While in the throes of uncertainty, each of us can play a role in supporting the demand for change—not by ignoring our feelings, but by facing them head on.
Jonathan F.P. Rose, cofounder or the Garrison Institute, recently spoke with David Simas, CEO of the Obama Foundation, about how compassion can support change, how we can meet moments of suffering, and how to take strategic action.
Simas holds a BA in political science from Stonehill College and a JD from Boston College Law School. He also serves on the national board of directors of OneGoal, an organization working to address barriers to college graduation for students from disadvantaged backgrounds.
Rose’s business, public policy, and not-for-profit work focus on creating a more environmentally, socially, and economically responsible world. He serves on the Garrison Institute’s Board and leads its Pathways to Planetary Health program.
Turning Anguish and Anger into Action
“The hopefulness in this moment is seeing people taking moments of anguish and turning them into moments of action,” Simas says. “That’s the place where anguish and anger are important.”
These emotions are a real part of the experience of injustice and cannot be minimized. Simas says it’s normal to encounter anger, fury, even despair. Our first reactions are either to fight these feelings or fuse with them. Neither produces a beneficial outcome.
“If you fight [anger] it will come back even stronger,” Simas says. And if you fuse with these emotions and identify with them, they will inhibit you from moving forward and taking action. Instead we must face our anger and assess it, he says.
“This is a moment that we are in collectively,” Simas says. “Don’t turn away from it, face it. Don’t just identify with it; work in it.”
How to Take Strategic Action
We are now in a space between a collective moment of anguish, anger, and recognition and pausing to ask ourselves, What do we do now?
Simas’ main message is to act strategically and in ways that will build toward a defined outcome.
“In order to move forward, you need to call out the injustice and those who did it, but you also need to recognize where they are allies.” Simas says. He offers two examples of how our feelings can fuel action—one example that may or may not be effective, and one that he believes is much more likely to lead to progress.
1. Two people organize a protest because they are moved by what’s happened
In this scenario, 500 people gather to march to a local precinct. They protest without a list of demands, names of the attendees are not captured, and a follow-up to their actions does not occur.
Awareness was raised as a result, and a sense of discomfort was introduced. The question now is: “Where does action flow strategically through that?” Simas says.
2. A protest is organized with specific demands
In a similar scenario to the first, people march to a local precinct with a list of specific demands related to the use of chokeholds and police review boards. The names of the people who participated in the protest are collected. In the aftermath, a list of follow-up actions are outlined.
“Now, if you are the elected official in those two scenarios, there are two very different reactions,” Simas says.
The difference in this example is that the actions are taken to bring people together with a common goal: to change the use of chokeholds in policing. The difference also lies in the need for elected officials to make decisions on clear actions that have been requested.
Listen to the whole conversation between Johnathan F.P. Roseand David Simashere.
Point of View Podcast Episode 5: A conversation with Frank Ostaseski about finding the inner resources to meet the impossible in extraordinary ways. Read More
In this episode of Radically Loved with Rosie Acosta, Mindful Editor Anne Alexander discusses the importance patience how to engage in meaningful dialogue. Read More
Cultivating a clear awareness of our inner world during moments of strong emotion is a powerful, portable way to step back from the activation, find our calm, and discover a right way forward. Read More
We are at an historic moment in the fight against racism, inequality, and exclusion. The brutal killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and other Black people; the resulting uprising in cities across the world, the stark statistics about how much worse COVID-19 has affected communities of color—all these have highlighted how systemic racism and hate continue to permeate our societies. In the midst of so much pain, it is also inspiring to see so many stepping up.
At Mindful and the Foundation for a Mindful Society, we’ve presented mindfulness as a practice that goes far beyond de-stressing and self-care. As a foundational tool, it can enable us to be more aware of how we hate, of our biases, of what we ignore. Being mindful also means being accountable for our actions and inactions. And taking steps to counteract bias and to change—to reduce suffering in every way possible.
