Doing Vs Being

We grow up believing that we should be always doing something, we live in a time where we avoid boredom at all coasts and we are always in a continuous state of how we are not as we would like to be.

 

Our mind is brilliant and extremely useful: it gets things done, help us solving problems, allow us to achieve our goals, enable us to learn and memorize information, empower us to achieve our wildest dream. It’s no surprise it has so much power over us and in society. However we can get “stuck” on the goal-setting mood and it can be difficult to let go of expectations, comparisons or judgments of how things should be.

 

We operate in two basic modes, which are the reflection of core patterns in brain activity. These mental modes are the “doing mode” and the “being mode”.

Becoming aware of these mental modes can have a great impact on our life.

Mindfulness training is a way to learn how to become aware of our mode of mind at any moment, and gives us the skills to disengage from unhelpful modes of mind and to engage more helpful ones.

 

“Doing” mode

 

Our mind is basically goal-oriented, these goals can be related to our external world: tying our shoes, driving a car or a spaceship, building citys, or, in a more internal way our goals can be feeling happy, never feel guilty again, trying to be more kind.  


The basic strategy for achieving these goals is by reducing the gap of how things are and how we want them to be.

Dealing on how things are not as we want them to be can create a further negative mood. In this way, our attempts to solve a “problem” by endlessly thinking about it can keep us locked into the state of mind from which we are doing our best to escape.

 

There is nothing wrong with the doing mode. It is very efective in getting things done in the external world. But when we tempt to solve internal problems using the doing mode, things can go wrong, because we cannot sometimes find efective strategies or solutions to solve a particular situation. Sometimes the solution is just to accept and allow.

 

When the doing mode is working on internal, self-related goals, we can more accurately call it the “driven–doing” mode. Whenever there is a sense of “have to,” “must,” “should,” “ought,” or “need to,” we can suspect the presence of the driven-doing mode. Its most common feature is a recurring sense of unsatisfactoriness, reflecting the fact that the mind is focused on processing mismatches between how we need things to be and how they actually are.

Driven–doing mode also involves a sense of continuously monitoring and checking up on progress toward reducing the gap between these two states (“How well am I doing?”). Why? Because where no immediate action can be taken to reduce discrepancies, the only thing the mind can do is continue to work on its ideas about how things are and how they should be, in the hope of finding a way to reduce the gap between them. Over and over again.

In this situation, the mind works consists of thoughts about the current situation, desired expectation, explanations for the discrepancy between them and possible ways to reduce them, which leads to expirience thoughts and concepts as “real” instead of events of the mind.

 

Equally, the mind will not be fully tuned in to the full actuality of present experience. It will be so preoccupied with analyzing the past or anticipating the future that the present is given a low priority.

Driven–doing underlies many of our reactions to everyday emotional experiences—we habitually turn to this mode to free ourselves from many kinds of unwanted emotion.

 

 

“Beeing” mode

 

The being mode is not defined by achieving goals. In this mode there is no need to monotorize, evaluate, judge or compare. Instead, the focus of the being mode is “accepting” and “allowing” what is, instead of changing it.

“Allowing” arises naturally when there is no goal or standard to be reached, and no need to evaluate experience in order to reduce discrepancies between actual and desired states. And this means the present moment can be processed in its full. 

 

The being mode brings us a shift in our relation to thoughts and feelings: they are seen as passing events in the mind. They arise, become objects of awareness, and then pass away.

This gives us space to not be triggered by feelings and not react with habits of action trying to get rid of unpleasent feelings or hanging on to pleasent ones. There is a greater hability to deal with uncomfortable emotional states.  Thoughts of “I should do this, I have to do that” do not necessary link to related actions, we can see them simply as events on the mind.

 This brings a sense of freedom and freshness to life.

 

Both mental modes are useful to us. Learning to recognize in which mode our mind is operating can be extremely useful for a more meaningful and happier life.

 

Through mindfulness practices, we can actually observe how it feels to disengage from a busy mind and shift into “being” mode.

 

There are many benefits in trying to find a balance between doing and being. Learning how to access the being mode gives us the possibility of experiencing life in a direct way and we open up to the infinite possibilities, that usually we do not have because of our judgements or preferences.

 

At our retreats we teach you how to do that, and you'll learn by experience it.

 

You'll learn Mindfulness meditation basics and how to apply it in your life, how to listen to your body and tune in with what you feel. You'll learn to recognize autopilot and acting instead of reacting. 

This could be a life changing experience. A transformational experience that you will carry to your daily life. In the end of the retreat you will have the techniques to slow down, to engage with your breath, to raise your level of self awareness which will lead to confidence and self-love.

The program is based on enjoying the present moment giving you tools to relieve stress, stress management and to live a more present life. You will regain control of your life and make every moment count.

You'll learn new skills to take home with you and feel empowered and confident beyond our 6 days together.

 

In the meanwhile, take good care of you,

Manuela

 

 

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