8 Pieces of Wisdom from 8 Enlightened Sages

When it comes to wisdom, our newly connected world gives us click-button access to more than we know what to do with. If you do a little searching around you can find a wealth of wisdom from just about every time period and all across the globe.

The only problem is, these various sages and their traditions at large spoke different languages, had different backgrounds and lived at all different times throughout the history of humankind.

But if you look closely, through the guise of language, culture, and time, you can see very much the same wisdom being echoed across virtually every spiritual tradition that has existed. Some you need to dig a little deeper, and in some, it's still right out in the open in pristine condition. But in either case- they all have it.

Because these sages echo the same principles, it can often seem like you're following an invisible trail laid out by these sages of the past.

These are your, and my, "spiritual ancestors". By that I mean these people have gone through the same journey to wisdom which you're going through now, and in that you can connect with them and feel their guidance.

10 Pieces of Wisdom from 10 Enlightened Sages

This list is just touching on the wealth of wisdom that now exists at your fingertips with the advent of the internet. No matter who you are, what religious (or non-religious) or spiritual background you come from you can find someone whom you identify with that can show you the path to wisdom within your own tradition (or non-tradition).

It's not always clean, it can be messy searching for the truth. But it's there, you just have to do the work and look not only at the various teachings closely but also at yourself.

Use this information to begin the "journey to yourself" so to speak. Because when it comes down to it, that's what the journey to wisdom is- the journey to discovering your true self.

1. You are your own best friend - Chogyam Trungpa

Chogyam Trungpa is someone who has greatly inspired me, so much so that one of the modules of Journey to the Present Moment is not only named, but built, in honor of his teachings ("The Warrior's Path").

Chogyam Trungpa was a Tibetan Buddhist monk trained traditionally in Tibet just before the Chinese invasion. After being in the West for some time, building countless meditation centers all throughout the West, he eventually created his own set of teachings which he called "Shambhala Training", named after the legendary enlightened kingdom and with his vision of helping create an enlightened society in mind.

One of the simplest and most practical of those being that the first and most important aspect of spiritual practice, or the journey to greater wisdom, which is to make friends with yourself.

You know everything about yourself.

No one knows better the incredible light that exists within you and no one else knows your deepest and darkest secrets like you do either. We're either our own best friends or our own worst enemies (usually, a combination of both).

The reality is, most of us are not the greatest friends with ourselves. We criticize ourselves and mistreat our bodies and minds in numerous ways. We know we were meant for something greater, but life has beat us down so much that we've stopped believing.

By closely and honestly analyzing ourselves with mindfulness and various forms of meditation, developing greater self-awareness, self-compassion, and self-love, we can find the only friend we've ever needed- ourselves.

This, to me, is one of the most important teachings of all. The path to greater wisdom, which I'll mention in proceeding points, is very much about releasing the ego and coming into a greater or "larger" existence.

It's often the ego which is the very reason we're so hard on ourselves, constantly trying to get us to "fit" into some specific mold which we think we're supposed to fit into in order to fill the feeling of "something" missing, when the reality is we were already beautiful and whole to begin with. If we can make friends with ourselves, nothing can stop us.

Our greatest obstacles don't exist outside- in the guns, bombs, name calling, corruption, and aggression of the world. Our greatest obstacle is ourself, from which anger and fear spawn each and every one of those things.

Making friends with ourselves allows us to face our anger, fear, and imperfection wholly and stop being critical of ourselves and the world around us. This is nothing less than a revolution from within.

2. Study the self - Sri Ramana Maharshi

Sri Ramana Maharshi was a great Hindu teacher who resided on the holy Arunachala Hill in India for essentially the entirety of his adult life, from the time he was 18 until his death in 1950 (never leaving even once).

Through the course of his life, he attracted swarms of devotees, including many Westerners, some of whom would eventually write books based on his life and teachings and gain Sri Ramana considerable attention.

Sri Ramana's most integral teaching was of the absolute self. Not the self as in you or I, but what he referred to as (in what little words he did speak) the non-personal, all-inclusive awareness.

His teachings, as well as the Buddha's and many other sage's teachings, centered around dissolving the illusion of the ego-self and realizing the true self- the permanent, omnipresent awareness or consciousness which we all arises from.

"Who am I?" is a set of questions put together by Sri Ramana in order to guide a seeker of wisdom to a deeper level of understanding and self-awareness. Each question leads into the next, starting with the most important question of all, who am I?

Self-inquiry is at the heart of essentially all wisdom traditions, and arguably the most important aspect of most. Self-inquiry is the very key which allows us to completely transform how we see the world around us. Or most specifically, it allows us to gain clarity and finally see the world around us, including ourselves, for what it was all along.

3. Dissolve the ego - The Buddha

"Happy are those who have overcome their egos; happy are those who have attained peace; happy are those who have found the Truth."

The Buddha (among many other spiritual teachers) taught that the ego is the one and only hindrance to us realizing enlightenment and discovering our true selves.

The ego is the illusory "I" which permeates everything that we do. It makes us feel separate from those around us, creates hostility between people, makes us critical of ourselves and encourages us to resist against the natural flow of things, and is especially difficult to separate ourselves from.

This is why the Buddha, and the Hindu Yogi's before him, used meditation and various methods of self-inquiry in order to systematically dismantle the ego.

If you look closely in your own life, you'll see that the ego has affected you negatively as well. It may take time, but if you work diligently to reduce the hold the ego has on you, you'll realize a greater and greater sense of peace and unity with the world around you.

4. Love. Love yourself, love your neighbor, love your enemy, love all - Jesus Christ

"Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another."

Much of what Jesus spoke of parallels what the Buddha and countless other spiritual teachers before and after him spoke of as well.

Unfortunately, it's difficult to know what words were his and what words were simply attributed to him by previous editors of the Bible with less-than-pure intentions, but one thing is for certain: Jesus was a very loving and very enlightened teacher.

Probably his most iconic teachings are on love and equality. Jesus treated everyone equally, even if they were tax collectors and prostitutes. He understood that everyone shined with the same light, and treated them as such.

Much of the conflicts that arise in the world today come from people thinking that they're different from one another.

Naturally, that makes us feel uncomfortable. And sometimes, if anger and an inability to handle emotions skillfully is thrown into the mix, that can be a lethal combination.

By following the path of self-inquiry, seeking to dissolve the ego, and realizing your interbeing with all other living and non-living beings, you'll see that this isn't the way to peace and happiness.

The only way is love, and the way to cultivate that love is through understanding.

5. We are one (treat you as I and I as you) - Rumi

The Sufi mystic Jalal al-Din Rumi, generally referred to as just "Rumi", has made a huge impact not only in the East but also in the West. Rumi not only brought people of many different nationalities and religious traditions together while he was alive but has continued to do so centuries after his death.

Rumi's teachings boil down to removing those blocks (namely: the ego) which keep you from realizing perfect love for God, primarily done through direct experience of ordinary activities like serving others.

It doesn't take a translator to see that the general idea of Sufi, and Rumi's, teachings sound an awful lot like the path to wisdom which the other sages and spiritual teachers I've mentioned thus far have followed and taught, only told from the point of view of a different language and culture, so naturally different words and points of view. Ultimately, these are all just different interpretations of the same one thing.

