The following reflection originally appeared in the newsletter I sent out on November 20, 2025.
Feel free to read just the bold words and skip the rest.
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Introduction
I recently came across a line that offers one of the better concise descriptions of mindfulness that I’ve ever encountered. It said:
“Mindfulness is the Middle Way between suppression and fusion.”
In today’s reflection, I’ll break down what that actually means, both theoretically and practically. I’ll also speak to many of the wrong turns people make when trying to practice with this, as well as how being mindful can actually set the stage for wise and loving action.
*** Here’s a short article I wrote on “what is mindfulness.” ***
Starting With The Cold
People often get the idea that mindfulness means we’re not supposed to feel things (suppression). They think we’re supposed to be some dispassionate, uninvolved witness that looks like a Buddha statue, both externally and internally.
This is a major misunderstanding of what mindfulness actually is.
As an example, imagine we are on a walk with a friend on a 50 degree, crisp windy day. It’s cold and we’re a little underdressed. There are three basic options on how we can relate to this experience.
We could suppress our feeling of the temperature, like running back to our car and wrapping ourself in a blanket, trying to busy ourself with the conversation so we don’t feel anything, or gritting our teeth and white-knuckling through the unpleasant sensations.
We could fuse with the temperature, collapsing into the sensation of cold, mentally complaining, feeling irritable, and putting our energy into schemes to get away from the cold as opposed to being present with the experience. If the urge to shiver arises, we collapse into it, shivering uncontrollably.
Finally, we could simply be mindful that “cold is happening.” We feel the crisp sensation of cold on the skin. We feel the tingles, pressures, movements of air, discomfort, and so on. If by chance some resistance or scheming thoughts arise, we notice those too. “Cold is happening. Piercing sensations are here. There is resistance.”
With mindfulness, when we feel-notice what’s happening without resistance or fusion, there is a choice point. Rather than go down the autopilot stream of reactivity, we can respond consciously. For example, from the ground of centeredness, we could choose to get the blanket, choose to take a deep breath, or choose to relax and let be.
Curiously, we actually feel more deeply with mindfulness than with fusion. This is because with fusion, we tend to give a fair bit of our bandwidth to the stories and resistance around the feeling, as opposed to just the raw feeling of cold.
Importantly, people think we need to “do something” to feel our feelings. Mostly, it’s just be mindful, notice the tendency to suppress or fuse, and choose to stay present. When we do this, feeling the feelings is automatic. Think about it — you don’t need a special trick to feel cold on a cold day; the direct experience is hiding in plain sight.
A Simple Definition
Suppression, fusion and mindfulness can apply to not just temperature, but also to thoughts, emotions, body sensations, urges, or anything else. Here are some basic definitions:
- Suppression means resisting, avoiding, pushing away, ignoring, bypassing, numbing, disassociating, or denying an experience.
- Fusion means identifying with, clinging onto, grasping, getting entangled in, reacting, or being swept away by an experience.
- Resting in the middle, mindfulness is neither a pushing away nor being lost in it. Similar to a mirror that reflects an image without reaction or judgment, mindfulness just shows us what’s happening. Mindfulness says, tension is here. Sadness is happening. Pain in the knee is occurring. There is sunshine. Feeling calm.
The Middle Way With Urges
One meditation exercise I like to give people is to become mindful of impulses and urges.
Basically, during meditation, I give the instruction for 10 minutes to not move a muscle in the body. What follows is deeper awareness of all the little impulses and urges to adjust a finger, the tongue, a leg, the back, and so on.
These impulses are happening all day long. To pick up our phone. To speak in a conversation the exact micro-second the other person stops speaking. To grab a snack. Even more subtly, to think a thought.
The most common response to these impulses is fusion. We simply follow the impulse on autopilot.
Sometimes we might also slip into suppression, noticing the urge and trying to distract ourselves from it, or perhaps criticizing ourselves for wanting a cookie at this hour.
