How to Develop a Daily Mindfulness Practice

The benefits of mindfulness are many and well-known. Mindfulness has been known to reduce stress and anxiety, aid in emotional regulation, and enhance mental well-being. Research has established that mindfulness doesn’t just improve our mental health but also boosts our physical health. 

It’s a very simple practice that leads to profound changes. But how many of us actually implement it in our daily lives?

If you’re struggling with developing and maintaining a mindfulness practice, my experience may help. The following is what I’ve been doing to keep my mind focused on the moment and to let go of the need to control outcomes.

I practise mindfulness in small chunks through the day. It calms me down, leads to greater productivity, and less emotional reactivity. It’s almost as if I loosen my grip on life for a few minutes each day and dare to be okay with the moment/circumstance as it is. Breathe in. Breathe out. It’s not about resigning to fate, but embracing something far greater. It’s embracing life as a whole, while dipping into the richness of the present moment. Life may be vast and complex but it’s only experienced moment to moment.

The present moment is where it’s at.

With that out of the way, let’s start.

Be Clear on Why You Want to Practise Mindfulness

Mindfulness can feel vague at times. It can certainly feel like an imposition. Since a wandering mind doesn’t like being pinned down, get clarity on why you want to practice mindfulness.

What are you hoping to achieve?

Do you want to reduce stress, lessen anxiety, develop greater appreciation of the present moment, or improve focus?

You may want all the benefits – and you may indeed end up receiving all of them, but you still have to state the why in clear terms for your mind to get on board. Once you’ve established your purpose, you may feel motivated to start a mindfulness practice in earnest and also stick to it. 

My main reasons for starting on this path were: to gain better emotional regulation, to improve focus, and to reduce stress.

Choose Specific (And Daily) Activities for Your Mindfulness Practice

In order to weave mindfulness into your daily life, choose an activity that’s a part of your routine, and turn it into an exercise in mindfulness.

“I’m going to be mindful from now on,” is a noble sentiment but hardly practicable. It’s unclear and so vast in its scope that one may just get lost in it. 

To make it easier to practice mindfulness, specify the timeframes during which you intend to do it. This will help narrow down your focus and make it more achievable.  

• “I’ll practice mindfulness when having morning tea.”
• “I’ll be mindful when driving my son to and from childcare.”
• “I’ll be mindful for at least 10 minutes on the train to work.”
• “I’m going to be mindful when reading this blog post.”

Practising mindfulness this way will help you build a daily practice. 

Start Small and Build on Gains

Setting aside one activity a day for practising mindfulness can quickly become a habit. You can then extend mindfulness to other activities. 

Move from one to two, and then three activities that you perform every day to turn them into opportunities for practising mindfulness. 

You can also increase the time that you spend in mindfulness on each activity.  

Don’t Be Result-Orientated

This is one area where not tracking results will work in your favour.

Practice mindfulness for the sake of it. The greater your dedication to mindfulness, the more it will become a habit, and the more benefits you will reap. 

But keep the focus on creating and maintaining a daily mindfulness practice. The results will take care of themselves.  

Be Consistent and Don’t Get In Your Own Way

I guess the advice about being consistent is straightforward to understand.

What I mean by “don’t get in your own way” is to not engage in activities that harm or sabotage your progress.

If you’ve been consistent for a few weeks and have a good mindfulness practice going, don’t become lazy/complacent and let a few days slip by of not doing it at all. (I’m deeply guilty of this and as a result keep finding myself starting from zero over and over again, and not just in relation to mindfulness.)

If you’ve built gains or momentum, do not stop. It’s ok to slip up once in a while, but don’t let it become a habit. Be committed to your practice, not to your excuses. 

Be committed to your practice, not to your excuses. 

www.hereismymind.com

Do Mindfulness Meditation

One could start their mindfulness practice with a dedicated mindfulness meditation, or one could add this to their practice later. 

The reason I didn’t suggest you start with a mindfulness meditation is that it would require you to add an activity to your (I’m guessing) already busy schedule. To me, that feels like piling a challenge on a challenge.

When we turn activities that are already deeply ingrained in our routines into opportunities to practice mindfulness, we have a greater chance of going through with them. 

However, if you think you can commit to a few minutes of mindfulness meditation on top of mindful activities throughout the day – you’re welcome to it!

Use Visual Cues to Propel Your Mindfulness Practice

It could be something you wear (like a beaded bracelet), it could be a quote set on your desktop, or it could be a picture that speaks to your truth – whenever you find your mind wandering, this visual cue will remind you to return to your dedicated blocks of mindfulness through the day. 

To Sum Up

Here’s a recap of the main points for easy reference.

• Be clear about why you want to practise mindfulness
• Choose specific (and daily) activities to establish a mindfulness practice
• Be consistent and don’t self-sabotage
• Do mindfulness meditation
• Use visual cues to propel your mindfulness practice

Moving from the default state of mindlessness/distraction to a general state of mindfulness isn’t going to happen overnight, or even over a year. 

But a lot can happen over the course of a few days if you remain consistent with your aim of turning certain daily activities into opportunities to practice mindfulness.