In week 6 of the MBSR course, we continue our focus on awareness, specifically around identifying our attitudes accurately and noticing our behaviors. Participants share what came up for them in the previous week as we continued our mindfulness practices. We talk about the difficult conversation assignment. The discussion is around key questions we were asked to be aware of when noticing we were in a difficult conversation. For example:
How did the difficulty come about?
What did you really want from the person or situation? What did you actually get?
What did the other person what? What did they actually get?
How did you feel during and after this time?
Have you resolved this issue yet? How?
The insights that come out of the dialogue and engagement from all participants are remarkable. Some realize their behaviors were not in alignment with what they wanted. Some realize they don’t actually have a great vocabulary around how to express their feelings. Some realize they weren’t even present at some point in the conversation.
We do a few mindfulness practices.
We bring back the event of the difficult conversation as a mindfulness practice. What do you notice? Where did you feel this in your body? If you are tension now, can you let this go?
The home practice or fieldwork is to alternate in between Sitting Meditation with the Body Scan Recording (which you can find on the teamofgreats website under resources) and/or the standing or lying down yoga recordings.
We then spend time talking about the all-day virtual retreat. What to bring? What to expect? How long?
We conclude with a brief Awareness of Breath meditation.
This is it.
