The Magic Of DOING What You Are Doing!

By Kate Mathers  www.magicofallowing.com

More on the freedom and joy of being in the present moment – Spot Meditations: Doing What You Are Doing!

As part of the Mindfulness Meditation courses that I teach, I show participants how to incorporate ‘Spot Meditations’ as part of their daily routine. These involve taking some simple activity and making a meditation out of it. You can ‘spot’ the opportunity at any point during your day, no matter how busy. And literally anything can become a beautiful exampleof mindfulness – of living with awareness – in the present moment. This is the magic of DOING what you are doing!

The benefits? Tension diffuses on the spot. Your mind slows down. You bring all  five senses to bear on what you are actually doing.  And if your mind wanders off, just bring your focus and your senses – sight, touch, sound, smell, taste – back to whatever you are actually doing, and really BE THERE for WHATEVER IT IS THAT YOU ARE DOING at that time! Most of the time we are either living in the past and thinking or worrying about something that we have or haven’t done, or we are away in the future thinking or worrying about some event that may or may not happen….. so try nourishing yourself daily (hourly if you like) with gifts of the present moment. Notice how liberating it feels. The scary thing is discovering how little of our time we actually spend in the present moment!

The transformative effect of this simple bringing of attention to the present moment is profound. In addition to the diffusion of tension in our body and mind,  we feel relief and joy and a sense of freedom when we bring our entire focus, our entire attention -  including all our senses -  to the present moment. This can be especially powerful when it concerns some routine activity that we usually carry out automatically, like cleaning our teeth, washing up, feeding the dog, answering the telephone, driving in traffic, eating a meal, preparing a meal, going for a walk, ironing, standing in a queue at the bank, gardening, walking up stairs……

You can use your senses to tune in at any given point during your day as to how you are sitting in your chair at your desk, how you are holding your pen, how you are using your computer keyboard, how you get up from your chair… and so on. Are you hunched over the desk? Are your fingers tense from gripping your pen too tightly? Are your wrists aching from bad positioning at your computer keyboard? Could you do what you are doing more effectively, expending less energy, if you were fully present?

As you can see, the range of possibilities is limitless!

Spot Meditations: Doing What You Are Doing!

Very broadly speaking, the following suggestions for spot meditations are biased towards those that might be more relevant for women in daily life. The next article will have suggestions oriented towards men. (Though, of course, all overlap.)

• For example, you can ‘spot’ meditate by consciously doing a simple activity such as hanging out the washing.  Mindfully hanging out the washing means using your body with respect – balancing your stretching and bending movements equally left and right, enjoying the fresh clean smell of washed clothes, being grateful that you have two arms that can reach upwards, that you have a machine to do the washing; sensing the energy of the trees and plants around you, the sky above you, feeling the earth beneath your feet and the sun’s warmth on your back; it’s the difference between resenting the whole task as a chore and exploring it in mindfulness, moment by moment, and returning to the house enriched and balanced by the experience. If you use a dryer instead, incorporate the same sort of ideas in mindfully moving through the drying/folding process in a similar manner. See how many things you can identify to keep you in the present moment throughout the task. You can carry the same sort of ideas through to doing the ironing. With all of these, you can discover for yourself the magic of Doing What You are Doing!

• You can do a ‘spot’ meditation when you prepare fruit. BE THERE for the task. Really Do What you are Doing! This can involve noticing the way in which you hold, say, a mango, in between your hands, and feeling the shape, and then the texture and smoothness of the skin; being aware of the sensation of the knife as it pares into the flesh; the soft, yielding texture of the flesh as you cut into it, smelling the fruity aroma floating upwards; seeing and experiencing the orange energy of the colour; feeling the taste and texture once in your mouth;being grateful to all the people who have worked to bring that mango to your plate; being grateful that you have a mango to eat; it’s all about being fully in the moment as you prepare the fruit. The preparation and eating are themselves the meditation, when you are doing what you are doing!

• You can even make a spot meditation out of washing up. Make a point of actually being there as you wash the pots and pans, noticing the colours of the dishes or the gleam of the pan; aware of the texture of the food sticking to it, and the heat of the water; taking in the sound of the tap running, the smell of the dishwashing liquid, the texture of the bubbles;being grateful that you have food to cook; appreciating the fact that you have two working arms and two strong legs that enable you to carry out the task of washing up; it’s all about being fully in the present rather than somewhere in the future or the past. You’ll be amazed at how rewarding it is, at the reduction in tension, and the feeling of relaxation and peace. This is the magic of doing what you are doing – even when it is the washing up.

• Meditations like this can literally be just a few seconds long. For example, it’s raining while you’re waiting in car line to pick up your child after school. Try focusing on the raindrops running down the windscreen. You could choose to focus on one raindrop only, and then on the next, and the next…….; or you could make the entire windscreen of raindrops your focus; whenever your mind wanders off, just come back to the focus of watching the raindrops running down the windscreen….. what they look like……. what they might feel like ……… be aware of any sound they make ………… imagine how the rain might smell ……..by the time your child is ready to get into the car, you will feel soothed and rejuvenated and refreshed. As opposed to irritated that you have had to wait,and resentful about the things you could have been doing instead. The Magic of Doing What you are Doing!

  The beauty of  these ‘spot meditations’ is that we cannot help but Do What We Are Doing!  This simple act brings us straight back into the present moment, where true peace, freedom and happiness lie. After all, the past is gone, and the future hasn’t arrived.  All we actually have, at any given time, is the present.

email: kate@magicofallowing.com

www.magicofallowing.com

“Living Liberation - Meditation Training, and so much more" "It changed my life"Find out more 

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