Rumi was known in his lifetime for promoting equality among people, whether of a different nationality or religious tradition. To this day, Rumi is the best-selling poet in the United States, and he wrote this on the subject:

Why think thus O men of piety

I have returned to sobriety

I am neither a Moslem nor a Hindu

I am not Christian, Zoroastrian, nor Jew

Rumi understood that we all come from the same source, and that makes us one great big family. To live in this way brings great joy, as opposed to living life thinking that even the next country over is some different breed of human, completely opposite of you with different beliefs and ideas contrary to your own.

To live in this way damages not just those whom you oppose, but yourself as well as everyone around you that you love. Anything that creates this sort of "friction" and negative energy needs to be understood as against the "natural way of things".

To live with love, understanding, and compassion for others, even those of different cultures and religious/spiritual traditions, is the way life should be lived.

Why do various traditions exist when we're all saying the same thing? Because diversity is the flavor of life. It makes things more enjoyable. And really, life is just one big play. To paraphrase Alan Watts: "It's trying to see how jazzed-up it can get."

6. Realize yourself as a reflection of the all (and live in a way that expresses that light) - Alan Watts

“You are a function of what the whole universe is doing in the same way that a wave is a function of what the whole ocean is doing.”

Alan Watts was one of just a handful of key figures in bringing the philosophies and spiritual traditions of the East to Western audiences, especially Zen Buddhism, and he's someone who's had a significant effect on me.

One of my favorite analogies is the analogy he uses to explain our place in the world or our "true nature". He says that we're like billions of tiny droplets of water (think water droplets hanging on a leaf), each and every one of us is a complete reflection of the ultimate (whatever you choose to call that).

Or in other words, all of life exists within us at once- each and every one of us. We're all a perfect image of the complete wonder of life itself. Most importantly, we should realize this and begin to live in a way that expresses this boundless light.

We spend so much of our time worried about small things, kicking ourselves over small mistakes and our imperfections, regretting the past, and worried about the future.

Most of us rarely, if ever, take a second to stop and just sit in the wonders of this moment, and to feel ourselves an inseparable part of that perfect moment. To live in a way that you strive to realize this in every moment brings a great sense of joy to every day of your life.

7. Wisdom is found in our everyday lives (lived deeply) - Meister Eckhart

“Spirituality is not to be learned by flight from the world, or by running away from things, or by turning solitary and going apart from the world. Rather, we must learn an inner solitude wherever or with whomsoever we may be. We must learn to penetrate things and find God there.”

Meister Eckhart is a Christian mystic who lived between the 13th and 14th centuries. Since his passing his popularity has spread throughout the West and the East, and many modern seekers credit Eckhart as being one of their major influences.

Eckhart Tolle, the great modern sage, was born Ulrich Leonard Tolle, and later changed his name in large part due to the influence Meister Eckhart had on him.

Meister Eckhart, like so many others especially in Buddhism (particularly Zen), discovered that a spiritual practice based on a more active, or "normal", life (everyday life) can be even greater than one based on the traditional reclusive and contemplative lifestyle many spiritual seekers believe they need to lead.

Meister Eckhart was one of many teachers to show us that, while solitary contemplation is important, wisdom and the sacred can and should be discovered right here in our normal, everyday life.

8. Life is Meditation (It all comes down to the right state of mind) - Huineng

Huineng is the 6th and last patriarch of Zen, and the person many consider to be the father of modern Zen. Virtually everything we know about Huineng comes from the Buddhist "Platform" Sutra, which is a collection of talks given by Huineng at a temple in Canton, China somewhere between the 8th and 13th centuries.

Huineng taught that meditation (Ch'an in Chinese) should be practiced at all times, not just during formal sitting (sound familiar?).

He stressed that it's the attitude of mind that's important, and not the physical posture or position because truth can be found while sitting, walking, standing, or lying down (the Buddha's Four Noble Postures).

What attitude of mind is that? Pure awareness. Living each moment mindfully aware of your thoughts, words, and actions and the deeper meaning and significance behind them (specifically, whether they arise from the ego or your true nature).

It's this state of mind which allows us to remove the barriers keeping us from greater levels of understanding. And this state of mind isn't just cultivated while sitting in meditation, we can live every moment of our lives in this way.

This really helps cut through to the essence of meditation and show it for what it is- adopting a specific attitude of mind, instead of some ritual with a specific posture and positioning.

Of course, this doesn't mean that life literally is meditation just as it is and that you don't have to do anything and you're somehow already living your meditation every day, but it does mean that we can make life into meditation by adopting the right state of mind while doing just about anything.

If evil flowers bloom in the mind-ground, Five blossoms flower from the stem. Together they will create the karma of ignorance; Now the mind-ground is blown by the winds of karma.

If correct flowers bloom in the mind ground, Five blossoms flower from the stem. Together they practice the prajna wisdom; In the future this will be the enlightenment of the Buddha.

______________________________

Below are links hand-picked by me for the various sages referenced above. If you're interested in learning more about one or more of them I'd suggest starting with the links below:

• Chogyam Trungpa - Shambhala.org and Chogyam Trungpa Amazon Author Page (Like Watts, lots of great books here. I'd suggest Meditation in Action, Shambhala: Sacred Path of the Warrior, and Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism)
• Sri Ramana Maharshi - SriRamanaMaharshi.org (My suggestion: navigate to Teachings > Instructions > then locate the small book image for "Who am I?" and click to download)
• Buddha - The Heart of the Buddha's Teachings (A clear and straightforward explanation of the Buddha's teachings from the words of Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh himself)
• Jesus Christ - The Third Jesus, Going Home: Jesus and Buddha as Brothers, and Living Buddha, Living Christ (I'd suggest this one on audio. Not only does Ben Kingsley himself narrate it, but the bell sounding in between sections really helps deepen the experience of listening to the book on audio)
• Rumi - WhirlingDervishes.org - The Life of Rumi and The Essential Rumi
• Alan Watts - AlanWatts.com and Alan Watts Amazon Author Page (Lots of great books and audio. I'd suggest the Out of Your Mind audio collection and The Way of Zen)
• Meister Eckhart - The Eckhart Society
• Huineng - The Platform Suttra translation on Amazon.com

Image Credits:

1. Chogyam Trungpa: Robert Del Tredici
2. Sri Raman Maharshi: Sriramanamaharshi.org
3. Jesus Christ: Namaha
4. Alan Watts: The Alan Watts Archives (AlanWatts.com)

10 Daily Rituals That Will Increase Your Physical and Mental Energy

When I started training in the martial arts again, after taking a break for some 3 years, my physical energy became a priority.

During that time, I tried various things to keep my energy up such as supplementary exercise, a powdered green supplement, eating lighter and more nutritious meals, and drinking the recommended amount of water daily.

But that was before two things:

1. Before I had much of an idea as to how mental activity- thoughts and emotions- affected energy levels (which I learned once I began meditating).
2. And before my first son was born.

After my first son was born, I realized that, before that point, I really had no idea what it meant to be exhausted. I started nearly falling asleep everywhere- sitting and playing with my son, training, working, and even almost while driving. I had to do something.

I've talked before about how shifting my schedule to waking up early had a tremendous effect on my energy levels, but that wasn't enough. I had to cover all my bases if I wanted to work, train, take care of my son, handle my other responsibilities, and keep up my daily (and quickly growing) meditation practice without falling off of any them.

It's been years since then, and while I stopped training, I now have even more on my plate than I did before with my second son and Buddhaimonia, so I have to make sure I keep my energy up not only to stay sharp and put out my best work but also to be present for everything I do- from spending time with loved ones to writing.

