Central Highlands, Iceland
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Mindfulness Based Stress ReductionMindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) is unlike any sort of program you may have encountered before. The 8 week course involves cultivating a different relationship between you and the things that challenge you in your life, and relies completely upon the tools you already have. However, just because you have the inner wisdom and resources to contend differently with your life and all its aspects, does not mean that you routinely use them. Most of us are on “auto-pilot” much of the day and tend to react much more than we respond to the decisions and situations we face.
MBSR is intended to develop the innate ability to cultivate mindfulness over “mindlessness”, with which we are all familiar. Those moments when we are unaware of where we are, what we are feeling and why we are doing what we are doing. Quite frequently, those are the moments that contribute most to our suffering. Just a few examples are: eating foods that we know we would be better off not eating; spending time with people that cause us great difficulty or emotional pain; or engaging in activities that are stressful, harmful or unnecessarily distracting. This is an opportunity to rediscover yourself and to access the qualities and strengths you possess deep inside. Sit back, take a moment to become aware of the surroundings you are in, the sensations in your body, the thoughts in your mind and the feelings in your heart. Are you feeling curious, excited, skeptical, nervous, hopeful or bored? Are you aware of physical sensations of tension, pain, warmth or numbness? Can you hold all of the amazing and varied things in your awareness for a moment without having to change them, extinguish them or get lost in them? Can you experience this very moment for the precious, fleeting and beautiful thing that it is? You have just tasted some of your own ability to be mindful and we invite you to cultivate it further through participation in the UC San Diego Mindfulness-Based programs. |
Mindfulness means moment-to-moment, non-judgmental awareness. It is cultivated by refining our capacity to pay attention, intentionally, in the present moment. In the process, we become more in touch with our life as it is unfolding. |