LESSON 4

Lesson 4

Mindfulness & Integrative Medicine

Doing, Being, and Mindfulness

Relaxation Practice (4):
Visualization

Designing a Different Mode of Mind

We do things all the time, but have you ever stopped to examine what “doing” really is. Seven core feature of being in “Doing Mode” are:

Doing is often automatic
Doing works via thinking
Doing focuses on past and future
Doing tries to avoid unpleasant experiences
Doing tries to make things change
Doing considers thoughts to be real or true
Doing often focuses on what needs to be done, while ignoring undesirable side effects

Many spend much of their lives in “Doing Mode” without realizing that they very rarely take time to just be. As you read through this lesson, try to estimate the balance you strike in your everyday life between existing in Doing Mode and Being Mode.

Living on “Automatic Pilot” versus Living with Conscious Awareness and Choice
1. In Doing Mode, we live on auto-pilot without much awareness of what we are doing. We maintain a narrow focus on our present goal, but we rarely stop to take in what is happening around us. In this way, we postpone being truly present in our lives.
2. In Being Mode, one is intentional rather than automatic. We actively choose what we do next and bring a beginner’s mind to our environment. We become fully conscious of our lives, which allows a freshness to arise to our perceptions.
Relating to Experience through Thought versus Directly Sensing Experience
1. The relationship you have to your experience shifts when you are in Doing Mode. Rather than directly sensing what is currently happening, as you likely do when you savor the flavor of a warm fudge brownie, you are thinking about your experience or telling yourself a story about it. You are thinking about feeling rather than being inside the feeling. This often leaves us disconnected from the stimulus (e.g. the taste of the brownie) because we are interacting more with our ideas about the stimulus (e.g. thinking about how caloric the brownie is while you are eating it). It’s almost like a translator is telling you about your experience in the sense that your thoughts become a third party that stands in the way of you directly encountering your experience.
2. In Being Mode you connect with life directly. You sense it, examine it, and know it intimately. You savor the warm, fudge brownie and notice all its complexities.
Dwelling on and in the Past and Future versus Being Fully in the Present Moment
1. In Doing Mode, the mind goes forward to the future and back to the past. This mental time traveling hooks you to the point that your body struggles to identify if you are truly experiencing those remembered/imagined events in real time. Remembering a fight you had with your spouse can cause your pulse increase, your body to tense, and your emotions to spike. Vividly imagining yourself on a sunny beach can cause you to relax and breathe deeply. Being lost in memories and visions disconnects us from experiencing the fullness of life in the present. Ruminating on the past and worrying about the future cause real anxiety and pain in the present. The ironic part is that our bodies waste countless hours throughout our lives responding to absent threats and trying to solve problems that don’t (and may never) exist. What a waste of stress! What do you think you might be experiencing if you weren’t hijacked like this all the time?
2. In Being Mode, the mind maintains a steady focus on the present. When thoughts of the past or future arise, you notice them as a part of the present, maybe thinking to yourself “hmm I’m noticing myself thinking about that history test I have next week”. You can witness these mental events occurring without getting sucked into them and taken down the rabbit hole with them. As if you were watching boxes pass you on a conveyor belt, you see your thoughts, but are not swept away with them. You do not experience them as defining you or consuming you in that moment.
Needing to Avoid, Escape, or Get Rid of Unpleasant Experience versus Approach It with Interest
1. In Doing Mode, aversion to unpleasant experience is an automatic reaction. You want to minimize, avoid, or obliterate unpleasant experiences. Unfortunately, this aversion (rather than acceptance) often serves to get you stuck in experiencing this unpleasant emotion for a longer time. Sometimes, the harder you push against a memory or feeling, the more it latches on to you. This is reminiscent of the parable of the two wolves: A grandfather is talking with his grandson and he says there are two wolves inside of us which are always at war with each other. One of them is a good wolf which represents things like kindness, bravery and love. The other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed, hatred and fear. The grandson stops and thinks about it for a second then he looks up at his grandfather and says, “Grandfather, which one wins?” The grandfather quietly replies, the one you feed(http://www.oneyoufeed.net/tale-of-two-wolves/). When you spend 90% of your mental energy re-experiencing and then avoiding/suppressing something (e.g. the time you lost in the soccer tournament), you are building a huge number of brain cells in the hub of your brain centered on that memory. This has numerous adverse side effects. It makes you really good at accessing that memory, links that memory with new memories you’re forming each day, and keeps that memory recycling through your working memory so it is easily grabbed by your conscious mind. Basically, it keeps you stuck in pain.
2. In Being Mode, you approach all experience, even unpleasant ones, with interest and respect. You bring curiosity and acceptance to stimuli that arise. You may think to yourself “I am noticing a tightness in my throat and an impulse to scream at that person”. This sounds very odd to most people. Why would I approach and be curious about unpleasant experiences? This will be explained late
Needing Things to Be Different versus Allowing Thing to Be Just as They Already Are
1. Doing Mode is dedicated to change. We often try to control our environments (often to little avail) so they can mirror what we think they should look like. We are intensely aware of the gap between what is and what should be. We get very good at spotting the inadequacy of the present and often the inadequacy of ourselves. Remembering that whatever you spend your time doing is what you get good at, it is easy to see how this mental pattern keep us highly aware of how bad things are, which keeps us unhappy. Just as a thorn-expert might walk through a beautiful garden and only pay attention to the thorns, so do we walk through life if we are stuck in Doing Mode. Ask yourself, what do you want to be an expert of?
2. Being Mode carries with it an underlying attitude of allowing. There are no preconceived notions thrust upon ourselves or our environment. We freshly experience the world just as it is. This is often called beginner’s mind and can be the reason why children see the world in ways adults never can, because they do not have mental representations or understandings for the way the world ought to look. It is new, rich, and curious to them. Being Modesimilarly involves radical acceptance which fosters unconditional kindness and goodwill towards ourselves and our world. If you would like to experiment with this construct, find something in the room that is ugly to you. Focus on this item and notice what judgments come up in your mind about it. Now, intently examine its color, shape, size, texture, weight, temperature, the way the light hits it…etc. Set a timer and do this for 3-5 minutes with just that one object. Just noticing, letting the images hit your eyeballs. Try not to evaluate the object or think about what it “should be”. Just be aware of what is. Did you end up noticing anything pleasant about it? Did it stay as ugly to you? How do you feel toward it after meditating on it?
Seeing Thoughts as True and Real versus Seeing Them as Mental Events
1. Doing Mode interprets thoughts and ideas about things as if they were the same as the things themselves. But the truth is, the thought of a flower is not the flower itself, it is just a mental event occurring in real time related to the flower. It is subjectively filtered through the lens you are currently wearing. This is a dangerous phenomenon as we can place too much stock in the truth of an untrue thought. Judgment and decision-making can be affected by this faulty system.
2. In Being Mode we interpret thoughts as mental events that enter and leave the mind which may or may not be true. This robs them of their power to control us. We evaluate them rather than them dictating our reality. In this way, you are much freer.
Prioritizing Goal Attainment versus Sensitivity to Wider Needs
1. In Doing Mode we often have tunnel vision that prevents us from evaluating broader needs (e.g. maintaining a low level of stress in life). This is a very quick way to deplete your inner resources and leave you exhausted. Yet, it is almost celebrated in American culture and is viewed as “normal” by most.
2. Being Mode invites you to adopt a wider frame so you are aware of the long term and complex impact of your choices. When you slow down to evaluate numerous facets of your life or see the facial expressions of those around you, you have more power to act in the best interest of yourself and those you love. This tuning in can also increase the quality of the present moment because you are not tunnel visioning your way into the future.