Flourishing Together
Mindful made a commitment four years ago to more frequently feature the important work of mindfulness teachers and community leaders of color. Our readers, our partners, our staff, and the communities we engage with through our foundation work, all benefit from the wise counsel of these thought leaders. The Mindful community has grown in powerful ways because of these relationships, and we plan to continue expanding this work and looking for more ways to uplift teachers and leaders of color, and to widely encourage anti-bias learning in our programs and products.
Taking Action
We need to do more, however, and we will do more to address racism and unconscious bias and its damaging effects—within our organization and within the mindfulness community at large. We will take additional concrete steps, now, and in the coming months and years.
We are committed to increasing the diversity of our staff, our leadership, and our board. We also commit to a more robust Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion program to bake into our organization a practice of ongoing self-examination, which can uncover ways we contribute to structural racism and inequality. We will update statements of our principles and our mission to explicitly include counteracting bias and racism. We will also listen and learn from emerging voices in the anti-racism and anti-bias communities.
We look forward to working together with all of you—our audience, our many contributing teachers and writers, and our institutional supporters—to make real change within and inspire real change in the world at large.
Amanda Hester, Director of Operations and Business Development at Mindful, explores why mindfulness is key to sitting with feelings of shame and blame. Read More
Michelle Maldonado, coauthor of A Bridge To Better: An Open Letter To Humanity and Resource Guide, shares a guided meditation for strengthening our ability to be self-aware, self-actualized, and self-determined as we co-create our emerging new reality and world together. Read More
We are amid so many shifts right now. Not only have we been confronted with a global pandemic, we’re also all being called to listen, learn, and take action in the fight against unnecessary pain and racial injustice. In the latest episode of Radically Loved with Rosie Acosta, Mindful Editor Anne Alexander explains that with this comes an increasing sense of shared responsibility.
But when others don’t show up in the ways that we want them to, can we offer them the understanding, grace, and generosity we give ourselves when we make mistakes?
How to Mindfully Approach Difficult Conversations
“The reality is we’re living in a world with sharp edges and grit and difficulty and pain and passion, confusion, and all of that stuff. And the real trick is to be able to have a sense of equanimity and respect,” Alexander says.
Communicating mindfully requires us to tap into empathy regardless of who we are or what we believe in. This can prove to be a challenge for anyone. It’s very difficult to express your point of view and hold someone else’s with grace, Alexander says. But we can engage in meaningful dialogue when coming to a conversation from a place of respect and recognition.
The Importance of Patience
The most difficult conversations are often with the people who are closest to us. There is so much unspoken context and relationship history that adds layers to a tough conversation with a loved one. It is patience and mindfulness that allow us to see each other past deep divides, she says.
“Perhaps the first goal [is] just to find those moments of togetherness and to re-establish that beautiful, fluid bond. The patience may take a long time to get to the place where that conversation can really happen.” Alexander says.
The hard work of having difficult conversations requires pushing past discomfort. And that takes a tremendous amount of commitment.
“Now is the time to be able to come to a place to be able to keep our own energy levels high enough that we can listen and we can be there.” Alexander says. “We can mediate, and we can try to absorb things, even if we don’t understand.”
Listen to the full episode of Radically Loved with Rosie Acosta: Being Mindful and Compassionate with Anne Alexander here.
This brief guided meditation lets us focus our attention on the sounds around us, finding bright moments of awareness even when we get distracted. Read More
Michelle Maldonado, coauthor of A Bridge To Better: An Open Letter To Humanity and Resource Guide, shares a guided meditation for strengthening our ability to be self-aware, self-actualized, and self-determined as we co-create our emerging new reality and world together. Read More
Spiritual hope opens us to possibility and energizes us to manifest our potential for love and wisdom. In contrast to attachment or egoic hope, which is the grasping for what will benefit a separate self, spiritual hope arises from trust in the openhearted awareness (bodhichitta) that is always and already within us. This talk explores how, as individuals and as a society, we can nourish spiritual hope, and create the grounds for healing and radical transformation.
“The very least you can do in your life is to figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance but live right in it, under its roof. What I want is so simple I almost can’t say it: elementary kindness.”
By teaching children meditation and mindfulness skills we help them increase their well-being and enable them to meet the stresses of the world with presence, self-compassion, and openness.
