Top Highlights

• In mindfulness practice, we change our relationship to difficult experiences—instead of trying to escape or avoid them, we move toward them.
• How can one practice possibly help with so many different problems? The answer is that they’re all made worse by the same natural tendency: in our effort to feel good, we try to avoid or escape discomfort, only to discover that this in fact multiplies our misery.
• an astonishing variety of problems actually stem from our attempts to get rid of problems.
• The problem is that our wonderfully adaptive tendency to seek pleasure and avoid pain, while great for our collective survival, locks us into shopping for pleasure and running from pain all day long.
• Unfortunately, the pleasure principle also makes it difficult for us to just be. In virtually every moment we’re attempting to adjust our experience, trying to hold on to pleasant moments and avoid unpleasant ones. This makes it very difficult to relax fully and feel at ease or satisfied.