Ever since I was a child, I have naturally gravitated toward solitude and self-care, but as an adult, my journey has been a little bit more of a roller coaster, with the typical cycles of “I’m super into this!” turning to “Well, I really don’t have the time.” I had always wanted to be the sort of person who meditated and did yoga, and the intended effects really resonated with me. The clear mind, the ability to be present, the willingness to slow down, all of it was something I wanted for myself. In almost every article I would read about the morning routines of ultrasuccessful people, some sort of daily prayer or meditation time was included, and I had made it to well over 200 days of meditating myself, so every time I would think about meditation, I would get more frustrated that it wasn’t a current part of my practice. It felt counterproductive; getting frustrated about not meditating seems like a problem that’s pretty easy to solve: start meditating! So I did my meditation practice that morning, for the first time in months. My mind felt busy, my body felt tired—I had plenty of excuses!—but I did it, and even though it wasn’t a perfect practice (not all of them will be), it was a practice nonetheless. That is what counted. And after that, I was able to keep going. Getting back on track that one day three months ago started the ball rolling again. It felt so good that I meditated later that evening, then the next morning, and suddenly, my practice was back, and it was on its way to being a nonnegotiable part of my self-care routine. It has now been three months, the end of which conveniently coincided with mindbodygreen’s 14-day meditation challenge with Light Watkins, and I have rediscovered a lot about meditation as a consistent habit: My relationship with my practice has changed a bit. I am incredibly proud, of course, of sitting down 180 times over the past 90 days (that’s almost 2,000 minutes!) for uninterrupted meditative silence. I am proud of myself for prioritizing the time to meditate and reflect, and sure, I enjoy seeing my run streak increase on the Headspace app, but I know that life will always happen around me, and there very well may be days when I don’t make room to meditate once, let alone twice. That’s OK. Like I mentioned earlier, it’s a lifestyle change that I want, not just a number of days, which is part of why my original experimentation with meditation was flawed: I was so focused on the run streak that I wasn’t able to enjoy the full benefits of actually sitting down to meditate. Consider this an invitation. I knew, for years, that I wanted to try meditation, but I allowed myself on more than one occasion to put it off, even when I had seen the positive effects firsthand. If you’ve wanted to try meditating before but have never taken that step, this is your time, and mindbodygreen’s challenge with Light Watkins is a great place to start. But whether you use Headspace, another app or program, or nothing at all, resting in silence, eyes closed, just allowing your body to sit in stillness will always be rewarding, and you will walk away with even a tiny bit more presence of mind. Want to deepen your meditation practice? Check out our meditation teacher training!