10 Daily Rituals That Will Increase Your Physical and Mental Energy

Before we start, I want to quickly go over two very important facts I've come to realize in the time I've worked to increase my daily energy. First...

There is no separation between the mind and the body. What the body feels, the mind feels. What the mind feels, the body feels.

Because of this, I'm not just going to cover points which help you get physical rest and energy, but also points which help you replenish and manage your mental energy. And secondly...

You won't have to do a bunch of crazy stuff to keep your energy up.

This post won't suggest supplements, crazy workouts, weird diets, or anything else like that. Not that they don't work, but that you don't need any of them. We're so used to just adding new things on to our life when we want a particular result- thinking that's the right way- but that further complicates our lives.

Nowadays, we're pushing ourselves harder than ever, especially in the U.S., where many people rather work themselves to death (figuratively) than go on a vacation. What's needed isn't something outside ourselves so much as it is us observing our life clearly and completely in order to identify not only how we can increase our energy naturally but also where we can save our energy.

We want energy so that we can live to the fullest so that we can get through our day without feeling like we've just finished 12 rounds of a boxing match. We want to feel alive and present, and I can say from experience that's pretty difficult when you've got so much responsibility in a given day.

But there is a way to do it without jumping through hoops while following a daily practice which nourishes your entire mind and body (as this is really just an extension of that).

These are my 10 best tips for increasing your physical and mental energy:

1. Develop self-awareness (live mindfully)

This might seem like an odd first point, but I've found it to be the foundation of my efforts to increase my daily physical and mental energy.

Self-awareness is all but necessary if you want to increase your daily energy levels, without which you're shooting in the dark. That is, guessing at what will help increase your energy when you have no idea what exactly is draining you.

You might say, "I know what's draining me, it's my kids!" But what exactly does that mean? Is it some form of drain on your emotions or are you running around all day? There's more to it than what first meets the eye.

With a daily mindfulness practice, you'll begin to notice when and what makes your energy dip and be able to take the proper action to counteract that- both in the moment and at large.

So first and foremost, you need to become very self-aware. We go about our day only sometimes noticing what's really draining us, and rarely noticing how our daily actions are fluctuating and potentially affecting that.

This is the centerpiece, the ability which allows you to monitor your energy levels with clarity and gather information to make accurate changes. Don't underestimate this point.

2. Hydrate properly

You may or may not be aware of how water affects your energy levels. I sure wasn't until I began drinking water consistently.

This was really one of the first things I ever tested to increase my energy levels, and it continues to be one of the most consistently helpful (aside from just being downright necessary for your health).

I've stuck pretty consistently to drinking 8 glasses of water a day for some 5 or so years now, so I can attest to its ability to increase a person's energy levels.

It might sound weird that water increases your energy, but it does. Water is a huge percentage of our body's composition, and that includes our brains.

When we're dehydrated, our brain can't work at its usual efficiency, and as a result, we can begin to feel fatigued and lose much of our energy (among other things).

This is one of those things that's always sitting right in front of our faces but which is easy to miss. But the reality is, it makes a big difference. Especially drinking a bottle of water every morning.

A bottle of water (typically 16.9 oz., just over 2 cups) every morning will help jump start your body, from your metabolism to your energy, and is one of the all-around best and easiest things you can do for your health.

I'd suggest picking up a canteen or reusable bottle that you can carry around with you (most will hold about 16 ounces or two cups). Without this, I've found it pretty difficult to keep up the habit of drinking 8 or more glasses of water each day (the actual recommended amount varies depending on your weight and activity level).

Just about every morning I make tea. I carry it in a canteen with a screw off top that doubles as a small cup, which helps keep the tea warm and reminds me to drink periodically throughout the day (switching mostly to tea has been a way to further increase the all-around health benefits of my daily drink, although I still drink a water bottle or two each day).

3. Sit in meditation

Meditation introduced me to the "other side" of the energy equation. As I mentioned earlier, it's not just about physical energy. Our mental activity has just as much, if not more, of an effect on our energy as our physical activity does.

Many of the thoughts and emotions we experience day and night generate stress within us, making our minds toss and turn constantly in a very real way, and this stress has very real physical and mental effects on us. And one of the effects those feelings of stress has on us is to deplete our energy.

Meditation is what allows you to bring the mind to rest, like a pebble slowly falling to the bottom of a pond. It won't silence the mind, that's not what you want and neither is that possible anyway, it will simply quiet your mind to a manageable (and observable) level. And this sense of clarity, or in this case more importantly: relief, can have a significant effect on your energy.

In order to feel the full effects of this, I'd suggest meditating once in the evening and once in the morning. I'd also suggest it be for longer periods, 30-45 minutes or longer each session.

In no way do you have to meditate for this long, but you'll notice a more significant effect if you do vs. meditating for just 10-15 minutes once or twice a day.

4. Master your nightly routine

The amount of attention you give to what you do right before and right after you sleep is a key factor in deciding your daily energy levels, and that's exactly what the next two points are about.

By dominating your nightly routine, I'm referring to a number of different things. These are the 4 points that have worked for me:

1. (Blue) lights off. Turn off all smartphones, tablets, laptops, and computers 2-3 hours before bed. At night, light- particularly blue light from electronics- messes with our biological clock and affects the quality of your sleep.
2. Have a bedtime and stick to it. This might sound obvious, but you need to make sure to get enough sleep each day, and you'll do that by having a set bedtime which you stick to (almost) each day. I used to have a bad habit of pushing my bedtime off, even though I knew technically I needed to get to sleep eventually. We have an uncanny ability to ignore reason at times (when it's convenient), and sometimes need to remind ourselves that our actions have various side effects on the rest of our life.
3. Adopt a nightly relaxation ritual. This could be one of a number of things, from a nightly tea meditation or reading to sitting meditation or light stretching. Whatever you choose to use, this is one of the most important aspects of a strong nightly routine which will help improve the quality of your sleep and ultimately increase your energy.
4. Leave your baggage outside. Before we go to bed, we tend to cycle through everything that happened that day. This is particularly dangerous on tough days, where all you end up doing is further stressing yourself out. To help avoid that, before you go to bed imagine yourself taking all of your issues and concerns and stuffing them into a bag. Give yourself permission to forget about them until you wake up in the morning. We tend to keep things in our heads because we're afraid of losing control, so if you tell yourself you can come back to them (or even better, physically write them down) you'll be able to mentally separate yourself from them for the time being. Also, this might sound like a temporary fix, but the more you do this the more you'll begin to see that these worries and stresses aren't a part of you, and rather are something which you can choose to let go of permanently.

Ultimately, with a strong nightly routine, you're trying to improve the quality of your sleep and set yourself up properly for the next day. By sticking to these 4 points you'll be able to do exactly that.

5. Master your morning routine

On the other end of things, there exists when, and what you do when, you wake up.

I've written about my morning routine in the past, and this is a major contributing factor in keeping my energy up throughout the day. This really has to do with two things:

1. Wake up early.Waking up early, as the sun rises long before your day really "begins", will instantly make a considerable difference in your energy levels each day (provided you went to bed at a reasonable hour). You don't even need to do anything once you wake up to notice it either. Just walk outside, breathe the fresh air, and take it all in. That's enough to energize you.
2. Adopt a set of energizing morning rituals to start you off for the day. Like the nightly relaxation ritual, this could be a number of things. I'd suggest checking out my post here for ideas, but if you want a few quick suggestions I'd say start off by meditating every morning, going for a short walk, and then doing something creative like keeping a journal, writing, drawing, painting, or creating something. This won't just energize you, it will jump-start your entire mind and body.

