A Conversation with Menswear Designer and Meditation Guru Chris Manning aka Mindfulness Man
January 3rd 2021
This is the fifteenth in a series of interviews with creative and inspiring people, chatting all things human and what it takes to ‘be’. The aim being not only to promote their work but to uncover their journey, learn about technique and pass on tips and advice. I’m hoping these conversations will inspire others to be unique, take risks and understand the beauty in failure …… We have but one life, lets make it creative !
Chris and I have been friends for many years so I knew our conversation would be relaxed and a joy to connect with him face to face , in a virtual kind of way, but more fool me I never imagined how inspiring, informative and what can only be described as an epic 60 mins of enlightenment !
You can see the full interview on IGTV here
Chris Manning is a menswear fashion designer and artist. Previously owning a street wear called ‘Death Before Dishonour’ his striking Japanese inspired illustrations were edgy and provocative. Now heading up a team of menswear designers bringing well cut, unique streetwear to the high street he splits his time between his two passions… creativity and mindfulness.
Over the last two and a half decades Chris has been a student of mindfulness , meditations and the teachings of Buddhism. At a time when meditation and mindfulness were considered a ‘hippy’ endeavour Chris and not particularly ‘on trend’ he was steadfast in the knowledge that the practice enriched his body and mind …. way ahead of the curve with the majority only catching up recently.
We all know how authenticity and integrity are the two attributes needed to grow a following … during the first Covid lockdown in early spring 2020 Chris saw people were struggling with mental health, he felt compelled to help. He wanted to share his knowledge and build a supportive community, the upshot was so starting a Face Book group called Mindfulness in Daily Life. In little over six months the group is now the second largest meditation and mindfulness group on facebook with 75K followers … I’m sure you’ll agree this is an incredible achievement. Chris offers daily guided meditations and has recently introduced a book club offering an interactive discussions, interviews and collective learning. His current book ( Jan 2021) is Living Beautifully: With Uncertainty and Change by Pema Chödrön .
Here’s only 7 minutes worth of wisdom during our 60 min chat … go to IGTV to see the full interview.
Top Take Aways
During meditation by bringing your attention to the physical body you start to focus the mind.
There’s a misconception that meditation is about clearing the mind and that’s the biggest load of bullshit ever, it’s not about that, it’s about seeing whats inside your mind and being aware of that process. And when you start become more familiar with the process you can go deeper into your mediation.
Book Recommendations
The Zen of Seeing by Frederick Franck
Living Beautifully: With Uncertainty and Change by Pema Chödrön
Sam - “ So, I want to make sure that we've got some good tips for people and things to grasp onto. And I'm like, I find myself, I detached myself quite a lot. And I'll throw myself into creativity as a detachment or like I'll be reading a book and then the next thing I'm like, what the fuck have I just read ? It’s like I'm just not here … I'm not present. ”
Chris - “ Yes. Like, you have to go all the way back to the start.”
Sam - “ Yeah. So I stopped drinking alcohol. And now, it's has been four years. And I have a cup of coffee, or some sugar, I can feel it rushing through my body, because it's almost like my body's really present. And I want to do the same for my mind. My mind is like I'm like a full blown junkie, I need to detox , what would you suggest if somebody is just feeling really like they want to become more present ? “
Chris - “ Well, what I would say is, don't try and be present in the mind. A - it's too tricky. You try to be present in the mind something will come around the corner and sneak up on you and before before you know it you're planning your holiday. So the way to be present is to go into the body. Okay, what the Buddha said in this 'Fathom long body' is our route to awakening, it's all here.
So we go into the body, we go into the soles of the feet if we're walking, we go into the breath, we can do this at any point, the breath is always there. So we basically take ourselves into physical sensations, we can observe the mind from there and that will help still the mind down. And the reason the breath is so good, is because the breath and the mind, the breath is the link between the mind and body. Okay, if you're agitated or stressed, your breathing will speed up. When you're relaxed, it will slow down. So you get an insight into where the mind is just from watching the breath. And the breath is physical, it's a bodily sensation. So we move into the breath and we really really observe it, we observe the length of it, Is it longer in , is it longer in short out , short in short out, all of this we really watch and we hone in and we stay with it and feel the physical sensations of the breath. That will show us the mind. The breath will show us the mind, any part of the body will, so try not to make it a mental exercise try to make it a physical exercise and tap into the mind through that otherwise you've no chance you'll get lost it. It’s too stormy, calm it down with the body first.
Sam - “That's such great advice because it's a real ‘to do’, isn't it. It’s like what I did after my dad died. I had quite a lot of therapy and the talking therapy was okay but I wanted, I'm a 'doer' I like to ‘do’ things. What I had to do if I was going down a dark thought process was, I'd have elastic band around my wrist and flick it to break the cycle.”
Chris - Well that is you coming out of the mind into the body to gain some control over the mind.
Sam - Yeah, totally. So it's the same kind of thing isn't it ? A physical thing. It's something you can do on an everyday kind of level?
Chris - “ I advise to meditate with the sensations of breathing at the nostrils. ( Chris points to the area directly below the nostrils) so there's a focus in practice. And if you really become familiar with where your breath hits that spot, the breath comes in, the breath comes out, you're not following it in and out, you're staying at one tiny spot and you familiarise yourself with that in everyday life. And it's there all the time. It's there when you’re cooking, when you're driving, when you're cleaning. And the more you look at that you do two things. Number one, if you familiarising yourself with this meditation object which I suggest ( the point below your nostril) you're doing two things, number one, you're bringing that piece of meditation out into your world, which is exactly what you want. And number two, you are reinforcing that point. So when you sit down in meditation, bang, you're there. Instead of what you're saying, you know, you're running off everywhere mentally you've trained outside of meditation to be with your object.
Do you see, as I said before, it's double pronged because then when you sit down at your computer, or sewing machine or whatever you're doing and tune into the breath, you're in meditation, with your eyes open, awake in the world and off the cushion.
To see more of Chris go to -
Instagram - @mindfulnessman
Face Book - Mindfulness in Daily Life