The verdict is still out on Mindfulness. A Shutterstock. Licensed Image.

Mindfulness is an essential and useful pathway that leads to peacefulness. It isn’t rocket science, it doesn’t require a trendy workshop, and it doesn’t require that you live in an ashram.

“Each Place Is The Right Place. The Place Where I Now Am Can Be A Sacred Space.”
– Ravi Ravindra

What Is Mindfulness?

The most basic definition of mindfulness might be the act of paying attention to the things that you are experiencing, and then choosing peacefulness in relation to every action, person, thought, feeling, and response.

Mindfulness in its purest form has the following characteristics:

• Being fully present to what’s happening in this moment
• Leaving the past in the past
• Letting fantasies of the future dissolve
• Refraining from self-judgment and judging others
• Keeping emotions in check
• Responding instead of reacting
• Strengthening our connection to our core selves

While mindfulness might not require you to be warm-fuzzy, spiritually-focused, or heart-centered, it does require a measure of awareness about what you are presenting to others and how you are being received.

The positive net-result of mindfulness might be that the people you engage feel non-threatened, accepted, heard, and relaxed upon interacting with you. Meanwhile, you would most likely be unaffected by interactions with others, remaining fully aware of yourself throughout each experience.

Some say that kindness and love are vital to the experience of being mindful. I don’t agree with this sentiment. Many people are broken, lost, lonely, hurt, and disconnected from their hearts. That’s their business.

Even in their states of broken-ness, I believe these types of people can still create a connection to their clarity and remain aware of how they are affecting others. It’s in this way that almost anyone can represent mindfulness, even if only for a few moments.

What Is Meditation?

Meditation is an ancient practice that helps people go beyond their personalities and deeper within themselves so that they can experience a more profound and connected sense of their true Self and their realities.

While many forms and teachers have emerged since its inception, meditation hasn’t changed very much and continues to hold the fascination and respect of a long list of spiritual leaders, traditions, and religions.

Medication techniques can include something as simple as focusing on a flower and welcoming the beauty of that flower into our hearts. It might also involve training the mind and heart to be receptive to the present moment so that our awareness can expand.

The primary goal of meditation is to inspire the superfecta of peacefulness: spiritual connectedness, mental clarity, emotional tranquility, and physical relaxation.

Meditation can occur in any location, and at any time, although early mornings offer the most meditative atmospheres. During early mornings, our bodies are in restful states of self-nurturance This is also when all of the usual societal energies are dormant. Many monks arise at 3 am and meditate until 6 am.

The Difference Between Mindfulness And Meditation

Meditation is mindful by nature, although it might be said that meditation takes us beyond our minds and therefore helps us become more expanded when compared to basic mindfulness.

It might be said that mindfulness is a form of meditation, but the practice of mindfulness might not always be meditative. You might be present to this moment in all its glory, but you might not achieve a meditative state or move beyond the mind.

It might be that mindfulness brings us into the present moment so resolutely that we are present to the activities and behaviors of our minds. Meanwhile, meditation helps us go above, surpass, or supersede our mental processes.

“Concentration Is A Cornerstone Of Mindfulness Practice. Your Mindfulness Will Only Be As Robust As The Capacity Of Your Mind To Be Calm And Stable. Without Calmness, The Mirror Of Mindfulness Will Have An Agitated And Choppy Surface And Will Not Be Able To Reflect Things With Any Accuracy.”
– Jon Kabat-Zinn

Mindfulness Meditation

Mindfulness meditation is one of the least complex forms of meditation. The premise goes something like this: choose to peacefully focus on your actions, emotions, and thoughts as you experience them, without thinking of the past or future, and without any preconception, precondition, or judgment.

If you are walking in the park, feel your feet and breath, embrace the trees and flowers, be present to your surroundings, and everything that you see, feel, and hear.

If you are speaking with another person, be fully present to every thought that comes to mind, distilling, and then disregarding all of your emotions, opinions, judgments, and other mental fodder. Be present to and present with your actions, live within your words, and forge a pathway to your core Self.

One form of mindfulness meditation consists of focusing on an object or idea. This might involve mental imagery, relaxing a part of your body, calming your mind, or gently concentrating on the breath.

When doing mindfulness meditation, be present to your thoughts, words, and responses. Ignore all extraneous distractions and fodder. Enter this peaceful space often, and remain in it for as long as you can.

If you’re interested in learning more about the topic, you might consider searching for mindfulness training in your area.

Useful Meditation Techniques

There are many helpful meditation techniques. You might select a method within a specific tradition like Hinduism or Buddhism, or you might choose to meditate on the image of your deity.

Among many others, you might consider Kundalini, Zen, or Transcendental Meditation. Millions of people throughout the world utilize these forms of meditation to invite peacefulness, open their hearts, and expand their awareness.

Dr. Vasant Lad, one of the most remarkable innovators and leaders in Ayurvedic medicine, and Director of the Ayurvedic Institute in Albuquerque, NM once said to me, “To become the rose, you must meditate on the rose. That which you meditate on, you become.” I love this quote because it speaks to the core nature of meditation.

