We all encounter “demons” of fear, anger, hurt, craving and shame. This talk explores our key ways of resisting difficult emotions, and how “when the resistance is gone, the demons are gone.” We look at the power of mindfulness and compassion to undo resistance, and open us to the loving presence that can handle whatever energies arise. This special talk was given at the 2019 IMCW 5-Day New Year’s Silent Retreat.
Whether we like it or not, this time of year cues our minds to reflect and think about habits we want to change. If you’re reading this, odds are one of those habits is bringing mindfulness into your life more and allowing this to be the year where it sticks. Or maybe you’re also looking to change other habits that run alongside your values like being more self-compassionate, living alongside your values, playing more, or creating more mastery in life. All of these are basic elements that help uncover happiness.
Whatever the habit is that you want to make, here are a few practical tips to help make your changes stick.
How to Make Your New Habits Stick
1. Choose the right practice
If you’re trying to integrate the ability to become more present in your daily life, choose what you want to practice. You may want to integrate a more formal mindfulness practice that would come in the form of a sitting meditation or mindful yoga. Or maybe you want to integrate more informal moments of just being present to whatever you are doing. Or maybe both. Or perhaps it’s exercise, better sleep, or being a more present friend. Having an awareness of what you want to do is the first step.
2. Set up reminders
As much as we’d like to think, “I got it all up here, I can remember,” it’s important to understand that your brain works off cues. The way our environments are set up cue our brain to make certain decisions. Give your new habits a boost by setting up your environment to support the changes you want to make. For example, you can put a meditation cushion next to your bed so it’s the first thing you see in the morning. You can sign up for an app that will remind you to have more mindful moments. There are many other apps that do this for exercise, sleep and even to keep you on whatever task you like. Or you can go old school: put up sticky notes in your work area or, even better, get a real person to practice with you and motivate each other.
3. Build a support network
Many of us have the rule in our heads that “I can do it on my own.” The fact is, you are more likely to actually integrate a new practice if you have people alongside you who are trying to do the same thing. Finding a group of people in your area or on the web that you can connect with is very important to sustaining this practice. You can connect through new challenges, learn from each other, and feel part of a community. Your community also serves as a reminder that this activity is important in your life. Check out Meetup.com to find a local group doing exactly what you’re interested in. If there isn’t a local community, an online group is a good runner up.
Try these three things out with whatever habits you are trying to change. Really build them into your routine and have compassion for yourself along the way. Making changes difficult work, but it’s also entirely attainable.
If you do stray from your practice “forgive and invite” — Forgive yourself for the time gone by, learn from your obstacles, and invite yourself in that present moment to begin again.
It’s the season for setting new goals and making resolutions, but the secret to lasting change is constructing a system of habits that make new outcomes possible. Read More
This guided session includes an overview of the primary components in meditation practices, and then guidance in awakening the senses, collecting the attention, and opening mindfully to changing experience (from the 2019 IMCW New Year’s 5-Day Silent Retreat).
Mirrors can evoke strong feelings in us – and they can also be incredibly powerful tools for changing our perspective and seeing parts of ourselves that are usually hidden as we look out into the world.
Our desire to be seen and reflected is basic and innate. As children, we learn to understand ourselves through the reflections of those around us. In fact, psychologists have found that face-to-face contact is essential for our social and emotional development. As we spend more time alone and on our devices, we miss out on this social reflection. Through the mirror, we can come face-to-face with ourselves at any time.
A practice that I have developed using a mirror mindfully in meditation can help uncover kinder self-awareness and strengthen our resilience to meet life’s challenges.
Learning to tune into your image will not turn you into a towering narcissist. Quite the opposite: you’ll learn to stay present with yourself, manage the intensity of your emotions, and tap into a new inner strength. In fact, kinder self-awareness is the key to breaking free from the inner critic and the external world that stokes our fears and anxieties that we are never safe, never good enough, and never have enough.
Learning About Yourself by Looking at Yourself
When I was a little girl, I used to look at myself in the side of the shiny chrome toaster on the table, entranced by the expressions that crossed over my face, sometimes exaggerating them, and imitating the adults around me. Looking at my own reflection filled me with amusement and curiosity and it helped me understand and express emotions. I was able to see how I felt and what I looked like while I was feeling it. This seemed to soothe me and was somehow affirming.
