[Avodah] What is Mindfulness and does Judaism have it

[Shoshana L. Boublil]

> From: "kennethgmiller at juno.com" <kennethgmiller at juno.com>
> Subject: Re: [Avodah] What is Mindfulness and does Judaism have it
(sorry, the last one went out mid-preparation)

> I was quite confused about this whole thread, and asked the threadstarter,
> R' Yonatan Kaganoff about it.
>
> For the benefit of others who might be similarly confused, it could be
> helpful to read the article in Wikipedia titled "Mindfulness". It can be
> found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindfulness  It is about seven pages
> long on my screen, and the first paragraph reads:
>
>> Mindfulness (Pali: Sati; Sanskrit: sm'ti) is a technique in
>> which a person becomes intentionally aware of their thoughts
>> and actions in the present moment, non-judgmentally. It plays
>> a central role in Buddhism, with Right Mindfulness (Pali:
>> sammâ-sati; Sanskrit: samyak-sm'ti) being the seventh element
>> of the Noble Eightfold Path, the sadhana of which is held in
>> the tradition to engender insight and wisdom. Mindfulness may
>> be paralogous in Christianity through the Eastern Orthodox
>> hesychastic concept of nepsis.
>
> Akiva Miller

I looked it up and found the following very interesting:

"In general, the Hesychast restricts his external activities for the sake of 
his Hesychastic practice."
=================
Sound like trying to achieve "Shev VeAl Ta'ase".

http://userpages.aug.com/~mdkersey/philokalia.html#Nepsis

When looking it up, it would appear to be pointed inward, towards oneself. 
Again a type of Shev VeAl Ta'aseh.

Interestingly enough the 6 mitzvot Shimiyot listed by Rambam, could be 
considered to be under this heading of mindfulness, but Rambam considers 
them mitzvot as in "active", and their goal is active - towards Hashem etc.

It looks like mindfulness for the Budhist is a goal in and of itself, while 
similar activity in Judaism is just a tool towards adding Kavana when doing 
a mitzva or performing other mitzvot.

Shoshana L. Boublil