5 Tips For Living A More Mindful Life

The most annoying piece of advice I ever received was from the therapist I saw in college. When I set up an appointment with her to talk through my anxiety, she advised me to “be mindful.” What on Earth is that supposed to mean?

At the time, I chalked her seemingly bad advice up to her low pay grade. But a year or two down the line, my “home” therapist suggested the same thing: to be mindful. Therapists, coaches, authors, and personal development gurus love to throw out that advice, but in my experience, no one has actually defined what being “mindful” actually means. The most I’ve gotten out of a therapist is that mindfulness includes deep breathing. While deep breathing can be helpful in reducing feelings of anxiety, it’s a vague solution, and it doesn’t even begin to cover the full spectrum of mindfulness. 

Throughout my 20s, my experiences have allowed me to form a more complete definition of what mindfulness is, and I now realize that my therapists were right. Mindfulness really does help many people, but if you don’t know where to start, here are a few tips to make your experience with mindfulness more meaningful:

1. Stop “playing the victim.” 

When we think about the “victim mindset,” we usually think of self-pity. We may also think of someone who whines about their circumstances and blames everyone else for them. At its core, though, “playing the victim” means believing that life happens to you. Do things out of your control happen to you? Absolutely, but you control how you react to them.  After all, you live your life. The moment you take responsibility for your life instead of letting it happen to you, everything changes. Outcomes that may seem out of reach become actionable. Problems that feel like they have no resolution become solvable. Your life is yours to live however you want, and part of being mindful is getting behind the wheel and taking control.

2. Set your intentions. 

I’m sure you’ve heard about five-year and 10-year plans. You may even have a professional timeline, an age by which you want to be married, or an idea of how many kids you want. As humans, we’re usually more concerned with the future than we are with the present, but sometimes we envision a future that we don’t even want. Sometimes we choose to pursue a career that doesn’t align with our true desires. Sometimes we get married or have kids because it’s what our spouse wants. And sometimes we say we want to travel more when we’re really homebodies. We say we want things because it sounds “right” to us, but we don’t take time to think about what we truly want. One of the best ways to be more mindful is to start setting intentions that align with your actual goals. I’m not talking about short-term goals. I’m talking about the deeply-rooted desires that stem from your identities and values. How do you want to live your life? Who do you want to show up as? Which missions and values drive you? Do the work and dig deep. Journaling is a great avenue to help you come up with these core goals and explore your desires on a deeper level. Once you figure out who you are and how you want to show up in the world, the rest comes easily. The habits, the changes, and the motivation that you need all come far more easily when you have a deeply rooted “why.” What’s yours? 

3. Pay attention. 

Pay attention to everything you do and every word you say. Social media and the internet both encourage us to step out of the present, but one of the most important aspects of mindfulness is living in the moment. This can be as simple as putting your phone down while you eat, stopping yourself from multitasking, or fully tuning into a conversation with a friend.  If you want to take this a step further, you can meditate, pay attention to your breathing patterns, examine your diet, and take inventory of your daily activities and how they align with your goals. You don’t need to spend an hour each day meditating in complete silence, but putting down your phone and paying attention to the present moment is a good start.

4. Act with purpose. 

We’re wired to spread ourselves thin and do multiple things at once. We’re taught that being busy is good and productivity makes us “worthy,” so we fill our schedules to the brim without leaving ourselves any time to think. But being busy all the time isn’t necessarily a good thing. Without a clear idea of what we want, we often fill our schedules  in order to avoid coping with our problems. Instead of dealing with tough emotions or setting our true intentions in life, we preoccupy ourselves with countless endeavors that aren’t even relevant to what we really want. We say “yes” for the sake of it or to appease others, and we give in to immediate gratification. Ultimately, we act in a way that doesn’t align with what we really want. We live our lives on autopilot, but to truly live a mindful life, we have to act purposefully, which comes a little more easily when we start setting intentions and paying attention. 

When you want something badly enough, it becomes a priority. As that priority helps you achieve your goals, you begin to pay attention to anything that gets in the way of you living out that intention. If that intention is truly aligned with your values, beliefs, and identity, you’ll do everything in your power to purposefully create a life embodying it. You’ll curate your life, make a plan, and get it done.

5. Find what works for you! 

Not every strategy always works for everyone, so don’t be afraid to find the best mindfulness techniques for you! This could include journaling, meditating, making to-do lists or calendars, or doing breathwork or yoga. You’re not here to live my best life; you’re here to live yours — whatever that may look like. 

Use these tips as guidance but remember that you can experiment. If they don’t work for you or if you slip up, that’s OK. Finding what helps you stay mindful is all part of the process.

Featured image via Avrielle Suleiman on Unsplash