As I mentioned in the last point, waking up early and adopting a set of morning rituals won't just increase your energy, it will positively supercharge you for the day ahead.

6. Be active (even if for only 7 minutes)

Physical exercise, or activity, is one of those staples that you need to always be mindful of. My philosophy on physical exercise has changed a lot over the past 5 or so years, but being active is still important to me.

When I was training in the martial arts, I worked out almost daily. After some time, I put more focus on my training and worked out just a few times each week. After I stopped training, I continued to clarify my understanding and increase my knowledge of physical activity and its effect on the human body, so I continued to exercise for some time.

What I eventually settled on was this: physical activity is important for both the body and mind, but it's really just important to be continuously active. Or in other words, you don't have to do much strenuous working out at all.

There's been a lot of studies done on what's called High-Intensity Interval training, and it's shown that all you really need is a very short period of high-intensity exercise (say 7-20 minutes) to get the same benefits you usually would from hours of running and working out.

While I stay really active because of my kids, this is one area I haven't done such a great job on in the past year. My daily practice, writing, building Buddhaimonia, and raising my kids has taken essentially all of my time, so naturally, some things got pushed aside.

For those looking to add physical exercise into their daily routine, I'd suggest starting with the 7-minute workout. It literally takes 7 minutes and will not only jump-start your body for the day if you do it in the morning but provide you with all of the usual energy-increasing benefits of physical exercise.

7. Learn to manage strong emotions

Strong emotions are one of the single most powerful energy draining forces that exist. Whether it's fear, anger, sadness, hatred, or something else, these strong emotions can embed themselves in us and quite literally take control of us. For the sake of the point, I'll use anger as the example.

Both my wife and I are strong-willed, so we tend to butt heads. And naturally, being married with two children (with a third on the way), we're placed into the most difficult situations together and are forced to think of solutions. Note: Anger really enjoys when two people are stuck in a high-stress situation.

Most of the time it's little things- a stressful day that puts your nerves on edge, so you lash out at the person closest to you, only to realize what you've done an hour later and apologize- but nonetheless, it has a real effect on both people's physical and mental energy in that moment (and for a number of hours afterward).

After a while, I noticed that on a morning after a fight like that I'd be absolutely incapable of waking up. It just wouldn't happen no matter how hard I tried. I was so exhausted that I had to sleep for an extra 2-3 hours. I was spent.

Ultimately, there's no avoiding this one, but you can beat it. It's natural to argue with those we love from time to time. And while it may at times be unavoidable, we can become mindful of the negative effects these arguments have on us and as a result put a stop to them when they start.

No matter what the emotion is, by practicing mindfulness we can notice these feelings building in us and put a stop to them before they take hold of us. There's no getting around feeling the emotion itself, but neither is that the problem. The problem is when the emotion takes the wheel- and mindfulness keeps those strong emotions from every taking control.

But we shouldn't just do this to increase our energy, we should do this for our health and well-being and the health and well-being of our loved ones as well. Remember, it's all connected.

8. Cultivate compassion for strangers

This one might seem wacky, but it's anything but that. Something that we rarely if ever notice, but which has an amazing ability to whittle away our energy, are the "little annoyances" of daily life.

That is, when someone cuts you off on the freeway, when your boss asks you to work an extra shift when the guy that took your order at the drive-thru forgot your order of cheesy fries and you didn't realize it until you got home. There's a limitless number of events in daily life which can be deemed "little annoyances" and it's these little annoyances that help whittle away at our energy all day long.

Things like this happen every day and they have a real effect on our energy, for the same reason as I mentioned above with regards to handling strong emotions. And it might not seem like a big deal, but these occasions add up.

When we live our lives making no attempt to understand those around us, we're constantly annoyed because we never consider why someone would do something to inconvenience our day. But when we live with compassion, which is based on understanding, our world opens up.

When we live with compassion and understanding, that driver that cuts us off on the freeway goes from being an a-hole to being a guy or girl who's either just having a bad day, or is late to an appointment, or is rushing a loved one to the hospital, or is just being tugged along by their habitual energy to rush around all day without understanding that it's hurting them.

Whatever it is that you think, the point is you begin to realize there are myriad reasons why someone might have cut you off on the freeway, and most importantly that it's not their fault.

You stop looking at people who "wrong" or annoy you as super villains deterring your efforts and begin looking at them as regular people just like you, with their own set of challenges and capable of mistakes as much as you.

But this isn't limited to just strangers, though, is it? This includes everyone in your life, whether you encounter them at a distance for just a moment or spend intimate time with them each day.

And by cultivating understanding and compassion for all those you encounter, you release yourself from the hold of the many strong emotions we often cultivate as a result of interacting with others.

I use a simple exercise pretty often for helping me cultivate compassion. It's proved incredibly useful as I go about my everyday life and encounter people in various situations, and is often just a really fun type of meditation you can do anywhere:

Think of someone you don’t like. This could be someone you hate, someone you generally dislike, or someone whom you’ve only recently had an argument with. Whoever they are, sit and meditate on this person. To do this, hold the person in your mind. This, of course, isn’t possible, but you’re holding as much of the person you know, your perception of the person, within your mind.

Once you have this picture, do these three things:

1. Realize that it's the picture in your head, your perception of the person, which is what you’re judging the person based off of. Not off of the real person, but of your interpretation of that person based on limited data.
2. Think of something which that person does or has done which you disapproved of and think of what logical reasons they might have had for doing that thing. If the person said something hurtful to you, start throwing possibilities out there: maybe something is stressing them and they don’t know how to deal with it, maybe they had a tragedy recently or were hurt and don’t know how to deal with the anger and sadness that's inside of them, or something else. Whatever it is, start thinking of specific possibilities that could be making them act this way. Think of as many as you can.
3. Take a step back and review those possibilities which you’ve thought up. Realize that the reason for their hurtful behavior is two things: 1) not originating from or because of you, and 2) simply from something which they’re experiencing which they don’t know how to deal with. Once you’ve done this, you’ll see that there’s more to the person than meets the eye. Conflict usually involves one or more people using anger to cause hurt, if you can realize that the reason this person acted out with anger and aggression wasn’t because of you, but because of something deep within themselves that they’re hurting from, you can learn to cultivate a great amount of compassion for that person.

By using this exercise these little annoyances are no longer a drain on your mental and therefore physical energy. They no longer stress you out and rather become almost pleasant opportunities to connect with others in an odd way.

When someone cuts you off, you're unaffected. When someone steps on your toe trying to rush into the area when you're going to a concert, you're not bothered. These situations now become opportunities to connect with the common humanity in the strangers you meet as you go about your day.

And with that, your stress level will be down, and your energy up.

9. Pre-plan

If I don't make a plan for myself, I have the tendency to bounce around, particularly when I'm working. This has a couple of bad side effects, including shortness of breath and mental exhaustion.

Technology does a lovely job of enhancing this as well- when I have 20 tabs open on Chrome, as well as Evernote, Microsoft Word, and Outlook open all at the same time it becomes really easy to lose myself and not only not get a whole lot done but really stress myself out. And working yourself into a panic like that really wastes energy.

