I was introduced to mindfulness meditation by my brother Dav many years ago, he has practiced and mastered many forms of psycho spiritual meditation. I attended one of his well being retreats in Spain in 2009. Mindfulness is a very simple form of meditation that was little known in the West until recently. The meditation consists of focusing your full attention on your breath as it flows in and out of your body. Focusing on each breath in this way allows you to observe your thoughts as they arise in your mind and, little by little, to let go of struggling with them.

You come to realise that thoughts come and go of their own accord; that you are not your thoughts. You can watch as they appear in your mind, seemingly from thin air, and watch again as they disappear, like a soap bubble bursting. You come to the profound understanding that thoughts and feelings (including negative ones) are transient. They come and they go, and ultimately, you have a choice about whether to act on them or not.

The technique of mindfulness meditation brings one into the present moment and from my experience I have found mindfulness meditation to be beneficial in enhancing the creative process and to perceiving out of the box. The part of the brain which deals with creativity, innovative ideas and problem solving processes is the area known as the neocortex. This area of the brain sits above the Limbic  system which in turn sits above the  primitive Reptilian brain. The limbic area deals with emotions, memories etc, this part of the brain is activated when we are under emotional stress, once this part of the brain is activated it is busy dealing with the stress and does not provide the upper neocortex with resource. Similarly the reptilian brain the oldest part of the brain is concerned with survival, it deals with our flight or fight response and once it is activated it does facilitate the neocortex. It’s only when the Limbic and Reptilian allow or are unoccupied  that neocortex can become fully activated and the creative juices start to flow.

The effects of mindfulness meditation include, stimulation of the neocortex, improvement of emotional intelligence and a reduction of the reactive nature of the reptilian brain and in turn all of these effects facilitate in ideas getting to and been processed by the neocortex and hence increasing creativity and productivity.