3 Hacks to Achieving a State of Mindfulness

Posted 27 September 2017

Mindfulness is the purposeful practice of being present in one’s mind and aware of one’s surroundings. The goal of practicing mindfulness is to strengthen attention, resilience, and mental strength and to foster a curious mindset. Much like any other skill, mindfulness needs to be practiced regularly in order to be developed and maintained. So how can we go about exercising mindfulness? Luckily for you, we have some life hacks to share!

Sync your breathing

One of the first components of mindfulness is mindful breathing, which involved being aware of the sensation of the breath and scanning the body. To begin mindfulness practice, it can be difficult to time the deep breathing exercise, which is why we provide a helpful gif that you can sync your breathing to. If you have attended our Mindfulness Training with our instructor Simon, this gif may look familiar.

When the shape contracts, breathe in deeply and hold your breath, and let out the breath as the shape expands. You may find that you prefer to do the opposite; inhale while the shape expands and exhale while it contracts. You may like to use this gif for the entire mindfulness practice, or just for the first few minutes until you get into the rhythm, depending on your own discretion.

Find a mindfulness buddy

Everything is better with a friend! Find someone you know – this may be a friend, a family member or a coworker – to practice your mindfulness and remind each other to take part in a daily exercise. Working out which time best suits both of you, try to allocate some time to a mindfulness exercise. You may prefer to begin with five minutes a day, and try to work up to longer exercises such as seven, 10 and eventually 15 minutes. Get your peers to hold each other accountable and discover your mindfulness journey together.

Use our FREE Hero Town guided mindfulness exercise

Our wonderful mindfulness instructor, Simon Dwyer, has put together a guided mindfulness exercise that is entirely free to use in your practices. This video also includes the gif above, so you can choose to follow along and watch the video, or use headphones and listen with your eyes closed. You may use this video as often as you like, or as a guide until you get the hang of mindfulness and can practice independently.

Find out more at Hero Town Geelong

If you are interested in learning more about mindfulness, then sign up for the information session on our website.

Hero Town Geelong, mindfulness

Steph Downing

Stephanie Downing is the administrative assistant for Hero Town Geelong. Born and raised in Geelong, Australia, Stephanie is a graduate of Deakin University with her Honours degree in Professional and Creative Writing. She adores words of all sorts and is especially infatuated with the medium of poetry and fiction, with publications of her work being featured in magazines such as WORDLY Magazine, Plumwood Mountain Journal and Cordite Poetry Review.