I've mostly eliminated this tendency, partly just due to my daily practice (and the next point), but also by pre-planning my days.

I'm not talking about anything complicated either. I've tried having a sheet for each day with each hour pre-planned and that was just an unrealistic amount of work. For me, it's simply keeping a short list (3-8 things) of major tasks I'm planning on accomplishing that day.

I used Clear on my iPhone for a while, but was always missing the key functionality of being able to pull tasks away from my major list to work on just for that particular day (and then move them back to the original list if I wanted later).

I found that functionality with Trello, and am now completely sold on it, especially because it not only works on iPhone/iPad/Mac but because I can also use it on my PC too (Clear apparently can do something like this on Mac, but for now I work mostly on my Windows PC, so Trello takes the crown).

10. STOP (and use your energy skillfully)

Despite all the talk of taking action to increase your energy, you need to remember that if you're a living being- breathing, eating, and sleeping like the rest of us- you have limits and sometimes just need to stop.

How that takes shape will depend on your situation and habitual patterns, though. That might mean:

• Slowing down
• Stopping from time to time
• Giving yourself more of a break
• Not necessarily stopping but doing your work while keeping your breathing more in control
• Or multiple strategies

I've tried out each strategy above, but the last one has worked best for me (although I use more than one consistently). Using your breath as an anchor, you're less prone to start flailing around both mentally and physically and more likely to stay present.

Sometimes when I work I get overwhelmed trying to do so much at once that I notice I'm practically holding my breath while working, so this has worked especially well for me.

Why do I mention this in a blog post about increasing physical and emotional energy? Because the way many of us work- running around like we've lost our brains- isn't an intelligent use of our energy.

When we work in a constant semi-panic we're not just draining ourselves mentally, spinning our heads in circles and literally giving ourselves headaches, but because our breathing is short and shallow throughout the better part of the day we're draining our physical energy as well.

The result is we end up both mentally and physically exhausted by the time we're off to work.

In middle school, I was on the track team. All the long-distance runners were advised to breathe through their nostrils while running, even though at first it seemed uncomfortable and unnatural, because once you get used to breathing that way it's much more efficient and doesn't expend as much energy as breathing through the mouth does.

Think of yourself in the same way. You have a finite amount of energy, and while you can recharge at certain points in the day, efficient use of your energy makes all the difference in your day-to-day life.

You can live in much the same way as a runner breathes through their mouth and expends their energy quickly, making them tired and affecting their performance, or you can live in the same way that a good runner runs, breathing through their nostrils in a slower and more controlled manner and allowing themselves to stay in control of what they're doing.

Each day, you get a certain amount of energy (through what you put into your body) and you spend a certain amount of energy (through your thoughts and actions). How much energy you get and how you spend the energy you have is up to you, but if you're not mindful of how you're spending your energy and of what and how much energy you're taking in, you're going to be less effective at everything you do.

And I don't just mean efficiency with regards to doing your work, I also mean with regards to maintaining peace within yourself and enjoying your life.

This is something everyone needs to take into consideration.

Especially with the way we're working nowadays and especially if you have kids or a lot of responsibilities, skillful use of your daily energy can create a huge change in the quality of your life.

Zen and the Art of Adapting to Life's Curveballs

"If a man has nothing to eat, fasting is the most intelligent thing he can do."

- Herman Hesse

The Freak Out

Two weeks ago, I found out I was going to be a father. For the third time. We didn't plan it.

I'll get back to that in a sec.

The way we normally go about our lives, our brains use our "local" consciousness to gather information and make both small and larger predictions in order to create the best chance for our survival.

And generally, as humans, we're often not just trying to survive, but we're trying to take steps to thrive. Specifically, to overcome our troubles and find peace, to be happy and enjoy our lives, and to forge some sense of greater meaning.

But because we only have so much power to change the world around us, and because our predictions can't be right 100% of the time, we're constantly hit with surprises- events which we didn't predict or expect would arise (i.e. the curveball).

So we do our best to not only predict what will happen so as to be ready for it, but also to affect the world around us in our favor in various ways. But what do we do when shit totally hits the fan (as it does, so often)?

When I found out I was going to be a father for the third time, on the cusp of my wife and I's upcoming wedding (we never had a formal ceremony), writing and working like a madman on everything Buddhaimonia (so many awesome things in the works!), and the already full-time job that is taking care of our two little dudes, I was honestly a little freaked out and questioned whether we'd be able to handle it.

What on Earth were we going to do? She already had a hard enough time taking care of these two crazy dudes during the day while I worked, what were we going to do with a third?

On top of that, the community at Buddhaimonia has really taken off, was this going to crush that? Was I just going to be so busy taking care of my 3 children that this amazing project I've devoted so much of my life to was just going to rot from neglect?

I started to flashback to all the conversations I've had with so many of you through the past couple of months, all the great things that are happening here and will happen in the future, and the force for good Buddhaimonia could grow into in the future. Then I instinctively imagined my books, notes, and all of my work burning in a great big fire, never to be seen again.

It's all over man. Why did you have to do it?

Shining a Light

...All of that went through my mind over the course of about 2 minutes.

Our minds can do the most irrational things at times.

Once I came to, grounding myself with my mindful breathing, I did a few things:

1. I recognized the emotions running through me with my mindfulness and simply observed them for a while, seeing that they weren't attached to any rational thought or were in any way sensible.

2. I realized the amazing gift that this new child would be and accepted her or him fully in my mind with love (don't go through a pregnancy despising your future child for what they kept you from doing, it's a sure way to depression and resentment).

3. I thought more closely about the fact that our oldest son Malik could actually be a big help to me and my wife with regards to taking care of this new baby.

4. I reminded myself of my growing flexibility with my work and I reaffirmed that nothing would ever keep me from giving my best effort to this, Buddhaimonia, which I've put my heart and soul into.

But most of all, I openly and consciously accepted everything as it was, including whatever may come.

Now, I couldn't feel better about the whole situation. I know it won't be easy, but what ever is?

I chose the Herman Hesse quote above because it perfectly describes my point:

Life is not a straight path. If it were, we could see clearly each next step and be able to prepare for it. That’s just not how life is- no matter how hard you try to make it that way.

Accept everything openly and mindfully as it is. Resistance creates friction which keeps you from peace. 

Not having food to drink might sound like an extreme example, but it gets the point across perfectly.

If you don't have food to eat, and you're constantly thinking and stressing about the fact that you don't have food to eat, that's pressure you're placing on yourself.

But accept the fact that you don't have food, and decide in your mind that you're fasting, and as a result of accepting the situation as it is you'll release the friction keeping you from being at peace.

Resisting the natural flow of life is like purposely pressing your hand up against a sanding belt. It's definitely not going to feel very good and as much as you try to stop the sanding belt with your hand you're just going to end up hurting yourself more.

This is how most of us live our lives. We don't even notice that it's our resistance which is causing the friction, the suffering in our lives, and not the event itself.

Some of this is easier said than done, admittedly, but no less true.

What's important isn't perfection, it's simply that you make your best effort in each moment. That will be enough. You've got your entire life to work at it.

The Monk and the Geisha

I figured it'd be wise to explain this idea in a little more detail as this is a topic easily misunderstood.

There's an old Zen story about a priest and a geisha that perfectly exemplifies this point:

A Zen Buddhist priest was among a group of guests who were attending a dinner party one evening. In traditional Japanese style, the guests were all seated on the floor surrounding a low rectangular table.

