Benefits of Mindfulness
Many people have a general idea of what mindfulness means; Merriam-Webster defines it as “the practice of maintaining a nonjudgmental state of heightened or complete awareness of one's thoughts, emotions, or experiences on a moment-to-moment basis”.
We might imagine a person meditating when we think of practicing mindfulness, but there are many ways to attain its scientifically proven benefits:
Movement-based practices such as yoga or tai chi.
Stillness work such as breath-work and meditation.
Non-traditional activities such as doing the dishes, raking a garden, or repairing a motorcycle.
It doesn’t matter how you express your practice, as long as you’re deciding to place your attention on one thing and sustaining that attention until your task is done.
Mindfulness practices are increasingly popular in schools due to their down-regulatory effects, which help young people feel calmer, lower their resting heart-rates, slow their breathing, reduce stress and anxiety, and manage difficult emotions such as anger or sadness. All of these outcomes combine to help their bodies and minds work more efficiently.
The immediate benefits of practicing mindfulness in school are obvious: a student’s grades are sure to suffer if they cannot control their attention. They may be easily distracted by their peers, or caught up thinking about a fight their parents had the night before. When the same child can harness the power of their mind and focus on the lesson plan at hand, it will yield significant gains in their academic scores.
Behavioral outcomes are also positively influenced by a mindfulness practice. Young people who present ADHD and ODD symptomatology (“acting out” behaviors) often display these dysregulated outcomes because they have unmanaged emotions, and lack the skills to regulate them. A mindfulness practice improves their ability to analyze and understand their emotions, leading to fewer negative outbursts, less frequent aggressive behavior, and healthier relationships with teachers and peers.
