Two Articles

First article : http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-mindfulness-good-medicine/

Second article : http://tinybuddha.com/blog/7-obstacles-to-mindfulness-and-how-to-overcome-them/

Because of the recent influx of people who have been practicing mindfulness in the last few years many people have begun to form their own opinions about the practice, and some may have even come to question how and why the practice should be used. Many people agree that the practice is beneficial, some doctors have come to use the practice to help patients medically, while other people use to just to add some "health" into their lives.

The first article I read was about mindfulness from a medical standpoint. Titled "Is mindfulness a good medicine ?" the article goes into depth talking about how the practice affects the brain. The article  is written by Hal Arkowitz,  and the main part of his article is about all the research of different programs that have to do with mindfulness from a medical standpoint. He talks about different programs including psychologist Scott Bishop, at the University of Toronto, Stefan Hofmann of Boston University and Bassam Khoury, at the University of Montreal. He studied how mindfulness affects the brain through these programs and almost all of these proved to be successful and positive on the brain.

The Second article I read was about mindfulness tips, from a practicing mindfulness everyday standpoint. The article delved into the practice of mindfulness and how people may have difficulties when starting out the practice. The author Henri Junttila begins the article by talking about his own experience with mindfulness, he emphasizes how at times you feel as if you have no where to go, the article talks about how you can get through a period like this. "Like with any worthwhile journey, you will feel like giving up and throwing in the towel multiple times."
It is very interesting to look at mindfulness from these two standpoints because its looking at it from a medical standpoint as well as a home practicing standpoint.