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Mindfulness for Dummies
Breathe deep, declutter your mind, and start leading a healthier, happier life
The worry won't stop. You're feeling stressed out, the day-to-day seems overwhelming, and it seems difficult to do the simplest things. How can you escape this continual negative feedback loop? Mindfulness is the answer.
Practiced by millions of people worldwide, mindfulness puts you back in a healthy relationship with yourself by teaching techniques that allow you to maintain a moment-by-moment awareness of your thoughts, feelings, and environment.
Clear your mind of distracting thoughts Focus on breathing and other self-control techniques Change the wiring and makeup of your brain Free yourself from the stress With this expert, easy-to-follow guide, there's never been a better time to get to grips with mindfulness and the many ways it can help you lead a happier, healthier life.
The worry won't stop. You're feeling stressed out, the day-to-day seems overwhelming, and it seems difficult to do the simplest things. How can you escape this continual negative feedback loop? Mindfulness is the answer.
Practiced by millions of people worldwide, mindfulness puts you back in a healthy relationship with yourself by teaching techniques that allow you to maintain a moment-by-moment awareness of your thoughts, feelings, and environment.
Clear your mind of distracting thoughts Focus on breathing and other self-control techniques Change the wiring and makeup of your brain Free yourself from the stress With this expert, easy-to-follow guide, there's never been a better time to get to grips with mindfulness and the many ways it can help you lead a happier, healthier life.
400 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2010
263 people are currently reading
1564 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 58 reviews
December 26, 2012
I would recommend going to Chapter 7 and get the "Mini Meditation" down and then read this excellent book. I wondered, "What is Mindfulness exactly" when I found this book in the library. My sleep quality is sometimes plagued with waking and having difficulty in getting back to sleep. No more! Just doing the mini meditation which theoretically takes just 3 minutes results in me going back to sleep always before I get to the last stage. I found many gems in this very readable book. I plan on buying a copy to refer to when my non-directed thinking gets ruminative and too much in the past or the future.
June 26, 2011
Although it gets a bit repetitive at times, this certainly is a must-read for those wanting a good introduction to mindfulness. I'm working on the 8 week program (I'm currently on week 2) and it's been the best thing I've done for myself on a loooooooong time.
January 14, 2018
Try the CD. Pulp the book.
October 14, 2013
I've thoroughly enjoyed M for D - another from the excellent series of books.
There's everything in here one needs to know to create a happier, healthier, more peaceful 'present moment' existence - and lots of fun exercises along the way to try out and see for yourself. The meditation CD is great too.
Mindfulness is all about gratitude for the way things are now, seeing the world with fresh eyes, and investing love and awareness into even the most mundane tasks. It really works too - it's free, and you don't even have to 'try' to do anything.
For anyone looking for more happiness and contentment in life (and who wouldn't be), this book is certainly a great place to start.
There's everything in here one needs to know to create a happier, healthier, more peaceful 'present moment' existence - and lots of fun exercises along the way to try out and see for yourself. The meditation CD is great too.
Mindfulness is all about gratitude for the way things are now, seeing the world with fresh eyes, and investing love and awareness into even the most mundane tasks. It really works too - it's free, and you don't even have to 'try' to do anything.
For anyone looking for more happiness and contentment in life (and who wouldn't be), this book is certainly a great place to start.
May 15, 2011
In my search for peace of mind (literally) I started looking for ways to teach myself how to meditate. Needless to say, I'm a person who has very very hard time at being still, and focusing. This book just might have changed my view on meditation all around.
Written in layman's terms, this book was concise, and full of humor. I would suggest this book to anyone who is looking for a new way to look at life. :)
Written in layman's terms, this book was concise, and full of humor. I would suggest this book to anyone who is looking for a new way to look at life. :)
June 17, 2013
This book gave many detailed descriptions of different mindfulness exercises you could do. It was focused on the actual meditation, and less on the philosophy part of meditation. That I liked.
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January 10, 2023Twee jaar geleden gelezen toen ik overspannen was. Daarna nooit meer overspannen geweest.
November 3, 2014
This book cause a lot of reflection.
I have now read a small number of books on mindfulness. From my perspective it is the current fad within therapeutic circles (Just as ACT was 5 years ago, DBT 15 years ago, and CBT 20 years ago).