Through meditation, we can change our realities. By focusing on the most peaceful sounds, imagery, and aspects within creation, we begin to mirror them. Over time, we can embody the peace found in the loveliest flower and the most gentle wind.

Breath Meditation

1. 1. Find a quiet place and consider lighting a candle. Sit in a comfortable position, either on a meditation pillow (on the floor) or on a couch or chair. Be sure to have back support so that you are not tempted to slouch.
   2. Chant the sound “OM” three times.
   3. Close your eyes and take three deep breaths, inhaling and exhaling freely and deeply.
   4. Imagine that your breath is the key to your peacefulness. Imagine it to be a gentle river that can bring light and love into your body.
   5. For the next five to ten minutes, try to focus solely on your breath. Let go of mental imagery, the past, the future, stressors, and any interruptions emerging from your immediate environment. Be grateful throughout the experience.
   6. Focus on your incoming breath and enjoy it.
   7. Focus on your outgoing breath and enjoy it.
   8. In your mind’s eye, imagine each breath enter your body and exit your body. You might imagine that your breath is akin to white light, or you might want to assign another color to it.
   9. As your breath moves into and throughout your body, imagine that your breath is nurturing every organ.
   10. When you exhale, Imagine that you are releasing stress and toxins.
   11. When you complete your five to ten minutes of focusing and breathing in this way, conclude your experience by chanting, “Om Shanti Shanti Shanti Om.”

Open your eyes and thank your heart and lungs for being full of life. Take a few moments to gather your energy and thoughts. Throughout the day, consider the peacefulness you found during this meditation. Try to repeat this process tomorrow and continue from there.

“By Concentrating On A Form, Sound Or Light, We Learn To Constantly Be In That State Of Inner Aloneness And To Be Joyful In Any Situation.”
— Amma

How Do I Begin?

If you can start by meditating for 2 minutes a day, you’ll be off to a great start. See if you can increase the number of minutes every day. Over time, you’ll establish a healthy habit of rising early and beginning the day with a lovely clarity of mind.

You might also consider reciting Sanskrit mantras. A mantra helps us detach from our monkey-minds and focus on the highest vibrations.

If meditation and mantras are challenging, explore being in the present moment through mindfulness. Being mindful inspires peacefulness, clarity, and relaxation.

As a result of being mindful, you might experience improvements in your relationships, work dynamics, and physical health.

Plants and trees communicate, which demonstrates their consciousness. A Shutterstock Licensed Image.

Just like the love we receive from our mothers and grandmothers, nature is a life-giving, lovable, and powerful healer. Is this interconnectedness and interdependence born from nature’s pre-engineered biology, or is there a type of plant consciousness? Are they sentient beings, with the ability to sense, feel, fathom, and communicate? The answer to this is more remarkable than you might imagine.

When we wander in the forest, we might be conscious of the abundant life around us. If we allow ourselves the opportunity, we might understand that when we walk among flowers and trees, our bodies, minds, and hearts are healed in some way. As we absorb the luscious beauty around us, somehow, with limited effort, we feel cleansed from head to toe. This is not just a feeling, it’s often a reality.

We see a robust and majestic pine tree, drenched in sunlight and surrounded by wet earth. Thirty feet away we see its equally vital twin in the shade, surrounded by dry soil. Scientists say that it’s not only that the twin tree has roots that will reach to the nearby wet ground for sustenance, it’s also that these two trees share nutrients and messages via an intricate underground network. This is why the tree in the shadows is as healthy as her sunlit neighbor.

“You Know What A Lima Bean Does When It’s Attacked By Spider Mites? It Releases A Volatile Chemical That Goes Out Into The World And Summons Another Species Of Mite That Comes In And Attacks The Spider Mite, Defending The Lima Bean. While We Have Consciousness, Toolmaking, And Language, Plants Have Biochemistry.” — Michael Pollan

Can Plants Feel Pain?

As far back as the 1980s, researchers like Frank Kühnemann at Germany’s Institute for Applied Physics at Bonn University, have worked to understand how plants communicate and about plant consciousness. It’s not airy-fairy curiosity that gave birth to this pursuit; it originally began to help farmers understand why their crops soured when stored in local silos or during intercontinental transport to foreign nurseries.

Originally developed by scientists at the Catholic University of Nijmegen in the Netherlands and later improved-upon by The Institute for Applied Physics, a unique acoustic device was built to evaluate plants’ stress levels by measuring the energies of ethylene gas molecules provoked with lasers.

During harvesting, cultivation, drought, and after exposure to salt, poor ozone quality and cold air, plants emit ethylene gas. While they emit the gas when being eaten, attacked, or cut, they also emit the same levels of ethylene when their fruit is ripe.

That amazing smell after you cut your lawn?
It’s the result of the grass reacting to being cut.

The German acoustic device determines the stress level of the plant by converting the levels of ethylene gas into corresponding sound waves. This helps us understand the levels of “pain” and stress the plants are experiencing and about plant consciousness.

