This Isn't a Mindfulness Book, or Is It? A New Book by Sarah Fader

A good friend of ours, mental health writer and advocate Sarah Fader, has a new book out. According to the title, it may — or may not — be a mindfulness book. Intrigued, I caught up with Sarah and asked if she’d tell me a little about her book and why she wanted to write it.

SF: This book is important to me because my mom taught me how to manage my anxiety with mindfulness when I was eighteen. That was over twenty years ago and it stayed with me.

MB: What’s the key message you have for your readers?

SF: I want people to know that mindfulness isn’t just a trendy word. It can help you cope with panic and anxiety, and there are simple ways to incorporate it into your life that you may not have thought of.

This Isn’t a Mindfulness Book, or Is It? My mindfulness journey plus three easy ways to meditate in everyday life is available from Amazon (print and Kindle).

Amazon com | Amazon UK

I found it an interesting read. If you’ve heard of mindfulness but don’t know what it is or if it might be for you, this serves as a short introduction by someone who has used mindfulness to positive effect in their own life for over twenty years. The book is organised as follows:

• What mindfulness means to me
• What is mindfulness?
• How does mindfulness help you?
• Is mindfulness hard?
• How can I incorporate mindfulness into my daily life?
• Three ways to practice mindfulness
• What does mindfulness mean to you?

So, it is a mindfulness book? I’d say yes. You won’t learn precisely how to do it (there are short examples) but you will have a greater idea of what mindfulness is about, and whether it’s likely to be for you.

About the Author

Sarah Fader is the Co-Founder of Stigma Fighters, a non-profit organization that encourages individuals with mental illness to share their personal stories. She has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Psychology Today, The Atlantic, Quartz, The Huffington Post, and McSweeney’s among others.

Sarah is a native New Yorker who enjoys naps, talking to strangers, and caring for her two small humans and six average-sized cats. Sarah lives with Bipolar type II, OCD ADHD, and PTSD.

Sarah has guested with us previously:

• Anxiety is Addictive
• Anxiety is my Wingman … I Think
• OCD Makes My Life Hard
• Uncertainty Makes Mental Illness Worse

You can read more about her at www.sarahfader.com

 

Thoughts Whilst Out Walking

Fran’s words from a few days ago are still with me: “The truest response is letting go ...”

Yes... let go of pain, of joy, of aching, of delight ... Do not hold on to any of it. Let it rise, have its moment, and go, to be replaced by what arises in its stead ... externally and within you.

Offer minimal resistance to what arises ... Let it pass through you, joyously, gratefully ...

We cling, we hold on, from fear. Fear of losing what was never ours to begin with. Fear of daring to reach for what is within our grasp.

This moment is all that you will ever own. It is what you have brought into being, it is what you were brought into being to experience, herenow. You are the universe’s gift to itself in this moment. No other has been granted this gift. Accept it, take it in your hands, examine its shape, colours, textures. Allow it fully into your awareness ... And let it go again ...

Life is not a lesson, though you can choose to see it as such. Life is not a trial, though you are free to live yours as though it were.

Any gift worth the name comes without strings ... you are free to decline it, trample on it, pass it on to another, keep it under lock and key ... And so it is with life, with this moment.

Originally written October 2012

 

I lay under a tree

I lay under a tree. Not the biggest tree. Not the most beautiful tree. Not the best tree. Not the most comfortable tree. Not even a symmetric tree. I didn’t even know what kind of tree it was. I paid attention to my inside world. I paid attention to my outside world. Until there was no difference.

Fran