001hello and thank you so much for joining us for the Atlantic County Institute of Technology's parent University today's edition is on mindfulness many people ask themselves the question what is mindfulness well mindfulness is the basic human ability for us to be fully present aware of where we are and what we are doing and trying our best not to be overly reactive or overwhelmed by what is going on around us well mindfulness is something that we all naturally possess as humans it's more readily available to us when we practice it on a daily basis whenever you bring awareness to what you're directly experiencing via your senses or to your state of mind by acknowledging your thoughts and emotions your being mindful and there's growing research showing that when you train your brain to be mindful you're
002actually remodeling the physical structure of your brain for the positive the goal of mindfulness is to wake up to the inter workings of our mental emotional and physical process you might also be asking yourself what is meditation meditation is exploring it's not a fixed destination your head doesn't become vacuumed free of thought utterly undistracted meditation is a special place where each and every moment is momentous when we meditate we venture into the workings of our minds our sensations may be air blowing on our skin or a harsh smell wafting into the room or the way that we feel maybe we love this moment or we dislike this or maybe we are craving something or we are thinking negatively about something and sometimes our thoughts something like wouldn't it be weird if an elephant was walking
003down the street playing a trumpet [Music] mindfulness meditation asks us to suspend our personal judgment and unleash our natural curiosity about the workings of the mind approaching our experiences with warmth and kindness to ourselves and others it's very easy to begin your own practice in mindfulness and meditation mindfulness is available to us in every moment of every day whether through meditation and body scans or mindful moment practices like taking time to pause and breathe when the phone rings instead of rushing to answer it we have the tools within us to get through anything that stands in our way I invite you to take a deep breath in through your nose exhale it out of your mouth and take everything one moment at a time we will get through this together