Alternatively, what mindfulness shows is that we have the option to simply notice, “urge to itch my face is happening,” or “wanting to think about my to-do list,” or an impulse to quit the meditation.”
When we are actually mindful of the impulse, we see we don’t need to fuse with it, and we also don’t need to swat it away. We let it be there, like sounds in the distance.
Ultimately, it’s fine to adjust our posture in meditation or to follow our impulses in daily life — but can we do it with intentionality instead of autopilot fusion?
Exploring Emotions
Imagine you have recently experienced some sort of loss. Maybe it’s the death of a loved one, a financial setback, some physical ailment, the end of a cherished era, or even lucidly realizing you can’t live up to your lofty expectations for your life.
It’s completely normal that sadness would arise, which is essentially the heart’s honoring something beloved, while also coming to terms with its passing.
With suppression, we do whatever we can to not feel the sadness. We may tell ourself to “be positive” or “this is just life.” Maybe we keep ourself so busy (or bombarded with screens) that we don’t take the time to actually feel or process it. Or, if we meditate, we choose a method that has intense concentration, endeavoring to block out or ignore anything other than our focus point, like all those scary feelings.
With fusion, we become the sadness. We collapse into its energy — slightly downcast, slouched, frowny, or flat. We cycle around the stories of the sadness, like “it will never be the same again.” We feel a deep need for meaning or explanation. We coax ourselves into crying, rehashing memories and watching sad movies, seeking catharsis for catharsis sake. We bring “sadness-tinted-glasses” into every interaction and activity. Maybe we mindlessly follow the urges of sadness, like to lay in bed all day and do nothing.
With mindfulness, we notice-feel the sadness, but see that it is just an experience happening; not who I am. We feel the heaviness, the sinking feeling, or the low energy, but we maintain some grounded sense of center. We breathe and notice, “sadness is happening.” If tears want to come, we let them come; but we don’t go searching for them or try to prolong them. There’s a sense of intimacy but not overwhelm; tenderness but not depression. We see that sadness doesn’t color every moment of the day or every interaction — there are sad moments and not-sad moments.
For some of the really big losses, waves of sadness may come for years. However, if 20 years later, we still feel a big loss, actively grieving, angry, or depressed about a death, something is off. We’re caught in a loop of suppression or fusion. Of course, it’s more nuanced than this, but the middle way is the answer — to mindfully feel-notice the pain, to actually let it move through.
I could write something similar for anger, shame, despair, fear/anxiety or longing, but the mindful middle way is the same.
Can we come to a really clean relationship with these emotions, seeing them as part of the package of being human? Can we simply allow them to arise and feel-notice them move through the mind & body? Neither fusing with the thoughts or raw energy nor pushing them away, believing they are bad.
Basically we learn the mindful middle way, relating to them with presence and care, that they may become allies that inform our wise choices, as opposed to enemies to overcome.
A Brief Note on Anxiety
This applies to basically everything, but one wrong turn people make is that they hear, “don’t suppress anxiety,” so when anxiety arises, they allow the thoughts to go on and on and on. However, this is just fusion!
The core of any emotion, including anxiety, is not in the thoughts — it’s the emotional energy in the body.
To mindfully be with an emotion doesn’t mean fusing with all the thoughts; it means noticing-feeling it in the body. Of course, the thoughts are there. We don’t try to make them stop. Rather, we see that when we give our attention to the core of the experience — the body — the thoughts taper off on their own, as opposed to going on forever.
There can be times it’s appropriate to consciously think about our anxiety, what’s going on, or if any action is needed. However, this clear, wise thinking is very different from the frantic thought chain of fusion.
So-Called Positive Emotions
Sometimes people ask, “what about positive emotions, like joy, awe or love? Shouldn’t we fuse with those?”
The more I’ve studied this terrain in my own experience, I’ve noticed that fusion has a degree of clenching. I sort of amp up the joy. I try to make it bigger or last longer. It’s buzzy and has undertones of restlessness. Inevitably, I always crash — and this can be quite subtle, but there is a lull of energy that follows the ending of fusion. If you look closely, you will see it.
