Puppy Mind and other challenges in beginning a mindfulness meditation practice
Many newcomers (and old-timers) to mindfulness meditation can experience challenges in the practice that feel so personal. In reality, the hurdles to practice tend to be deeply human, timeless and shared by all practitioners at some point or another. You are not alone. Knowing what some of these challenges are and that they are universal can help us recognize them earlier on and work with them more skillfully as we practice. You can overcome any challenge to your mindfulness meditation practice in two steps.
Step 1. Recognize the Challenge
Step 2. Show It Kindness
Read below to get (re-)acquainted with top challenges to a mindfulness meditation practice.
PUPPY MIND (Busy Mind)
As the heart pumps blood, the mind pumps thoughts. If we’re not actively thinking, the mind will still fire off thoughts. (Try NOT thinking for 20 seconds). When sitting to meditate or gather attention mindfully, the mind can start racing. Editor at Mindful Magazine, Anne Alexander, recently described her own thoughts as flying “like a storm in a snow globe.” We can be so accustomed to the busyness of the mind that it can even feel disorienting when we train our attention to settle on an anchor like the breath.
Ways to Work with a Busy Mind
1-word Labeling. See if you can boil down what the mind is doing in one word label. This is not an exhaustive word search, or an exact fit exercise but a loose, 1-word translation that requires little, if any, effort. If we notice our thoughts we can simply say, “thinking” and gently escort attention back to the breath. Other labels might be “planning”, “rehearsing”, “figuring out”, or, again, simply “thinking.” This allows the thought and thinking mind to be acknowledged without getting caught up in it. The same can be done with emotions (“worry”, “excitement”) and physical sensations (“discomfort”, “pleasantness”).
Visualize. Visualizing the mind and thoughts can help us see and experience that we are not our thoughts. One analogy is the “Big Sky” mind where thoughts are like cloud formations that come and go. We could imagine the sky as awareness itself and clouds are the thoughts drifting by. Instead of following a cloud, we take in the whole sky and notice the coming and going of clouds without getting attached to one. If a cloud pulls our attention away, the moment we notice is a moment of waking up, releasing the cloud and continuing to see the arising and passing of thoughts. Other useful visuals can be a train passing and thoughts are the cars. You can watch the cars go by without hopping onto one. If you wake up and notice you’ve hopped on a car, acknowledge the car and gently step back off, returning attention to the breath.
Puppy Training. Our attitude is essential and the analogy of puppy mind fits well. It is a puppy’s nature to bounce around and run away while being trained. If we punish or berate the puppy, it is not helpful. Instead, we gently, kindly and firmly bring the puppy back. You might even give it a loving scratch behind the ear. Cultivate the same attitude with your own mind and see how the experience might shift.
RESTLESSNESS and sometimes Boredom
Restlessness can feel like a pacing tiger. Physically, it can feel like muscles twitching, foot tapping, heart racing or more. Emotions can feel agitated and thoughts pressing. First, remember that restlessness is completely natural. Our human systems, especially in Western and US culture, are modeled, trained and rewarded for our To-Do lists. A To-Be list might earn sideways glances or outright skepticism.
Ways to Work With Restlessness
Attune awareness to physical sensations. Place your awareness on the physical sensations that signal the body’s experience of restlessness. In other words, what tells you that you are feeling restless? Get curious and start labeling what you can notice (e.g. drumming fingers, repeatedly opening eyes to look at a clock, jumpy legs). Do the same with any thoughts and emotions. Identifying and describing the specific experience of restlessness can give us some space around the physical feelings or emotions and feel less identified with it. By saying, Ah! Restlessness! There you are! You might find the tiger is satisfied that they were seen and even settle down for a bit.
IRRITATION
Irritation arises when we’re not okay with the way things are. Mindfulness meditation invites us to gather our “awareness on purpose to the present moment, non-judgmentally”, from Jon Kabat-Zinn, founder of Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction. For anyone who has tried this, bliss is not always the result and you are may be familiar with the experience of irritability even resentment or anger. There’s a phrase, “What we resist persists.” I picture young children or puppies trying to get our attention. The more we push them away, the more extreme their efforts will be to demand our attention.
Ways to work with Irritation
Befriend it. Instead of being irritated with irritation, consider turning towards it as you might check in with an agitated friend. Reflect back to them/her/him what you notice about their experience. You could try simple phrases like ‘I see that you feel really irritated (angry, resentful, agitated, furious).’