As I grew older I learned, like most of us do, to use the mirror to monitor my appearance and critique it based on cultural standards of beauty — finding endless flaws and imperfections. Occasionally, I’d rest my gaze for just a moment and look into my own eyes – who was I? How was I really feeling?
One day I caught a glimpse of my face in the mirror and was shocked by how sad and distressed I looked — I’d barely realized I felt that way thinking I felt “fine.” I came to realize that I’d been cultivating an image of myself that I thought would be pleasing to other people, and in the process, I’d lost touch with how I felt inside.
Learning to tune into your image will not turn you into a towering narcissist. Quite the opposite: you’ll learn to stay present with yourself, manage the intensity of your emotions, and tap into a new inner strength.
I began to take time to look at my reflection in the mirror, not to focus on my appearance or to imagine how I looked to others, but to simply acknowledge myself and get in touch with how I felt. In doing this over time, I found a way to look past the imperfections in my appearance and see deeper into my own eyes with compassion. It became a meditation. A way to simply be present with no goal other than to be there with myself.
Simply setting a time every day to give myself my own undivided attention became a precious respite from my busy life. I looked forward to having the time to simply rest and relax in my own presence.
But it wasn’t an exercise in self-adoration.
I didn’t sit there blowing kisses at myself. Rather, it was a check-in to how I was feeling about myself, my appearance, my emotions, and the various running dramas in my life. My face revealed a lot – and some of it wasn’t easy to see. I disciplined myself to look at myself regardless of how I was feeling or how many distractions there were in my life. After doing this mirror meditation for at least 10 minutes a day for over a year, I noticed a profound difference — and others did too.
Over time, I learned to approach myself in a way that felt natural, accepting, and kind — and became less self-conscious about my appearance in the process. I also came to use the mirror to manage day-to-day stresses and distractions.
Instead of searching outside myself for people, places and things that would distract me from negative emotions or self-criticism, I used the mirror to face myself and ground myself by simply looking into my own eyes with compassion. I found the mirror was a great way to work out my emotions, too. When I was struggling with negative feelings and there was no one who could lend a compassionate ear—or I just didn’t want to upset anyone or say something I’d regret — the mirror became a powerful reflector of my own pain and suffering.
The mirror offered a perspective that I couldn’t see from inside my own head. I saw myself in a way that was often just too raw and vulnerable to share with others. Looking in the mirror, I was often flooded with a feeling of compassion and appreciation for how much I do and how hard I try — instead of relying on affirmations from others or validation from whatever I was currently defining as “success,” I simply acknowledged myself unapologetically with love and compassion. I didn’t have to do anything, I was worthy of love and compassion by simply being.
My motives for connecting with others were clearer: It was less about getting them to see me and validate me and think I was wonderful, and more about discovering who they truly are, and what they are communicating beyond their words.
Occasionally, my inner critic would erupt, “Isn’t this a bit narcissistic?” “Aren’t you being selfish?” “Shouldn’t you be focusing on helping others less fortunate instead of looking at yourself in the mirror?” When I stopped to really consider these critiques and ask myself how mirror gazing influenced my relationships and general approach to life, I found it had, in fact, created a profound shift. But the irony was that by making time to see myself in the mirror I was actually more interested in making deep connections with others, not less.
Why? My motives for connecting with others were clearer: It was less about getting them to see me and validate me and think I was wonderful, and more about discovering who they truly are, and what they are communicating beyond their words. A common saying is that there are two sides of a conversation: talking and waiting to talk. In the urgency to be seen and acknowledged and understood, we can completely miss each other. By seeing ourselves, we can practice self-compassion about our own needs and build our capacity to see others with compassion.
Teaching the Mirror Meditation
The mirror became such a useful tool for me that I wanted to share it with others. For the last seven years, I have been teaching mirror meditation. By combining mirror gazing with the principles of mindfulness meditation, students meditate on their own reflection.
At first, most people seem very awkward and self-conscious. Their faces tense, eyes harsh and critical as they look at themselves, adjusting this and that. Then as they share what they are experiencing, I guide them to look beyond their surface appearance, put aside their habitual stories, and take a deeper look at themselves. I invite them to see themselves as the person who is suffering instead the object of their criticism. Often, they are able to shift their attention from seeing their imperfections to seeing themselves as the sufferer and the creator of the suffering in the mirror. Something clicks. Usually, by the end of the session, their faces soften and over time they seem calmer and more self-accepting, kinder to themselves and more trusting of their own experience.
