Mindfulness encourages us to be “in the moment” and comes out of Eastern concepts around Buddhism and meditation. As I’ve watched its huge rise in popularity I’ve realized two important things. First of all, we’re becoming more and more stressed in our everyday lives and are crying out for ways to quiet down our noisy minds. Second, we’re looking for solutions that are simpler than traditional meditation, which has a reputation for being pretty tough to master.
The good news is that we can get many of the benefits of mindfulness and meditation much more easily than you might imagine. In fact, even if you’ve never consciously practiced mindfulness in your life, you’ve definitely been in plenty of mindful states and reaped the benefits. When was the last time you were so absorbed in a pleasurable task that time seemed to just disappear? Perhaps you were cooking a fun dish or painting a picture or reading a book, or were lost in a crossword or Sudoku puzzle. What happened in your mind? All the noise and stress that was running around inside it vanished, as if by magic. You weren’t fixated on the past. You weren’t worrying about the future. You were present in the moment. There was only you and your task.
Psychologists call this state of mind “flow.” We have a natural capacity for flow states, but we seem to find them harder to access as we get older. As children, we spend much of our time absorbed in play. When my own son is playing Lego or my daughter is painting a picture, they sometimes become so lost in what they’re doing that they can’t hear me talking to them. But when we grow up, there’s precious little time for these lovely, restorative moments of flow.
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To hear an exciting conversation about the importance of flow, check out my Feel Better, Live More podcast episode with James Wallman at drchatterjee.com/64 |
5 MINUTES OF FLOW
Devote just five minutes a day to access your flow state.
Before you start, take three deep breaths to help you relax and calm your mind. Think about what you’re about to do and what you would like to achieve by doing it.
There are all kinds of activities that’ll help shift you into flow. They tend to be activities that you enjoy doing. It also needs to be something that you can fully direct your attention towards, so the task needs be hard enough that you have to concentrate but not so challenging that you feel like giving up. Everyone will have a different form of activity they feel naturally drawn to. Here are a few ideas that have been especially popular with my patients.
Painting
If you like to paint, keep your brushes visible in your home and close to hand. Just get going on a project for five minutes and allow yourself to look forward to continuing on your next Feel Better Day.
Drawing
Drawing might be a little easier to get going than painting, as there is less setup involved. Simply open up a pad, imagine what you want to draw, and do it. It is amazing how many times our children do just this. My daughter will often ask me, “Daddy, what shall I draw today?” As soon as I give her an answer, she happily opens up her book and is fully immersed in drawing. It works just as well for adults too! If you haven’t finished your drawing at the end of your five minutes, carry on, if you have the time, or continue where you left off on your next Feel Better Day.
Knitting
Some of my patients love to knit. One of them, sixty-four-year-old Sheila, was suffering from anxiety. She lived by herself and would spend all day worrying about many different scenarios. She used to knit when she was younger but had not done it in years. I recommended that she dig out her knitting needles and restart for five minutes every day, to help focus her mind. Within days, she was feeling calmer, more relaxed, and happier.
Reading
If you’re the kind of person who can be easily transported into the world of a book, you might be more used to reading in the evening. But many of my patients find that getting into the practice of reading in the morning can be calming. Consider reading something uplifting and motivating that puts you in a positive frame of mind to start the day.
Adult coloring books
When you’re trying to color, it’s almost impossible to be doing anything else but focusing on the page in front of you. Adult coloring books are one of the easiest and most enjoyable ways to practice mindfulness and access flow.
Listening to music
Listening to music can be a great way of practicing mindfulness, but only if you’re fully immersed in it. It’s no good scrolling through your social media feed and emails at the same time. Choose a piece of music that makes you feel good and lifts your mood. Put on your headphones. Intently follow the drumbeat or the bass line or listen carefully to the meaning behind the lyrics.
Playing music
Do you play an instrument, or did you use to? If you did, brilliant. If you didn’t, it’s still brilliant. You don’t have to be an expert at your instrument. You’re not playing for anyone else. The only thing that’s important is that you’re able to get lost in what you’re doing. Even five minutes of playing can do wonders for your mind. One of my patients accesses flow by playing the piano. Her son takes piano lessons and when he goes to bed in the evening she looks at his piano books and tries to play the songs he’s currently learning. As she becomes fully engrossed in reading the music and trying to coordinate her right and left hands, it completely switches off her mind. Afterwards, she reports feeling significantly happier and less anxious.
Jigsaw puzzles
Trying to complete a jigsaw puzzle can be a brilliant way of achieving flow state. I often do this with my children’s puzzles. If this appeals to you, you can buy a variety of different jigsaw puzzles to suit your ability level. Remember, the point is simply to immerse yourself fully for five minutes.
CASE STUDY
Colette was once a high-flying lawyer but had given up her career to raise her three daughters, aged between nine and fourteen. Her husband was also a lawyer and worked long hours. Like most busy parents, Colette didn’t have much time for herself and seemed to be constantly busy picking her children up from school and ferrying them between clubs and play dates. When she came in to see me, Colette had been suffering from headaches across the front of her forehead for four months. She’d been taking over-the-counter medication, which was dealing with the symptoms, but she quite rightly started to worry about her reliance on them. But when she didn't take the pills she sometimes felt so poorly she became worried about her driving, which had a subsequent effect on her ability to meet the needs of her kids.
She told me that she’d wake up feeling exhausted and usually press snooze a few times. She’d then be running late, rushing around, trying to get the kids ready, and getting breakfast on the go. Her husband would leave the house at six a.m. Usually, before the end of breakfast, her headache would begin.
I asked her if she had ever tried doing any relaxation exercises. She rolled her eyes at me and said, “Meditation and mindfulness? Not for me. Sorry, Dr. Chatterjee, I know you mean well. But they’re not my cup of tea. They usually leave me more irritated than when I started because I just don’t feel like I’m achieving anything when I try them.”
I have many patients like Colette. She was something of a perfectionist and what people used to call a Type A personality. She was all about nononsense forward motion, and felt in control only when she believed she was getting things done and getting them done well.
I tailored my advice to suit Colette’s personality. I suggested that she buy herself an adult coloring book. Although she was initially skeptical, I managed to persuade her to give it a go. I asked her to set her alarm a little earlier, go downstairs while her kids were still sleeping, put on the kettle to boil as usual, and then, once she had made her cup of tea, sit down and color for just five minutes. I asked her to commit to this five days a week for the next two weeks.
I could tell there wasn’t a single atom in Colette’s being that believed this was going to work. When she came in a couple of weeks later, she told me she hadn’t managed to keep it up. She either forgot altogether or decided, in the moment, that she had more important things to do with her five minutes than sitting down with her colored pencils. But I wasn’t going to give up that easily. I told her a little bit about the science of behavior change and how, ideally, you need to change your environment to make the new behavior you are trying to engage in as easy as possible. I asked her to leave her coloring book next to her kettle with her pen and pick it up as the kettle was coming to the boil. And that’s what did it. Keeping the book there hooked the action of coloring into her existing habit of making tea. To her surprise, she began looking forward to doing it every morning. They were “precious” minutes, she told me a few weeks later, in which she forgot everything else that was going on and got lost in a simple creative pleasure. She’d achieved flow, on a daily basis, and after four weeks her headaches had almost completely disappeared.