Hey everyone, welcome to Radio Headspace and to Friday, it's Sam here with you.

So as you know, we've been talking about the Buddhist teachings of the Eightfold Path,

and our focus for this episode holds a special place in my heart because it's helped me and

so many others and is really why I got into teaching in the first place.

I'm talking about the value of mindfulness.

From the Buddhist perspective, mindfulness is foundational for the development of wisdom.

Being mindful involves having a profound depth and breadth of awareness of our present

moment experiences.

It encourages us to see how interdependent we all are and how connected we are to our natural world.

In case you're not exactly sure what mindfulness means, here's a definition that I've adopted

over the years.

When we're being mindful, we're paying attention on purpose with openness, curiosity,

and a willingness to be with our thoughts and feelings just as they are.

And mindfulness offers us amazing tools for emotion regulation, allowing us to name and witness emotions

and how they show up in our bodies, turning toward them instead of away from them.

I like the way Zen Buddhists frame living mindfully.

They say that we should practice while chopping wood and carrying water.

In modern terms, this means we can be more mindful as we carry on with our everyday activities

from eating and working, to socializing and resting.

And we often equate mindfulness with meditation, but meditation is really like a lab

where we get concentrated practice in developing our mindfulness muscle.

And then the more we practice, the more we can apply it to life off the cushion,

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