Is It Mindfulness Week?

When I’m at my best, it’s always mindfulness week for me. I try to do a sitting meditation each weekday (even if just for a few minutes), as well as five to 10 minutes of journaling each morning. And if I’m in the right zone, I turn my run into a mindfulness practice, as I concentrate my mind on each step I’m taking as I move forward, rather than drifting off to a list of problems and worries.  

But I’m not always at my best–this week, due to busyness, I’ve yet to meditate once and it’s already Wednesday. I have journaled twice and run once, so that counts for something. Mostly, I know that at this point in my life mindfulness is a bit second nature for me and is something that creeps into my day even when I don’t realize it. 

That’s largely because I’ve had a mindfulness practice for about 25 years, and lately I’ve been thinking a lot about what it’s done for me. 

Sunset at the Moors in Provincetown, Massachusetts

One reason it’s top of mind is because the lovely gentlemen who run the Mindfulness in Politics Project recently had me on as a podcast guest to talk about how I use mindfulness to keep myself motivated and feeling creative, even in the face of daunting odds (e.g., pretty much everything in the USA right now is daunting, if you’re paying attention). 

A second reason is that I was recently invited to speak to a small cohort of midcareer professionals who had worked on economic policy during the Biden Administration. These are people who worked incredibly hard and got a lot of great things done for the country, but who have seen the fruits of their labor getting dismantled by the current White House occupant. I spoke to them about resilience and recommitting to your purpose during times of transition and general hardship. In short, I gave them a 75 minute crash course on mindfulness and how to have a fighting chance of doing tough work for the long-haul.

I might write more about some of the exercises I did with them, thinking that they might help some of you who read this. So stay tuned for that.

For now, I want to thank Igor and Josh for having me on their podcast, and for those 20 young professionals who are still giving it their all.