Rediscovering Calm in a Chaotic World | Dr. Mark Williams and Dr. Danny Penman

There are moments in life that decide your fate. They ripple into the future and dictate how you experience the world in the moments that follow; either positive and uplifting, dark and chaotic, or flat and dull.

What if you could recognize these moments before they seized control of your life?

What if you could use them to set sail for a better future? 

What if all moments, big and small, could be harnessed this way?

These are the questions that Oxford Professor Mark Williams and Dr. Danny Penman address in their wonderful new book, Deeper Mindfulness: A New Way to Rediscover Calm in a Chaotic World.

These questions are also at the heart of our conversation today which is the second episode in our stress and anxiety series here on the podcast. 

Each episode in this series invites some of the world’s leading experts to share inspiring insights, practical tools, and helpful resources for navigating stress and anxiety more effectively in our lives.
 
Miss the first episode in the series? You can find it here:

• Unwinding Anxiety | Dr. Jud Brewer

In today's episode Mark and Danny will share: 

• How they have used mindfulness to overcome personal and professional challenges including a hangliding accident that led to Danny’s hospitalization and the incredible story of his recovery. 
• Why mindfulness is so effective for healing, and for working with stress and anxiety
• Why they have made mindfulness the central focus of their work in mental health
• An introduction to the concept of 'feeling tones' - an automatic and often subconscious categorization of our experience as pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral. 
• How to increase awareness of feeling tones in the moment they happen
• Practices for working with feeling tones that lead to calm, clarity, and wellbeing.
• Neuroscience findings that shed light on how our brains construct our reality and how we can leverage this knowledge to take back control of our lives.

About Danny and Mark:

Dr Danny Penman is a qualified meditation teacher and award-winning writer and journalist. He currently writes features for the UK Daily Mail, having previously worked for the BBC, New Scientist and the Independent newspaper. He is co-author of the international bestseller Mindfulness: A Practical Guide to Finding Peace in a Frantic World.  In 2014, he won the British Medical Association’s Best Book Award for Mindfulness for Health: A Practical Guide to Relieving Pain, Reducing Stress and Restoring Wellbeing (co- written with Vidyamala Burch). His books have been translated into more than 25 languages.

 Professor Mark Williams is Professor of Clinical Psychology and Wellcome Trust Principal Research Fellow at the University of Oxford. He co-developed MBCT, is Director of the Oxford Mindfulness Centre, and is co-author of the international best-seller The Mindful Way Through Depression. He is one of the premier researchers in the field of mindfulness worldwide, and has been a pioneer in its development and dissemination.

Visit Franticworld.com for more on Mark and Danny

The 5-day Transforming Stress Challenge begins November 13th. Register now!

• Head to practicingcourage.com/stress to sign up.

Thanks for listening!