In order to help kids of all ages find their way into practicing mindfulness, it can be helpful to give them an easy definition they can relate to.
A Definition of Mindfulness Meditation for Children
Mindfulness meditation, at its simplest, is paying attention to what is happening in the present moment. It may be what you’re feeling, hearing, or anything else you notice. There’s no special place of calm you have to reach and it’s not about clearing your mind, it’s just an honest and kind look at what you’re experiencing in this moment.
A Mindfulness Practice for Families
One easy way to introduce mindfulness to your children is through informal practices that you can do along with them. Start with a simple kindness meditation—offering good wishes and compassion to others.
1. To begin, find a comfortable sitting position. You can even place a hand on the heart. Allow your eyes to close or lower your gaze toward the floor.
2. Bring to mind someone who you really respect and look up to, and who really loves you in return.
3. Notice how you feel as you bring this person to mind.
4. Make a kind wish and send it their way. What would make them happy?
5. Next, bring to mind someone else you love and care about: A family member, a friend, a beloved colleague. Just bring this person to mind, sending this person a kind wish.
We’ll move from here to a more neutral person. Perhaps someone you don’t know very well: A parent you see occasionally in the pick-up line, a person who delivers your mail, or makes your coffee in the morning. Just bring this person to mind and imagine yourself sending them some kind of kind wish.
6. Lastly, bring to mind someone who has frustrated you lately, someone who is a little difficult. Send this last person a kind wish—something nice for them in their life.
7. Check in with your mind and body as you conclude this practice. Allow your eyes to open if they’ve been closed. Notice if there’s any shift
Why Teach Mindfulness to Children?
When we teach mindfulness to kids, we give them the tools they need to build confidence, cope with stress, and relate to uncomfortable or challenging moments. The earlier we do so in their young lives, the greater the opportunity to help them cultivate resilience and develop and refine their mindfulness practice as they mature.
Teaching mindfulness to kids can also help shape three critical skills developed in early childhood: paying attention and remembering information, shifting back and forth between tasks, and behaving appropriately with others. These abilities are known as executive functions and they are essential for more advanced tasks like planning, reasoning, problem-solving, and positive social relationships.
There Benefits of Mindfulness for Kids
Studies show that the benefits of mindfulness for kids may include:
2. Improvedacademic performance, ability to resolve conflict, overall well-being.
3. Decreasedlevels of stress, depression, anxiety, disruptive behavior.
Mindfulness Activities for Kids
To introduce the idea of mindfulness more directly to your kids, you can use exercises that encourage them to tune into their senses. Make a game out of eating a snack very slowly, savoring the smell, texture, and taste. Or, dive into an afternoon of glitter jar making with any variety of materials: glitter, different-coloured beads, food colouring and oil, pieces of lego. The DIY craft doubles as a creative exercise and a mindfulness tool to represent the mind settling.
An Appreciation Practice for Children
Leading the game:
Ask your child: “Do you ever feel disappointed by something or someone?”
Ask: “How did that make you feel?” Acknowledge their feelings and, if appropriate, talk about them.
Say something like: “I bet even when you’re feeling disappointed there are good things happening in your life, too. Let’s name three good things together.”
Tips for naming three good things:
Remind your child that the point of this game isn’t to pretend they’re not upset when they feel upset. It’s to remember that they can feel two things at once: they can feel grateful for good things while feeling sad, hurt, or disappointed by challenges.
If children or teens have trouble thinking of three good things on their own, brainstorm and help them discover some.
When kids understand that this game is not about sweeping their feelings under the rug, the phrase “three good things” can become a playful and humorous response to the minor gripes that show up in family life.
Parents can encourage kids to remind them to name Three Good Things when they’re stuck on a trivial disappointment or minor annoyance, too.
To develop a habit of thankfulness, play Three Good Things around the dinner table, before bedtime, and at other times when the family is together.
Guided Mindfulness Meditation for Children
Once your child is comfortable with the idea of meditation, you can offer them tools to refine their own practice. Here are three guided practices developed for kids. Feel free to join your child in these meditations if it helps encourage focus.
