Mindfulness in Psychotherapy
DBT SkillsAt some level, all the other skills require mindfulness, which is, requires the ability to pay attention. There are a lot of different definitions of mindfulness. So you gotta remember that. Okay. So if you have mindfulness, in psychology, for example, when mindfulness is in psychology, you're talking about the practice of paying attention. The practice of focusing your mind. And-- so it's really helping you to be able to stay attentive to one thing at a time.
It doesn't mean they can't then switch to something else, but it's really a practice in effect between you and your mind. Okay. So that's sort of the psychological meaning of it. Then there's an entire other meaning of it, which is spiritual. And then the spiritual meaning of mindfulness, It's where you're practicing becoming one. Okay. So that's basically what practice is. It's based on the notion that all of us are one.
In other words, we're all attached to each other, were one with each other. The universe itself is one. And then mindfulness in that particular practice is you're trying to practice the experience of oneness. You can't make yourself experience that, but you're paying attention to that. So it really has to do in spiritual and psychology, the idea of focusing the mind.
And what you're trying to do is focus it without trying to change it. So mindfulness always has a characteristic of observing without changing it. Without trying to make it be whatever it is you want it to be. You just allow it to be whatever it is. You notice it, experience it, and keep going.