewhat differently. To me, “mindfulness” is the ability to live fullistically(TM)—that is, to see the connection between your thoughts, your feelings and the experiences you’re living.
Let me give you an example. My friend Harriet is known as “The Angel Lady.” She loves to send care packages to people she knows who are struggling with disease or other issues. But Harriet is an older woman living on a fixed income, and some months are easier than others to do this loving chore.
One day, she was talking with a friend about this, and the friend said, “It’s terrible to get old and have to live on a limited income, isn’t it?” Harriet disagreed. “Oh, God knows that I love to do this, and somehow, it always works out.”
The next day, she got a letter from a law firm she didn’t recognize. When she opened it, she learned that a distant relative had died. He mentioned her in his will: inside the envelope was a check for $2,000.
Some people might call this “the law of attraction.” But I don’t. For quantum physicists have discovered that we live in a zero-point field of pure potential, and when we fix our focus and don’t doubt or resist, we don’t attract—we create. So you could say that Harriet created both the $2,000 check and the situation of living on a limited income through her beliefs and focus.
If you’re still wondering how this happens, here’s a little science. In spite of what the scale tells us, our bodies are not solid. They’re simply a collection of energy, held together by thought. If you take any so-called “solid” object and break it down into its smallest sub-atomic particles, you’ll discover that at some point, the particles seem to disappear, including as our bodies. The particles do leave trails, however, which change either position or momentum whenever they are observed. This is known as the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, and what it basically means is that you never know what energy is going to do. Energy actually cannot ever be created or destroyed: it just changes form. And it does so according to the forces acting upon it, including—and most especially—human thought and emotion.
There are numerous science experiments that prove this, including one where a subject’s DNA was taken by swabbing his mouth. The DNA was then moved to a spot 350 miles away, and the subject was shown pictures that evoked emotions like happiness, sadness, anger and sympathy. At the exact moment that the subject’s emotion changed, so did the DNA, even though there was no physical connection between them. This same principle is what drives the positive effect of intercessory prayer chains—people send unconditional love, and the recipient’s body responds to it according to its owner’s belief system and soul needs. Often, the pray-ers find that they, too, enjoy improved health and/or wellbeing.
So the idea that anything can be “out there” and attracted can really be expanded to the concept that energy—packaged in either human or some other form—is constantly changing according to the forces working on it. Living mindfully is not just noticing the details of your present circumstances. It’s bigger than that. Instead of asking questions like, “What is this?” or “How did I get this?” you can live mind-fully and say, “I created this.”
Creating something is very different than thinking it was already created by something or someone else. If you create something, it comes through you, not to you. And if it comes through you, then it’s a reflection of who and what you are. Then it’s more correct to say, “I am this.” Often, teachers of enlightenment will suggest that we simply walk around, experiencing everything in our world and saying, “I am this.” Eventually, they suggest, we fall deeply in love with what we have created, and the boundaries between us dissolve, creating the experience of oneness.
Most people who teach mindfulness want to slow down the mind. To me, it doesn’t matter if it is fast or slow. It just is, and whatever is, creates. Accepting that can come as a huge relief to people who have struggled with the traditional definition of mindfulness or find it difficult to do. Even if your mind is fast, you can relax and enjoy the myriad of things it has created through you as an individual and as part of the greater collective mind that contains us all.
So even though my mind often acts like an unruly toddler that seems hell-bent on getting into trouble, I love knowing that it is simply an instrument that I can use to play any kind of vibrational song I want. And when I get tired of doing that, I also know that the greater mind of which I am a part can take over, and that can be equally, if not more enjoyable. I am deeply grateful for the mind-FULL-ness that makes life both predictable and surprising.
© Copyright 2009 Robin L. Silverman. All Rights Reserved.
