It surprised me when the idea of mindfulness is to strengthen our mind, so we can be more aware of ourselves and not react immediately, just hold for a few seconds before we choose to respond.
You will quite often see this quote by Jon Kabat-Zinn when you come across mindfulness.
Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementally
Jon Kabat-Zinn
It means all the moments of mindfulness are in an aware state by purposely paying attention to what is happening in the current situation without judging or labelling.
Reflection
This makes me wonder how many times my mind drive away by other things, without knowing it and in fact I make a lot of judgments about those thoughts whether they are good or bad. How does that feel if I am living in the present without thinking of the past or planning for the future?