Beginner’s Mindset - Mindfulness
Let’s start the discussion of the 9 Attitudes of Mindfulness with the Beginners Mind.
This post is accompanied by a matching yoga class that is part of the Seeking Selah Yoga Mindfulness Playlist on YouTube. Check it out! https://youtu.be/b-0wWdnFmQM
What Dr. Zinn Kabat Says
In the Beginner’s Mind, there are always fresh new moments. When I was first reading about this, the phrase, “never lose your sense of wonder” came to mind. When we’re not practicing the Beginner’s Mind, we can find ourselves so full of ideas and preconceptions that it leaves us without much space for new ideas or to see things as they really are. Dr. Zinn Kabat says, “We tend to take the ordinary for granted and fail to grasp the extra-ordinariness of the ordinary.” So by contrast, the “expert’s mind” doesn’t have many possibilities but in the beginner’s mind, there are infinite possibilities. He says that it is a discipline to bring this mindset daily.
Relating this to us
This isn’t a new age concept and not everyone can turn off the thoughts in their brain that easily. And let’s ask the question, “why?” Well, we have responsibilities now. #adulting. I need to get that load of laundry going, I shouldn’t buy out food again, I better get home to cook. I don’t want to waste the food I bought so I better cook up those bell peppers and down the rabbit hole our thoughts go. But friends, being able to put those thoughts on hold in order to see something anew means we have to trust that all those thoughts of responsibility swirling around in our heads are taken care of.
Can you recall being a child and playing outside and your mom calling you in for a snack or for dinner? Or shoot, maybe it was your neighbor’s dad who offered for you to just stay for dinner -but either way, you didn’t worry about going to the grocery store, coming up with the money to buy the food, or cooking it. Someone else was worrying about you getting fed.
Do you remember having clothes to put on without ever having to worry about where they came from, if they were clean, what they looked like?
How old were we when we started worrying about these things? For some of us, sooner than others. Perhaps it was when you were repeatedly hungry, or when your clothes wore out, or maybe the car broke down, or your parents didn’t have money to give so you could join your friends at the movies.
Regardless, if we can go back to that mindset, before those unsavory realities settled in, we can envision that feeling of just being. Being present. Playing outside and just being caught up in the fun of playing tag, hunting for bugs, enjoying a book, being in the moment.
What the bible says
God wants us to be humble and dependent on Him. Trusting Him. And in doing so, we lift up the burdens and thoughts that weigh on our minds. God wants to continue to teach us and to shape us. If we are in the “expert’s mind” how much will we miss that God wants to teach us, what he wants to bless us with?
This is such an important concept that even Jesus said in Matthew 18:3, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” In other words, we must be humble like children, acknowledging our dependence on God to provide in the same way that young children are dependent on their parents to provide for them.
What does that mean for me in my everyday life? It means that I have to trust God that my needs are being met and will be met. Here on Earth, He will provide me with the opportunities and means for a full life. A passage that I found comfort in over the years is, Matthew 6:25-34.
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life[a]?
28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
How great is that quote? I encourage you to look it up and read it over and over as Lectio Divina practice. I was out biking one day and came across a meadow just teeming with different colored grasses, butterflies, birds, and beauty and thought of that verse. For me, it ties back into this Beginner’s mindset beautifully. If you are humbly dependent on God for your needs, how much more easily can you be present to the moment, not worrying about your responsibilities for long enough to try to see or learn something anew? The Psalms are loaded with poems about the beauty and majesty of God’s creation, Earth (see Psalm 104).
Can you try out the Beginner’s Mindset?
I’d like to challenge you to look at something anew with this Beginner’s mindset. That cup of coffee? Can you detect a flavor profile? That same walk from your car to the grocery? Can you notice a bird in the tree nearby or can you get excited that those oranges you’re about to buy were shipped from the other side of the country or maybe from a different country entirely for you to enjoy? Can you apply it to your job? Perhaps dive into some research articles to find new information instead of putting on the “expert’s cap” and saying that you already know how to do it all and feeling like your metaphorical cup is already full?
I have a beautiful example of the beginner’s mind in my toddler. His glee in the mundane fills me with happiness and helps me to look at some ordinary as extra-ordinary.
I’d love to hear how you are able to apply the beginner’s mindset to your life. Please leave your thoughts in the comments below!