Resting on the table in front of each guest was a small hibachi grill filled with hot coals. Each guest cooked their own portion of meat and vegetables, which were brought out by geisha's and placed in various areas of the table.

The priest noticed that one of the geisha's conducted herself as if she might have had some Zen training. He decided to test her, so he called her over.

The geisha knelt across the table from the priest and bowed. The priest bowed in return and said, "I would like to give you a gift." Using his chopsticks, he reached into the hibachi, picked up a hot coal, and offered it to the geisha.

She hesitated for a moment, then finally pulled the sleeves of her kimono down over her hands. She grabbed the coal, ran into the kitchen, and dropped it into a pan of water. Her hands were not hurt, but the beautiful kimono gown was ruined.

When the geisha returned with a new kimono, she went back to the table and knelt across from the priest.

She bowed to the priest. He bowed in return. Then she said: "I would like to give you a gift as well."

"I would be honored" the priest replied.

She picked up a pair of chopsticks, removed a hot coal from the priest's grill, and offered it to him. The priest reached into his robe and took out a cigarette.

As he leaned forward to light his smoke he said, "Thank you. That is exactly what I wanted."

In this story, the priest, as well as the geisha, exemplify the true spirit of Zen.

In the case of the geisha, she could have easily gotten angry at the priest. But the only thing anger would have done would be to burn her.

Instead, she accepted the piece of coal with her unrolled kimono and went into the other room to dispose of it and change.

In the case of the priest, he didn't just, "roll with it" so to speak, he adapted the coal as a light for his cigarette.

Both the priest and the geisha adapted to their situations and accepted what was presented to them without creating friction.

This may just be a story, but one which highlights an important point: to go with the natural flow of things is part of the path to peace and harmony within oneself.

Keep in mind, this doesn't mean you should lie down and take whatever comes at you and live without goals or intentions.

There is a time to act, but it should be done in the spirit of naturalness instead of in the spirit of resisting what is. It should also be done while considering the well-being of others as well as ourselves. And we should live mindfully in order to observe when we're creating that friction in order to be able to identify what's the natural way in the first place.

When to Push, When to Go with It

Right about now, if you've been following along closely, you might be confused as to just how you're supposed to know when to push and when to go with the flow and adapt.

There's no science to it, it's mostly intuitive. For the most part, it's our "broad" or greater intentions which make up the majority of our "pushing" efforts. For instance: deciding you're going to build a business, save for a house, or work towards a promotion.

And it's life in the moment which is where we must adapt and "go with the flow". We set goals or intentions and life moves along naturally, without any mind for those goals or intentions.

In this way, life can often seem as though it's trying to keep us from accomplishing our goals, but it's really just impartial.

So when we set goals or intentions, and something gets in the way, the best thing to do isn't to give up on that goal or to fight back and continue to try to make it happen as is, but to adapt and accomplish it by going with the natural flow of things.

In general, friction is caused because we fight back against what's presented to us. But we fight back because we had other plans or desires in the first place, something else we wanted to happen in a certain situation. So it's those plans and predictions which are causing us to want to fight back against reality.

So don't hesitate to set goals or make big plans, simply do so without any attachment to them or to the way you originally expected to do or accomplish said thing. If something changes, you accept those changes openly and move with them.

Have Courage

The ability to adapt at a moment’s notice to the curveballs of life, whether big or small, while not labelling them bad and just going with the natural flow of life is a big deciding factor in our ability to maintain our peace of mind.

By doing so, you consciously decide that you don’t derive your peace and happiness from external events but rather the deeper and ever-flowing “thusness” of life (resting in the present moment, feeling the interconnectedness of all of life) which is always available to us no matter what's going on in our lives.

If you're constantly reacting negatively to change, whether big or small, whether it’s trying to push or pull to change reality into something you believe more pleasant or just getting bitter and angry over what’s already happened, then you’ll be frequently unhappy with your life.

In the "modern" world, there's such a strong sense of, "Fight back!" "Resist!" "Make/Change your destiny!" And to do so while not only ignoring our own well-being but the well-being of others.

There's nothing wrong with living purposely, but if you live your life thinking you're always fighting back against it and everything in it then you're just placing your hand on that sanding belt again.

I grew up in the U.S., so I can't speak for anywhere else, but most Americans have a strong sense of this. Most of us grew up thinking that life was a constant pushing and pulling, fighting against the odds, against the "forces", and making it happen no matter what.

And while this mentality can help accomplish tasks, it creates a lot of harm too.

Going with the natural flow of things isn't a sign of weakness, it's a sign of strength and courage. It takes both to accept that you're not completely in control, and to realize that you don't need to be to find happiness, and by doing so you'll be well on your way to finding peace.

So, baby #3. This is me announcing, "I'm rolling with it". Who's with me?

"The pain that you create now is always some form of nonacceptance, some form of unconscious resistance to what is. On the level of thought, the resistance is some form of judgment. On the emotional level, it is some form of negativity. The intensity of the pain depends on the degree of resistance to the present moment."

- Eckhart Tolle

5 Powerful Ways Mindful Eating Will Transform Your Relationship With Food

In the morning, you eat. In the afternoon, you eat. At night, you eat. You also drink water, tea, coffee, and whatever else and surely snack from time to time as well. Whoever you are and whatever your exact routine is, if you're alive and kicking then food is a huge part of your life.

So if we had a way to transform mealtime into a highly nourishing, peaceful, joy-filled, and awakening experience, what would happen? It could positively transform our lives altogether. That's what mindful eating allows us to do, which is the process of eating with mindfulness.

Mindfulness is the act of fully paying attention in a subtle and particular way to the present experience. By bringing this particular form of paying attention to meal time we transform a typically routine and mundane activity into an exercise in peace and tranquility, not to mention the fact that it encourages healthy eating habits.*

There are various ways to bring mindful eating into meal time, these are 5 powerful ways mindful eating will transform your relationship with food:

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Get 2 Free Chapters of My Book, Zen for Everyday Life

Zen for Everyday Life is a moment-to-moment mindfulness guide made to help you discover peace and happiness in your everyday life using more than 40 meditations and exercises, including an expansive chapter on the practice of mindful eating.

If you’d like to get 2 free chapters, plus my free email course, enter your name and email below, click the yellow button, and you’ll get the download link sent straight to your inbox:

5 Powerful Ways Mindful Eating Will Transform Your Relationship With Food

1. Mindful eating

First, the act of mindful eating itself is simple and easy and the basis for the other 4 points. By following these steps you'll be able to start eating mindfully today:

1. Pause & savor. Take a moment before eating to notice the aroma of the food. Savor the various smells arising from your plate.
2. Eat (mindfully). Be mindful of the lifting of your hands and utensil and, once the bite is placed into your mouth, be completely mindful of the act of chewing the food itself. Experience each flavor as it bursts in your mouth and notice how the food feels as you chew it. And as your major point of attention during mindful eating, be fully present for the act of chewing.
3. Simply be (mindfully). When thoughts, feelings, or other sensations arise within your "field of mindfulness" (just like you field of vision, your field of mindfulness is all possible thoughts, feelings, and sensations occurring while you're being mindful), acknowledge them gently with a figurative "tip of the hat" as if they were floating by you on a cloud and then bring your focus back to the act of eating.
4. Pause & breathe. Occasionally, in between bites you can be mindful of your in-breath and out-breath if you'd like to really savor your meal and enhance your mindful meal.