It speaks negatively of rumination, and positively of meditation. On the one hand it describes a mindful state as emptying you mind, whilst then saying you get your most creative and best ideas whilst being mindful. WTF!!!
Anyway, as a Mental Health Clinician I think mindfulness is a very useful tool, like all the other tools it is not the only answer. Sometimes distraction is just as valid of a technique. Even the Dali Lama is his book "The Art of Happiness", said if you have tried meditating and other techniques to resolve trauma (and you have not found these effective), in the end you should just try to forget about it.
The Mental states described as being mindful, are quite similar to the mental states I find myself in whilst I am exercising. Even this book states you don't have to sit there and navel gaze to be mindful. I actually enjoy the state that I describe as ruminating, just letting my thoughts flow. It is in these ruminating states I find my best ideas. I am coming to suspect that rumination and meditation are just the opposite of the same coin (like tenacity vs stubbornness). Ruminating is no more bad than meditating. Mindfulness theorist would agree, because a great aspect of mindfulness is the suspension of judgement, and allowing things just to be.
I suspect that mindfulness, will join the others as another mental health clinicians tool, which is OK. No tool is going to work all the time on all life's problems. A great result is the ability to help some of the people some of the time.
Then again I am by nature a skeptic who is most skeptical of whatever is popular.
I have now read a small number of books on mindfulness. From my perspective it is the current fad within therapeutic circles (Just as ACT was 5 years ago, DBT 15 years ago, and CBT 20 years ago).
It speaks negatively of rumination, and positively of meditation. On the one hand it describes a mindful state as emptying you mind, whilst then saying you get your most creative and best ideas whilst being mindful. WTF!!!
Anyway, as a Mental Health Clinician I think mindfulness is a very useful tool, like all the other tools it is not the only answer. Sometimes distraction is just as valid of a technique. Even the Dali Lama is his book "The Art of Happiness", said if you have tried meditating and other techniques to resolve trauma (and you have not found these effective), in the end you should just try to forget about it.
The Mental states described as being mindful, are quite similar to the mental states I find myself in whilst I am exercising. Even this book states you don't have to sit there and navel gaze to be mindful. I actually enjoy the state that I describe as ruminating, just letting my thoughts flow. It is in these ruminating states I find my best ideas. I am coming to suspect that rumination and meditation are just the opposite of the same coin (like tenacity vs stubbornness). Ruminating is no more bad than meditating. Mindfulness theorist would agree, because a great aspect of mindfulness is the suspension of judgement, and allowing things just to be.
I suspect that mindfulness, will join the others as another mental health clinicians tool, which is OK. No tool is going to work all the time on all life's problems. A great result is the ability to help some of the people some of the time.
Then again I am by nature a skeptic who is most skeptical of whatever is popular.
June 24, 2014
The book I read to research this post was Mindfulness For Dummies by Shamash Alldina which is an excellent book which I bought from kindle. This book is a sort of introduction to Mindful-Meditation and Mindfulness and if you are interested in exploring this subject, this is a great book. Mindfulness is about enjoying mundane or apparently mundane things in life like eating which can actually be very enjoyable experiences when you focus on it. With eating you would chew the food thoroughly, taste it and explore the texture etc. When you think of it, it is amazing we are alive and in this wonderful universe and mindfulness is about appreciating this. Even though mindfulness focuses on sensations and senses people who suffered chronic pain have reported mindfulness training helped lessen the sensations of pain and improve the ability to cope with it. They have done brain scans on Buddhist monks doing compassion meditation and scientists couldn't believe how positive their thought patterns were. This has led scientists to believe things like compassion and positivity are learnt rather than hard wired in our brains. Mindfulness tends to be associated with Buddhism and in particular Zen Buddhism because there are quite a few different types of the religion. This book is over 300 pages so is a decent length and I really enjoyed reading it. An interesting benefit of eating mindfully is you should just eat what you require and it will put you in touch with your mind and body so you won't need to worry about things like dieting. It can help you achieve your ideal weight and it is similar with animals which just eat what and when they require.
September 20, 2017
Very informative and accessible to a Westerner with little to no exposure to Eastern mindset. This book presents several techniques for practicing meditation in a secular (non-religious) way, as well as suggestions for practicing mindfulness and bringing the "beginner's mind" into day to day life. I read the 2nd edition with CD. I found the included meditations to be very good, with most of them between 5 and 10 minutes long... the perfect length for me. The body scan, on the other hand, was 32 minutes long and, in my opinion, too long for a beginner's book.
