Living with a Mum on a Mindfulness Mission

I’m sure, like me, those of you of a certain age were very happy to see Cold Feet return to our screens again recently.

The series didn’t disappoint with warmth and humour in abundance.  In addition, the story line given to Jon Thomson’s character Pete revolved around the serious theme of mental health, and more specifically someone who was dealing with depression.  However, the show gave it a lighter slant when Pete tried Mindfulness.  Though it was a fairly stereotypical portrayal of the practices (the raisin scene had me in stitches while the snippet of the class left me cringing), it was good to see it being publicised on mainstream TV.   Although Pete found Mindfulness really helpful, his wife Jenny was less convinced, and it left me wondering how my husband really views my attachment to living mindfully.

So I thought I’d do some digging and ask him a few questions.  Here is the first attempt:

Me: What does Mindfulness mean to you?

Him:  Something to do with raisins?

Me:  Initially how did you view Mindfulness?

Him:  As an excuse to lie down.

Me: What do you consider the impact on family life of a one of the parents practicing Mindfulness?

Him:  More childcare duties for the other one.

Me:  Has Mindfulness noticeably changed me since practicing it?

Him:  Yes – see my previous answer.

Me:  Do you think Mindfulness has changed you?  How important does formal mindful meditative practice seem?

Yes – see above.  Very – I need to an excuse to lie down too……

Mmmm I could see this wasn’t going the way I had envisaged, and as I feared, though outwardly very supportive of my attachment to mindful living I did appear to have a sceptic on my hands.

So I went away (took some deep breaths!) and then tried again.

This time round after being bribed with beer to take the ‘interview’ seriously I got some interesting responses which encouraged me to continue my mission to practice mindfulness as much as a busy Mum possibly can.  Here are his more thoughtful answers:

Me: What does Mindfulness mean to you?

Him:  Living in the present moment and not getting too bound up in negative thoughts and worries  (Me:  oooooh so you have been listening to me a bit!)

Me:  Initially how did you view Mindfulness?

Him:  To start with I thought it was some kind of meditation practice that offered someone a rest from the day.  Now I can see that it is more than that and can offer a great range of benefits.

Me: What do you consider the impact on family life of one of the parents practicing Mindfulness?

Him:  It has certainly helped bring more calmness more often to our home.  I also think it has influenced how we speak to, and interact with the children, and each other (Me:  this is sounding more promising :-))

Me:  Has Mindfulness noticeably changed me since I have been practicing it?

Him:  Yes – you are calmer, more content and seem more resilient (Me:  Ahhhhh that’s nice that you have noticed….)

Me:  Do you think Mindfulness has changed you?  How important does formal mindful meditative practice seem to be to you?

Him:  Although I haven’t done any formal training or practice I’ve seen how much it has helped you.  If you do a guided body scan last thing at night then I tend to follow it too (Me:  Yay – I knew it, I knew you were listening too).   I’m trying to apply some of the principles to home and work life now – mostly to help bring patience, focus and positivity to more challenging situations.

From reading some of your posts and articles you’ve shared it’s reminded me of some of the things I previously took from sport – being in the moment, playful, present, and focused.  As I no longer do sport seriously (Me:  funny that – with 3 kids to look after…) it took me back to considering the fundamentals of high-performance and how to apply these to my work as it can sometimes be high pressured and there is time when stress needs to be managed.  Though I can see the formal meditations are important for some people, Mindfulness is having a positive impact on me without really doing many.

In fact I actually went to a session on Mindfulness at work which was really well attended and very interesting so clearly it’s not just you who thinks it’s any good!  (Me:  Wow! I hadn’t really realised you’d been thinking of Mindfulness in this way…)

Me:  So back to the inspiration for this post – are you Pete or Jenny?

Him:  I’m a Penny!!!! (Me:  Ha, ha, ha – I’ll take that as a win!)

To me this seems incredibly positive and hopefully shows the benefits, for a whole family, of even just one person practicing mindfulness in the household.

If my hubby can be persuaded to the benefits of Mindfulness then it it my belief that lots of people can.