As someone’s who’s dealt with severe OCD anxiety for most of my life, I’ve always been against the whole mindfulness gimmick. I think it was honestly…bullshit. But I think I might have figured it out on my own. So what is mindfulness to me? I think its literally stepping outside of my mind. When you have anxiety it can be easy to forget that the only organ in your body isn’t just the brain you’re using to overthink and obsess about everything with.
Lately I try to focus on what my body can do and how it feels. I focus on how my legs feel when I walk or how my body feels when I lay in bed under my covers. I look at the objects around me and listen to the sounds in my environment. I go outside just to feel the cold on my skin. I find myself enjoying little things like the sounds people make when speaking or feeling the water drip down my body in the shower. I love feeling my boyfriend’s warm skin against mine and feeling him breathe against me when he falls asleep on my chest. I’m starting to realize there’s so much more going on around me than the thoughts in my head. I won’t say this was easy. But its something I’ve learned to do through determination and the help of my antidepressants.
My favorite thing right now is the way I feel when I move my body. I feel so free when I work out. Knowing that I can run or walk, I can move my body this or that way is so freeing. I’m starting to feel like I can do anything. There’s something so inspirational about my recent coming into mindfulness. I am unsure of how to describe it. But I feel like there is many parts of me that I have been ignoring due to my anxiety being so bad. I want to explore this some more.
Unruly Bodies 
Hi, I love this post because I think a common misconception about mindfulness is that it always has to be you alone within meditation trying to focus or clear your mind. While, yes, this can be one part of it all of the things you have described are very much a part of the practice as well. Something my mom taught me when I was young was a practice of “active meditation” or where it is referred in Western thought as active mindfulness. It is along the same lines of when you space out in the car and suddenly are at your destination, or shower thoughts. These active meditative states help to produce the same results of passive, and can be more beneficial for many people. Sometimes trying to ignore or come away from the body is not helpful or possible, but using it can promote the same inner peace. Connecting body and mind in a nontraditional way. The mind does not always need to dominate the body and sometimes in working together you can find a harmony you never realized was there. My favorite kind of active meditation is just through touch, moving your hand around your body (sexually or not, however you prefer) and seeing what comes of your own touch. I find when I do this this I tend to be kinder to myself in my mind, because my touch was gentle and appreciative of my body, so my mind should be too. If you get a chance try active touch and let me know how it goes! Great post.
I really appreciate your reply a lot. The words “the mind does not always need to dominate the body” will stick with me from now on. I want to try the active touch tip you gave me at the end because something I still struggle with is being kind to myself. I want to find the harmony you speak of because my mind and body connection is still very awkward (for lack of a better term). Thank you a lot.
I really enjoyed reading your blog post! I feel like it’s so hard in today’s society to focus on the little things in life and appreciate something as simple as body movement or sounds in nature because we are always chasing after the next big thing. In a world where we can share every living moment with one another, it’s hard not to compare yourself and overthink. We need more posts like these on social media accounts because so much of what is on our feed eventually leads us to even more anxiety that is unnecessary.