Name It to Tame it. Get curious and see how specifically you can note, without judgment, the experience of it. Is there a physical sensation that occurs? If so, could you invite that area to soften, inviting space around it? Are there thoughts, emotions or beliefs underneath the irritation? If so, try giving a 1-word label (e.g. tiredness, sadness, disappointment, frustration). After naming the experience, gently return attention back to the breath (or other anchor).
Offer kindness. With kind interest, you might even ask the place of irritation, “What need wants to be met right now?” The intention of the question is not to respond or become attached to what might arise but simply note without judgment the irritation or what might be underneath it. It might take some imagination but try it out. You might find that a fresh insight emerges, or the feeling may even pass. Or not. Holding an intention to continue to be with what is there without judgment and with kind, open interest.
SLEEPINESS
This is a tough one because many people, particularly in US culture, are chronically sleep-deprived. If sleepiness sets in during a meditation it could simply point to a need for sleep.
In addition, the body can have a physiological response to become drowsy when faced with difficult thoughts, emotions or sensations. It is a way of putting oneself to sleep as a mind /body strategy for coping with feeling overwhelmed or stressed.
Ways to work with Sleepiness
Stand up. Mindfulness meditation can be done in several postures including standing and walking meditation. The upright posture and movement can help energize the body.
Breathing. Use a yoga breathing technique of inhaling briefly through the nose, then sharply exhale through both nostrils, while pulling your navel in toward your spine. You can place a hand on your belly to feel the contraction of the navel. The exhalation is active, short and quick, while the inhalation is short and normal. Again, pull your navel in as you exhale and soften it on the inhalation. Repeat for 20 cycles and resume normal breathing. Discontinue if there’s discomfort. Repeat for 20 cycles if another energy boost is needed.
Sleep. Begin to notice if it is possible to increase the amount and quality of sleep you get each night. This shift alone can be game-changing as Arianna Huffington shares in the compiled research in her book The Sleep Revolution.
LETTING GO OF GOALS
Not having a goal may sound counter-intuitive because goals can be wonderful tools to support us exploring new territories for growth. However, we can become overly attached to a “goal” and then it can become The Goal. And The Goal begins to manage us. (Side Story. I had a client who set his watch to display the progress completing his pre-programmed fitness goal in a circle. Completing the circle meant he met the goal for the day. The visual encouraged him at first but then he felt pressured and falling short if he did not complete the circle each day. I asked how many miles he had to walk or run to complete the circle. He could not remember what he had input because he relied on the circle to tell him his progress. A goal for a goal’s sake, instead of a personal, present moment and meaningful attunement to what supported his own physical well-being.)
If we complete a goal we might enjoy the momentary fulfillment until the question inevitably creeps in… Great, you did that goal but.. What’s Next? And next? And next? Our goal can become The Goal. This practice is truly about the journey, not the goal. The moment we overly attach to a goal, we step out of the journey and present moment experience and step into a sense of striving, efforting, proving, validation or more. Words like “should” or “supposed to” are good cues that we’re in an argument with reality.
Ways to work with Goals
Try not having one. How often are we guided, rewarded or validated for not having a goal? To not Do It? Try it out and see what it’s like to not have a goal in this practice. Many people come to mindfulness meditation for deeply human reasons - desire for greater peace of mind, calm, joy, stress reduction, health benefits, freedom and more. These are not goal-oriented outcomes to be measured or achieved. If we wrap these human desires in goals - as in 'I'm 34% on the way to greater happiness!' - it can chase away the very thing we hope to find. If you still maintain that you must have a goal, aim to be as kind as possible to yourself in each practice. If you find it difficult to be kind, see if you can include and be kind to that, too.
I DON’T HAVE TIME TO MEDITATE.
For new (as well as seasoned practitioners), starting a mindfulness meditation practice can feel daunting. We operate in a never-ending checklist that scrolls and scrolls. Picture a google search that displays 200,000 results with the option to Show More! The prospect of adding one more thing, especially something that doesn’t produce an immediate, evident result, can seem challenging. The approach is not to shoehorn a mindfulness meditation practice into life but to Build It In. A practice begins with a desire, willingness and intention and is followed by commitment, discipline and compassion
Ways to Work with Time
Build It In. Set a time and place to meditate each day. Make the place as inviting as possible with comfortable pillows, blanket, flowers or other element. Tell any co-habitants (family, roommate, pets) you will be meditating at this time and to kindly not disturb you. Turn off devices or leave them in another room or car. Ask someone who is also beginning to be a daily check-in partner. Checking in with someone is both supportive and raises our sense of accountability to ourselves.