Sometimes these changes have been quite miraculous. Many have reported deep insights in how they see themselves and how it influences their lives, by simply taking the time to give themselves their full attention, allowing people to cut through their self-delusions and develop kinder and more accurate self-awareness. Some have found it to be a powerful tool to support their programs of personal development, as in psychotherapy, life coaching, addiction recovery, and life-transition support groups.
As the work continued, I asked my mirror gazing students to describe in their own words any changes they noticed from doing the meditation. When the content of these written responses were analyzed, three themes consistently stand out.
And the mirror revealed just how much their criticisms were affecting them because they could see it on their face.
First, they became aware of just how much they criticized themselves — whether it was their appearance or some other aspect of themselves that they habitually found unacceptable. The mirror brought it to light. And the mirror revealed just how much their criticisms were affecting them because they could see it on their face! Then they had a choice, and a practice, to treat themselves with more acceptance and compassion.
The mirror also reflected their facial expressions so they were much more aware of how they were feeling moment-to-moment which at first was a bit shocking for many. Some became more aware of emotions they typically avoided like fear, anger, or disgust, that they hadn’t noticed before. They found that their capacity to feel and accept a broader range of emotions increased from doing the meditation.
And lastly, many noticed a positive impact on their relationships, which might seem a bit counterintuitive. They became much more aware of how they were seeing others and being seen. It seems that by practicing giving themselves their full attention and learning how to be with themselves through uncomfortable emotions, they were able to be more present with others and their relationships deepened.
Why Mirror Meditation Works
Why is mirror-gazing so powerful and effective? As I delved into the neuroscience and psychology research, the pieces of the puzzle came together. Research tells us that we need face-to-face contact to develop a sense of self, to manage our emotions, and to develop empathy for others. We come to understand who we are through others’ reflections of us. And in seeing their faces, we learn how they feel and how we feel in turn. We practice modulating our expressions moment-to-moment based on their reactions to us. This is the foundation for learning to regulate our emotions and navigate complex social situations.
As we spend more time alone and on our devices, we miss out on the face-to-face reflection that helps us stay emotionally connected to ourselves. The mirror can be a valuable tool for maintaining that connection. The mirror reflects the quality of the relationship we have with ourselves. In my work, it has been astonishing to see how unkind people can be to themselves without even realizing it. The mirror reflects our self-criticism with exquisite accuracy and then mirror meditation provides a choice, and a practice, to treat ourselves with kindness.
Practice the Mirror Meditation
I recommend 10 minutes of silent mirror gazing per day. Here are some simple guidelines.
1. Set the space and intention.
Choose a well-lit distraction-free space where you can position a mirror so that it’s freestanding and you can see into your eyes without straining or leaning forward. Sit on a meditation cushion or on a chair with both feet on the ground. Set a timer for 10 minutes. Have no goals other than to sit with yourself for the allotted time.
2. Tune into your breathing.
Begin with your eyes closed. Tune in to your breath. Are you holding your breath or breathing rapidly? Take a few slow, deep belly breaths. Then breathe regularly and naturally, just observing your breath move your belly, ribcage and collarbones as you inhale and then gently contracting your collarbones, ribcage and belly as you exhale. Notice any areas of tension in your body, especially your face and shoulders, then imagine sending your breath to relax those areas and letting tension melt away.
3. Begin to gaze into your eyes.
Notice if your breathing changes when your first look at yourself. Come back to full steady breathing. Notice the quality of your gaze: Is it harsh or soft? Try to soften your gaze as much as you can. If you notice yourself hardening by focusing on a detail or a flaw in your appearance – breathe until you feel yourself softening again.
4. Observe your critic.
If your initial reaction to looking at yourself is critical, notice your eyes as you look at yourself in this exacting, maybe even harsh or cold way – see if you can flip your attention from the person (or image in the mirror) that you are scrutinizing to seeing the person who is underneath receiving that scrutiny – that’s who you really are. How does that part of you feel be receiving those critiques?
