My mum takes photos of everything.

My mum takes photos of everything

And I mean everything.

I mean everything. Her Instagram is awash with hundreds of shots of the wildlife in her garden, street art, and—her favourite finds—red phone boxes. She’s not got millions of followers to entertain, there’s no particular aesthetic to maintain, and there’s certainly no strategy to her posting. She simply takes photos of anything and everything that—in her words—amuses, interests or visually pleases her.

This is mindfulness. It’s stopping for a second to appreciate the way the light filters through the leaves of a tree in the middle of a busy highway. It’s thinking this light is so beautiful you feel compelled to take out your phone and snap a photo; it’s being present in the moment and being moved by the simple wonder around you at any one time. There’s power in the pause; in stealing a tiny fraction of your hectic day for yourself.

Mindfulness is easy. It’s not hours of meditation or achieving a state of nirvana you can tap into at any time. It won’t be found in a self-help book, or after myriad yoga sessions. It’s nothing more than the basic human ability to be fully present—it’s fully appreciating something that reminds you of the beauty in the world. It’s being centred and aware of where you are and what you’re doing; it’s committing to memory something worthy of being preserved. It’s stopping in the middle of a busy street to snap a photo of the bougainvillea flowers spilling over a crumbling wall. It’s realising this is beautiful and meaningful; it’s listening to what’s speaking to you.

And if it’s this easy, you don’t even have to do anything to be mindful. On your commute, actually notice the dappled light streaming through the changing leaves; savour the scent of the steam rising from your coffee and the way it spirals through the air as the mug sits on your desk; enjoy the weight of the cosy scarf wound round your neck or the sunshine on your skin; take that one second to feel it when you tell someone you love them.

In this hyper-connected and busy world we live in, it’s so easy to fall into autopilot and cruise through each day. Take a breath, look around and practice some mindfulness. Any routine activity can be made mindful if you focus your full attention on it. You might find you enjoy it; the suds on your skin from washing the dishes, the odd bubble escaping to float away and then pop! A flash of iridescence exploding into the ether.

Add a little mindfulness to your day and you’ll reap the benefits. Mindfulness has been shown to reduce stress and anxiety by shrinking the amygdala, the primal region of the brain associated with fear and involved in the body’s response to stress. It reduces insomnia, increases your sense of wellbeing and increases energy. It improves your emotional and social intelligence and develops your empathy, while also sharpening memory and increasing focus. Clinical trials are also showing mindfulness can be as effective as medication in reducing depression for some people. Eating mindfully (actually enjoying your food and realising when you’re hungry or full) has also been shown to work better than any diet for effective long-term weight loss.

It’s funny, because the person who practices mindfulness the most is my mum: the woman who denounces yoga as ‘a load of breathing tosh’ and lacks the time and energy for ‘namby-pamby’ nonsense. Yet here she is—the most mindful person I know! Don’t let something so easy and so good for you become pretentious. Live mindfully by simply opening your eyes to what’s going on around you. My mum’s got it right: stop and take the photo.