Mindfulness + Woodworking

So, about woodworking — I know nothing! Now at this point, if you are wondering what I am doing writing for this esteemed publication — you are not alone — let me start by telling you how this article came to be.

About six months ago, in the throws of dark days of the COVID-19 crisis, which now seems like the better days, a group of friends and I decided to start experimenting with writing for fun on medium — I do not consider myself a writer — I trained as and consider myself a scientist and have always thought that there is a different code about scientific writing— or so I thought! I have since come to think of writing for me is a series of experiments with words. Some would work, and some would leave traces for improvement, and as a trained experimenter — nothing is more delightful than to keep learning new things and finding new friends — so all that to say, this is my attempt at learning and writing about woodworking — thanks for coming along for a ride.

Humans, as it turns out, have been interested in woodworking for a long time, at least 1.5 million years old — In a study published in the Journal of human evolution, Archeologists found traces of acacia wood on stone tools belonging to our evolutionary relatives, Homo erectus, likely implying they were some of the earliest woodworkers on record.

Woodworking, for the purposes of this story, is referring to the activity or skill of making items from wood, including cabinet making, wood carving, carpentry, and such. Along with stone, clay, and animal parts, wood was likely one of the first materials worked on by humans, and it is something that continues to inspire our imagination today.

Though with the merging of modern technology and human ingenuity, woodworking today benefits from mass production and computer-controlled manufacturing, though I suspect the readers of this publication are likely more inclined to engage and report on handcrafted work.

So, I thought I would take this opportunity to combine two of my current interests — mindfulness and woodworking — Like woodworking, mindfulness is a way of engaging with our world in an intentional, reflective, and planned yet playful manner.

I have previously written about mindfulness— Essentially, as I understand it, mindfulness or meditation is about becoming aware of one’s experiences. It can involve developing an awareness of our body, our thoughts, our feelings, and our actions.

Our mind craves coherence like Luke Skywalker craves adventure — There’s a constant drive for our brain to connect the dots of our moment to moment experiences. It is beneficial to understand our present experiences as they connect with our past and to imagine their impact on our future.

We can learn from our past and plan for our future. It also explains our bursts of creative insight and our remarkable ability to feel, for example, our close friend’s unhappiness when she’s having a hard time. That unconscious effort, that internal drive to understand and make sense of the world, can’t be overestimated — and it may be the most compelling sign of the adaptive and prosocial nature of the unconscious mind. However, the one thing it can keep us from is — Living in the present and engaging in the practice of mindfulness can help us bring our awareness to the present moment.

The practice of mindfulness or meditation is essentially a practice to live fully by separating moments — living in the present, learning from our past, and preparing for our future. I imagine that there are similarities in the two processes — that is mindfulness and woodworking.

For instance, I imagine, there is a certain amount of present awareness needed to focus on the task at hand while you are working with woodworking tools — it can allow for you to slow down and help cut the chatter in your mind to a minimum lest you risk hurting yourself or missing a step.

Woodworking projects certainly benefit from learning from our past projects, and it would be hard to imagine starting a woodworking project without at least a vision of what you would like to see as the finished product. There is also something quite satisfying working with natural material such as wood, gently shaping it into something meaningful and maybe even beautiful.

One thing that can combine the two — meditation benches — A meditation bench is a type of low stool that is canted forward, and it allows a person to tuck their legs beneath the bench, thereby making it easy to sit with a straight back — it might not sound like it, but it is actually surprisingly comfortable.

Here are two possible options for meditation benches:

Meditation Bench A — a rocking meditation bench

Meditation Bench B — a simple three boards design

To the woodworking experts in this group — how difficult do you imagine undertaking making a meditation bench woodworking project would be for a complete novice? Might you suggest another start project instead? I am honestly not sure I feel brave enough to embark on a woodworking project quite yet, but it certainly has been fun exploring the topic as it relates to my meditation practice.

Thank you to ScienceDuuude for the inspiration and invitation, and thank you all for reading!

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