The Mindfulness Habit: From Mindlessness To Mindfulness

By Sharon Bull

“Transformation is hard at first, messy in the middle and gorgeous at the end” ~ Robin Sharma

I liken mindfulness to any other new activity or skill we wish to embrace. Just as learning to play an instrument requires practice and dedication, so does a change in our thought process. In whatever way we wish to enhance our life and well being, we have to put in the effort.

I look back to my teens and the sudden urge I had to be the next Siouxsie Sioux. The Punk phenomenon had shaken up the music industry and taking to the stage with a guitar around my neck seemed so appealing. My desire for a musician’s life was intensified after an evening drinking with The Slits and I begged my parents for a guitar.

Mum and Dad were both in the entertainment business, so it didn’t take long for them to source me a bass guitar and amp. What I didn’t anticipate was the hours of practise I would need to put in and, worse still, the cuts and sores on my finger ends in the early stages. Joining a band was relatively easy for me, though the dream didn’t last too long. My younger brother was in the initial stages of setting up his first band and encouraged me with all his heart to take my instrument seriously. Within a short space of time I was sacked and rightly so. My passion and commitment to learn the bass just wasn’t there.

When I look at TV programmes like X Factor or The Voice and watch the hundreds of hopefuls queuing for auditions with hopes and dreams of instant success, I smile and think about my bass guitar. Considering the passion and determination involved along with the trials and tribulations most artists have to endure, it’s hardly surprising that few succeed. In music, we seem to want the end result without the journey, forgetting that the journey is often the most important part of it all. It’s much the same with mindfulness and meditation.

I’m still a relative novice but, since May 2012, I have meditated twice daily with the exception of the odd day. The first few months of meditation were challenging. On the one hand I could see that my life was slowly transforming. On the other hand I felt some of my negative thoughts and reactions were becoming increasingly worse. What I came to realise was that I was properly engaging for the first time with negative trains of thought that had been a pattern in my life for many years.

For over thirty years I allowed myself to believe material things were the key to happiness, love, admiration and friendship. I wanted people to respect me, believe in me and see me as the confident and vivacious woman that I truly didn’t believe I was. Credit cards were like gifts from heaven as they hit the floor by the letterbox and the more I had in my purse, the better I would feel.

Depression has played an persistently annoying game with me since the age of twenty and I had never fully understood the reasons behind it. For a while I managed to hide the severity of the situation from family, close friends and creditors. I was both ashamed and too proud to admit defeat. But eventually my drinking, lack of sleep and continual food binging began to take their toll. It was the continual threatening phone calls from my creditors and months of sleepless nights which gave me no other option but to throw away the cards and consolidate my £50,000 debt caused by a shopping addiction. The spending party was well and truly over.

Towards the end of 2011, I packed my bags and reluctantly waved goodbye to my independence. I had no choice. It was my only option. Fortunately I had a doting mother willing to take me under her wing. Without her help I could have been dead or at least homeless and on the streets.

Looking back I realise I was one of countless people living with stress, unhappiness, depression, anxiety, addiction and pain. I was trudging through life on autopilot without realising the harm I was doing to myself, simply from my negative thoughts and feelings. Without realising it, I had become yet another individual who had fallen into the trap of striving to emulate the perfect lifestyles tantalisingly portrayed in magazines, adverts and other media.

It was mindfulness that transformed my thinking and ultimately turned my life around, helping to cure both my depression and addictive behaviour. With perseverance and continued practise, I began to notice profoundly positive changes in my life. Above all else, I realised that, though my experience had been tough in so many ways, it was ultimately a gift. Because my experience brought me to the point where I realised that the life I was living was unsustainable and had to change.

Mindfulness, the key to that life change, is available to all of us. With just a little effort and concentration, we can all be mindful for a moment. And each of those moments is a vital step towards a more peaceful, satisfying way of life.

To find out more about my story and what I do, please visit: www.smtoni.co.uk or S.M.Toni Face Book