Mindfulness

A Kindly Approach to Being with Cancer

Trish Bartley

• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781118961070
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Medicina
• Subtopic: Enfermería

Mindfulness: A Kindly Approach to Being with Cancer offers people with cancer a means to bring mindfulness and kindliness into their lives, to help them cope with the challenge of a life-threatening illness.

• Adapts Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), an approach with a strong evidence base for people with recurrent depression, for the needs and challenges of people with cancer
• Presents the standard 8-week course of MBCT for cancer in a flexible format that is designed to suit each reader's own particular timescale, context and situation
• Based on more than 15 years of program development and clinical application by the author, and the work and experience of mindfulness teachers in other cancer centres around the world
• Provides specific practices and approaches tailored to support the different phases of a cancer experience – from diagnosis and treatment to living with uncertainty and managing life with cancer
• Features five extended stories from people personally affected by cancer who have used mindfulness-based practices to support them in their own experience of illness, life and treatment

Chapter 1
Intention

May what I do flow from me like a river,

no forcing and no holding back,

the way it is with children.

Then in these swelling and ebbing currents,

these deepening tides moving out, returning,

I will sing you as no one ever has,

streaming through widening channels

into the open sea.

Rainer Maria Rilke¹

This poem might be speaking about learning to be mindful in the context of cancer. A small river is always flowing and changing. Sometimes it is bright and dancing, sometimes agitated and busy, and sometimes depleted and low. Yet, streams and rivers can fascinate in their movement, flow, and inevitable journey to the sea. Do you have a river near you? Could you go and watch it with this idea of flow and change in mind?

Rilke is speaking of his intention, ‘May what I do flow from me like a river’. I think he is inviting the possibility of being entirely how he is, moment by moment – inspired by the river that has no way of being anything else. We so often try to be braver and better. Is it possible to be the river that you are?

Intention

The intentions we set ourselves remind us of what is important. It is like having an internal compass. When we form the intention to be more mindful, that intention focuses and shapes our choices and actions.

Myla and Jon Kabat‐Zinn²

Intention is the first of our four movements, underpinning all the others. Consciously cultivating intention may not be a familiar process – but if we identify and stay connected with what matters to us, it will support us well. Maybe, we can then use our time to make space to enjoy what is precious. We can choose to stop delaying living – and allow an experience of illness to motivate choices of wellness. What might that mean to you? There may be lots of reasons why this may not seem possible, but let us see what unfolds from the process of cultivating mindful intention.

We consider this in a number of ways that are practical, reflective and practice‐based. Later, we follow a Body Scan, and introduce two short practices. At the end of this chapter, we look at the implications of being diagnosed with cancer, and learn a ‘first aid’ mindfulness practice.

Preparing the ground³

Cultivating intention is the first step in bringing mindfulness into your life. It links you to your vision for what you hope mindfulness may offer.

We might bring to mind some intentions made in the past that started well, but did not last. Like New Year’s Resolutions, they often focus on giving something up, rather than putting something in place. The motivation behind them is what seems to count. Cultivating an ‘ought to’ intention is likely to become irritating and guilt inducing. At the other extreme, we might be tempted to frame our intention in meaningful significance that is writ large! This can prove exhausting to sustain.

Our world tends to motivate us towards hard work and constant busyness. We end up driven to get more and more done. When someone becomes ill, their productivity is inevitably diminished and this can feel very difficult, for the universe tends to define us by what we do – as we do ourselves.

Instead can we look at intentions that support a simpler and kinder way of being? Can we find ways of fostering a commitment to enjoy and appreciate all that we love in our lives? Can we put meaning into the detail of ‘living’ rather than the ‘doing’ of it? This is what mindfulness has to offer us.

Intention has a vital role in ‘co‐opting’ your mind to come onboard as an ally and a friend.

When mindfulness is harnessed with conscious intention, we can align to those choices that support well‐being and offer skilful responses to difficulty.

Developing a new skill takes practice. Starting mindfulness is a bit like learning to play a musical instrument. It takes time before you can make a decent sound – but with a commitment to practice regularly, it starts to feel more natural.

Every action involves some form of intention. It might be vague – an almost mindless or unconscious intention – such as when we stand up to make a hot drink, or walk upstairs to fetch something and then forget half way up what we wanted!

At the other end of the scale, there are overarching intentions that are formed to support what is wholesome – and what we hold dear. These then become specific when translated into everyday actions. They guide the choices we make.

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Jennifer was going to be 40 and had finished treatment for breast cancer two years before. She decided to enter her first ever mini triathlon to prove to herself that she was now well and not yet ‘over the hill’ (her overarching intention). She made some specific intentions to train regularly in all three activities. She didn't do as much as she planned, but she was thrilled to be able to complete the course.

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Clarifying Your Intention

We look now at cultivating a personal overarching intention. There are three steps to follow, which you will be guided through. This may seem a bit mechanical for something that connects you with what you hold dear, so you might reflect on some of this on a walk, while listening to some lovely ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• About the Companion Website
• Some Opening Words
• Starting Out
• Chapter 1: Intention
• Chapter 2: Coming Back
• Chapter 3: Turning Towards
• Chapter 4: Kindness
• Chapter 5: Completing And Continuing
• Chapter 6: Connecting To Our Common Humanity
• Some Parting Words
• Appendix 1: Cancer And Mindfulness-Based Approaches
• Appendix 2: Resources
• Appendix 3: The Three Circle Model of Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Cancer (MBCT-Ca)
• Appendix 4: SQUASH AND SESAME SOUP
• Bibliography
• Index
• About the Author
• End User License Agreement