Playfulness is not a distraction: How Mindfulness expands our reality and our identity
It’s a drizzly afternoon and I am sitting with a group of adults, in a wooden hut overlooking some beautiful gardens.
Earlier in the day, they were out in a woodland and I had given them a tarpaulin and rope to put up as a shelter from the wind and the rain and a stove and some unusual tools and materials to start a fire. They were left to sort themselves as they saw fit.
Meanwhile, I sat at the top of a small cliff face, with my harness and ropes, and one-by-one these grown-ups, all working professionals in their 30s & 40s arrived, had a quick chat, and then I helped them as they abseiled back down to the ground.
By the time I had finished, I arrived at the woodland clearing to find people talking excitedly under a tarpaulin shelter, hot drinks in hands, proudly looking at the fire they had created. One person had taken himself off to sit by a river. Two others were lying on the ground, looking up at the tree canopy, the drizzle gently falling on their face.
Later on, back in the wooden hut I ask the group how they felt during their day.
“It was the perfect distraction,” is the general consensus.
“From what?” I ask
“From reality, from my life”
This is a response I hear time and time again. Not just during outdoor adventure, but even playing silly games, or during a mindfulness meditation or yoga session.
There is a belief going round that reality is reserved only for the day-to-day grind, and that fun and games, moments of relaxation or time with friends can only be counted as distraction or "not-real"
In truth what is happening in the present moment is reality. It is the thought-created baggage that is the distraction.
Being playful with friends, sitting peacefully by the river, or finding challenge in an abseil are the most real things we can attend to whilst we are doing them. Our deadlines, bank balance or our uncomfortable memories are like jeers from the crowd that will only throw us out of balance when we listen to them.
A mindfulness practice helps us to attend to and recognise the present moment.
It allows us to notice the clear distinction between what we are sensing in the moment, and something that is only thought created.
“My real life is my daily routine and everything else is just noise” is a thought, and not a fact. We are also the person who is experiencing the rain on our face, the smell of wood smoke and laughter with friends. We don't have to have the luxury of taking a day off or be in a beautiful setting to do this. Even 3 minutes of sitting with the breath can help us to recognise that we are a part of a world that is much bigger than our default mode of living.
By having an open awareness of the present moment, we can realise that the little moments of fun, play, peace and contentment are not mere distractions. In that moment they are all that there is and all that we are, and we have the opportunity to put down our thought-created-baggage of our past concerns and our future worries and just embrace the people the environment and the feeling we have right now.
Realising that the present moment is ‘the reality’ is perhaps easier when we our focusing on our basic needs of shelter, comfort and warmth in the outdoors.
