Notice the Colors: a Mindfulness Experiment

I took a walk today, listening to music on my phone as I usually do, and an interesting thought came to me. I often use my headphones to silence my automatic thought process. Sometimes those thoughts aren’t very resourceful, but a great song can silence them!

I decided to challenge myself to walk the rest of the way with my music paused. After about a minute my thoughts began to speed up. As I ducked under a low-hanging branch I thought…

“Wow, those leaves are so green”

In that moment I noticed my mind went totally silent. I looked at the sky and thought, “The sky is so blue.” After continuing this simple process of identifying colors for a few minutes, my mind was completely at ease.

Consciously noticing colors was a simple mental task that I didn’t have to think about, but enough to keep my mind from drifting into a negative place.

I think this is an incredibly simple mindfulness exercise that anyone can try, even sitting in an office. You can notice how the gray the grays are if your office is a bit dull :) Give it a try, and tell me about your experience!