Cultivating mindfulness of breath is a practice that goes back literally thousands of years, and there are many schools of thought on how and why to do it—some better than others.
From the perspective of ACT, there are really only two things you need to know:
most people do it wrong
meditation is a tool, not a control strategy
On point one, that often includes experienced meditators, and even people who teach meditation professionally. Can you guess the mistake most people tend to make when they meditate?
I bet you can—I’ve been sprinkling clues all over the place.
If you’re going to meditate, you need a good guide. Jon Kabat-Zinn (who created the Body Scan, and helped create Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy) has a book called Full Catastrophe Living, and it’s an excellent entry point.
So—you probably want to feel better, right?
That’s the problem.
The reason so many people get meditation wrong is because they try to use it to make themselves feel better. ACT calls this “striving,” and in the Acceptance and Commitment Therapy paradigm, it’s a guaranteed path to suffering.
So maybe you’re thinking, wait, if I try to get better, I won’t get better? How is that supposed to work?
Yes, there is a waft of some weird Zenny paradox here, but don’t worry. “Getting better,” in the ACT sense, isn’t about controlling your feelings—it’s (in part) about accepting them. But that’s a topic for later.
For now, we just want to watch our breath.
I’ll briefly describe a simple mindfulness-of-breath practice here. If you want a more thorough example, you can find that and much more in either The Mindful Way or Full Catastrophe Living.
To start, you’ll need a reasonably calm and quiet place, and about ten minutes. You can do the exercise either sitting (with good but not rigid posture), or lying down flat on your back.
Close your eyes
Slowly begin to draw your attention to the sensations of your breathing—follow the air as it goes through your nose or lips, then into your lungs; follow the sensations as the air then leaves your body
Notice the sensations
You do not need to count your breaths, or try to alter your breathing in any way
Just notice. Just watch. Just let it happen
A hallmark of being human is your attention will almost immediately start to wander.
Don’t worry—this is exactly how the process of mindful meditation is supposed to unfold. When you notice that your attention has wandered, gently draw it back to your breathing.
You can make note of the wandering, if you like, and you can also notice any evaluations or judging thoughts that come along with it. And then, gently but firmly, draw your attention back to your breath.
Make contact with your breath, over and over, each time gently returning to the sensations of breathing when you notice your mind has wandered. Do this for about ten minutes, once a day or so, with no agenda nor motive other than simply doing it.
Some people love to meditate, and they do it a lot. If you find you like it or even that it helps you relax—great! There is no reason to stop (so long as you’re not using it to try to control your feelings or to try to relax—don’t try to do anything).
And if, like me, you find you’d rather be doing other things—that’s fine, too.
For our purposes, mindfulness meditation is but a stepping stone on the way to being more present in your life. When you notice your breathing, you are joining it—and your body—in the present moment.
And that is a worthy goal.