It's as simple as that. While eating with mindfulness, remember that you're open to anything and everything that comes into your field of awareness and don't attempt to push any thoughts or sensations away. Accept them openly and simply bring your focus back to the act of chewing/lifting your hands/etc.

Mindful eating is beneficial first and foremost as a type of "meditation-in-action" like walking or driving meditation, allowing you to observe the goings-on of your mind especially with regards to your relationship with food.

But it also works as a nice "pause button" in your day, particularly if you often find yourself rushing around without even noticing what you're doing (most of us are so used to rushing around that we do it even when there is no purpose or benefit to it).

2. Contemplating on the true nature of your meal

We can take mindful eating one step further by contemplating on the nature of the food in front of us.

Like taking a magnifying glass to something, contemplating on the true nature of our food is the practice of looking deeply into each individual piece of food on our plate and seeing not only where it comes from but also what it's made up of.

To do this is simple, simply follow these steps:

1. Pick an object. In this case, your food. If you have multiple food items on your plate then pick just one.
2. Work backward. That is, take that carrot for instance and start with where you got it- the store. Then imagine, or find out if you don't know, how it got to the store, how it was transported, how it was packaged, how it was farmed, and how it grew from a seed in the ground into a carrot. Lastly, think about the soil and all the things that make up the soil that would eventually provide the seed the nutrients to grow into the carrot as it sits in front of you now.
3. Realize interbeing. Lastly, think of how if you were to take away even one of those elements: the farmer, the farm, the soil, the seed, or the facility that packaged and delivered it, the carrot would cease to exist.

This exercise helps us deepen our relationship with, as well as grow a deep sense of appreciation for, the food in front of us.

3. A silent meal

Zen Buddhist monks and nuns eat each meal in silence. Why do they do this? It's difficult to describe, however, for the same reasons that sitting in silence and meditating for a few minutes each day can be beneficial, eating a meal silently in mindfulness can also be just as beneficial.

A silent meal is exactly what it sounds like- eating a meal mindfully and silently. This further enhances the practice of mindful eating and can take an already nourishing experience to the next level.

In the case of eating, it's difficult and rather ineffective to eat mindfully while also maintaining a conversation with someone, so to eat silently is to maintain the maximum benefit from your practice of mindful eating.

Try it out with a friend or colleague and see how great you feel afterward.

4. 30 Chews

Zen Buddhist monks and nuns chew each bite of food no less than 30 times. They do this to help improve their practice of mindful eating, therein emphasizing the act of chewing, the focal point in mindful eating.

This is a nice shift from the way most of us are used to eating, gulping everything down and then rushing off.

But additional chewing doesn't just help us savor the experience of eating with mindfulness. A nice bonus to this practice is that it can also curb overeating and aid in digestion.

When you first try this out it can be difficult to fight the impulse to swallow your food quickly, but with practice, it will become easier to chew for longer periods of time. Try it out a few times at least to get yourself used to it, it's absolutely worth it.

5. Cooking the Buddha

Mindful eating is about more than just the eating itself, it's also cooking and preparing your food in mindfulness as well. Anything that has to do with your relationship with food really should be considered within the realm of mindful eating.

Cooking the Buddha is cooking with mindfulness, and it's the simple act of doing every step of the cooking and preparation process in mindfulness:

1. Prepare (mindfully). Carefully lay out each ingredient, being fully present as you pull each ingredient out of the fridge or cupboard and place it down on your counter top.
2. Cook (mindfully). Be fully present for the cutting, mixing, and stirring of all ingredients and be there fully in that moment cooking your meal. Don't cook to eat, simply cook, and cook with all of your being as if it were the most important thing in the world.
3. Eat (mindfully). Then, enjoy your meal in mindfulness!

Despite the fact that I don't cook often (my wife's cooking is wizardry), this is one of the most enjoyable mindfulness practices I've found. If you cook on a regular basis, this can become a great source of meditation in your daily life.

Mindful eating can transform the way we look at and handle food in many ways. Try it out for yourself and see how it transforms this basic everyday activity into a nourishing meditation. ________________________________________

Get 2 Free Chapters of My Book, Zen for Everyday Life

Zen for Everyday Life is a moment-to-moment mindfulness guide made to help you discover peace and happiness in your everyday life using more than 40 meditations and exercises, including an expansive chapter on the practice of mindful eating.

If you’d like to get 2 free chapters, plus my free email course, enter your name and email below, click the yellow button, and you’ll get the download link sent straight to your inbox:

______________________________________________

Sources:

1. *Mindful eating for healthy eating habits: Greatergood.berkeley.edu - Better Eating Through Mindfulness

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10 Things Mindfulness Will Teach You About Life

Many people think that mindfulness is about quieting the mind and relieving stress. Sure, your mind will quiet to some degree, but you'll never cease thinking (nor is that the point), and stress relief is only a byproduct.

That's not to say that those things aren't important, just that there's something more important in your practice of mindfulness than simple stress relief.

It may very well be though that if you approach your practice from the perspective of simply attaining relief from your stresses, especially if you only ever sit in meditation and never practice mindfulness in your daily life, that you'll completely miss the most important gifts of mindfulness practice.

It's for this reason that you should approach your practice with a universal perspective. What I mean by that is, understand that mindfulness is really about shining a spotlight on your entire life. That is, every aspect of your being, and not just as a simple stress reliever or performance enhancer you do for 15 minutes each day.

Mindfulness isn't only about:

• Sitting cross-legged
• Following your breath
• Quieting the mind
• Relieving stress

It's also, more importantly, about:

• Striving to live every moment of your life in mindfulness
• Discovering the truth- and the beauty- of the present moment
• Observing every aspect of your being with mindfulness, including your thoughts
• Discovering the root of suffering, not just temporary relief

This is exactly what I bring to light in Zen for Everyday Life. That is, striving to live your entire life with mindfulness and meditation to uncover the real "gems" of mindfulness and meditation practice. Here are some of those gems.

10 Things Mindfulness Will Teach You About Life

1. We're all interconnected

The fact that we're all intrinsically connected isn't some fluffy principle someone made up, it's something which you can experience right now in your daily life. But the way we usually live our lives our awareness is hovering right below the signs so to speak. So we rarely, if ever, see it.

Once you begin practicing mindfulness you'll begin to see the natural rhythm of life and how we all depend on so many different things just to come to be as we are in the present and to continue on living each day.

And this isn't limited to people either. This includes all other living and non-living things- on land, in the ocean, and in the sky. This can be seen in very concrete ways- in the way we depend on the coral reefs or on the delivery of our local food and water supply for instance- but also in a much deeper way. In a very real way, we exist in the clouds, in the rain, and in the mountains. And they in us.

This single realization can change the way you live your entire life. From the way you treat others, to what you devote your time to, to the products you consume, and the causes you support.

2. Our world is crazy (your existence, as it is, is highly unlikely)

Beyond that you'll realize is that we're not just interconnected, but that this world is downright crazy.

What I mean by that is, have you ever thought about the amount of work the world at large had to put in to deliver all the products that exist in your home to you as they are?

From your soap to your shampoo, razor, shoes, clothes, coffee or tea, each item on your breakfast plate, your stove, refrigerator, computer, and everything in between, your mindfulness practice will get you to begin seeing things much differently than you once did.

Think about the number of people, machines, and worldly resources as well as the thousands of hours of time it took to create and further manage and develop this elaborate system of life we've developed for ourselves.

