How can mindfulness help me?

Some of you know that as well as being a mindfulness coach, I am an avid reader of fiction. I recently came across a word I had not encountered before: suadade. A Portuguese word which means longing. A longing for happier times. Perhaps there’s some nostalgia thrown in there, and most certainly a yearning.

These elusive happier times might be in the past or future. We wistfully long for something that isn’t in the present. We can spend hours, days, weeks, months and years wanting this utopian ideal to transform us and take us anywhere that isn’t here. Sometimes we spend our whole life in a state of longing, wondering if the ideal even exists at all.

Here’s the thing. Every moment we spend wanting this moment to be different, is a lost opportunity for living. What do I mean by that? I’m alive, so what’s the problem?

Is this it?

Well, there’s being alive and having great things: family, friends, fresh food, a place to live. But as some of us know, we can have all these things and not necessarily be happy. We can feel disconnected, lonely in a crowded room, wondering if this is ‘it’.

Then there is being alive and being present. Being present with whatever is, in that precise moment. And anything could be unfolding. Life events sent to rattle us, unforeseen curve balls that take the wind out of our sails. Or indeed moments of mundane routine, life’s great highs such as weddings and births, or perhaps an understated contentment found in the simplest of things.

What if our approach to whatever was happening in the moment meant that we could be happy in it?

Can mindfulness really deliver on such a promise?

Yes.

I used to live my life working incredibly hard simply to pay for one amazing holiday after another. I had one rule about traveling home: I didn’t do it unless the next trip was booked. I rationed, divided and stretched my annual leave days as if they were the most precious commodity on earth. Because to me, they were.

Fast forward several years, and I’m a little saddened by my old approach. I thought I was living so well! I wasn’t. I was constantly chasing something else. I had a serious case of suadade.

It took a complete burnout for my eyes to be opened to a different approach. And that approach centred on mindfulness. I completed an 8-week course; I began meditating every day. When I was physically well again, that’s when the great stuff started happening.

Happy for no reason

I was happy for no apparent reason. I basked in the simplest of things that mere months ago I wouldn’t have given a second thought to: a rose opening, the feel of my cosy winter dressing gown, the sound of my milk frother whirring.

Put simply, life slowed down. I connected with myself properly for the first time in over 40 years. The shine couldn’t be dulled, even when those curve balls came hard and fast.

What’s more, the recipe for a mindful lifestyle is so simple. I needed a teacher to get me started, but you might like to check out my free resources and just have a go. Or book on for a free taster with me. Take the plunge, decide to have a structured approach and really start living. Your time really is now and there’s everything to play for.

If you’re interested, the book was All My Mothers by Joanna Glen (4.5 stars on Goodreads. You’re welcome).