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Saturday 20 December 2014

Mindfulness improves relationships in these four ways

Mindfulness can improve relationships, if only because the practice tends to make people more empathic. Mindfulness also makes people less reactive and that helps relationships too. I would summarise the benefits of mindfulness practice on relationships like this:

1. We become more empathic.
Empathy is the ability to understand how another person feels. It improves relationships at home and at work. In neuroscience research, it has been found that the “insula”, a structure in the brain which is involved with empathy, is strengthened in people who practice mindfulness.

2. We become less reactive.
This “pause for thought” improves listening skills and gives us time to choose more helpful responses. Improvements in the interaction between ‘thinking’ and ‘emotional’ parts of the brain help to lower reactivity and to give us a vital space in which to make better choices. These improvements result from mindfulness practice and have been observed by neuroscientists.

3. We brood and ruminate less.
Ruminating or brooding on the faults of others, from intimate partners to work colleagues, worsens relationships. Because in mindfulness we are encouraged to return continually from our thoughts to our direct experience of reality, with acceptance, we are far less likely to spend time and energy on rumination. This is an extremely valuable effect of mindfulness practice. Rumination can prolong negative emotions and can harm relationships and our own well-being for years.

4. We become less 'clingy.'
Because of that fall in reactivity (Point 2 above) we notice automatic reactions such as 'clinging' and can step back from them. 'Clinging' to another person (unless, of course, you're a baby!) can lead the other person to push you away as they seek to maintain their psychological space. Mindfulness helps you to arrive at an empathic relationship between two independent people who are choosing to be in the relationship. You should also get better a spotting situations in which 'clingyness' leads you into destructive relationships.

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