The concepts of mindfulness vs self awareness are often used together and sometimes even interchangeably. However, they are two different concepts and states of mind.
It’s also believed that self-awareness is one of the core foundations of mindfulness. However, there’s a lot more to understand. So, let’s get a deeper understanding here…
What is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness refers to your ability to be completely aware and be in the present moment. It’s the practice to be conscious of your body, feelings, and surroundings. It’s also a type of meditation where you focus and sense the present.
The primary principle of mindfulness is all about being non-judgmental about the self. It also guides you to let go of your thoughts about the past and future.
Negative emotions, stress, and anxiety make it difficult to practice. However, when you face such challenges, that’s a greater call to practice mindfulness.
Mindfulness improves your life in the following ways:
- It reduces stress.
- You get mental clarity and can focus better.
- It promotes self-awareness, which helps in emotional regulation.
- It improves your mental health.
- And, it may improve sleep and regulate blood pressure, alleviate chronic pain, heart disease, and gastrointestinal issues.
Now, let’s move on to the next concept….
What is Self-Awareness?
Self-awareness is the concept of knowing yourself. In this, you pay attention to your feelings, thoughts, and characteristics. You analyze whether they align with your personal standards.
It also gives you clarity about your emotions in the present and their impact on your thinking style and actions. It helps you manage your emotions and keep them under control.
When you practice self-awareness, you reap these benefits:
- You can make better decisions.
- You improve your relationship with friends, family, coworkers, and anyone that matters to you.
- And, you become more confident and wise.
- It boosts your leadership, communication, and listening skills.
Now, let’s take a closer look at the differences…
5 Key Comparisons Between Mindfulness Vs Self Awareness
While the basic theories and benefits of mindfulness and self-awareness are explained, most people still get confused between the two. After all, there’s quite a connection between them. So, let’s take a closer look here through all the similarities and differences in this chart.
| Mindfulness | Self-Awareness | |
| Similarities | They guide you to focus on the present.They make you compassionate toward others. | |
| Differences | You practice non-judgmental introspection with it. | It asks you to look within and change, which may include judgment. |
| You may not understand your emotions that well with mindfulness. | Self-awareness helps you get an honest understanding of your emotions and thoughts. | |
| It mainly controls your thoughts and emotions. | It majorly controls your lifestyle. |
Now, that’s probably too concise to understand both clearly. So, let’s get a detailed explanation here…
1. Both mindfulness and self-awareness help you live in the moment
Mindfulness helps you understand your thoughts, feelings, and even physical sensations better.
On the other hand, self-awareness amplifies the same feeling by focusing on the surrounding world. With it, you perceive information from the world using your five senses.
Mindfulness and self-awareness let you stay connected with your present life. Thus, you live fully in the moment with both. As a result, you’re less likely to immerse yourself in past regrets or future worries.
2. Both let you be compassionate
With mindfulness, you can understand your thoughts and feelings better.
Self-awareness helps you perceive life from others’ perspectives. You can observe and understand why they react to certain situations in their ways.
When you understand your own and others’ feelings, you gain clarity about situations. It reduces the chances of misunderstandings. So, together, they can make you more compassionate towards others and treat them better.
3. Mindfulness involves non-judgmental introspection, but self-awareness is looking inward to fix your emotions
Mindfulness is all about introspecting your own thoughts and feelings. You understand and acknowledge the world inside your mind. You reflect on these internal dialogues and emotions without judgment.
Further, you focus on being present and aware of these. Instead, you let all sorts of emotions and thoughts enter and leave your mind. It teaches you not to get attached to certain thoughts or judge yourself for being negative.
On the flip side, self-awareness tells you to accept the world by putting yourself in others’ shoes. It asks you to be objective about yourself, i.e., to look inward from a third-party perspective.
Then, you must try to understand the following:
- Why do you react negatively to others?
- How do your actions and responses affect you?
- What are the ways to overcome negative thoughts and emotions?
It pushes you to not only know yourself better but evolve as a better person in society. In a way, it may ask you to judge yourself, unlike mindfulness.
4. Unlike mindfulness, self-awareness helps you understand your emotions a lot
Mindfulness asks you to passively notice the rise and fall of all types of emotions. You don’t have to fight against any kind of thought or emotion. So, you may not be able to regulate your feelings.
However, self-awareness is a way to understand all sorts of emotions you face. Especially if you face a toxic thought pattern or self-sabotaging emotions, it urges you not to ignore them.
Instead, you’re supposed to dig deeper, find the core of these emotions, and exterminate them. So, it helps you regulate your mood.
5. Mindfulness impacts your thoughts, and self-awareness impacts your life
When you practice mindfulness, you learn that regrets about the past are mere memories and worries about the future are ideas. You become mindful of both the past and future. It pushes you to live and think in the moment.
However, self-awareness teaches you to align every area of your life with your inner standards. So, it affects your lifestyle.
A word from TheMindFool
Most people wonder which of the two – mindfulness and self-awareness – is more important. However, understand that they are pretty deeply connected. When you practice mindfulness, you also practice meditation, gratitude, journaling, self-awareness, and more!
Ultimately, mindfulness lets you pay attention to internal thoughts without judgment. Self-awareness lets you focus on both internal thoughts and the external environment and assess them simultaneously.
Now, it’s your turn to practice them, find out which helps you the most, and stick to that!
