Meditation

Lab 3
De-Mystifying Mindfulness
through Experiential Learning

Leiden University & MentalPraxis.com

Module 3: Philosophy &/of Mindfulness

 Leiden University & MentalPraxis.com
Module 3: Philosophy &/of Mindfulness

Meditation Lab 3
De-Mystifying Mindfulness through Experiential Learning

Welcome

The MOOC ‘De-Mystifying Mindfulness’ aims to provide a

mixture of third-person, scholarly inquiry into the nature and
significance of Mindfulness today with first-person,
experiential investigation into the practice and felt-experience
of Mindfulness. These ‘Meditation Labs’ have been designed
specifically to address the latter, giving you an opportunity to
experiment with some of the most important practices
associated with Mindfulness. In each module you will be introduced to new practices in the
form of audio-guidance, which you are free to download and use at your convenience.

We are delighted to be able to offer guidance by two of the most experienced and respected
teachers of Mindfulness today, Mark Williams, Emeritus Professor of Clinical Psychology at
Oxford University and co-founder of Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), and
Rebecca Crane, Director of the Centre for Mindfulness Research & Practice at the University of
Bangor. This gives you a choice of voices and styles to experience. If desired, guidance by Chris
Goto-Jones can also be developed and provided – please let us know.

1. Sitting Practice: open awareness

Following on from the exercises in Med Lab 2, where we attempted

to build on the practice of ‘mindfulness of breath and body’ with an
exercise in the ‘mindfulness of sounds and thoughts,’ in this lab
we’re going to take the next logical step and integrate those two
phases into a single coherent practice, which resembles the ‘4

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foundations of Mindfulness’ practice that we have been discussing in the lectures. This
complicated practice also adds an extra stage at the end, which we often call ‘open awareness,’
in which we attempt to allow our awareness to move organically to whatever calls for it, but at
the same time to maintain that particular quality of attention that we have come to recognize
as Mindful.

During module 3, you should experiment with the different versions of the ‘open awareness’
meditation in the audio recordings. Try it in different postures. Try different durations. And try
to perform this practice on 3 days out of 7. Keep some notes about what you experience in
your journal.

2. Sitting with Difficulty

For all of us, sooner or later, we encounter difficulties when we practice.

These could be in the form of physical discomfort or pain, or they could
take the form of haunting thoughts that trigger ruminations and suffering,
or they could emerge unexpectedly as emotional challenges.

As we’ve seen over and over again, Mindfulness is not about pushing away
those thoughts or sensations that disturb us; it is not about aversion.
Instead, we try to cultivate a more permissive attitude to these difficulties:

we attempt to allow them in, to let them be. And in so doing, we Sitting Without Difficulty?
cultivate a different attitude towards our suffering, which is sometimes
known as ‘befriending’ our suffering. The poem by Rumi, ‘The Guest House,’ which appears in
this module of the course, speaks directly to this attitude.

During module 3, you should experiment with different versions of the ‘letting be’ or ‘sitting
with difficulty’ meditations in the audio guidance. Try them at different times of the day and
for different durations. Try to perform them on 3 days out of 7. Keep some notes about what
you experience in your journal.

3. 3-Step Breathing Space (continued from module 2)

Taking steps to build your Mindfulness practice into your daily life can seem very difficult. It is
easy for us to fall into the trap of thinking that Mindfulness is something we do when we lie
down for the body scan or sit on our cushion for a formal sitting practice … or even when we
walk slowly in little circles in the garden. However, it’s also important to find ways to generalize
Meditation Lab 3, De-Mystifying Mindfulness
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our practice into our everyday life. One of the most powerful ways to do this is by making use
of short, efficient practices like the ‘3-step breathing space,’ which can be done in only a couple
of minutes, wherever you happen to be. It can serve very effectively as a ‘refresher’ or as an
‘anchor’ during the day.

Here in module 3, you should continue experimenting with the audio guidance for the 3-step
breathing space. As before, you might try setting a specific time each day to perform the
practice, wherever you happen to be: at work, at school, out shopping, walking through the
streets, wherever. Perhaps you’ll do it at 12.00 noon each day, and you might set an alarm so
you remember. However, in this module, you might want to make use of this practice in a
more responsive or reactive way when you encounter difficulties in your day: perhaps you try it
before a meeting with your boss, before an exam, or when you suddenly realize that you’re
angry or in pain? Try to do this practice for 6 days out of 7. Keep some notes about what you
experience in your journal.

4. Unpleasant Experiences

In the previous modules, we’ve spent quite a lot of time paying attention to the emergence of
positive, pleasant experiences in our days, deconstructing them to explore how the work on us
(and how we work on them). In this module, however, we’re going to try to dedicate some
attention to way we experience more negative or unpleasant events. It can be fascinating and
valuable for us to take a moment to see whether we can recognize what made a particular
experience unpleasant for us. In other words, how do we know when something is an
unpleasant experience? What is it about the cluster of sensations we encounter that we
experience as unpleasant?

In the process of module 3, you should try to bring some awareness to one unpleasant
experience everyday (7 days out of 7). Take some notes about it in your journal, and see
whether you can describe to yourself the thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations that
accompanied the event. How do you know it was an unpleasant event, not a neutral or an
pleasant one? Try not to focus on the very worst things that happen, but just examine
something small that you found uncomfortable … perhaps your coffee was cold or you trod in
puddle of water and soaked your foot?

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Summary

In the Meditation Lab of module 3, you should experiment with 4 practices:

1. Open Awareness Meditation

2. Sitting with Difficulty
3. 3-Step Breathing Space
4. Unpleasant Experience

And you should keep a simple journal in which you record your experiences while performing
these practices. Of course, you might also want to keep up some of the practices that we
explored in modules 1 and 2, and you should feel free to do so. In particular, many people
might find it supportive to continue with the body scan from time to time.

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