Our lives are spent building up to more important moments, later, the moments when we’ll be happy. But when those moments come, we’re not happier. In fact, we’re already looking ahead to the next big moments: an upcoming trip, a big project being completed, meeting up with friends, getting that great thing you ordered online, finding your next favorite book, meal, drink, experience. What if that wonderful moment we’ve been waiting for is this one, right now? What if this very moment is the...

When we wake up in the morning, many of us automatically go on our phones or computers and start reading, checking messages, responding to things, and moving through our online world on autopilot. We go through our day like this as well, managing as best we can, dealing with stress and being overwhelmed, moving through the physical world forgetting to be mindful. For the most part, everything is normal. We’re managing. On good days, things go pretty well. On bad days, frustration and stress...

It happens to all of us: we don’t get done what we hoped to get done, then we feel stressed or guilty about it. It’s time to let that go, because it’s not helping us. We can build resiliency around this, with a little mental training. And it will help us in magical ways. Think about whether you’ve done any of these things: * Set out to do a certain habit (exercise, eating, meditation, writing) and then didn’t do it as planned. You feel guilty, disappointed in yourself, or just...

I’ve come to realize, more and more, that I’m always rushing. I rush from one task to the next, rush through eating my food, impatient for meditation to be over, rushing through reading something, rushing to get somewhere, anxious to get a task or project finished. What’s the deal? This coming from a guy who has written a lot about slowing down and savoring, about being present, about single-tasking? As always, when I write these articles, they’re as much a reminder to myself about what...

The more I talk to people about their struggles, the more I realize that we all have some sense of dissatisfaction with ourselves. I have it, and I’d be willing to bet everyone reading this does too. Consider some of the ways we’re dissatisfied with ourselves: * We constantly have a feeling that we should be better, doing more, more productive, more mindful, and so on. * We doubt ourselves when we have to speak in a group or in public, and feel that we’re not good enough to...

Throughout the day, we get frustrated, irritated, angry. We are frustrated in traffic, when a loved one doesn’t behave the way we like, when someone tells us we’re wrong, when technology doesn’t work the way we want, when dinner is ruined, among many other daily stresses. These frustrations can build up into unhappiness, relationship problems, work problems, built up stress, blowing your top at someone when you lose your cool. Not always helpful stuff! I’m going to suggest a mindful shift...

As you sit here reading these words, you are breathing … stop for a moment and notice this breath. You could control the breath, and make it behave as you like … or you can simply let yourself breathe. There is peace in just letting your body breathe, without having to do anything about it. Now imagine letting the your hands breathe. Just let them be, without having to control them. Just let them breathe. Now look around you, and notice what else is in the room with you. See each object,...

The question I’ve been asking myself lately, before I do anything, is a deceptively simple one: “What’s the most loving thing you can do in this situation?“ Now, that might sound corny to some of you, might seem irrelevant to most of you. But give me one minute of your time to explain. I’ve been experimenting for awhile with letting go. Not running when I have uncertainty, fear, discomfort. Not acting on my fears or frustrations. Not letting these things drive me, but sitting still with...

When we go about our day, we tell ourselves a story about what’s happening … and at the center of that narrative is a single person. Ourselves. When I talk to myself about how so-and-so is inconsiderate or treated me badly, when I tell myself that it’s OK to procrastinate because I’m tired and not in the mood … I’m at the center of this movie. It’s an ongoing story about my life and everything around me, with me at the center. I’m sure you can relate — you’re at the center of your movie as...

Each of us has a different reality. And we’re creating that reality, and can shape it in many ways. We tend to think of reality as something external and absolute, like the sun shining down on us on a hot, lazy afternoon. That sun is really there, whether we believe it or not, right? But as humans, our reality is shaped by what we perceive. So one person will see the sun has overwhelmingly hot and oppressive, the other sees it as an opportunity for a great tan. Another will see it as a huge...

There’s a part of today’s consumerist world that drives us to want more, buy more, act on our impulses, hoard, spend to solve our problems, create comfort through shopping, seek thrills through travel, do more, be more. What would happen if we broke from our addiction to wanting and buying more? What would life be like if we didn’t need all that? Imagine a life where we could enjoy simple, free pleasures like going for a walk in nature, meditating, reading a book, writing. By buying less...

