Hi, welcome back to

your Daily Mindfulness.

In today's session, I'd like to offer

you a new definition for mindfulness.

Now, one of the definitions that I've

often utilized that I wrote about in

my book is mindfulness is this capacity

to be with our experience rather

than in our experience in a way that

is spacious, curious and heartfelt.

One thing you'll notice in that definition

is that I don't say non-judgment,

which is often used in mindfulness.

And instead I replaced that with

curiosity, bringing a curious

orientation to our experience.

And the reason I've done that is because

I feel like curiosity accomplishes

what non-judgment aims to accomplish.

Curiosity is inherently non-judgemental.

It just aims to understand what is

here right now, not necessarily put

it in a category of good or bad.

It's just wondering, oh,

what is this moment like?

What is this experience like?

So I, I stand by curiosity.

However, the one thing that can sometimes

happen with curiosity, is it can create a

very active orientation to our experience.

This sort of depends on

how we relate to curiosity.

But I know for a lot of people, when

they think of curiosity, there's

this feeling of like, I need to

figure this out, what is this about?

And that in meditation can actually

reinforce the sense of an individual

I, or a sense of self that needs to

come to some sort of conclusion or a,

win something in the meditation, or

really dig in and get to know something.

And that can potentially be problematic

because one of the things we're also

wanting to cultivate in meditation

is this receptive quality, receiving

what is arising into awareness.

So I want to offer a very simple,

new two word definition of

mindfulness, receptive curiosity.

Receptive curiosity.

We're leaning back, we're receiving the

moment as it comes to us into awareness.

But we also have this curious

orientation of what is this

moment like, what's here now.

If there's some pain or a thought

and we're paying attention to

it, the curiosity might say, Hmm,

what is this experience like?

What is it like to have a thought?

What is it like to feel

this pain in this moment?

But it's done in a way that's not trying

to dig into the experience or win or

get to the conclusion of something.

It's just this soft, passive

receiving of the moment with a

gentle interest in what's happening.

So see if this works for you.

What I like about receptive curiosity.

Is that it can be integrated into

your meditation practice, but it

can also be integrated as almost

a mantra throughout your day.

Anytime you find yourself tense,

overwhelmed, or just wanting to drop

into a more present state, you can

just drop that phrase in, receptive

curiosity, and see what it shifts

in your internal experience for you.

Thank you for your practice.

Let's settle in for today's meditation.