Mindfulness and Meditation

With the advancement of technology, people have a lot more access to information than just a few years ago. As a result, it is very common to suffer from information overload. It is not uncommon to feel that your head is full of thoughts, and you are unable to stop and bring clarity to what truly matters.

With this excess, it has become customary to suffer from stress and anxiety. In his book, “Data Smog,” journalist David Shenk estimates that a week’s worth of today’s New York Times has the amount of information that a person in the past century encountered over their entire lifetime. There was no time to evolve biologically to assimilate all these stimuli. Is it any wonder that we have this feeling of not knowing where to focus?

In his book “21 lessons for the 21st century”, Yuval Harari quotes a phrase that illustrates this moment in history very well: “In a world deluged by irrelevant information, clarity is power.” Taking this context into account, tools are needed to deal with the challenges of modern life. Mindfulness and Meditation are such tools. So, what is the difference between them?

Previously, when we defined Mindfulness, click here to read, we talked about the ability to maintain concentration, attention, and focus in every moment, about being present and aware in everything you do.

Meditation, on the other hand, goes beyond Mindfulness and occurs when one sustains concentration long enough to truly silence the mind, which may lead to obtaining insights into one’s life. It is when you have clarity of emotions, thoughts, and behaviors.

Mindfulness would be the way, the attention, the concentration. Meditation, on the other hand, is when the mind is silent, and there is nothing else in that moment that bothers you.

There are techniques for training and simple exercises to do every day. Look for some of them here in the coming weeks.