An 8-Minute Practice to Notice Positive Moments
A Mindfulness Practice for Kids: Coming Back to the Positive
8:00
Lie down somewhere comfortable. Let your arms and legs fall to the ground. Close your eyes gently.
Start to notice how your body changes with each breath you take. Each time you breathe, your belly moves up, and your belly moves down. If it is easier, put a hand on your belly. Or if you want, put a stuffed animal there.
Each time you breathe, your belly moves. Your hand, or your toy, rises, and then falls. See if you can count ten breaths that way. Breathing in, one, breathing out, one.
When you lose count, don’t worry about it. That’s normal, and happens to everyone. Come back to whatever number you last remember.
Now, shift your attention to your day. Breathing in, focus on your breath as your belly goes up. Breathing out, focus on something that went well today.
With each breath: breathing in, noticing your belly move, and with each breath out, noticing something that went well today.
Now, picture something about yourself that makes you proud. Breathing in, focus on your belly moving. Breathing out, picture something that makes you proud of yourself. If nothing comes to mind, that sometimes happens. If that’s how you feel, picture what you’d wish for yourself instead.
Finally, bring someone to mind who makes you happy. Before we end, try one more practice. Breathing in, notice your belly move. And now, breathing out, picture someone who makes you happy.
As you come to the end of this practice, take a few deep breaths, and start to wiggle your arms and legs. Pause and decide what you’d like to do next.
It’s normal to have thoughts that make us feel scared or bad. We should never ignore anything important, but it’s useful to focus on the rest of our lives too. Take a few minutes every day to notice what has gone well, and see what happens next.
Guided Audio Practices for Kids
1. A Meditation for Preschoolers
This guided practice will help you teach your child the basics of mindfulness by drawing on the elements of nature. Follow along as your child observes their experience and explores their strength within.
Be Like Nature: Mindfulness for Preschoolers
4:00
2. A Meditation for Young Kids
A body scan meditation is a great way to help your child bring attention to the present moment—especially when emotions or thoughts are overwhelming. They’ll learn to explore sensations in the body while bringing calmness, attention, and appreciation to daytime routines or bedtime rituals.
A Calming Body Scan: Mindfulness for Kids
11:39
3. A Meditation for Teens
Preadolescents and teens can practice mindfulness the same way as adults. Although, practices geared toward this age group often feature language that is more engaging to them. Here is an 8-minute practice, appropriate for older kids, that uses counting breaths to cultivate mindful awareness.
Count Your Breaths: Mindfulness for Teens
8:13
Sign up for our FREE resilience kit
Mindfulness Practices for Families and Kids
Mindfulness practice can offer your child stress management strategies to calm their nervous system. Below are a few kid-friendly breathing techniques you can demonstrate and do with them.
5 Mindful Breath Practices for Children
1. Belly Breathing
When breathing in, the belly expands slightly; and when breathing out, it contracts. Do several rounds and return to normal breathing.
2. Mindful Breathing
Simply notice the breath and feel it move in the body. You can add visuals and words to make the practice more engaging. For example, on the in-breath ask your child to repeat the phrase, I am a lake and on the out-breath, I am calm. This technique can be adapted to use any visual and taps into the power of imagination.
3. Teddy Bear Breath
This is a great variation of the belly-breathing practice for little ones. Have them lie down with a teddy or stuffed animal on their belly, and let them watch as it moves up and down while they breathe, as if they are rocking it to sleep.
4. Four Square Breathing
This practice is a useful tool for older children. Breathe in for a count of four. Hold the breath for a count of four. Breathe out for a count of four. Hold the breath for a count of four. Do several rounds and return to normal breathing.
5. Basic Breath Ball Practice
You can use a Hoberman sphere—a geodesic dome that can be folded and unfolded—to teach your child basic breath awareness. The toy can be referred to as a breath ball because the dome’s movements mimic the movements of breathing: as the dome folds inward, we imagine the out-breath contracting; as the dome expands, we imagine the lungs expanding on the in-breath.