Aside from that, the book has lots of practical suggestions, which I appreciate. This is the kind of book I underlined, paper-clipped, and tabbed. I feel like now that I've read through from beginning to end, I'll probably re-read it again, picking out chapters that specifically apply to whatever is going on in my life.
While it does touch briefly on Buddhism, it mainly focuses on the practical application of meditation and mindfulness in a general sense. If you want something more transcendent, pair this book with Thich Nhat Hanh's The Miracle of Mindfulness, or Shinryu Suzuki's Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind for a more spiritual flavor.
Aside from that, the book has lots of practical suggestions, which I appreciate. This is the kind of book I underlined, paper-clipped, and tabbed. I feel like now that I've read through from beginning to end, I'll probably re-read it again, picking out chapters that specifically apply to whatever is going on in my life.
While it does touch briefly on Buddhism, it mainly focuses on the practical application of meditation and mindfulness in a general sense. If you want something more transcendent, pair this book with Thich Nhat Hanh's The Miracle of Mindfulness, or Shinryu Suzuki's Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind for a more spiritual flavor.
March 20, 2013
A very practical guide to mindfulness. I would recommend to anyone who might be scared off by more "spiritual" approaches to meditation. As a bonus, the CD contains guided meditations read in the most mellifluous voice! Because of his British accent, my husband and I have nicknamed Shamash Alidina "the meditation gecko."
December 6, 2012
This book was great. Very easy to read for the beginner or for someone who has done some mindfulness training. I lent the book to my daughter's school counselor and she used the CD and teaching often for the kids at school.
February 12, 2012
I'm going to write a review for Wildmind for this book, check out wildmind.
June 19, 2012
A good all round guide to mindfulness with lots of tips and advice on how to fit it into a Western life.
August 6, 2012
Easy to read, easy to understand and easy to take some advice in searching of finding the inner peace trough meditation.
August 18, 2013
A quick read but good introduction to the practice of mindfulness based on a stress reduction study done at UMass, so this is a proven method, not snake oil.
July 25, 2012
It is the first 'dummies' book I have read. Surprisingly good.
August 23, 2020
As other books from the (For Dummies) series, I really like how they cover a topic almost from A to Z, giving me a great overview about something I usually knew very little about and also include helpful tips about what I can do with the knowledge I gained.
The book is big, 300+ pages, I read it over the course of 6 months, which gave me an opportunity to digest what I read, apply it and then continue reading it. It's full of mindful exercises and things you can try. It helped me understand some concepts I had hard time to fully understand and live like the "being" mode vs "doing" mode. It helped me connect to the present moment with my all senses instead of thinking either about the past or the future. I learned about mindful eating and I now enjoy my eating time more. It also helped me commit to regular meditation routine which is helping me deal with my thoughts.
I really recommend that book, and as mentioned in the book, it can be a good read along with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy after making some progress in the therapy. It can be hard to digest what in this book at the peak of depression for example.
The book is big, 300+ pages, I read it over the course of 6 months, which gave me an opportunity to digest what I read, apply it and then continue reading it. It's full of mindful exercises and things you can try. It helped me understand some concepts I had hard time to fully understand and live like the "being" mode vs "doing" mode. It helped me connect to the present moment with my all senses instead of thinking either about the past or the future. I learned about mindful eating and I now enjoy my eating time more. It also helped me commit to regular meditation routine which is helping me deal with my thoughts.
I really recommend that book, and as mentioned in the book, it can be a good read along with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy after making some progress in the therapy. It can be hard to digest what in this book at the peak of depression for example.
September 12, 2018
The good reference book for mindfulness and practice of it. Some of the mini-stories in the book are inspiring. The book advises avoiding the systems which make meditation farther away from us. It says anybody can meditate anywhere and can be mindful. The role of intention to be mindful is very important. There are just two critics about the book. Former is the book sometimes refers to scientific researches but rarely explicitly show the source. We trust the author but sometimes we need to see the origin of research. Latter is in the last chapters I felt a self-repeating. There was no flow. However, all chapter is good reference when the reader needs to understand practices.
