Im doing a masters course through a UK varsity for further accreditation. Im walking on tiptoe as my chosen career is filled with potholes of fluff and headgames. Every "tool" Im given, if not outright discarded, needs to be tested before I am inclined to absorb it in my daily life. Its frustrating as I watch how my fellows embrace the woo and the facilitators look proudly upon the magic they bestow... its exhausting to sit amongst this nonsense and look enthusiastic. If the accreditation didnt hold a proper bump in salary, Id have left two months ago.
At any rate, the new buzzword is "Mindfulness". Not in the sense that one needs to consider others but akin to meditation and reflection on one's thoughts. It creates these situations where you are planted on a chair in class whilst some sod takes you "lets leave our earthly bodies, embrace the feelings in the room, let us now travel outside, hear the wind rustling in the trees... MY GODS, THERE'S THE FRECKING MOON! LETS GO THERE!" And yours truly sits there with her eyes wide open wondering where I went wrong in life having to endure this - a different mindfulness if you please. Then you go home and am obliged to write a 3000 word essay on your experience. Just as well I have a good imagination.
Needless to say (but saying it anyway) this particular "tool" is on the ever growing discarded heap. We are assessed on a continual basis and in one session I was probed as to my Mindfullness experiences, upon which I responded "I practice mindfulness in the same manner as prayer"... I passed the module, and Im mindful to be grateful. Fuck. I dont even feel guilty. I was mindfully honest.