Mindfulness: How to avoid "othering" the others

Mindfulness can often be seen as a nebulous term. What does it mean to be mindful? Can one person's mindfulness be another person's harm?

Sure, every concept can, and will be, interpreted differently by each person. Yet, mindfulness tends to have at least one universal quality: awareness of others alongside oneself.

When we are mindful, we recognize there are other human beings in our sphere of existence, and take care to be aware of them. Being aware means acknowledging that their thoughts, ideas, behaviors, and personalities are likely to be different than our own. The greatest of human challenges is learning to be in community and communication with one another in both joy and conflict. When we experience interpersonal conflict, it can often be as a result of "othering" or lead to "othering".

In recent years, the term "othering", has become popular. What is "othering"? According to the Oxford-Cambridge dictionary, "othering" means treating someone as if they are not part of a group or different in some way. Many people use "othering" as a synonym of "stereotyping". "Othering" is a way of highlighting or focussing on differences, instead of similarities.

It's human nature to compare and contrast differences and similarities between our own self and those around us. Children naturally do this all the time. It's actually a fundamental way in which our brains create neural pathways and develop when we are young. However, as we age, we learn that always focussing on difference and using those differences to treat people differently, are not useful to ourselves, our communities, and our societies at large. Democratic ideals of nations like the United States and the United Kingdom are founded on the concept that every person is "created equal", which implies that they should be treated equally.

Focussing on differences turns into harmful "othering" or "stereotyping" when we use words and actions to treat someone differently based on untruths, or perceived truths that are really all in our minds. Landlords who turn down an apartment rental application to someone because of the color of their skin, because they assume the family will "tear the place up like animals" is an example of when differences become othering and harmful. The landlord's assumption is not based on actual truth or fact, but potentially on past experience or shared stereotypes by other landlords they know. I'll discuss more on truth in a moment.

Now that these ideas have been defined, what can we do about it? Why should we care? And, what can "mindfulness" do to assist in avoiding othering?

I'm going to share a story of when I was recently "othered", and how I handled it. It was a huge moment of personal growth for me. In our divisive times where many seem to wallow in excitable energies, it's paramount to use mindfulness to be our best selves as often as possible. Just like Mahatma Gandi's famous quote "Be the change you want to see in the world", if we want our world to be different than it is, then we must be deeply aware of each relationship, personal interaction, and even our own energy and emotions, as we move through our lives. Mindfulness helps us to achieve this aim.

A few weeks ago, I posted about the Fall Into Peace 2025 Greece yoga retreat on social media, in terms of "prosperity mindset". For some reason, many of the forums I post in would not publish this post. I did not understand why. However, one forum did post it, and someone I know, a neighbor, posted a reply to it that was very hurtful to me. The message implied that I was financially gouging people, and that the community we live in could not financially support the cost of such a trip, and therefore, I should move someplace else.

Frankly, I was devastated. I was devastated for several reasons: 1) I had never received a negative comment on one of my yoga programs before, 2) I knew the person and had just recently received help from her partner, 3) I have felt so welcome in my community, more than any other place I've lived before. In short, I love where I live.

In addition, my menopausal hormones were raging and I had just experienced the loss of my work laptop. All of this combined for an emotional reaction.

Thankfully, I experienced my emotional reaction by myself, and with a couple of close friends who were able to talk me through it. I sought and received the support I needed to breathe, get back to the present moment, and breathe again. Whew. But, now what? Once I calmed down, I was left with what to do next. Do I respond? Do I ignore the comment? What should I do?

Scrabble tiles spelling the word mindfulness.

The tricky part is that I still live in this community and have this person as my neighbor. So, whatever I do will have repercussions on my comfort, safety, and joy where I live. This is mindfulness. I recognized there were people in my community who felt a certain way about my yoga offerings that were different than my own. And, attempting to discuss the situation with them might lead to a worsening of relationship.

One of the friends I had a loving and supportive phone call with, has extensive experience with Non-Violent Communication (NVC). Non-violent communication is the attempt to resolve conflict by expressing one's own needs, and listening to others' needs with compassion, and avoiding criticism and blame. He suggested that a way I could handle this person and the comment she left, was to acknowledge her viewpoint and ask for her suggestions on how I could improve my offerings, so that they would be more accessible to members of our community. I used AI to help me write a response. I posted a reply comment that said her feedback was valid and that I love our community. Then, I asked her what I could change to make this yoga program more accessible to those in our community.

I did not receive a response, nor did I expect one. When a person is reacting out of an emotional trigger of some kind, it is rare that they will want to engage in problem-solving. However, my friend did share that he was able to use NVC successfully many times to engage his fiercest critics, which then turned them into his fiercest allies.

At the end of the day, we all want to be heard.

