“MINDFULNESS” by Ellen J. Langer

Last year, I thought I had Mindfulness figured out.
It was 2011 when I learned for the first time about the concept of Mindfulness in Andy Puddicombe’s book, and I was hooked. In my quest to understand and practice it, I went to “The School of Life” course and read about Buddhism. I also discovered the books written by Thich Nat Hanh, Pema Chödrön, and J. Krishnamurti. 

But in 2022, when I read Ellen J. Langer‘s book “MINDFULNESS,” I realized that I still have to learn about Mindfulness. 

Ellen is a Psychology professor at Harvard, known as the mother of Mindfulness, and she published this book in 1989. Based on tones of research, Ellen explained Mindfulness through its opposite concept of mindlessness.

 “If we fall into a routine rather than make decisions anew each time, we can get mindlessly seduced into activities we wouldn’t engage otherwise.

Mindlessness also allows us to compartmentalize uncomfortable thoughts.

Mindlessness limits our control by preventing us from making intelligent choices.”

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“Openness, not only to new information, but to different points of view is also an important feature of mindfulness.
Once we become mindfully aware of views other than our own, we start to realize that there are as many different views as there are different observers.
Such awareness is potentially liberating.”

Kindle, 2022