1. Using both hands, gently hold the breathing ball in front of your belly.
2. Hold one square on opposite sides of the sphere’s surface.
3. Take a deep breath in. As your belly expands, let the ball expand with it.
4. Breathe in fairly slowly, maybe holding momentarily at the top of the breath as you fully expand the ball.
5. As you breath out, allow the sphere to contract to its smallest size.
6. Repeat a few times. You might even count along in a rhythm.
Mindful Parenting Tips
It’s important to follow the oxygen mask principle: put your own mask on first, before you help your child. The more we discover how to be mindful ourselves, the more we can turn to mindful parenting strategies and appreciate our children’s capacity to be present in each moment.
There’s an inner skill set called for in parenting—an awareness of what is, what’s changing, and what matters going forward. In day-to-day life, take the time you need to notice your own feelings, pause before responding, and practice listening.
7 Things Mindful Families Do Differently
1. Embrace Imperfection
You are going to make mistakes, you are going to hurt your children’s feelings, and you are not going to be able to show up in all the ways you want to or the ways your children want you to, but none of that makes you a bad parent—it only makes you a human one. When you can move into a place of acceptance of this you are able to shift into a greater ease and grace within yourself.
2. Listen with Curiosity
When we pause and listen to each other more in our lives, we can engage the experiences in our family with a growth mindset. We can see the struggles and triumphs as opportunities for learning and growth. Instead of judging each other, we can get better at recognizing when we don’t understand where the other person is coming from, lean in with curiosity and say, “tell me more.” Or we might try and stand in their shoes to understand their perspective by asking ourselves, “why might they be acting this way?”
3. Communicate Courageously
Being clear and honest with each other about what you need and how you feel is ultimately an act of kindness that creates trust and connection. This means showing up with our partners and kids with an open heart and an open mind. It builds on listening with curiosity and creates space for everyone to feel comfortable to share how they feel and what they need.
4. Practice Appreciation and Gratitude
While words of affirmation may or may not be your primary love language, we all want to be seen and appreciated and there’s a surprisingly simple way of doing this that can have huge benefits—intentionally practicing being appreciative and expressing gratitude to one another. By taking the time to acknowledge our kids or our partner when they empty the dishwasher or are ready on time, we can shift the culture of the household from demanding and frustrated to cooperative and grateful
5. Forgive Ourselves and Each Other
In practicing mindfulness we come to understand that our mistakes aren’t signs of failing at being a human. Instead, they are opportunities for learning about the inevitable pitfalls of life, what gets in our way and understanding the optimal route to get back into a space of balance and connection.
The simple phrase of “forgive, investigate and invite” can be enormously helpful. If we have transgressed, we can set the intention to “forgive” ourselves for this wrongdoing, understanding that we can’t change the past, remembering that we aren’t perfect, and realizing that we often make mistakes out of ignorance, confusion or upset feelings.
6. Practice Support and Generosity
Our kids are always watching us, learning how to be in the world and modeling our behaviors. So it’s important that we model this way of being in the world and include them in these acts as often as possible. Want some ideas? You can consider getting involved in service projects at a local school or organization. You can encourage your kids to make pictures or cards for their grandparents or someone who is ill. These small or large acts are the essential healing agent within the family system, our culture, and the world. Ultimately, connection is the cornerstone of well-being and it starts in the family.
7. Remember to Play and Have Fun
It seems silly to say that any of us would forget to have fun and enjoy each other but it’s more common than you think. Raising children is probably the most important job you will ever be tasked with and the pressure of raising good humans can be weighty. So much so that we can fall into a pattern of taking things too seriously and being overly focused on tasks (chores, homework, activities, etc.) that we lose the enjoyment of being together.
Kids need ease and fun when it comes to difficult tasks like challenging negative self-talk, says Dr. Hazel Harrison. She introduces “The Critical Critter” for exploring self-critical thoughts with your child. Read More
Children who learn to practice gratitude are happier and more optimistic in the long run. Try this four-step practice to foster gratitude with your child. Read More
Along with newer children’s books about mindfulness, many beloved picture books also offer mindful messages about kindness, friendship, and contemplating the world around us. Here are a few of our favorites. Read More
As we relax and awaken through our physical body, we discover the formless dimension of awareness or spirit that permeates all of life. This meditation includes a poem from Mary Oliver.
