With the onset of the the new year, I’ve been working with patients trying to find ways to instill mindfulness in their daily lives. The problem is people think taking time out to meditate for a few minutes is enough to stay calm and not let stress get to them. Not true. Stress is all around us. It is chipping away at our health and taking down our quality of life. A five minute meditation each night isn’t enough to offset what stress does to us.

Mediation is a way of life. Its the way we handle our moments in real time- not making a mess all day and cleaning it up for a few minutes at night. So what can we do to get mindfulness better ingrained into our daily routine?

Here’s something I’ve found to be easy- Every time you have to put the passcode in your phone, stop and take a deep breath to your lower abdomen. That’s it. It’s just enough to pop in the clutch and step out of the daily wave of events one moment at a time. Slowly, it starts to build a habit of awareness and teaches us how we can stop the world and check in regularly with ourselves. This isn’t rocket science but slow and steady is the way of peace.

One thing to note is that you should change your passcode so that there is a new mental cue for you every time you check your phone. There’s nothing like old habits to pull us into our old trances.

Try it out and let me know how it goes.