By Leo Babauta
As we get started with our mindfulness practice … it’s important that you take today to make a commitment.
You must make a commitment to yourself, to show up regularly and to practice mindfulness. To stay with what arises, and to have the courage to keep practicing.
Make an acknowledgement that you are important enough to show up for. You are worthy of making this commitment to yourself.
Now make a commitment to me, as your teacher … that you’ll make it worth my time to create this material, by honoring me with your commitment to show up.
Finally, make a commitment to everyone else taking this course. Commit to showing up regularly, every day if you can, and coming back if for some reason you take a break. Commit to asking and answering questions if you’re able. Commit to doing some or all of the daily challenges.
You can do this!
Commit to a Time & Place
A commitment to practice isn’t very effective if you just say, “I’m going to practice being mindful!” To be truly effective, you should commit to a specific time and place each day.
First, commit to a certain time. And be sure to show up and actually practice at that time! You only need 10 minutes a day to start with, so find 10 minutes in the morning and practice then.
Next, commit to a specific place. Ideally this is a quiet place without too much clutter. Maybe your living room or bedroom. If you don’t have any good place like this, because you have lots of family or roommates, you can do it in bed or even in the bathroom. Or maybe outside.
Finally, find a timer. We’re going to start with just 2 minutes a day, but it’s good to have a timer.
These are all you need to get ready.
What Will the Practice Be?
At this point, you’re probably asking what the daily practice will be. We’ll get the details of that in the next few lessons.
In Lesson 3, we’ll talk about how to set up for practice. In Lesson 4, I explain what the beginning of the practice will be (checking in) and in Lesson 5, I explain the foundation of the rest of the practice (breathing). There will be more to come after that, but each day should consist of these two things as the most basic daily practice.
Be patient and we’ll get to it all!
Exercise
Right now, I’d like you to do the following:
- Take one minute to meditate on your commitment. Do you feel fully committed? If not, what is stopping you from being fully committed?
- Pick a time and place for your mindfulness practice.
- Commit to yourself.
- Commit to me and the rest of your fellow mindfulness students here … or do it in your accountability group on the forum.
When you’re done, you can hit the “complete lesson” button.