Mindfulness

Use Traveling As A Time To Practice Mindfulness

By  | 

There is no better time to practice mindfulness than when you’re traveling. If you’re like most people, most of your attention is focused on getting to the destination, which means you’re living in the future not the present. You consider the journey to be an inconvenience. You just want to get where you’re going so that the real experience can start.

Actually in the sense outlined above traveling is a microcosm for how many people live their lives. They’re so focused on their plans, on their goals and aspirations, that time flies by without them even paying much attention to it. They discount all the miracles of their existence, considering the present insignificant, as just a stepping stone to get to somewhere else.

You can start to break this bad habit by forgetting about the destination any time you travel, realizing worrying about it won’t make it arrive any sooner. Instead just focus all your attention on the present by cultivating deep, mindful breathing. Consider your present experience to be worthy all on its own, not just as a means to an end. Appreciate the scenery, the company, the sense of calm that comes from deep breathing and from letting go of future expectations. Deciding there are plenty of miracles right where you are.

What you’ll notice is that traveling goes from being a gigantic pain to a pleasant experience. You’ll also notice that time seems to go by more quickly. When you’re worried about the future time drags out, we’ve all been there, and when you’re having fun in the pleasant time flies by, we’ve all been there too.

Related posts:

  1. One Day At A Time If you’re feeling overwhelmed then you’re almost certainly looking towards the future with a sense of dread, wondering how on earth you’re going to make it through. Your best chance of finding success and diminishing your anxiety is to adopt a mindful attitude, bringing all of your attention to the moment. Existing fully in the […]...
  2. Time to Start Enjoying Life Now The downside of having goals and aspirations is that if you’re not careful you will get caught up obsessing over them and unwittingly take yourself out of the present moment, thinking of your life as on a holding pattern until you get to where you hope to go. People live their entire adult lives this […]...
  3. Preoccupied With Life Changes “When I accept myself as I am, then I can change.” – Carl Rogers The paradox about life changes is that when you are too preoccupied with them happening you actually get in your own way, stunting your growth and making the changes you desire less likely to happen. Of course if you don’t think […]...
  4. Happiness Is Available In The Present Moment “Our appointment with life is in the present moment. If we do not have peace and joy right now, when will we have peace and joy-tomorrow, or after tomorrow? What is preventing us from being happy right now?” – Thich Nhat Hanh The irony of the Western attitude towards life is that we do want […]...
  5. Worry It’s no accident that people do lots of their worrying while tossing and turning in bed, unable to go to sleep, ruminating over some matter as they lie awake, staring into the darkness. In our modern world the time before sleep is one of the last reprieves from the endless diversions and distractions that keep […]...
  6. Present Many of us in the West have a hard time understanding what is meant by existing in the present moment. You are reading this right now, so where else could you be but in the present? Eastern masters and Gestalt psychologists would reply that of course you’re here, but you’re probably not fully here. Next […]...
  7. Mindful Depression “Depression is the inability to construct a future.” -Rollo May Time is a funny thing. On one hand you have Western psychologists shouting “It’s all about the future! You’ve got to have goals and aspirations!” and on the other hand you have Buddhists replying “The only thing that matters is the present!” The mindful attitude […]...
  8. Mindfulness Works But You Have To Commit To The Practice While the proliferation of mindfulness into the mainstream is desirable the downside is that many ordinary people without real knowledge of the practice are compelled to view the whole thing as nothing more than a buzzword, as hollow and ineffective. This attitude is only strengthened by the fact that whenever anything becomes popular charlatans come […]...
  9. Grounding Yourself In The Present Moment To Combat Anxiety When unwanted life events make the future cloudy existential anxiety skyrockets. This anxiety is often funneled into obsessive ruminating around various possible bad outcomes. The imagination runs wild, which reinforces and strengthens the existential anxiety already there, causing a vicious anxiety loop where painful negative feelings are nourished and flourish. The anxiety causes terrifying guesses […]...
  10. Focus On Who You Are And Who You Can Be If you see yourself as a static, unchanging entity whose personality and attributes are set what you gain is powerful protection against existential anxiety but what you lose is the chance to become who you really are. If you focus exclusively on the future you gain the chance to grow but you lose the chance […]...
  11. Fear And Mindfulness When we consider just how many people spend most of their lives in a state of fear the need for increased mindfulness becomes obvious. The sad part is that most of these fears don’t come to pass, and even when they do all that time spent being afraid only adds to the cumulative misery. Of […]...
  12. Mindfulness Versus Escapism The Here And Now Is Incompatible With Anxiety The here and now focus that mindfulness entails is incompatible with anxiety in that anxiety is uncertainty around what might happen, meaning anxiety is pointed towards the future. So coming fully to the present moment is the antidote. When we can focus all of our being on some object […]...
  13. Mundane Tasks And Mindfulness Even the most interesting job in the world has its mundane elements, its i’s to dot and t’s to cross. The common attitude is to consider these mundane tasks necessary evils, to feel put out but to try to get through them as best we can so that we can get back to the good […]...
  14. Energy of Mindfulness Thich Nhat Hanh teaches that the energy of mindfulness is what allows you to transform emotions you don’t want like fear, anger, or loneliness into emotions you do want. The energy of mindfulness wraps around that other energy, much like the way a mother goes to a crying baby and tenderly embraces her, and instantly […]...
  15. Hope And Mindfulness Most everyone thinks of hope in a positive light, as something to nurture and cultivate, but the shadow side of this positive state of being that has helped many people persevere through difficult times is that we’re pulled out of the present moment, instead focusing our attention, our thoughts and feelings, on some set of […]...
  16. Discounting The Present Versus Mindfulness Many of us put a lot of stock into the idea that bigger and better things are on the horizon. We tell ourselves that while happiness and fulfillment may elude us right now they will surely be within our grasp when we’ve finally achieved our goals. We discount the present in favor of that dreamt of […]...
  17. Young Children Teach Us Mindfulness When young children try to get your attention, when they interrupt what you’re doing, they might seem to be distracting you but actually they’re calling you back to the present moment. They’re reminding you of what true mindfulness is, which is total contact with the here and now. Young children do this as a matter […]...
  18. Bells Of Mindfulness In The Modern World The modern world, with all its demands, distractions, and annoyances, seems diametrically opposed to the practice of mindfulness. Most people hold on to the semi-conscious belief that if they’re not out in nature or within the walls of a religious institution then there’s no point in trying to do anything spiritual. Most of us have […]...
  19. Christianity Is A Life Practice Christianity is, first and foremost, a life practice. It’s not enough to believe that Jesus existed and was the son of God and died on the cross and was resurrected on the third day to qualify as a Christian. Christianity is not just a set of passive beliefs, it’s an active orientation towards people and […]...
  20. Daily Yoga Practice If you’ve taken that exciting step to make yoga a daily or almost daily practice, feel proud of yourself for your dedication. But also remember that circumstances can change when you do something every day. Christmas wouldn’t be the same if it came around every morning. When people only practice once in a while, they […]...
Related Items