Eastern wisdom — How mindfulness and awareness are changing my life

Republished from my September 01, 2014 tumbler post — I guess tumbler is not a really thing anymore :)

In the last 12 months or so I asked myself the questions “why am I here” a lot. While by the western contemporary society standards I have been doing relatively well in life, had a few a good jobs, had a loving girlfriend, travelled the world, etc. etc. Still I wasn’t happy.

It was extremely destabilizing to be in a state in which I couldn’t to use my rationality to explain what was going on. I did what I was supposed to do across the board: got 2 master degrees in 2 continents, “checked all the boxes” and still something wasn’t working in my life.

After trying a lot of different approaches to identify and tackle my deep unhappiness I encountered mindfulness, meditation and Buddhists practices. These practices started to shift my focus from “doing things” to “being”, from externally driven milestones to internally motivated activities, it turns out that by following the socially accepted path obliterated my deep need for a sense of purpose in life.

Our modern lifestyle doesn’t indeed leave space for just “being”, to reflect nor for introspection. We always need to do something, to distract ourselves from our life, to check out what other people are doing perhaps on our Facebook mobile app, to buy something, to write an email, to just be busy… the only thing we cannot do is just be with ourselves, to feel our body, to acknowledge our place in the world, to live our own life. It is much easier in this way: we don’t have to think, we can just follow somebody else’s advice, our friends, our bosses, our parents, society’s… then we can blame them when we are unhappy, which turns out happens most of the time because THIS IS NOT THE LIFE WE CHOOSE OURSELF.

For me now it’s clear that purpose it’s a key driver of my life. I need to know what I decide to do with my time impacts the world and live it by the moment: be present. A world in which people are not their job, where people are “fundamentally good” beings and we are here to help each other with the skills that we have been provided and those we developed.

Some sociologists would classify these aspirations as those of a millennial (I am certainly part of that age range), but I really don’t care that much: this is me.

What this actually meant?

• Acknowledging that being gentle with my body and my mind was the first step to bring that attitude towards the world. Dedicating time every day to introspection and meditation practices enabled me to be in a stable place that allowed me to surf through the ups and downs of life confident in the future
• Realizing that the activities that I spend my time on need to be in line with my purpose: I need to see how my skills can be used to help others. Every day I make sure this holds true.
• Being honest, open and transparent. Do not shy away from the hard questions in whichever settings they might arise, from the personal life to the professional context: “nothing is somebody else’s problem” and leave behind the things that do not work for you, whether material (e.g. jobs) or immaterial (e.g. behaviors)
• Connecting with people: be present, listen, discuss, support, argue, understand how other beings live their life, what they need, how I can help

What’s next for me?

• Continuing on this path: every day it’s a new step of a wonderful and unpredictable journey. Like sailors every new change in the ocean condition teaches us something but no storm is identical, so no matter how much expertize we accumulate we need to keep disciplined enough to do our homework.
• Sharing my journey and helping others however I can to master their storms, keeping in mind that everybody needs to deal with his/her own demons. It’s a lonely but exhilarating journey that needs to be faced by each of us, still knowing that other were able to master it its unquestionably of great help.

A few things that worked for me in this journey and that maybe can be helpful for others too:

• Acknowledge that every person is fundamentally good and you can work with them through any type of difficulty
• Accept that you are the only person that needs to live with the decisions you make, don’t outsource them
• Deep inside you have the answers to all your questions, be honest and acknowledge that when you say “I don’t know,” it actually means: the answer is too hard to even say it, but doing the right thing will pay in the long run
• Don’t overfill your life with calendar appointments and tasks to accomplish: leave space in your life for you to be honest with yourself and observe objectively your life
• Sending more emails and working more hours doesn’t make you more productive: less is often more
• Never take a coffee espresso to go: you can spare 5 min of your day and enjoy life
• Remember that “you are not your job”
• Take care of your body, you don’t have another one

A few pointers to valuable resources:

• Vipassna meditation technique: www.dhamma.org. Through this organization I had one of the best experiences in my life: a 10 days silent meditation retreat in the desert. If you are interested in exploring more in depth who you are, don’t ask too many questions about schedule or other practicals, just go
• Shambhala: www.shambhala.org. A community of people that are courageous to live every day with their eyes open to what is happening in the world.
• Book “Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind” by Jon Kabat-Zinn. A western Medical Doctor measuring the impact of meditation and awareness techniques using “western” standards.

Thank you to all good friends and family members that have been with my in my journey so far and that I hope to support in the same way in the future…

Originally published at caricoscarico.tumblr.com.