5. Notice where your attention goes and associated feelings.
Gaze at your reflection, staying open to whatever arises. Notice any sensations or emotions that come up and allow them to simply be there without judgment or interpretation. Let your feelings and thoughts simply pass by as you breathe, relax your body, and gaze at yourself with no goal other than to be present with yourself. Notice if your attention becomes very narrow and exacting, and if so, see if you can expand it back to seeing your whole body, your whole self, and notice any emotions on your face. Observe this expansion and contraction of your attention and the thoughts and images that come to mind. Just noticing where your attention goes and any feelings that are associated with it without judgment. Hold a kind intention toward yourself as you do the practice. You may be surprised how much your view of yourself can change over the course of 10 minutes.
Watch the TEDx Talk: What Mirror Meditation Can Teach You
When self-doubt takes over, we can begin to lose our sense of purpose and identity. Here’s how you can be more confident in the choices you make. Read More
They are the basis for most of our positive outcomes in life. They determine how often we practice mindfulness, our exercise patterns, our ability to place our full attention on our work. They bolster our capacity to interact with the people around us from a sense of compassion and full presence.
Our habits also create most of the problems we encounter in life. They keep us stuck in self-defeating patterns like eating that full pint of ice cream, getting lost for hours on social media, or “checking out” instead of being present for the people we love.
As you begin this New Year, it’s easy to get caught-up thinking only about goals, outcomes, and New Year’s resolutions. These are important. But we think it’s even more important to consider the underlying habits that either keep you stuck or allow you to experience profound changes.
How do you nourish healthy habits? Here are three proven steps:
3 Science-Backed Strategies to Build Healthy Habits in the New Year
Step 1: Take an Inventory of Your Current Habit System
Edward Deming, one of America’s leading management scientists in the 20th century, declared, “Every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets.” Allow that to sink in for a moment.
The idea here is that your current system of habits is “perfectly designed” to produce the negative, self-defeating, patterns you wish you could change. If you struggle to exercise, it’s because your current habit system is perfectly designed to keep you from working out. If you can’t find time to meditate, it’s because your current habit system is perfectly designed to prevent you from training your mind.
Which existing habits are standing in your way? Which new habits will allow you to make the changes you would like to see?
And that raises an important question: what results do you wish you were getting? For instance, do you want to be more mindful, less distracted? Do you want to be kinder, less agitated? Do you want to spend more time exploring the things that matter most to you, less time binge-watching shows on Netflix? These are the outcomes you want to change.
Next, look one level deeper, at changes in habits that will help you achieve these outcomes. And this begs a second question: Which existing habits are standing in your way? Which new habits will allow you to make the changes you would like to see?
Step 2: Build New Habits By Stacking Them on Habits You Already Have
By now, you should have a few new habits in mind that will help you achieve the changes you’d like to make. The question then becomes: how do you build these new habits?
In our work with high performers and executives, we’ve found that the best way to build new habits is to, in the words of habit expert James Clear, “stack” them on top of existing habits.
For example, let’s say you want to build the habit of spending less time distracted by your phone. You could try to build this habit from scratch by saying, “I am not going to look at my phone at all in the evening.”
Stacking this new habit on top of an existing habit is a much more effective strategy. For example, you can say: “After I walk through my front door and take off my jacket in the evening, I’m going to put my phone on Do Not Disturb mode.” This approach increases your likelihood of building the habit not only by tying it to an existing habit (taking off your coat as you walk in the door) but it also includes a specific action, which the research says is another important strategy for making habits stick. Instead, saying vaguely, “I’m going to try to look at my phone less,” it’s based on a tangible action, “switching my phone to Do Not Disturb.”
The path to changing your life is more about the process of building the habit than the specific habit itself.
There are numerous ways to enact this strategy in everyday life. You could use your walk into the office as a time for practicing present moment awareness, use slowing down in your car at stop signs or stop lights as a cue to take one or two mindful breaths, or use beginning meals as a cue for expressing one thing you are grateful for.
The possibilities here are endless with this simple strategy: Stack the new habit you wish to create on top of an existing habit so that it becomes integrated into the midst of your everyday life.
Step 3: Build and Sustain Your New Habits Using the Four C’s
The final step uses what we call the Four C’s of habit formation to weave these new habits deep into the fabric of your everyday life.
