MAINSTREAM MINDFULNESS
The Idea of
Mainstream
Mindfulness
Mindfulness has become so culturally saturated that the word itself has lost most of its meaning. We are told to "live mindfully" and that stress will dissolve, productivity will soar, and we'll finally stop doom-scrolling at 2am. But let's be honest — is it actually working?
Here's the thing nobody mentions in the Instagram captions: mindfulness isn't new. It can be traced to the fifth century BC, when it appeared in the 37 Factors of Enlightenment in Buddha's teachings. So no, your favourite CEO did not invent it at a Tulum retreat.
I spent most of 2020 immersed in the research and trying to practice it daily — partly out of genuine curiosity, partly out of sheer pandemic-induced desperation. What I found was less a solution and more a mirror. Which is either deeply profound or deeply annoying, depending on the day.
So where do you start? The best entry point is deceptively simple: figure out what mindfulness means for you specifically, then decide where to apply it. Not everyone needs a meditation cushion and a Headspace subscription. For me, the single most transformative practice was spending less time on my phone. That's it. No gong baths required.
Do not confuse mindfulness with meditation, though meditative exercises are part of the toolkit. Ask yourself honestly: do you need this for relationships? Stress? Work? All three simultaneously while also managing a global health crisis? Once you know the target, the practice becomes useful rather than another thing to feel guilty about not doing correctly.
At its core, mindfulness is the art of being present. The "now." And yes, the concept has become so mainstream that celebrities endorse it between brand deals and gurus coach Fortune 500 CEOs between TED Talks. Anyone can embrace this practice: pay attention to your body, your food, your movement, your breath. It's just awareness. The fact that we've turned awareness into a $4.4 billion industry is, perhaps, something to be mindful of.
The term "McMindfulness" was coined by Buddhist teacher and psychotherapist Miles Neale to describe "a feeding frenzy of spiritual practices that provide immediate nutrition but no long-term sustenance." He was not wrong. There's a growing conversation in the wellness world about decolonising mindfulness — recognising that the Asian wisdom traditions at its roots have been culturally stripped, packaged, and resold at a significant markup since at least the 18th century.
None of which means it doesn't work. I've experienced work burnout several times — a special kind of exhaustion that startup culture both creates and refuses to acknowledge — and the synergy of body-mind awareness genuinely helped. Not because it removed the stressors, but because it made me better at recognising them before they became crises. That's not nothing.
What 2020 did, for all its chaos, was force a collective reckoning with connection. Many of us reached for our phones. Some of us reached for something else. Mindfulness — stripped of the apps and the influencers and the $200 retreat deposits — is simply the practice of noticing. Noticing who drains you and who fills you up. Noticing that a small act of kindness can make someone's entire day. Noticing that you've been staring at a screen for four hours and your neck hurts.
You don't have to go spiritual with it. Though you absolutely can. That's the beauty — and the maddening, brilliant vagueness — of the whole thing.
If you want to go deeper, here's where to start:
McMindfulness: How Mindfulness Became the New Capitalist Spirituality by Ronald Purser, published by Repeater Books — the most rigorous critique of the wellness-industrial complex you'll find. Not anti-mindfulness; anti-nonsense.
"Is Mindfulness Meditation BS?" — WIRED, 2017, by Robert Wright. Sharp, honest, and arrives at a more nuanced conclusion than the title suggests.
Apps worth trying: Headspace and 10% Happier are both genuinely good entry points. No guru required.
For those who want something even simpler — no app, no book, no retreat — try this. Next time you're feeling sad, sit down, close your eyes, and actually study the sadness. Don't fight it. Just observe it. You might notice, for example, that the feeling sits specifically around your eyes — in exactly the place that would activate if you started crying. That careful observation, combined with a kind of acceptance, can make the feeling significantly less overwhelming. And, crucially, less a permanent part of your self-definition.
The information is out there. The tools exist. The only real question is which one is going to work for you — because that answer is genuinely, irritatingly, wonderfully unique to every single person.
Cover visual by Emma Allegretti
Personal essays, cultural rants,
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Leila Antakly writes about culture, wellness, creativity, and the complicated business of being alive — on her Substack. Subscribe for more.
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