Mindfulness as Mental Health

As I’m busy preparing for a theoretical presentation on mindfulness as a therapeutic modality - I feel stressed and anxious. An unaccommodating professor paired with a heavy-duty grading rubric is a recipe for overwhelm. I notice that when I am physiologically activated by stress, I kick into hyper-arousal and hyper-vigilance. Similar to a trauma response, I am aware that academic stress can prompt a moment of mental chaos.

The irony isn’t lost on me that this event was triggered by a presentation on mindfulness. The course that I’m taking teaches students to integrate clinical skills and tools with psychotherapy theories and principles. I’m wondering if this is the assignment itself - how do I emotionally self-regulate when confronted with psychological stress. Aha! Mindfulness. Jon Kabat-Zinn notes that the act of mindfulness looks like observing the thoughts/feelings process unfold in real-time. Noticing without judgment.

I meditated this morning and then decided to write this blog post to witness the process unfolding in a non-judgmental way. A simple lesson learned via a complicated test.