You can read entire books on productivity, dozens of blog posts, and implement half a dozen different productivity systems. But at the end of the day, you’d have gotten nothing important done. The truth is, productivity is fairly simple, in theory. Even if you have an overwhelming amount to do, the steps aren’t hard to figure out: * Pick something important to work on (a task from your most important project, perhaps). What you pick doesn’t really matter, because you’ll get the rest...

We think we need to improve ourselves and our current situation, because we’re dissatisfied (at least a little bit) with how things are. We have a drive to improve, improve. So we strive for change — exercise more, eat better, read more, be more mindful, do more meaningful work, be more disciplined. And yet, we struggle with change. Why is that? What’s going on? The problem is that we are clinging to the illusion of solidity. Allow me to explain. It turns out that we all want things to be...

Would it seem miraculous if you could dissolve anxiety, fears, stress, frustration, anger … by making a small mental shift? The answer might lie in thinking about how we watch films. Last night, I was watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy with my kids, and my 9-year-old daughter said some of the things in the movie scared her. I started talking about how they’re all just actors, and isn’t it funny how they dress up in these costumes to tell us this story? By helping her to see through the...

I was in a plane descending into Portland for a quick stopover, and I gazed upon a brilliant pink sunrise over blue and purple mountains, and my heart ached. Instinctively, I looked over to Eva to share this breath-taking moment, but she was sleeping. I felt incomplete, not being able to share the moment with her, or with anyone. Its beauty was slipping through my fingers. This was a teachable moment for me: I somehow felt this moment wasn’t enough, without being able to share it. It took...

Pretty much all of us experience frustration on a daily (or even hourly) basis. We get frustrated by other people, by ourselves, by technology, by work situations, by small crises that come up all the time. You know you’re frustrated when you find yourself sighing, or complaining about people, or fuming about something that happened, or going over why you’re right and they’re wrong. Frustration is normal, but holding on to frustration is not so fun. It’s not even helpful: if the situation...

Our lives become filled, even controlled, by the things we think we need to do. We think we can’t live without these things, but actually, we can. We can opt out. Think about how busy our lives have become. Think about how distracted we’ve become. Think about how many things needlessly pull on our attention, our time, our money, our sanity. We have let these things overcome us, but in fact, we have a choice. We can become conscious, we can choose to do and consume and need less. It’s the...

Almost our entire lives are spent in a quest to gain control, security and comfort in our lives. Unfortunately, we never really get it, so we keep trying, relentlessly. This is the main activity of our lives. What would happen if we stopped? We could be less restricted by fear, less anxious, less driven by the need for comfort … and more in love with life as it is. You might be surprised by how much we strive for control. The Ways We Try to Get Control The basic nature of life is that...

If someone tells you that they don’t care what other people think, they are fooling themselves. None of us are free from this worry. Everyone is trying to look good in the eyes of others. Everyone stresses out about how they look, how they’re perceived, whether people think they’re awesome or good people. It’s why Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, blogs and mirrors exist. Unfortunately, this constant worry about how we’re perceived in the eyes of others can cause us to struggle. We worry about...

We go through our day judging our experiences, other people, ourselves: this is good, this is bad. If all goes well, most of it will be good, but more than we realize, we dislike certain experiences, things about people, about ourselves. We “like” online comments by others, or pages on the Internet. We give a thumbs up or thumbs down to movies, to restaurant experiences, songs. It’s ingrained in our thinking processes. What would it be like to drop all of that judging as good and bad? What...

Have you created healthy habits for you, but haven’t gotten your kids or spouse on board? You’re not alone — lots of people get frustrated when their loved ones don’t want to create healthy habits. I’ve had a bunch of people write to me about this, including one person who wrote about his sons, who are 10 and 12: “They have bad habits with unhealthy food, computer time, and fighting. And I have a very hard time trying to make a change for them. I do not live with their mother, who is a very...

Today, I only have questions. We’re striving for happiness and contentment, but when will we be there? I think we often see a time in the future when things will be better — we’ll have a better relationship, job, house, health situation, financial situation, and more. But when will that day come? What’s stopping us from being content right now? What’s stopping us from being present right now? Many of us can point to external conditions that get in the way of being present (some problem on...

Something I forget a lot, and have to remind myself about a lot: I’m not on my way somewhere. This moment isn’t just a stepping stone to get to another place. It’s the destination. I’m already here. I’m not on my way to a more important moment. This current moment is the most important moment. This might be obvious to some of you, but I forget a lot. It’s not usually obvious until I remind myself. And even then, it takes some convincing, because I have a tendency to discount this moment...