Enhancing Enjoyment with Mindfulness 10 Weeks to Love and Abundance

Welcome back Everybody, to this third video in the series on my new book, 10 Weeks to Love and Abundance. I'm your host and the author, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. In this video, we're talking about enjoying the moment, or what some people refer to as mindfulness. Part of a mindset of love and abundance is being mindful of enjoying and being grateful for all of the things that you have in this moment instead of focusing on all the things that you lack. Saying to yourself, I'll be happy when instead of saying I'll be happy when you say I'll be happy, I will choose to be happy, I will recognize yes, everything may not be perfect in my life, but I do have a lot of things that are going well that may make my life rich and meaningful. When you pay attention to the things that you have instead of what you lack, you can feel supported, content and encouraged. These positive feelings cause the release of relaxation and happy chemicals, which can also help you reduce stress, inflammation, sleep problems, and even improve your immunity. What about that self assessment that happens in every chapter? How much time do you spend living in the future dreaming about how you will be happy one day? You know, some people may say not much time at all. Some people may say, I live there all day every day. But it's important to recognize this because when you are spending that time living in the future, you're not noticing, embracing and cherishing the present. Make a list of things that you enjoy or that you have that are important in the present. How much of them do you miss because you're living in the future? Maybe you're living in the future thinking, I'll be happy when I make a million dollars. So you're working all the time, but because you're working all the time, you miss spending time with your kids and your dogs and your family and whatever else makes you happy. How will you feel in the future about missing out on these things that you actually have right now that are important to you because you were focused on the future and not appreciating the present? The five strategies that I propose for helping you focus on being more mindful and enjoy the moment include mindfulness and purposeful action. And I've done a lot of videos on mindfulness and purposeful action, but basically being aware of the present moment, the good and the bad, and choosing to use your energy to move toward your goals, to nurture the things that are important, and choosing to not give your energy to the things that are distractions or not in your best interest. It's a Little bit of a paradigm shift. Instead of trying to get rid of something unpleasant, you're saying, you know what? I'm not even going to give that energy. I'm going to focus on the opposite. If I nurture love and abundance, then I'm not going to have anxiety and scarcity. Developing an attitude of gratitude, really recognizing what you've got going on for you, looking around at others and going, you know what? I've got a lot going for me. You know, you may have your health, you may have, you know, a roof over your head. Being grateful for the things in your life that are important that you do have. Again, there are going to be things that you want that you don't have yet or things that are not going well. Maybe, maybe you're struggling with a chronic illness right now. Okay, that is a challenge, no doubt. However, it's important. A concept called hardiness helps us recognize that it's important to look and embrace the dialectics. Looking at all of the things in our life, not just the one thing that's going bad or the three things that are going bad, but looking at all of the things and creating a balance. This is not an activity that's in the book, but it's one that I've used in my group counseling sessions. We create, literally create a balance using a hanger and two Dixie cups, and we use marbles. On the left side, the Dixie cup is negative stuff. On the right side, the Dixie cup is positive stuff. And people are encouraged to go up there with the bag of marbles and put in marbles to each side based on what they are mindful of at that moment in their life and try to notice what the balance is. And it really encourages people to reflect on the things that are going well. Yes, sometimes the negative side still is heavier than the positive side, but that helps people see that there is some counterbalance and there are things that they may be able to do to improve the moment. Taking optimism breaks is really important. And I give you some suggestions for how to work this in. And I'm not talking about toxic optimism where you pretend everything is fine all the time. That's just. That's not even realistic. But optimism breaks gives you an opportunity to step back and say, okay, if I were going to put on my rose colored glasses, how I. How could I reframe this situation? Optimistically, it gives you a different perspective. Doesn't mean you have to hold on to it forever, but it gives you the opportunity to see a situation from a different perspective and choose which way you want to see it. Hardiness, as I mentioned earlier, is the concept that when faced with situations, we need to have an attitude of commitment, control and challenge. Recognizing all of the things in our life that to which we're committed and noticing the ones that are going well and the ones not so well, focusing on the aspects of all of those situations that we have control over. What can we nurture in the things that are going well? What can we do differently to address the things that aren't going well? And viewing challenges Viewing problems and as challenges, instead of viewing them as barriers that we can't get around, see them as obstacles. And just like an obstacle course, in order to get past that thing, you either need to go over it, under it, or around it generally. So an obstacle can be seen as a challenge instead of something that is immovable and thwart your progress. As usual, the book contains a lot of discussion, writing and meditation prompts and activities for each of these strategies to help you develop them and nurture them in yourself and others. It's natural to be more aware of threats. That's just protective. You know, it's a lot more problematic if we don't notice the poisonous snake and we step on it as than if we don't notice the little bunny rabbit and we happen to scare it off into the woods. A lot more problematic. So our brain is actually programmed to pay more attention to the negative. The good news is we can train our brain to also recognize the good things and create balance. But it takes work. It does take work. Instead of being in a perpetual state of saying I will be happy when it's important to change and switch to a state of just saying I will be happy.