This is the life you live in every day, and realizing this can become a source of great fascination, joy, and gratitude.

But if you go beyond this, you realize we're just acting out what we know, because this is exactly how nature has operated all along. Always perfectly at balance, yet unbelievably complicated and seemingly fragile on the surface, once you realize this the world is revealed as being both unbelievably fascinating and awe-inspiring.

3. We all have creativity within us

Once you've been practicing mindfulness for some time, you may notice a spontaneous source of creativity trying to leap out from you which is beyond your comprehension.

In other words- it feels like the source of your creativity isn't "you" at all. At least, the you that you typically associate as being all of you (not just a "bag of skin" as Alan Watts so eloquently put it). This will be especially noticeable if you didn't typically consider yourself the creative type before.

It's well documented- as well as things are documented in Zen at least- that Zen training often "compels" students to begin expressing themselves through "traditional" art.

I always thought this was fascinating. And I thought it was even more fascinating when it began happening to me.

I used to draw, do poetry, and other various things in high school, so it wasn't like I hadn't been partial to creativity or art before, but I hadn't done much of anything since then. But after meditating for some time I began feeling compelled to draw and do various things again and express, well....something (myself?).

This isn't something which can easily, or even properly, be put into words (and much of it can be left for interpretation). But know that mindfulness will bring you in touch with your inner creativity- which we all have- as the ground of your being seeks to express itself spontaneously through you.

4. Change your perspective = change your life

Becoming more aware of yourself- what you do each day, what you think, and what you feel- and everything occurring around you in the present moment changes literally everything about your life in the most profound ways.

Or perhaps more accurately I should say that it changes nothing but your perspective. That's really what happens when you practice mindfulness.

You're going to feel like your entire life has changed from practicing mindfulness, but really nothing around you and even you in large part has changed all that much. It's simply your perspective changing, or opening up, which has changed everything.

I'm not saying things haven't changed, that you just perceive that they've changed and are somehow fooling yourself, I'm saying mindfulness will teach you that your perspective is literally everything there is.

When everything is crumbling down around you, rooting yourself to the present moment with mindfulness will not just allow you to weather the storm but also allow you to continue to find beauty in your daily life.

5. Peace and equanimity are discovered and maintained by rooting ourselves in the present

There is no other way we'll discover peace and stability than through discarding all other false notions and realizing how firmly rooted we are to the present moment.

So much of the chaos that exists in our minds comes from regretting and reflecting about the past, worrying about and building up the future, and imagining all kinds of possibilities in between.

This thinking will never completely cease, but the problem is we get so caught up in it thinking we're off somewhere else when the only place we ever really are- even when we're thinking- is in the present moment.

On top of that, it's the resisting of the present moment that causes so much pain and confusion for us as well. When something happens, we often fight it, and so by resisting the present reality we cause friction to ourselves and our life at large.

Mindfulness will fully reunite you with the present moment and show you the peace and equanimity that exists within it. This is a lesson no one should live without.

6. The present moment is a renewable source of joy

We can find some measure of happiness in memories- recollecting about positive experiences- and therefore feeling better about our lives, but this form of happiness isn't possible for everyone and as we go about our lives past experiences take on new meaning, so this doesn't necessarily last forever.

That's on top of the fact that these memories always have to fight against the present state of our lives, so they don't always have the same effect.

Experiential happiness- that is, living in the present moment and experiencing all the little joys life has to offer (which are really significant when looked at closely with mindfulness)- is a renewable source of happiness that can never be taken from us. This is where true happiness exists.

By practicing mindfulness, and becoming better attuned to the beautiful little intricacies of life, you begin to cultivate a great sense of joy in your daily life. And this can never be taken from you, no matter what's going on in the rest of your life.

7. Life doesn't have to be lived on fast-forward

Traditionally, the East had a much different outlook on time than those in the West. In fact, it's literally impossible to find any textual evidence of when the first Hindu scriptures were written because they never kept dates. Yes, that means for potentially thousands of years they essentially had no concept of "history" as we know it.

In the East, the view of time was more cyclic than linear like it's always been in the West. By that I mean the belief was that the same general cycle of occurrences happened over and over repeatedly.

This view likely arose from their understanding of how we live our lives more than anything. When looked at more closely, this cyclic view of time really is the way we live our lives- always going through the motions, repeating the same cycle of pain and suffering usually without end or until we realize the truth. This view of time is largely helpful as it allows us to realize we need to transcend this cycle of suffering.

The West's interpretation of time on the other hand, theorized to have been born from Judaism itself, is linear. This means that time is a straight line extending out indefinitely, no period of time every overlapping with another.

What does all of this mean, and why does it matter? It's because of this linear view of time, or the fact that we're controlled by it, that we rush around so much.

We believe we need to make the most of every single second of our lives for fear of wasting time. In this view, time is a limited resource.

This forces us to rush around all day long trying not to waste a single minute of life. Which, ironically, keeps us from ever really living.

What's far more important than time, no matter what your view, is to be fully present to this moment and attending to your life right now as it is in this very instant, as opposed to always thinking about later today, tomorrow, or next week.

Some of this is necessary, but when you're always living in this way you're trying to catch something which can never be found, and you end up spending your entire life doing nothing all that important.

When you practice mindfulness, you begin to realize that slowing down isn't just nice, it's our natural way of life and most conducive to our health and happiness.

8. Self-awareness is our greatest gift

Self-awareness is the very thing which makes us humans so special. And while it's also the very thing which causes us pain and suffering, it's also the very thing which allows us to awaken fully to the truth and beauty of life itself.

When you begin to see just how many different and significant ways that mindfulness can transform your life, you'll realize that awareness is our greatest gift. And this gift should be nurtured and developed on a daily basis.

Mindfulness will teach you that a keen and non-judgmental self-awareness is the key to thriving in life.

9. You have to let some things develop on their own

Any and all of the pain we experience is due to our resistance to the present moment experience, and part of that comes from the friction we cause ourselves when we try to force things to happen when they're not ready.

Some things just take time to develop. Or, perhaps more accurately, some things just happen on their own clock. They don't necessarily need a lot of time, but rather that they'll develop at their own speed and you can do little to hurry the process along.

This is something you'll learn very early on in your mindfulness practice, as mindfulness works in exactly the same way. You can't race or rush in any way to develop your mindfulness faster than someone else.

You can dedicate yourself, and that will make a huge difference, but there's no shortcuts, and it ultimately develops on its own once you've dedicated yourself.

And through your practice you can begin to notice how the rest of life works in the same way. Some things you just can't rush. The natural flow of things will occur on its own, and any pushing or pulling you do will just cause friction and result in pain for you.

Mindfulness will teach you that you just need to let some things develop on their own.

10. All that exists is the present moment

Literally everything, even your thoughts of the past and the future, exists in the present moment.

Everything we ever experience is nothing other than the totality of the present moment. The sooner you fully realize this the sooner you'll discover peace and happiness.

We get so wrapped up thinking about this or that and we end up losing track of ourselves altogether. But this takes us away from our one and only home, the present moment, and we end up fooling ourselves into thinking that something exists outside of this moment. But nothing does.

Mindfulness will show you that all that exists is the present moment, nothing else. Everything is right here, right now, waiting for you to wake up and join the party.

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What has mindfulness taught you? I'd love to hear what insights mindfulness has given you about your own life in the comments below.