Mindfulness Classes With Oli Doyle

Life is a mirror, reflecting your inner world back at you. If you're lost in anger, the world will show you anger. If you're caught up in judgement, the world will give you these back too.

So when something seems to push your buttons, this is a very good thing. It is an opportunity to discover who you are.

It is rare that Hollywood is enlightening, but this line from one of Jack Nicholson's great roles speaks to the paradox of human existence; We live as if the future will be better than now, but no-one has ever been there.

Watch the news tonight and you will hear it, see it, feel it, we are waiting. We are anticipating. We are planning ahead. It might be more beneficial for us and the planet if we stopped asking "What will the future be like?" and instead considered this question:

"If today was humanity's last day, how would we treat this moment?"

How would you answer?

Today is a story day at my house. At times like these, we all get caught up (at least a bit), in those stressful stories spun so exquisitely by the mind. I can see it happening in others, and I feel it happening in me; the mind is in charge a little more than usual.

I know this, because my friend stress tells me so, and the mind has a story about that too. This story says "Stress is bad, you should be present so the stress goes away."

What I notice is that, when I follow this story, I resist what is (stress) and I feel the normal effects of that resistance (more stress). I try to get rid of it and the old 'What you resist persists' law seems to kick in.

But luckily, a few years back, I discovered an alternative. I noticed that, when I allow the feeling, embrace it even, I come straight back to the present. The stress then becomes just another part of now, like the breath, or the birds singing.

Treat stress like a friend and it becomes one. And today I wanted to share this simple but powerful way to make stress a force for good in your life.

Knowledge has the power to improve our lives incredibly. Equally it can kill the mystery of life by reducing this unpredictable world to a series of quantifiable parts.

Or so it seems.

In reality, you NEVER know what will happen next, and you can never explain anything. You can tell a story about it, but there is no concrete truth.

There are two choices once you understand this; you can hide from the mystery, or you can embrace it. Today the choice is yours.

Listening to the radio today I was struck by a feature of the human mind; the search for the new and familiar. This sounds like a paradox, but in fact we tend to seek experiences that feel new and exciting, within the realm of the familiar.

Just like the 'new' pop songs that sound familiar enough that millions love them straight away, in life we humans want to be stimulated, but safe.

In the practice of mindfulness, this has a couple of implications: first, it is easy to ignore the familiar, to zone out in everyday life. Second, it can lead us to lose our curiosity, our freshness for the new.

In the life of a mindfulness student, every breath is different. Every day is completely unlike any other. And time is a practicality, not a reality.

Join me today on a mind-ending journey and you might come to see the beauty, the excitement and the joy contained in every ordinary instant.

Picture a wild, heaving nightclub in Brazil. The music is electrifying, the mood is intense and the dancefloor is heaving. And you? Why you're standing against the wall.

You see, you are much too busy thinking to dance, there is too much to figure out. Why is the music so loud? What if there is a fire? And what will everyone think of me if I don't dance just right?

Life is a wild, crazy nightclub, and most people are holding the wall. If you want to get in the mix, today's class is for you.

Life energy is pulsing through all of us all the time, but the mind numbs our awareness.

Today, I will show you how to listen to your body from the inside, boost your immune system and sharpen your present moment awareness.

When I was a kid, everyone told me to think about my future. They convinced me (for a while), that this was the way to be happy: plan ahead, work hard, succeed, feel good.

And so we have the 5 year plan, the 10 year blueprint, which is completely upside down. It's a trade off: forgo happiness now, and you can have it later, but what if you don't survive until later?

Today is all about flipping the usual approach on its head and doing something radically different: thinking about how you want to live today and trusting that the future will take care of itself.

This approach is radical, freeing, and it might just save the human race.

Today I feel tension in my jaw, my thoughts are running a little bit faster and I know who's to blame. It's their fault.

You know them right? They do things that are unfair, unjust and illogical. They are selfish, irrational and stupid. And they're everywhere!

Luckily, my happiness is no-one else's business (although I forget this sometimes!) My peace is mine to enjoy or ignore, and today I choose to return there.

Join me for a simple practice that will refocus your attention, from the uncontrollable outer to the already peaceful inner. Maybe a billion people doing this, and I think we'll have world peace.

At the airport yesterday, I noticed something odd; everyone stood there, waiting in line, before the gate was even open...

Humans seem to have an in-built urge to "get there". Spend a few minutes watching people waiting in line and you can see it. Watch how we shuffle a few inches forward to get closer to the front, even though we know this shuffling makes no difference. Watch people driving faster to get to their holiday destination 5 minutes quicker, and listen to the language of progress and growth that dominates our economic culture.

Even better, take a look inside and notice what you are rushing toward, and see how this rushing decreses your quality of life.

Today's class is all about what happens when you focus on the journey and let the destination take care of itself.