5 Mindful Ways to Move about Your Life

Many of us traverse our days on autopilot, largely zoning out while we perform the same routines. One day blurs into another, and before we know it, it’s another Monday. And we’re left wondering: Where did the time go? Has it been an hour or three? Did I eat anything today? What did I eat yesterday? Who did I talk to? What did I even do? When we move about our days mindlessly, we miss out. We miss out on the daily miracles, the delicious bites and the rejuvenating downtime. We miss out on the hilarious, honest, happy or meaningful moments in our lives. But by intentionally paying more attention and tweaking our perspective, we can move about our lives more mindfully.

Practice Intentional Self-Care

According to authors Jeffrey Brantley, M.D., and Wendy Millstine, NC, in their book Five Good Minutes In Your Body: 100 Mindful Practices to Help You Accept Yourself & Feel At Home In Your Body, the most mundane activities can become an opportunity for sustenance and self-care. They write, “What if you paid more attention on purpose to the nourishing and encouraging power present in countless moments of daily life? What if you consciously added positive affirmations to these ordinary activities to practice intentional self-care?”

For instance, even something as simple – and mundane – as brushing your teeth or stretching your body can become a sweet moment. According to the authors, you might say to yourself, “Brushing my teeth, I am taking care of them,” or “Stretching gently, I comfort my body.”

Become a Miracle Hunter

You’re probably familiar with Albert Einstein’s famous quote: “There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” Every day, make it your mission to find the miraculous. Don’t worry. The hunt is not hard. For instance, even before you open your eyes, you probably feel the warmth of your first miracle: the sun. Next, you might feel the satisfying touch of your second miracle: your significant other. Or you might feel a little one or two jumping on your bed. Or you might open your eyes to see a lovely flower blooming by your bedside. After getting up, you might experience the miracle of water cascading down your face. Then you might experience the miracles residing in each bite of your breakfast or just a single piece of bread.

According to Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh in the book Your True Home, “When I hold a piece of bread, I look at it, and sometimes I smile at it. The piece of bread is an ambassador of the cosmos offering nourishment and support. Looking deeply into the piece of bread, I see the sunshine, the clouds, the great earth. Without the sunshine, no wheat can grow. Without the clouds, there is no rain for our wheat to grow. Without the great earth, nothing can grow. That is why the piece of bread that I hold in my hand is a wonder of life. It is there for all of us. We have to be there for it.” And that’s before you’ve even stepped outside your home.

Become a Scientist

View your world with a scientist’s curiosity and attention to detail. Raise questions about the everyday. Consider how something works and why something is the way it is. Pay attention to your surroundings as though you were studying them. Jot down your observations in a journal. Write down what the blooms smell like by your house. Write down the shapes of the clouds every Friday. Write down the games you play with your child every day. Write down their favorite things every month. Use your smart phone to capture your spouse’s smile when they look at you. Or capture your feet, half-hidden in the sand, soaked in a pool, atop the grass or firmly positioned on the pavement.

Experience Your Emotions

Mindfulness isn’t just paying attention to the positive moments in your life. It’s paying attention to everything – and that includes the range of your emotions. It’s paying attention to negative feelings and doing so without judgment. Remember that while they may be painful, feelings are fleeting. (Often ignoring our feelings takes more work than just feeling them.) According to Thich Nhat Hanh in Your True Home, “Feelings are born, take shape and last for a few moments, and then disappear. As with the physical form, birth and death of feelings occur in every moment. In meditation, we look mindfully at this river of feelings. We contemplate their arising, their remaining, and their disappearance. We witness their impermanence.

When we have an unpleasant feeling, we say to ourselves, ‘This feeling is in me, it will stay for a while, and then it will disappear because it is impermanent.’ Just by seeing the impermanence of feelings in this way, we suffer a lot less.” When we pause and choose to live our lives mindfully, the meaningful moments and daily miracles – which are always present – open up to us like a blossoming bud. We step off the conveyor belt of autopilot and into our lives.