Self-Observations

As you were reading over these seven distinctions between Doing Mode and Being Mode, what did you notice about the overall balance of doing and being in your life? Was it balance in an optimal way to suit your needs and life? For most of us, doing mode is much more common but can rob us of connectedness, satisfaction, and health. Luckily, recognizing the problem is the first step toward fixing it. Ask yourself, would I like to be in Being Mode more often? How often? How will I know I’m reaching this goal?

Mindfulness

Having a regular mindfulness practice is a way to cultivate Being Mode. As we have discussed, mindfulness is the awareness that emerges through paying attention to the present moment on purpose and nonjudgmentally. You can be mindful of anything you can sense: smells, flavors, temperature, thoughts, emotions…etc. Numerous studies from around the world for the past few decades have shown that mindfulness has a great number of benefits in regard to satisfaction with life, relational wellness, as well as mental and physical health. Of course mindfulness is not a magical practice that removes all pain from your life. It can, however, help you maintain a more accepting, compassionate relationship with the pain as it arises in the present moment. Rather than telling yourself a story about how painful the pain is, how the pain will never go away, how bad you are for experiencing this pain, and how no one else has pain like yours, you can simply notice the pain as a chemical event transpiring in your body or mind. You can bring kindness to your encounter with the pain. Compassion for self and others is a core aspect of mindfulness.