Poem (the spirit likes to dress up)
The spirit
likes to dress up like this:
ten fingers,
ten toes,
shoulders, and all the rest
at night
in the black branches,
in the morning
in the blue branches
of the world.
It could float, of course,
but would rather
plumb rough matter.
Airy and shapeless thing,
it needs
the metaphor of the body,
lime and appetite,
the oceanic fluids;
it needs the body’s world,
instinct
and imagination
and the dark hug of time,
sweetness
and tangibility,
to be understood,
to be more than pure light
that burns
where no one is –
so it enters us –
in the morning
shines from brute comfort
like a stitch of lightning;
and at night
lights up the deep and wondrous
drownings of the body
like a star.
You know those moments when things don’t go as planned—the job, the relationship, your health—and you feel unmoored and unsure of your next steps? Or, when things are going so well that there’s a sense of opportunity right at your fingertips? Those are the moments when having a clear sense of purpose can both anchor and guide you; it can also help you navigate the tricky in-between stages when your life feels a lot less clear, offering a sense of ease and skill and, dare I say, grace.
Uncovering your purpose is a process. In fact, I like to define purpose as an ongoing process of developing a clear understanding of what is most meaningful to you, and aligning your actions and behaviors in the world to be consistent with those qualities. It’s the skill of being in tune with your mind, heart, and body, so you can recognize when you’re about to stray from your path and find your way back on course. And, equally important, being clear can help you acknowledge those moments where your path and your purpose are aligned so you can celebrate them with gratitude.
The work of defining purpose is the work of becoming fully conscious of what you love and what is most alive within you and then acting accordingly.
Getting clear about your purpose is an internal practice of connecting with the sources of meaning, joy, and inspiration that reside deeply within you. The work of defining purpose is the work of becoming fully conscious of what you love and what is most alive within you and then (and this can be the hard part) acting accordingly. This work takes time, practice, imagination, compassion, curiosity, and kind awareness. It’s an evolving process, a beautiful and sometimes painful one, that you can be in relationship with over the arc of your whole life.
How I connected to my purpose
About nine years ago, I began experiencing a vague sense that I was misaligned in my work. I found myself dreading work, rather than feeling excited or engaged by it. Bad work habits began creeping in—I would heavily procrastinate on projects, not be responsive to emails. The quality of my work began to suffer as well. And the most troubling sign of all—my attitude and personality also began changing. I was no longer energetic and excited about work, instead a dullness took over and I became more and more stressed. This was especially problematic because I managed a team of people and my mood changes became increasingly apparent and affected some of them in negative ways.
I had spent years successfully building my career as an organizational psychologist working with some very interesting companies. My work was fulfilling for me personally and also provided me and my family security and stability. So I was feeling very confused about what to do next.
Thankfully, I had been practicing meditation since college. I knew that I needed to take time to sit in quiet reflection with all that was arising for me. As I did so over the course of the year, I came to realize that what I most wanted to do was focus full time on sharing the practice of mindfulness and meditation in organizations. It was so alive for me. But this was way before mindfulness was mainstream. And the thought of building a career teaching mindfulness in organizations sounded a little crazy.
Yet I couldn’t ignore what I was feeling.
At the time, I had an exciting job at Google, where I was responsible for providing leadership development programs for senior leaders across the company. It was a great role and represented the culmination of many years of hard work. I felt grateful and very lucky to have such a job—yet I couldn’t escape the feeling that my work was hurting me, physically and mentally. I was feeling depleted. My heart, mind, and body were saying “Focus more on your meditation practice, go deeper, see what’s possible,” but my logical mind couldn’t imagine quitting a job at Google. It took a lot of time to clarify my purpose and work up the courage and resolve to flip the script and take the big career- and life-changing step that I was considering next.
