by Kristine Kopperud, BJW Contributor

Lately, I’ve noticed a byproduct of my own mindfulness practice (which is far from regular or peer-reviewed for proficiency): I notice micro-moments of mindfulness in others. These are tiny instances in which someone might pause and choose their response, or when I observe someone listening with full intention to listen. I notice small politenesses among strangers and even a watchful companionship among my chickens. (Yes, chickens. I know one is missing if when I shut them in the coop, its brood-mate tries to push back out the door to look for it.)

I’ve even noticed one of my cats practicing a sort of compassion, when she tolerates the aggressive grooming of her youngest fur-sibling, a rescue she mothered when he didn’t know how to groom himself. His attentions lead, without fail, to hissing and swatting—when like a pesky younger brother, he just cannot resist roughhousing and takes the grooming too far. But day after day, this older cat lets him back into her space to lick-lick-lick his gratitude as he knows how.

Among humans, I noticed masterful mindful response just yesterday, in concert band rehearsal, as our conductor (as usual) would stop us, ask for some point of deeper artistry, and patiently start the section of music we’d screwed up, again. This director is a veteran teacher with more than 50 years on the podium, and this band – all adults – is attentive and skilled in ways student ensembles might still be learning. But we still miss unthinkably obvious sharps and flats. We still blow through the cutoff she just clearly articulated should end precisely on beat three of the measure. We still crescendo way past what the music so clearly calls for (and these instructions for how loud to or soft to play are actually printed in the music, phrase by phrase!).

I sit near enough to the podium that I can see how our director’s eyes follow what she hears as we play. I can see how they narrow with impatience—not quite agitation—when yes, someone misses that accidental again. But always (or nearly), I see her take in a deep clarifying breath before she speaks. Rather than singling out the source of any given mistake (which she often knows—don't think she doesn’t!), she starts with a note of gratitude. “Great, great job with that transition,” she might say, “really well-balanced.” Then she’ll ask for more – more of what we can do better, rather than less of what we’ve done wrong. It’s subtle, but powerful. I leave rehearsal with a welling sense of pride and gratitude for the efforts of so many people, listening, tuning, trying moment by moment to give our audience of listeners the gift of what we experience every week, there in the room together.

It’s said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but brain science suggests that paying close attention to and copying the skills of others is more than a passing pleasantry. "While it was once regarded as a low-level, ‘primitive’ instinct,” writes journalist Annie Murphy Paul in her recent book The Extended Mind, “researchers are coming to recognize that imitation—at least as practiced by humans, including very young ones—is a complex and sophisticated capacity.” It’s how apprentices learn so much from masters, and how using templates and blueprints isn’t cheating – they can help us scaffold our own original thinking much faster and more creatively as we apply them to new problems.

So maybe it makes sense that witnessing the mindfulness of others is itself a practice. Of course, just watching mindfulness won’t make me better at the skill itself. There’s no substitute for putting in the work. But noticing more mindfulness around me helps me see more mindfulness—or opportunities for it—in myself. And that’s surely more than a knockoff.

How Do THEY Do It? On Observing the Mindfulness of Others