Several friends suggested I just ignore the comment. Somehow, that did not seem like the right thing to do. I did not like the helpless or meek feeling of being "othered" by the person who posted the comment. I belong in my community just as much as they do. We were both attracted to this community for maybe some similar reasons, and also some different reasons. Whether we want to be or not, we are in community together. I did not want to feed into the energy behind her comment, yet I wanted to acknowledge the humanity that caused her to make the comment.

Most people in the world do not know what they think or feel. They are simply unconsciously reacting to internal beliefs or past experiences. This is especially true for someone who suffers from PTSD or CPTSD from trauma. I am one of these people, and have spent most of my life reacting from complications of my PTSD that I developed from childhood trauma. Mindfulness allows us to learn about what is happening in our internal world, so that we don't merely react, but rather we respond. Mindfulness gives us the choice on how we want to respond, if at all. Years of yoga, mindfulness, and stillness practices allow me to react less than before, and respond more than ever. I will never be perfect, yet I live a more fulfilling and joyful life with the ratio of respond/react being higher on the "respond" side.

After I listened to the support offered to me, and I vented my feelings, and I felt the hurt and pain of the comment and what was being insinuated, I breathed. I reflected. Then, I made a choice to respond that did not "other" the person "othering" me. It took a lot of courage and awareness to attempt this. If it hadn't been for all the years of stillness practice, mindfulness practice, and yoga practice, I don't think I could have done this with the grace that I did.

After responding, I prayed for my neighbor. I prayed for her to receive all the things that I would like to receive: warm and compassionate communication; feeling included in our community; support and encouragement for her efforts. This is an excellent mindfulness technique. It helps me to develop empathy and connection so that I avoid "othering" others in return. Praying for others to receive what I want humbles me to recognize that most people want the same things. The likelihood that my neighbor wants the things I listed is high, because we all want things like this. When I recognize our commonalities, I am less likely to "other" in return.

A man meditating under a tree.

Lastly, studying meditation helps me to develop compassion for others and become aware of my natural tendency to "other". Lately, I've been calling meditation "stillness", because some people do not like the connection to a religion or religious practice. I recently took a program developed by a Buddhist monk, Mingur Rinpoche, that teaches the concepts and techniques of meditation without the Buddhism part. I really enjoyed learning this practice. During that course, Mr. Rinpoche said everyone is trying to become happy. They do and say things that they believe will bring them happiness. When we can see people's actions and words in this light, it is easier to reframe our experience from a place of compassion for the human suffering and experiences we all share, instead of "othering" on top of more "othering".

What I really learned from this segment of the meditation training is that people often have the false belief that putting others down will make them happy. It is true that "othering" someone can lead to a sense of superiority, or an adrenaline rush that they "got" someone, and the like. However, it's a fleeting feeling. The sense of control, power, or happiness generated when putting someone down does not last. The minds of many people then draw the conclusion that "I must do this again, to feel this jolt of false happiness". Then the mind goes to someplace like "If I achieve this fleeting happiness enough times in a row, I will be happy all the time."

This never results in the happiness we seek. Repeatedly "othering" people is a hallow win, a false sense of accomplishment. How can we know if we are in this cycle? By becoming still, and asking ourselves what we feel, what we believe, and then examining the facts as they are presented. Questioning our own motives, reflecting on possible past events, and the like, help us to see the truth of our own minds. And, we also see how our relationship to our minds is such that we often simply believe every thought we have, and never question the validity of it. Our minds are such powerful entities that work towards our personal and species-wide survival, that it takes effort to examine our relationship to them. Even so, it is possible. Many have done this before our time, and successfully created a new relationship to their mind.

I had wanted to say thank you to this neighbor and her partner for the help they had given me a few weeks prior. After I replied to her comment, the next day, I purchased coffees for both of them at our local cafe. I called her up and let her know they could pick up the coffees whenever they wished. She thanked me and told me how nice that was.

With attention to how we feel, think, and self-care, we can pause before responding. Using mindfulness and stillness practices can go a long way to fostering communication, dialog, and cooperation. We can resolve conflicts when we listen with a heart and mind that we have thoroughly explored. In this case, I recognized I was taking the neighbor's comment very personally. This is an emotional habit I am very aware of as a result of the abuse and lack of safety I experienced when young. I began to examine the why behind that, and inviting myself to let the whole situation go. If we don't know our mental and emotional habits, then how will we know we are not acting out of them in response to another?

In my many years of 12-step recovery, I have been blessed to hear many people share things. like, "I want to know the truth" or "I want to live in truth". If we do not know what is true inside ourselves, then how can we see or experience truth in our external world?

Stillness, yoga, and mindfulness help us get at the truth.

If you would like to explore how mindfulness can help you in your personal and professional lives, get in touch.

With mindfulness and imperfection, Marissa