Commence Small. This first critical tip builds on Stanford professor BJ Fogg’s research, which suggests you start with a goal you can realistically achieve. For example, it’s better to start with 5 minutes of meditation each day than to set yourself up for disappointment by trying to meditate for an hour. Be careful of setting unrealistic New Year’s goals that risk failing in mere days because they are too big. Remember, the path to changing your life is more about the process of building the habit than the specific habit itself.
Commit. Make a 100% commitment to building your new habit. It turns out that it’s actually easier to commit to building a new habit 100% of the time than 99%. That 1%, after all, can make you miserable. It fuels that voice in your head that says, “I’ll skip it just this once.” But by making a 100% commitment to a tiny habit, you end this mental argument. We have seen over and over again with thousands of people that this is really the key tip for creating new habits.
Create a consistent Cue. Going back to the idea of habit stacking, where creating a “cue” helps you remember to act. Use one of your existing habits as your cue, as a trigger that helps you remember to build the new habit. If you want to spend less time mind wandering and more time noticing the sights, sounds, and sensations of the present moment, for instance, come up with a regularly repeating cue that reminds you to practice, a cue like waking up, going to bed, walking upstairs, stopping at stoplights, riding in elevators, or standing in line at the store.
Celebrate. All you have to do to celebrate is savor the experience for just a few seconds. Savor the exquisite feeling of connecting to your breath. Savor the feeling of pleasure that you derive from doing the activity you made a 100% commitment to carry out.
So, while the world hammers on about goals, outcomes, and New Year’s resolutions over the next few weeks, remember that real change and progress only happens when we carefully construct a system of habits that make new outcomes possible.
When we use mindfulness to get rid of stress, we’re no longer being mindful. Try this practice for being with and reimagining stressful moments. Read More
A simple mindfulness strategy for mastering the habit of becoming more present to each moment and, as a result, experiencing greater focus, productivity, and life satisfaction. Read More
As an old year ends and a new one begins, I like to find a few quiet moments for a simple practice that helps recognize this transition and honor all that has happened and all that awaits. I’d love to invite you to join me.
You might want to have a tissue or a journal handy. I find this practice brings so many emotions to the surface, making me teary and grateful and excited to be alive all at once.
A Practice for Honoring The Transition to a New Year
Sit comfortably, relax your body, and close your eyes.
Slowly, gently, breathe in through your nose, imagining that you are breathing in all of 2019 and what transpired for you, holding the whole year in your lungs for a couple of seconds.
Survey your memories as they come in on your breath, catching glimpses of the year’s high and low moments.
Allow yourself to feel the good, bad, disappointing, marvelous, wondrous, thanking everything that life brought to you this year.
Let it all go. With a deep, long exhale, let it all go.
Experience the tides of your breath a few times, in and out, and then rest, sensing the air coming in through your nostrils, and flowing out.
Let your breath flow naturally, effortlessly.
Next, imagine a field of snow, freshly fallen all around you, pure, expectant.
Allow your heart to swell and your ears to attune: What is calling to you this year? Where does your heart long to go?
Feel and sense deeply and when you are ready, let your eyes flutter open: Welcome to a new beginning.
Take some time to write down whatever came up for you during that meditation—the residue of moments are important, funny things you remember. Those are the things that stick with you. You have to cherish the good moments as they’re there. Know that the bad stuff passes. Like waves on the ocean, it’s the just the highs and lows that you remember.
Explore the February Issue
And welcome too to the love, hope, and laughter in the February issue of Mindful. Mindfulness icon Tara Brach teaches us how to find true self-compassion in the face of our restless anxieties. Ali, Atman, and Andrés of the Holistic Life Foundation bring us hope in the power of mindfulness to transform lives and communities. And Barry, Mindful’s beloved and Falstaffian founding editor, brings us laughter by sharing that none of us, alas, is the center of the universe.
Wishing you a new year filled with deep breaths, wonderful beginnings, love, hope, and laughter.
This meditation explores the meaning of forgiveness and its role in healing and transformation. We then are guided in a forgiveness practice that helps us release the armoring of blame, and inhabit an inclusive and open heart (given at the Fall 2019 IMCW 7-Day Silent Retreat).
