Lately I've been trying to note
behaviors mentally, as opposed to berating myself for them (mentally).
With this in mind, here are 2 mindfulness practices I've been using
lately:
Phone practice. I mentally note every
time I take out my phone when I'm doing something else. This happens
a lot when I'm cooking (put the water on to boil, open the phone),
and when I'm walking the dog – two activities I've been trying to
do more with more attention. I often find that when I take out my
phone I'm already at the end of a long strand of distracted thinking
– that is, I was already distracted before I took out my phone.
Irritation practice. With three teenage
kids I get a lot of chances to practice this. Irritation, leading to
anger, is one of my primary character defects.
Usually with anger or irritation the response follows immediately on
the heels of the stimulus. So my goal is to mentally note rising
irritation, and (hopefully) to be able
to pause between feeling the feeling and reacting. So if I get
irritated after the sixth stimulus, when last week I would have
gotten irritated after the second stimulus, that's progress. And when I get to 1,000, I win!