Eventually I chose to leave Google and cofound a workplace wellness and mindfulness company called WisdomLabs. It was a tough decision to leave, both because it meant a career transition and because it had real financial consequences for me and my family. But from the moment I stepped into this new role, I felt a sense of fulfillment that I had never experienced before. And over time the company began to make good on the vision of bringing mindfulness and wellness solutions to organizations around the world. Following my calling to offer mindfulness solutions to organizations continues to be a source of deep fulfillment for me to this day.
I eventually moved on to my current role leading the global nonprofit Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute, which offers science-based mindfulness and emotional intelligence skills development solutions to communities and organizations around the world. Uncovering my purpose—which is to live and work toward the full integration of mindfulness in all domains of my life—and then acting on my discovery is how I created my reality today.
The journey to live your purpose is in a sense nothing less than a process of connecting with the aspects of your life and work that are most meaningful to you, and living and working in a congruent way. Importantly, this is a practice, a process, not a once-and-done.
That means it’s essential to check in regularly so you’re in tune with your current purpose and aware when changes naturally begin to crop up and require you to change course.
I’d like to share the practices that helped me create clarity about my purpose and my ongoing commitment to align my life with my discovery.
Exploring the Four Pillars of Purpose
There are four research-backed qualities that lead to a strong sense of purpose: awareness, values, aspirations, and congruent behaviors. The good news is that these qualities can be nurtured with simple mindfulness practices designed to activate these four “pillars of purpose.” Those practices are: awareness, to connect with what’s alive within you; intention, to visualize your best life; alignment, to match your actions with your values; and resilience, to unhook from rigidity.
How to Practice Awareness
1. Connecting with What’s Alive for You
Illustration by Edmon de Haro
Awareness simply means paying attention to the experience you are having as you are having it. You can practice awareness of your own sense of purpose through quiet meditation, taking the time to simply notice the thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations that arise when you consider your life and what purpose means to you. By observing your thoughts, emotions, ideas, sensations, discomfort, and anything else that arises, with kindness and curiosity, you can begin the process of discovery that can lead to insight into your purpose.
You can also integrate the practice of awareness into your everyday life. Ask yourself: What do you notice as you move through your day, or as you engage in tasks, meetings, or other forms of work? Is your life and work situation energizing? Draining? Does it sometimes bring feelings of joy or well being, or the opposite?
Remember that awareness practice is a process and that each phase, stage, and chapter of your life is a stepping-stone and a learning experience in which you can exercise awareness. Be kind to yourself as you bring curiosity to these large questions of purpose. We’re all unfolding. Life is a process. The fact that you’re interested in aligning your life with your purpose means that you’re already halfway there. Reflecting on purpose helps you gain insight into your own lived experiences and, when necessary, into how to respond appropriately and effectively to opportunities as they present themselves.
The fact that you’re interested in aligning your life with your purpose means that you’re already halfway there.
In both the formal meditation and integrated practices of developing awareness of purpose, the most important consideration is whether your life or work situation is contributing to a sense of aliveness for you. Perhaps more than anything, focusing on what makes you feel alive and energized is a key indicator of what is good and true and worthwhile to consider in terms of purpose. Aliveness can take many forms: joy, absorption, meaningfulness. I find that this concept of a search for what is most alive in one’s life is not only profound and beautiful but also very practical. You know it when you see, feel, or sense it!
How to Practice Intention
2. Imagining Your Best Life
Illustration by Edmon de Haro
Intention is your innate capacity to harness and direct your energy and effort at will. It seems simple enough, but it takes a lot of practice to harness your innate ability to direct your attention at will. And it’s also a critical skill for the journey toward realizing your purpose.
In many ways, setting the intention to live with purpose is an act of imagining an ideal future, and then living and working toward the realization of that vision.
Setting a clear and strong intention toward realizing purpose helps you to create the conditions for that purpose to arise. Some call this serendipity but there may be a more scientific explanation linking our thoughts and intentions with our behaviors. Neuroscientist Regina Pally describes how setting intentions (or goals) for yourself causes your brain to nonconsciously predict what is most likely to happen in order to achieve those goals. Then your brain becomes wired to act in ways consistent with those expectations. “According to neuroscience,” says Pally, “even before events happen, the brain has already made a prediction about what is most likely to happen, and sets in motion the perceptions, behaviors, emotions, physiologic responses, and interpersonal ways of relating that best fit with what is predicted.” In many ways, setting the intention to live with purpose is an act of imagining an ideal future, and then living and working toward the realization of that vision.
