Welcome
A warm welcome to my website. My name is Helen O’Neill and my background is in clinical psychology. I trained as a mindfulness teacher with the Centre for Mindfulness Research and Practice at Bangor University in Wales and was awarded a Masters in 2016. I am a member of the Mindfulness Teachers Association of Ireland.
What is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is the awareness that emerges when we deliberately focus attention on our present moment experience in a non- judging, accepting way.
Jon Kabat Zinn
Mindfulness involves paying attention to what is happening in the present moment with a kind and friendly attitude towards ourselves and our experience. We all have the innate capacity to be mindful, and we can develop this skill through meditation practice, and the cultivation of particular attitudes such as curiosity, acceptance and kindness. By practicing mindfulness regularly, we learn to recognise how we relate to both the external world, and our inner world. In this way, we can come to know ourselves better. This self awareness is the first step in learning to respond, rather than react habitually to the stressors and challenges that life presents. Mindfulness also allows a greater appreciation of the little things in life that we so often take for granted.