In contrast, when I am simply mindful, without suppression or fusion, I actually feel a deeper joy. It’s a joy that doesn’t need it to remain to feel fulfilled. It’s more serene, present, and centered. It’s cooler.
How to be mindful of joy or love instead of fusing?
The simplest instruction is to bring yourself to a place of joy or love & notice what pulls you from that.
Using more words, notice if there is a quality of peace, ease, or settledness. If not, inquire what is inhibiting that peaceful quality? If so, pay attention to your inner experience and notice when the little movement to clench, cling, amp up, hold on, make it last longer enters in.
When you see these little movements with mindfulness, you again see you have a choice to follow them or not.
For example, let’s say you’re at a restaurant catching up with an old friend. Even if it’s wordless, you notice a subtle tension arise that says, “this is such a nice delightful conversation and I don’t want it to end, but I worry they are going to say it’s time to go, so I’ll fill the gaps with more words so they don’t have a chance to call it.”
If you see that whole chain reaction and the tension along with it, you don’t have to just spew out more words. You don’t need to suppress or ignore the feeling of wanting more. You let it be there without grabbing hold of it, like sounds in the distance. You trust the conversation will end when it the time is ripe. You allow yourself to flow with the universe.
A Brief Note on Passivity
Sometimes people get the idea that when you’re mindful of an urge, emotion, thought, sensation, and find an acceptance of it, that means you “don’t do anything.”
However, mindfulness is just step one of a two step process:
- Step one, mindfully notice and allow what’s happening.
- Step two, if there’s something to do, do it; if not, abide peacefully.
Doing something could mean adjusting our posturing, journaling about our sadness, talking it over with a good friend, or creating an action plan. It could also mean bringing in self-compassion, gratitude, or doing a technique to ground ourselves amidst overwhelm. If the world is burning and people are suffering, it might mean harnessing your gifts and skills to care for others. The list could go on and on.
Importantly, when we actually do the mindful part first, our actions are clearer, less fixated on results, and more peaceful each step of the way. It also leads to about 1,000x less burnout.
How To Practically Use This Teaching
The simplest way to apply this is to become mindful of the three modes in your real-time experience.
Whether during meditation or across the day, notice, “suppression is happening,” “fusion is happening,” or “mindful allowing is happening.”
Begin to study those three experiences.
When you suppress something, what’s that like? Do you notice tension? A pushing away? What are the thoughts like? What does the body feel like?
When you fuse with something, what’s that like? Do you notice tension? A gripping onto? What are the thoughts like? What does the body feel like?
When you are mindfully allowing something, what’s that like? Do you notice ease? An allowing-to-be? What are the thoughts like? What does the body feel like?
What are the situations or phenomena that prompt you most regularly into each mode? Maybe you fuse with thoughts, suppress physical pain, and mindfully allow sadness, anxiety and joy. Study your mind!
When you notice yourself clearly in a certain mode, It can be useful across the day to actually verbally label, “fusing,” “suppressing,” or “mindful.”
And for the pro-level tip — remember to not fuse with your fusion or suppress your suppression. Simply notice those too as more things to mindfully allow. If you find yourself in their throes, just take a breath, pause, feel your feet, and proceed.
Conclusion
For me, one of the most interesting questions is, what does it mean to live a life well-lived?
A simple answer to that question is abstaining from suppression and fusion. To enter more and more deeply in the mindful middle way.
I trust that the more you study your own experience and see how you move through these three modes, the profound depth and beauty of the middle way will reveal itself. The more you see that, the more you’ll incline that way organically.
Of course, things like a regular meditation practice, trustworthy guides, and a community of fellow practitioners are really, really helpful aids along the way — they turn it from a “good idea” into a “lived reality.”
May you increasingly live a life well lived!!
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