androushka - The gist of it is that we are all so conditioned to think that we are always distracted from actually experiencing life. The thought-process, wich is supposed to be a human function limited to solving certain tasks (like gathering information, planning, solving certain problems etc) has become compulsive and dominates our lives completly, leading to fear, disconectedness (is that a word?), craving etc. Being "in the now", focusing completly on what you're doing without loosing yourself in thought is being at peace.
Practice by paying attention to regular things. Like if you're washing your hands, there is a lot of things going on, like sense-perception from the water, touch, sent from the soap, sounds etc. The mind will tell you this is all trivial and un-important, so most of the time we don't even notice that we wash our hands, walk up some stairs or prepare a meal. Instead we spend the time worrying about things that ultimatly are only in our minds, rehearsing conversations, worrying about stuff in the future or day-dreaming about things we'd like to happen. Ultimatly, living in ones own thoughts, instead of paying attention to what actually is, is dysfunctional, irrational and leads to poor decisions and unhappyness.
You can also practice by actually listening to your mind. Don't try and force your thoughts to think in certain ways, it won't work. Simply pay attention to what thoughts and emotional patterns your mind is producing. Be curious, receptive, non-judging. If you can listen to your thoughts, there is a gap between you and them. You cease to be your thoughts, and so they loose some of their control over you.
I haven't seen the vids yet, but in the outlines posted it sounds a lot like "The Power of Now" Dev, does that sound right?
There are, of course, some problems with "now" from a scientific standpoint. I'm no physicist, but i believe modern science generally agrees that there is no now, or not past or future relative to it. Our perception of "flowing time" comes as a function of memory (it only works in one direction), however we exist wholly in the fourth dimension. This would mean that at least semantically it would need some reworking.
In any event, i've been meaning to take a listen since your original post :)
I just watched the whole thing and here's my take, In 13:24 he says meditation is an ‘adventure’ in finding out who you are. And in that adventure add value to your life… Without knowing where we are now, our projection into the future (goals) will be unattached. ‘Meditation- it’s not what you think.’ In 18:30 he tells his med. Students not to put a desk between them and their patient, but to lean in and find an appropriate distance in order to connect to them again, to not project in the past or future. 21:05 The beginner’s mind… We only have moments in which to live. The future and past are both useful concepts, but we inhabit our lives more fully with awareness of the present. 23:19 the first practice is to hold a moment in awareness, utilizing our senses; sight, hearing, smelling, proprioception, breathing. Be aware of our breath without effort; just surf your sensation at this time, as if your life depended on it. Feel the breath, not think about it on the in and out breath. It’s not about breathing though, it’s about awareness. Keeping in check with the ‘assignment’ of breathing when we our mind wanders, no agenda, no blaming. It’s not easy, as the mind is conditioned to being entertained, so it will wander. 37:50 the next practice is to expand our awareness of our breath into awareness of the rest of our body. For example, fixing our posture in the most optimal way so that our breath is unimpeded. Imagine feeling your skin breathing. Then expand our awareness into our feelings , without judgments. 44:30 Let our awareness be a larger part of our life than the ‘stories’ we tell ourselves, which is largely inaccurate. The real practice of meditation occurs beyond this 5 minute practice of breathing. It occurs in the mindfulness in daily living. The thing is, we forget being aware and get caught up in our memories/past and our plans/future. So, it’s important to anchor our lives to awareness of the present or ‘tune our machine’ everyday, even for 5 minutes of this formal or first practice. 57:43 I found that I need less sleep because there’s a kind of rest in [mindfulness] that’ you don’t get in sleep. Neuroplasticity is the process of building functional neurons by activating parts of the brain and is driven by repetitive ‘attending’; running, swimming, making love can be meditation. 1:10:23 If you find something that affected you, good or bad, pour some awareness on that thought or feeling with kindness. It’s not attaining some ideal, it’s recognizing who you already are and the beauty that’s already you.
@Doug: I'm not familiar enough with "The Power of Now" material, but I guess Mindfulness and MBSR both, conceptually, suffer from any logical weakness in the concept of "now." Can't really dispute that.
I just want to revisit one thing that was said in this thread...
androushka - If you can listen to your thoughts, there is a gap between you and them. You cease to be your thoughts, and so they loose some of their control over you.
Doug, they're the same at the core, but The Power of Now is spiritual in terminology while Kabat-Zin and his school of mindfulness is more concrete (he made it his mission to raise awareness of Mindfulness/meditation within the medical community and he's doing so succesully)