Because these qualities are so helpful to foster, mindfulness is a core part of an effective therapy known as Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT). MBCT was created in the early 1990s by psychologists John Teasdale, Mark Williams, and Zindel Segal in order to treat recurrent depression. MBCT is an 8-week structured mindfulness program that has been well-researched and found to be highly effective. It is known in psychology as an evidence-based treatment, which is a respected classification. It is a cost-effective, medication-free mental health treatment that is helpful for anxiety, panic disorder, bipolar disorder, and depression. Evidence has also emerged that MBCT helps people cope with severe physical illnesses, such as cancer. Mindfulness and self-compassion are key mechanisms that help people heal both mentally and physically.

References

Teasdale, J., Williams, J, & Segal, Z. (2014). The mindful way workbook: An 8-week program to free yourself from depression and emotional distress. New York, NY: Guilford Press.

Application: Effectiveness of Mindfulness for ADHD and Other Conditions

Overall, many studies have been emerging in the last decade that offer a great deal of support for the effectiveness of mindfulness-based treatments for ADHD highlighting the many benefits of mindfulness. Zylowska and colleagues (2008) conducted an eight week mindfulness training program, the Mindful Awareness Practices (MAPs) for ADHD. This MAPS program adapts mindfulness practices to help individuals with ADHD step out of Doing Mode and into Being Mode. Their sample consisted of 8 adolescents and 24 adults with ADHD.

Participants engaged in two and a half hours of weekly structured group mindfulness training and reportedly practiced mindfulness for approximately one hour each week at home (Zylowska et al., 2008). In order to measure alerting, orienting, and conflict attention regulation, the Stroop Task, the color-word inference test, and the computerized Attention Network Test (ANT) were administered. Attentional set-shifting and inhibition were measured by the Trail Making Test, and working memory was assessed using the Digit Span from the Weschler Adult Intelligence Scale. The ADHD Rating Scale IV and the Swanson, Nolan and Pelham Scale (SNAP-IV) were used to measure ADHD symptoms for adults and adolescents respectively. Results revealed significant pre- to posttest improvements in ADHD symptoms (inattention, hyperactivity, conflict attention, and set shifting). Working memory was not significantly improved. This means that overall, the average participant was reportedly and observationally living better with their chronic condition after having practiced mindfulness for just eight weeks.

The Zylowska (2008) study was ground breaking in the area of ADHD and mindfulness. It used a mindfulness curriculum, adapted from mindfulness-based stress reduction, that was specifically oriented towards treating ADHD. For example, participants were allowed to do walking meditations rather than only sitting meditations to mitigate difficulties related to hyperactivity or restlessness. This study also specifically assessed participants’ satisfaction with the mindfulness program, adherence to treatment, and the degree to which participants’ dedication to regular at-home practice influenced their symptom alleviation. On a scale from 1 (least satisfied) to 10 (most satisfied), adults and adolescents reported very high satisfaction with the mindfulness training program (adult M=9.40, SD= 0.80; adolescent M=9.35, SD= 1.04). The number of minutes spent practicing mindfulness at home was marginally associated with improvement in conflict attention (p= .07). Treatment adherence was approximately 78% and no adverse effects of mindfulness were reported.

Overall, these findings suggest that mindfulness was effective in treating ADHD, was well-liked by participants, and did not produce any harmful side effects. Although this study was limited by the lack of a randomized control group and by a small sample size (N=32), it offers a great deal of promise for the efficacy of mindfulness-based interventions for ADHD.

References

Zylowska, L., Ackerman, D. L., Yang, M. H., Futrell, J. L., Horton, N. L., Hale, T. S.,...Smalley, S. L. (2008). Mindfulness meditation training in adults and adolescents with ADHD: A feasibility study. Journal of Attention Disorders, 11(6), 737-746. doi:10.1177/1087054707308502

Mindfulness and Acceptance (Powerpoint):

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3-1-RkV8UaCSndfYU1BMVdWT1k/view?usp=sharing