Mindfulness is hard when you have a neurodivergent mind. The research suggests those of us who are autistic, ADHDrs, or have other neurodivergent conditions like anxiety, OCD, bipolar or BPD, have particular challenges with practicing mindfulness. But research also suggests that we can deeply benefit when we practice and train with mindfulness, over a period of time. The challenge is in getting started and learning how to practice mindfulness, when most instructions come through a neurotypical lens.
It’s no secret that neurodivergent minds work differently. That’s what makes us neurodivergent! So it’s not surprising that practices designed to train the mind would work a little bit differently for us too. When I was starting meditation and mindfulness, with my Audhd, PDA, & high anxiety brain, I found that neurotypical meditation instructors weren’t able to help me when I ran into difficulties. Their minds - and thus their internal experiences with meditation - were just different from mine. And even worse, the way traditional instructions were offered, often didn’t make much sense with what was going on for me.
Eventually, I found teachers and resources whose minds worked more similarly to mine, and that’s when my meditation practice really began to offer me strong benefits. I also learned to be more open to adjusting my practice in ways that worked for my mind - instead of literally following every instruction as some kind of rule.
Now, with well over a decade of experience practicing and teaching mindfulness and meditation based practices, I have learned some tips and tricks for making it more accessible for neurodivergent minds.
If you’ve had a hard time with mindfulness, I’d love to share them with you!
Breaking Down Mindfulness Practice To Core Elements
One of the most important realizations I’ve had in my neurodivergent mindfulness journey is that there are many many many ways to practice mindfulness. But when you’re being introduced to mindfulness, it’s often with a few key practices. The rules to these practices will usually be highly emphasized, and indeed, the rules have some importance because they offer structure, which helps train the mind.
Still, in these specific mindfulness spaces, you might think that the practices offered are the one way to do mindfulness, and it’s just not true. There are endless ways.
For me, things really opened up when I began to understand the functions behind these rules and practices, so that I could adjust them to my needs without forgoing the basic structure of mindfulness entirely.
While there are definitely variations depending on the type of mindfulness and what it’s training, particularly with more advanced practices. But most mindfulness practices tend to fit a basic template - with really clear functions. And I find that for neurodivergent folks often like to have all the information and really understand WHY they are being asked to do things a certain way. For me, understanding this can definitely be key.
So I’d like to offer you a basic “mindfulness template” that you can fill out in a way that makes sense for you.
Template For How To Practice Mindfulness With a Neurodivergent Mind
Mindfulness is essentially a practice of getting in touch with your own mind, body, emotions and environment. So, when we practice mindfulness, the key elements usually relate to how we are engaging with those aspects of experience.
Let’s go through each one so you can understand the function behind the usual instructions.
Comfortable Body:
The first step of practicing mindfulness is deciding what to do with your body. The main thing is to be comfortable for however long you are meditating. For some, the classic meditation posture of sitting cross legged on a cushion with an upright posture, can feel a bit tortuous. But it is actually designed to be an optimally comfortable position for long periods of meditation. It can take a little time for your body to adjust to this posture and build muscles in the right places to support it, but it may be worth it for those who find sitting meditation for long periods beneficial. Still, for some of us with challenges like chronic pain or hypermobility, it may not actually be comfortable for us - even in the long run.
Additionally, sitting still can be painful for those of us who stim or have generally hyperactive bodies. So think about what is comfortable for you - and work with that. The main point is to have a comfortable body, and don’t have to use a lot of focus on directing it, so you can focus on the work with mind.
Here are a few options that you might try:
Sitting in whatever way is most comfortable for you
Sitting and swaying or stimming
Laying down
Doing Yoga or stretching
Walking
Running
Swimming
Biking
Free-form Dancing (my personal favorite)
Free-from movement or stimming of any kind
Creating art
Eating
Grounded Mind:
The second main factor in mindfulness is what you do with your mind. Most practices have something that you rest your awareness on, whether that’s your breath, a mantra, your bodily sensations, or the environment around you. If you have a more literal mind, you might feel a lot of pressure to stay focused on that object of awareness and feel like a failure at mindfulness if you don’t keep up with it.
But these are not things that you need to stay focused on at all times. The skill being learned isn’t staying mindful, it’s in coming back to awareness over and over again. Instead of thinking of this object like a task you must be focused on throughout your meditation, think of these as a tether to bring your back to some kind of ground. When the mind becomes wild and overwhelmed, we can lean back into these objects of awareness as a resource. It is the path back to awareness.
