The relationship between mindfulness and meditation

Mindfulness is an actively adjustable, non-judgmental state of awareness of the present moment, and meditation is the most commonly used training method to systematically cultivate this state. The two are neither subordinate nor completely equivalent concepts - simply put, meditation can practice mindfulness, but mindfulness does not necessarily require meditation to obtain it.

The first time I came into contact with these two terms was when I signed up for an online class in 2018. The name of the class package at that time was "21-Day Mindfulness Meditation Training Camp", which made me think that the two were two names for the same thing for a long time. It wasn't until I went to Zhongnan Mountain to participate in a 10-day Vipassana camp. The master who led the camp enlightened me with one sentence: "Walking, standing, sitting and lying down are all Zen. When you meditate, all you can think about is the quarrel with your colleagues last week. That's called sitting dry, and you don't even have half a dime of mindfulness."； When you walk, you are clearly aware of the force with which your feet are raised and lowered. Even if you don't cross your legs and close your eyes, you are already in righteous thoughts. ”

Interestingly, there have always been subtle differences in the definitions of the two in different fields. The definition of mindfulness now commonly used in clinical psychology was proposed by Kabat-Zinn in 1979 when he developed MBSR (Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction) at Massachusetts Medical School: "The process of purposefully and non-judgmentally maintaining attention on the present experience." The path to mindfulness practice in this context is particularly wide, in addition to the classic sitting meditation, as well as body scans, mindful eating, and mindful walking. I previously taught the "Mindfulness Method for Unpacking Takeaways" to an Internet operator friend who works overtime until 12 o'clock every day. This means carefully feeling the wrinkles of the plastic bag, the temperature of the lunch box, and smelling the aroma of the first bite of rice when unpacking the lunch box. It only takes 10 seconds. That counts. Meditation is just one of the most efficient and most supported by empirical data.

Of course there are controversies. For example, in the traditional Theravada Buddhist practice system, many monks who have practiced for a long time believe that "daily mindfulness" without systematic Vipassana (Vipassana, one of the core categories of meditation) training can be regarded as short-term concentration at best, but not true mindfulness at all. It is unstable, does not go deep, and will be broken by the slightest external interference. I previously talked to a bhikshuni who has been practicing for 12 years about the "slight mindfulness" of feeling the pearls popping up while drinking milk tea. She smiled and shook her head: "That is just 'knowing that you are eating pearls', which is far from the mindfulness that can eliminate worries. ”

But from the perspective of mass application, this controversy is actually not that important. In 2022, the "Journal of Clinical Psychiatry" published a meta-analysis covering 12,000 patients with mild to moderate anxiety disorders. The results showed that whether you use 20 minutes of sitting meditation every day as a practice method or use fragmented daily anchoring practices (such as focusing on feeling the water flow every time you wash your hands, and spending 1 minute counting your breath every day), as long as the cumulative active awareness time per week can reach 30 minutes, the relief rate of anxiety symptoms can reach more than 35%. The difference in the effects of the two is not statistically significant at all. For most ordinary people who just want to relieve stress and reduce internal friction, worrying about "orthodox and unorthodox" is completely causing trouble for themselves.

I often give this analogy to my friends: Mindfulness is like your body’s immunity. You can maintain your immunity at a good level if you stay up less late, walk more, and don’t gorge yourself on meals.； Meditation is equivalent to going to the gym regularly to lift irons. It is definitely more efficient and has more stable results, but it is definitely not the only way. I also did it two years ago, forcing myself to sit for 30 minutes of meditation every day. In fact, I didn't enter the state at all during that time. As soon as I sat down, I couldn't help but count the seconds: there are still 20 minutes, there are still 10 minutes. After sitting, if I feel that I have too many distracting thoughts, I will scold myself for being useless. On the contrary, the more I practice, the more anxious I will be. Later, I simply stopped meditating and switched to carefully smelling the burnt aroma of coffee powder when making coffee every morning, and feeling the texture of oil slowly rising when hot water is washed down. When I took the first sip, I felt the temperature sliding from the tip of my tongue to my throat. In just one minute, I quickly found the relaxation of "not holding on to the past and not worrying about the future." Later, I checked the information and found out that this scattered practice is called "micro-mindfulness", and the effect is really no worse than sitting for half an hour.

In fact, many people are now entangled in the relationship between mindfulness and meditation. In essence, they are still afraid of "practicing the wrong thing" and that the time spent is useless. But in the final analysis, whether it is mindfulness or meditation, the ultimate goal is to make you live more comfortably in the present moment, not to add a new criterion of "I am not good enough". If you like to sit quietly, it would be great to meditate for 10 minutes every day. ； If you can't sit still, feel the force of your feet on the ground while waiting for the subway, or feel the temperature of the hot air blowing through your hair while blow-drying your hair. Even if it's only for a few seconds, you have already touched the threshold of mindfulness. There is nothing right or wrong about it.