Mindfulness is a lazy donkey. You can’t push it to move faster. 
We are clearly not used to that. When it’s not about the effort that you bring. When it’s not about trying hard and the willing to succeed. How can you reach it?

There are multiple ways to meditate. You can practice during training, getting to sleep, doing coffee or on your way to work. But it’s never the objective. You do sports to build muscles, you need sleep, you want to get coffee and going to work will keep your job alive. This is not bad, it’s a very good practice. But also a reason why people tend to sit down with the only objective of meditation.

With passion you can build a routine. With willingness you keep it up. Following the breath (or the anchor you have chosen) will keep you in state of presents. Being present is already a hard exercise. To achieve this, one must consciously recognize thoughts. And wake up from this dream. The exercise is the same everywhere. Realize that one is thinking and return to the anchor. For most people this might be already the reason for the meditation. It definitely increases productivity. Nowadays a keyword. But in general this is the base. Not the why.

Now to be very concrete: you can reach “presents” by effort, hard trying and practice. This is how you reach mastery for any craft. Assuming you now have a habit, so you do meditate and reach a present state regularly. From this point onward it’s not about effort anymore. Logically, when I’m right, then it’s not about trying in general. It’s about doing.

The difference between doing and trying is the following. When I focus on my breath to come back to present, this is a mechanism that helps me. When I’m present and still need to focus on my breath to uphold my consciousness I am distracted by breathing. Breathing is not a method to sharpen our mind for work and fully concentrate on a permanent task — instead look at it as a tool that we use to come to present.

One simple idea changed my thinking about meditation completely.

I understood that sitting down and be with yourself as your only purpose is a complete different game. It’s your own focus time. There is no other reason to sit down and be quiet. Listening to yourself and understanding your body and emotional feelings. This is only for you. One day I thought, this time should be sacred to you. A daily time-slot for you to heal and recover. To come into balance, relax and let go. Which is in itself, a way to reach mindfulness. It’s not a try. This is why.

When you know why you sit here this step becomes easier. For the next level, breathing needs to become second nature. Practice makes the master. Your anchor just brings you back to the base, the state you need to reach is openness. You want to become thoughtless. Effortless. You want to be open for everything that comes. When your thoughts slowly disappear, you stopped planning, thinking and wandering. Then you feel only how you breathe. You stopped thinking about it. Stopped controlling it. You sit and feel the sensations in your body. This is the gate to mindfulness and awakening.

Hope you enjoyed reading.

Please let me know, what you think about effortlessly, mastery of present and the idea of personal focus time.

Thanks, Stefan