Acoustics-based research surrounding plants has given farming a boost. More specifically, it’s helped farmers understand that storing apples with other crops can damage the other crops. This research also points to the stress that plants experience during travel, given certain types of plant-based traveling companions.

The results of these experiments, and many since, have shown us plants can respond and react to their experiences. They can also remember and learn from their experiences and can make adjustments based on what they’ve learned. Plants emit gases and chemicals into the soil around them, and send messages through their roots to nearby plants. Suffice it to say that the world of plants is mind-blowing.

“Never Go To A Doctor Whose Office Plants Have Died.”
— Erma Bombeck

Do Plants Have Feelings?

When hearing that plants react and feel “pain,” your heart might fill with compassion and empathy. You might want to start a new organization aimed at protecting plants from cruelty! Certainly a noble pursuit.
While there are similarities among humans, animals, and plants, it’s important to consider that a plant’s purpose and systems are mostly dissimilar to those of humans and animals. When a human feels pain, they cry.
When plants are cut or stored alongside rotting apples, they emit ethylene gas. This doesn’t mean the plant doesn’t feel pain, it means we have a lot to learn about the nature of plants, especially as it relates to the notion of suffering.

It’s probable that plants don’t suffer in the same way humans and animals suffer and plants don’t feel the same way humans and animals feel. It’s certainly a lovely notion that at least one part of the earth’s ecosystem might be saved from a measure of suffering.

While humans, animals, and plants all have unique systems for connecting and each has a distinct cry for help, plants don’t have the same cortex and therefore, do not think and feel in the same way humans and animals do. It’s within thinking that emotions arise. And it’s during the expression of emotions that we understand when a creature is in pain. That said, plants clearly have their own thinking and feeling systems, many of which we have yet to understand.

It begs the question, what is a vegan to do? If my cucumber can feel my bite, should I become a Breatharian? For now, vegans should probably continue to eat vegetables, but feel free to be more loving and grateful when you bite into them!

Can Plants Communicate?

Although it started with the exploration of what seemed to be an insane premise, plants, just like humans and animals, can be shy or aggressive, connected or reclusive, and givers, receivers, or both. Upon certain conditions, plants will also warn their neighbors about impending attacks, problems, and the abundance and depletion of nutrients within the plant’s network.

Science seems to agree. According to Velemir Ninkovic, an ecologist at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, “Plants … use signals to avoid competing situations and to prepare for future competition.”

“God Sleeps In The Minerals, Awakens In Plants, Walks In Animals, And Thinks In Man.” — Arthur Young

Are Plants Sentient?

According to Kenneth Worth, Ph.D., “Plants produce serotonin, GABA, and melatonin, which act as hormones and neurotransmitters in animal brains, though it’s not yet known what they do in plants. Intriguingly, drugs such as Prozac, Ritalin, and amphetamines can disrupt these “neurotransmitters” in plants.” Putting all the pieces together, here’s what plants can do:

• Grow with proper nutrition
• Send messages and friend requests
• Sense the need for nutrients in other plants
• Share nutrients with other plants, even as far as 30 meters away
• Send out electric distress signals
• Sense light
• Encourage neighbors to grow in ways that will help save them
• Communicate using gases and chemical secretions in the soil
• Emit measurable sounds
• Send out signals to denote proximity to other plants
• React, Remember & Learn
• Produce Serotonin, GABA & Melatonin, which act like hormones in human beings

Related to the above, if we can give plants even the slightest benefit of the doubt, it must be probable that plants are sentient.

What Do You Feel Around Plants?

While the scientific and hippie ideologies surrounding plants might not always be aligned, what’s most important is what we each feel and sense around plants. Do you talk to your plants? Do you touch them with love? Whether you’re an academic researcher, holistic healer, or magical wizard living in another realm, plants give us oxygen, life, colors and vibrations, all of which provide measurable benefits.
Plant Research In India And China

In 1962, Dr. T.C. Singh, the head of Botany at an Indian University, concluded that plants exposed to music experienced accelerated growth. He also found that the violin provided the most value in this area. Other scientists over time have concluded that classical music has a profound effect on plants’ health. Dr. Singh also found that barefoot, traditional Indian dancing in the same room as the plants caused them to flower two weeks earlier than previously recorded.

Physicist and Indian plant physiologist Sir Jagadis Chandra Bose, concluded after decades of researching the effects of environments on plants that, like humans, plants are sensitive to noise and nurturance. He also concluded that plants feel pain and understand affection.

In China’s Fujian Province, farmers claim their crop yields increased, and grain size significantly improved when using sound systems to play Buddhist chants in and around their fields. It seems undeniable that plants are sensitive in similar ways to humans and animals. Even with gaps in scientific research, there appears to be consensus around the notion that plants sense, feel, fathom, and communicate.

It’s humbling and exciting to learn about the expansive natures and abilities of plants. It’s also surprising and illuminating to learn about the parallels between plants and human/animal behaviors.

Enjoy and connect with your plants, receive their rich abundance when wandering in the forest, and share your love with all living Beings in your life.