November 20, 2019
As I was expecting, there are too many contradictions in this book. When it comes to happiness, unsurprisingly, these kinds of books do not manage covering the topic in a proper way, since they're only written to satisfy expectations of people with sorrows... For instance, the story of cracked pot and the story of the lion cub grew among the sheep give totally different messages in terms of self-acceptance.
In brief, as a person who has been eagerly pondering over anxiety and the ways to cope with it for a long time, although I cannot deny the possibility that this book can help some reduce their sorrows and fears, I have to say that I found it unrealistic.
In brief, as a person who has been eagerly pondering over anxiety and the ways to cope with it for a long time, although I cannot deny the possibility that this book can help some reduce their sorrows and fears, I have to say that I found it unrealistic.
January 4, 2024
I found a mistake in this book.
This line is mistake. " Love is a powerful attitude."
There is no teaching about "Love" in Buddhism.
It is important to have compassion for all life in the universe.
Same as "Meditation For Dummies 4th Edition", this book explains the benefits of meditation.
The Buddha, the originator of meditation, who was born in the year 2600, told his disciples that to experience its benefits, they must practice it.
Rather than reading a hundred books on meditation, he told them to actually try it.
He said that if you do meditation, you will discover that this world is "impermanent".
This line is mistake. " Love is a powerful attitude."
There is no teaching about "Love" in Buddhism.
It is important to have compassion for all life in the universe.
Same as "Meditation For Dummies 4th Edition", this book explains the benefits of meditation.
The Buddha, the originator of meditation, who was born in the year 2600, told his disciples that to experience its benefits, they must practice it.
Rather than reading a hundred books on meditation, he told them to actually try it.
He said that if you do meditation, you will discover that this world is "impermanent".
March 1, 2021
I've heard about Mindfulness a lot, and the only thing I knew was that it was like some kind of meditation.
With this book I finally learn exactly what it is, what's it for, and how to apply it to my life. It contains several exercises to bring conciousness to your life and not letting anxiousness, anger, nor other bad feelings take control of you at a certain time, hence, living a peaceful life full of compasion and understanding of yourself and the ones around you, as well as some others to appreciatte more the good times and even the smallest things.
With this book I finally learn exactly what it is, what's it for, and how to apply it to my life. It contains several exercises to bring conciousness to your life and not letting anxiousness, anger, nor other bad feelings take control of you at a certain time, hence, living a peaceful life full of compasion and understanding of yourself and the ones around you, as well as some others to appreciatte more the good times and even the smallest things.
August 23, 2018
I initially laughed when I saw this book “be more relaxed you Dummy!”.
However 2 chapters in I had a pad and pen and was making notes.
This covers Mindfulness practices, getting started, meditation tips and combating chronic pain, parenting, anxiety, anger etc.
A book to read slowly and if you really do want a more mindful life I recommend doing each practical exercise.
However 2 chapters in I had a pad and pen and was making notes.
This covers Mindfulness practices, getting started, meditation tips and combating chronic pain, parenting, anxiety, anger etc.
A book to read slowly and if you really do want a more mindful life I recommend doing each practical exercise.
August 10, 2024
Personnellement je trouve que c est le livre de référence pour la méditation pleine conscience. Fais lgtps que je me cherchais un bouquin pour mieux apprendre la méditation et j ai trouvé avec ce livre ce que je cherchais. Je l ai emprunté à la bibliothèque mais c est un livre que je veux me procurer éventuellement comme ouvrage de référence.
La phrase que je retiens le plus: mes pensées ne sont pas des faits :)
La phrase que je retiens le plus: mes pensées ne sont pas des faits :)
July 21, 2020
easy read! it was hard to access the audios but i would just read the meditation in the book and then try a mini version out for myself. theres a lot of good info in it and really breaks down mindfulness
August 14, 2017
I read the version without the cd (ebook version) it was short and a great place to start....
November 16, 2017
Too repetitive but has some good things
January 7, 2019
Some really good and useful information for living in the present. I will try to adhere to some of the advice on a daily basis.
June 20, 2019
probably a good place to start if you are completely new to mindfulness, the chapters are brief and to the point. the book covers a wide range of topics but i found it to be very repetitive.
March 22, 2022
ik ga deze nooit aflezen het is net een schoolboek.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 58 reviews