Unfolding Now
Dorje M. Jennette | Doctor of PsychologyArchive for January, 2010
“I have a dream”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke these words in uncertain times. We commemorate him for contributing to tremendous progress in history. We honor his memory by doing what we can to maintain the momentum of progress his strength helped to push along.
Many may wonder what part of the dream remains unfulfilled. It’s easy to be unaware of ways in which some forms of injustice continue to prevail when one is not directly oppressed. For instance, even if one is aware of the large patterns of unequal access to opportunity that persist in American society, subtle forms of racism may escape notice (see this article).
We honor Dr. King’s memory by mindfully bringing attention to the injustice that is unfolding now and standing up for the dream of social justice that we share with Dr. King. For example, we can speak up when someone makes a joke at the expense of people who are not present or might not feel empowered to defend themselves. As Dr. King echoed, “Silence is the voice of complicity.” Even if speaking up involves some risk that people will misunderstand or flat-out disagree, we can draw upon the strength that Dr. King’s example gives us.
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Smart Focus
There’s so much going on in the world that it’s impossible to pay attention to everything. How do we select our focus of attention?
Because much of our lives have to do with other people, we naturally turn much of our attention to social interactions. However, even within the realm of our social lives, there is too much information for our capacity of attention to handle at once.
Unfortunately, many of us become overly stressed by selectively focusing on negative social interactions, such as indifference, criticism, or rejection. In fact, some people tend to misperceive neutral or ambiguous interactions as rejection. This negative bias in attention is not an accurate representation of the world, and causes tremendous stress.
Recently, researchers published studies in the prestigious Journal of Personality and Social Psychology that showed that people can significantly reduce their stress levels by playing an attention-training game for five minutes per day for one week. The game can help people cope in a world in which it is impossible to please everyone.
Researchers showed that the game even works for people who work in one of the most rejection-filled occupations, telemarketing. Those randomly assigned to play the game instead of a similar game had significantly lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol. You can play the game here.
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Going Green
An understanding of mindfulness involves not only expanding awareness of experiences occurring internally, but also developing an openness to perceiving what is happening in the world we inhabit. In fact, it’s a false dichotomy to separate internal experiences from external experiences.
The oxygen we depend upon is mostly supplied by plants that transform the carbon dioxide we exhale. Although some cultures value developing independence, we actually are interdependent to an extent that it makes sense to consider the interests of our environment.
The next breath becomes an opportunity to develop an awareness of how connected we are to the plants that provided the oxygen in that breath. Enhanced awareness is an opportunity to care for the world that, in turn, supports us.
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