Trust Research. Often people begin to notice that a daily meditation practice saves time and improves virtually every marker of mental, emotional and physical well-being. This experience is supported by research for individuals and companies. For example, meetings that begin with 1-minute of silence and mindful breathing are more productive, result in better decision making, creative ideas and enhanced problem-solving. The work of Dr. Richard Davidson at the Center for Healthy Minds at U. of Wisconsin-Madison has produced some of the most rigorous and ground-breaking research of mindfulness and “qualities of mind we suspect affect well-being, including attention, resilience, equanimity, savoring positive emotions, kindness, compassion, gratitude and empathy.”
DOUBT
Best for last. Doubt is possibly the most potent and relentless challenge. Am I doing this right? Is this going to work? Is this for me? This might work for others, but it surefire won't work for me because ____ (my mind is too busy, I can't sit still, I have brown hair, etc.). Some uncertainty can be helpful in life and invites us to pause and consider before reflexively doing or believing something. At other times, doubt can be more like second-guessing and a way to keep us "safe" by staying in a comfort zone, sidestepping a new challenge to avoid, exposure, disappointment or difficulty later.
Doubt can also take the form of the cross-hairs of feeling “selfish” or “undeserving” in taking time to be present to ourselves. There is a canon of research demonstrating the health benefits of stress-reduction and coping skills that derive from a regular mindfulness meditation practice. It is a radical act of self-care which is sacred and wholesome in and of itself. To further dispel the notion of “selfishness,” it is also clear the greater our own well-being, the more fully we can show up and be in service not only to ourselves, but to our families, work, communities. Everyone is served when we bring our gifts fully forth in this life.
Ways to work with doubt:
Neuroplasticity or I am not my thoughts. Consider this radical notion that your thoughts are just…. Thoughts. They are neither facts nor truth no matter how convincing they sometimes are. Neuroscience suggests we have many thousands of thoughts a day and the majority of them are the same recurring thoughts we had the day before and the day before that and….
With the exploding research in brain science, scientist Donald Hebb and later researchers found “neurons that fire together, wire together.” By directing our own awareness, thoughts and where we place attention, we can actively change our brain’s structure. We have the capacity to work with the negativity bias built into the reptilian brain to balance with the more evolved pre-frontal cortex. In daily life, this means we can dis-identify unproductive thoughts and cultivate our innate capacity for resilience, joy, empathy and more. For more, see the findings of psychologist and author, Dr. Rick Hanson, and his research in positive neuroplasticity in his books Hardwiring Happiness, Reslient and Buddha’s Brain.
Name it to Tame it. If doubt creeps in and you begin questioning yourself or your reasons for practicing mindfulness and meditation, turn your attention to the doubt itself. Can you sense what’s underneath the doubt? Is there fear or anxiety? If so, can you sense what is within the fear or anxiety? Or is it something else? The phrase “Name it to Tame it” comes from psychiatrist, educator and mindfulness researcher, Dan Siegel. founder and co-director of the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC). His extensive years research on the human mind and cultivation of well-being demonstrates the power of naming our emotions.
Know you are in good company. Doubt is a formidable hindrance because it can be stealthy, invisible and happen in the quiet of our own mind. It can be accompanied with deepest insecurities even shame. Not only do we experience doubt but we might feel alone in the experience. Remembering you are not alone and knowing that doubt is one of the greatest and most universally shared experiences can help relieve us from taking it personally. Doubt is not just a challenge for newcomers. A story from the Buddhist canon describes the final and greatest demon the Buddha had to face while meditating before enlightenment was doubt.
Finally, beginning a mindfulness meditation practice is an act of courage, self-care and fortitude to establish a practice that takes time just for ourselves. Learning to be with the direct experience of our own humanity with compassion and wisdom is among the most honoring acts we can do in this life. As we deepen in this practice, the benefits will be seen in our health and well-being, our capacity to be present to our own experience, across all our relationships and in every domain of our life.
Acknowledgements
Deep bow of gratitude to parents, La Sarmiento and Wendy Taylor, for permission to post a picture of their profoundly lovable, furry and enlightened pups, Annabel and Bader.