Setting intentions isn’t reserved only for things relating to your purpose with a capital “P.” Living a life of purpose means investing everyday moments with intention—which is why another key element in practicing intention is love. Having our intentions informed by love emphasizes the quality of how we are being in the world, rather than what we are doing. Bringing love to the mundane activities of everyday life is an invitation for each of us to live every day as our best selves. No matter what, intention imbued with love can bring us closer to a sense of congruence and alignment between what we value and how we act in the world.
How to Practice Alignment
3. When Your Actions Match Your Values
Illustration by Edmon de Haro
After you do the hard work of uncovering what’s alive for you, and setting the intention to direct your energy to incorporating those things in your life more, the next step is aligning your actions. It can be hard work: acting in a way that aligns with your values. It is sometimes all too easy to lose sight of what’s most important to you when you’re in the middle of the slings and arrows of everyday life. It is very easy to succumb to the “busyness trap,” or prioritize the needs of others over your own—to lose the forest for the trees. The days, months, and years pass by and there can be the surreal feeling or realization of “How did I get here? Where did my time go?”
It’s helpful to consider that all of the decisions and actions you take eventually help you better understand what alignment means to you. The very act of recognizing that you feel misaligned is the absolute necessary beginning point on the path to full alignment with your purpose.
The very act of recognizing that you feel misaligned is the absolute necessary beginning point on the path to full alignment with your purpose.
So, how do you know if you are living and working in an aligned way? In the simplest sense, it is about congruence. “Look closely at the present you are constructing; it should look like the future you are dreaming,” suggests Alice Walker, the renowned American writer and activist.
How do you know when you are on course to this “future you are dreaming”? I’d like to offer the following inquiry-based practice focused on the three “gates” that lead to aligned action.
How to Practice Resilience
4. Unhooking from Rigidity
Illustration by Edmon de Haro
Resilience is the learned capacity to bounce back from adversity, adapt, and thrive, according to world-renowned resilience expert Linda Graham. Learning resilience is critically important to realizing your purpose because it allows you to gracefully and effectively navigate the challenges you will certainly meet along the way. Challenges and setbacks are inevitable. I’d go as far as to say they are necessary: They force you to redefine and connect with your purpose in an even more meaningful way. That’s why the final pillar of realizing purpose is the ability to harness resilience to come back to your sense of purpose when you lose your way.
The good news is that more than five decades of research show that resilience is highly trainable. A mindfulness practice called response flexibility underpins the core research-backed resilience factors of optimism, balanced management of strong or difficult emotions, a sense of safety, and a strong social support system.
According to Graham, response flexibility is “the ability to pause, step back, reflect, shift perspectives, create options and choose wisely,” especially when we are met with adversity.
Your purpose is not some elusive hidden treasure that reveals itself all at once in a blaze of euphoria. Contemplating your purpose and taking aligned action is a process, a sometimes scary and painful process that unfolds over time. Sometimes long periods of time. Perhaps even the arc of a lifetime. As you live your way into a deeper understanding of what is true and good and meaningful for you, no matter how on or off course you might feel right now, you will gain the capability to acknowledge and invite new possibilities to live and work with awareness, intention and aligned action.
Developing your purpose is ultimately an exercise in imagination and creativity, because as the beloved Brazilian philosopher and educator Rubem Alves noted, “The frontiers of the possible are not determined by the limits of the actual.” What, then, is possible for you? Developing a sense of purpose for all that is possible (and not only what is actual) means listening deeply to your inner voice and connecting with what is most alive, true, and good in your life
Rich Fernandez, CEO of the Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute, talks about how he leaned on his mindfulness practice to turn his career into a calling. Read More
In this 4-part series, you’ll learn how to connect with what’s meaningful to you, set intentions for your future, define your purpose, and the ups and downs of the journey to living in alignment with your heart work. Read More