There can be a sort of rhythm to this, drifting off and coming back that can be quite soothing to my neurodivergent mind. But only when the drifting off isn't made into a problem by labeling it a failure.
Still, for me, the traditional instructions to follow my natural breath do nothing but provoke anxiety. So I’ve shifted to resting my awareness on different things, such as the sounds in the space, the sensation on the bottom of my feet, or a repetitive or freeform movement I’m performing. If you find that a meditative focus isn’t working well for you - find another one. Then let your mind come back to it over and over again, a familiar friend to call you back home to your own awareness.
Here are a few options that you might try resting your awareness on:
Your breath
The physical sensations in your body
Physical sensations in part of your body, like the palms of your hands or bottom of your feet
Something you're eating
The sounds happening around you
The colors around you
A mantra
Counting numbers
An image like a mandala or a work of art
A visualization in your mind
A physical motion you are performing
Kind Heart:
The last piece to this picture is how you respond emotionally to what’s happening in your body and mind. It’s pretty instinctual to try to push away unpleasant experiences like intense emotions or physical pain, and it's easy to judge or reject ourselves for our perceived shortcomings. But one key element to mindfulness is welcoming all of our internal experiences with non-judgemental acceptance and loving kindness.
We can think of this like hosting our emotions, thoughts and inner parts for an internal gathering. While they visit us in our inner space, we allow them to just be as they are. We can listen to their complaints and offer them some love and kindness, like we might want someone to listen to us when we are upset.
If an emotion or thought arises, we notice it, we get curious about it, and we send it some kindness. None of our thoughts or feelings are considered to be a problem here.
Of course, that's not always easy to do! And you definitely won't be perfect at it. But you don't need to be. We are just trying to practice that skill. You're not failing if you can't instantly feel the warm fuzzies toward your most painful inner experiences.
We've developed these habits for a reason. Sometimes we push away intense emotions because they are genuinely too much for us to handle in that moment.
Trust yourself. The point of this practice is to develop kindness towards yourself, even the parts you don't really like. Stay as open as you can while still respecting your own boundaries, but prioritize being kind to yourself. If you feel like it's too much, let that part of you know that you’re not ready for it. Send some love to the part of you that is feeling overwhelmed by it all. Take a break, come back to the tether of whatever object of awareness you picked, or ground your attention in your body.
Now, in case you are reading these instructions and thinking “send myself some love? WTF does that mean?” let me add a little more detail. Practices that work with loving-kindness and compassion usually rely on a felt sense of love and kindness that most feel internally. To recognize this feeling, think about how you feel when you see someone you really love, or when someone is especially kind to you. Or maybe for you this arises when you cuddle with your favorite pet. You can practice generating the feeling by thinking about whatever triggers this felt emotion for you. Then, when you need to send some to yourself, you can generate that same emotion. Traditional Metta, Maitri and Tonglen practices are good places to start if you want to work on building this skill.
But if this is still unintuitive sounding for you, it may be due to alexithymia, a condition that impacts a lot of neurodivergent folks. This can make it hard to recognize or feel our emotions directly. If this is your situation, don’t worry! The felt sense isn’t everything, and sometimes it can be developed over time with these practices. Still there are other ways to be kind to yourself that can serve the same purpose.
Here are some alternative ways to be kind to yourself during mindfulness practices:
Practice saying kind and loving things to yourself when your internal monologue gets judgemental or painful. Give yourself a pet name like dear one, darling, or little buddy, and offer yourself encouragement, support and commiseration through your internal words.
Visualize your inner parts, feelings and thoughts as individual beings or as yourself as a child and imagine giving them a hug, patting them on the back or doing anything that you, yourself would find comforting from a loved one.
Find an inner mantra of kindness that you can come back to when you are overwhelmed or being hard on yourself.
Offer yourself physical touch like rubbing or tapping your heart, stroking your arm, or any other physical gesture or stim that is comforting to you.
Getting Started With Your Custom Mindfulness Practice:
The structure above can be reworked in so many ways! I recommend starting by picking one of the options from each category of Body, Mind and Heart, and seeing how it works for you.
There is no wrong way to be mindful. What’s important is finding the ways that benefit you and allow you to continue working with them. If you get stuck, seek out trainings or resources on mindfulness that are led by neurodivergent teachers, who can help you troubleshoot what’s going on in your neurodivergent mind. I use a lot of mindfulness based practices in my own coaching work with neurodivergent clients to help improve things like emotional resilience, focus and quality of life. It is possible to get past the initial hurdles and find real benefit in these practices. Good luck! And feel free to reach out if you need some help.
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