Try this simple daily exercise to be more present
Happiness is nice. But I think what we really want to feel is peace. Deep OK-ness.
Faith offers that for some people, and it’s a vibe that we can consciously cultivate. It just takes some skill-building and practice.
The heart of the labor involves learning to dis-identify from our minds — to step back from the world and wild ride that is our thoughts and purely arrive in the here and now.
Disentangling from the chatter and narratives in our minds is a practice in presence, and it expands our capacity to feel peace.
This week and next, I’ll share practices that can help build this skill. They are samples of the kinds of things we will continue doing in the new program I just launched, Mindset Workouts.
Here’s the exercise for this week:
Pick any normal daily activity, something you do every day, but that only takes a few moments. Washing your hands is better than taking a shower, for example, because it takes less time.
Set the intention to get really present during that specific activity — if not every single time you do it, then at least once per day.
To be more specific about the process: Tune into the physical sensation you feel in your body while doing your chosen activity. Switch from thinking faculties into feeling faculties.
Say you choose washing your hands.
For those few moments at the sink, feel the water touching your skin, the friction between your fingers, the slipperiness of the soap, the tingling of the bubbles. Feel whatever physical sensations arise.
Maybe you don’t wash your hands, no problem (well it is a problem, but that’s a different conversation), pick something else — whatever you think you’ll stick to the most. Perhaps the first time you grab your phone in the morning, or when you open your computer for the day, or when you get into the car, or walk up a flight of stairs.
Whatever it is, use those moments to get out of your head and into your body. You’ll find that it’s almost impossible to genuinely feel and continue thinking at the same time. You’ll know you’re doing this right if you feel any degree of easing or peace as you do it.
We’re only talking about a few seconds at a time here, but every encounter with presence is valuable. We get a taste of peace in the moment and become incrementally more conscious over time. Every little moment of being awake and tuned-in helps us know peace in our bones more and more.
So, join me. Pick a daily activity and let’s practice presence. And, if this kind of work speaks to you, please check out Mindset Workouts, where we dive into a different theme and exercise like this every week.
Working on ourselves feels really good, and this is a simple way to dig in.
Mindset workouts can help us be healthy without breaking a sweat.
