zen habits : breathe

‘ To meditate does not mean to fight with a problem.

To meditate means to observe.’

~Thich Nhat Hanh

By Leo Babauta

It’s no secret that I advocate meditation as a great way to start your day, deal with stress, live in the present and more.

But what many people don’t realize is that meditation is perhaps the most important habit if you want to change other habits.

Recently I wrote about the Four Habits That Form Other Habits — and you might recall Habit 2:

Be Mindful of Negative Thoughts

How do you learn to be mindful of your negative thoughts? Simple: you practice. And how do you practice mindfulness of your thoughts? By far the best method I’ve found is meditation.

Let’s look at why meditation is so good for helping to change your habits, and how to form the meditation habit.

How Meditation Helps Habits

When we are unaware of our thoughts and urges, which arise in the back of our mind mostly unnoticed, they have a power over us. We are unable to change if these unbidden thoughts control us. But when we learn to observe them, we can then release their power over us.

Meditation is practice for observing those thoughts, for being more mindful of them throughout the day.

I will give you several examples in my own life, though actually there are dozens:

1. When I quit smoking, I would get an urge to take just one drag on a cigarette, and it would get so strong I had a hard time beating it. At the same time, I had these rationalizing thoughts: “It’s OK to smoke just one — one cigarette doesn’t hurt you", or “Why are you making yourself suffer like this? It’s not worth it!" And those thoughts and urges would have beat me if I let them, but I watched them. I didn’t act, I just watched. And the would rise and crest and then fade, and I would be OK.
2. When I started running, I wanted to stop when things got uncomfortable. But I learned that it was just a scared part of my mind that wanted to stop, a part of me that shied away from discomfort. I would watch that scared part of me, that makes me quit anything hard, and not let it control me.
3. When I write, I often get the urge to go do something else. When this urge goes unnoticed, I just act on it, and procrastinate. When I am mindful of this urge (and the accompanying rationalizations that come if I don’t act on the urge), then I can pause and watch the urge and let it go, and return to the writing.

This same process helped me change my eating habits, run a marathon, change my clutter habits, and much more.

But none of that would have been possible if I didn’t learn to watch, to be mindful of my urges and rationalizations and negative thoughts that told me I couldn’t do it.

How did I learn to watch and be mindful? Meditation. It is the one habit where all you’re doing is practicing this mindful observing, where everything else is stripped away in a beautiful simplicity that leaves just you and your thoughts and the present moment.

How to Form the Meditation Habit

It’s pretty simple, but the doing is everything:

1. Commit to just 2 minutes a day. Start simply if you want the habit to stick. You can do it for 5 minutes if you feel good about it, but all you’re committing to is 2 minutes each day.
2. Pick a time and trigger. Not an exact time of day, but a general time, like morning when you wake up, or during your lunch hour. The trigger should be something you already do regularly, like drink your first cup of coffee, brush your teeth, have lunch, or arrive home from work.
3. Find a quiet spot. Sometimes early morning is best, before others in your house might be awake and making lots of noise. Others might find a spot in a park or on the beach or some other soothing setting. It really doesn’t matter where — as long as you can sit without being bothered for a few minutes. A few people walking by your park bench is fine.
4. Sit comfortably. Don’t fuss too much about how you sit, what you wear, what you sit on, etc. I personally like to sit on a pillow on the floor, with my back leaning against a wall, because I’m very inflexible. Others who can sit cross-legged comfortably might do that instead. Still others can sit on a chair or couch if sitting on the floor is uncomfortable. Zen practitioners often use a zafu, a round cushion filled with kapok or buckwheat. Don’t go out and buy one if you don’t already have one. Any cushion or pillow will do, and some people can sit on a bare floor comfortably.
5. Focus on your breath. As you breathe in, follow your breath in through your nostrils, then into your throat, then into your lungs and belly. Sit straight, keep your eyes open but looking at the ground and with a soft focus. If you want to close your eyes, that’s fine. As you breathe out, follow your breath out back into the world. If it helps, count … one breath in, two breath out, three breath in, four breath out … when you get to 10, start over. If you lose track, start over. If you find your mind wandering (and you will), just pay attention to your mind wandering, then bring it gently back to your breath. Repeat this process for the few minutes you meditate. You won’t be very good at it at first, most likely, but you’ll get better with practice.

And that’s it. It’s a very simple practice, but you want to do it for 2 minutes, every day, after the same trigger each day. Do this for a month and you’ll have a daily meditation habit.

Posted: Friday, March 1, 2013

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zen habits : breathe

‘Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own actions.’ ~Dalai Lama

By Leo Babauta

I’m not one who believes you can be happy all the time, but I have learned you can be happy much of the time.

And that’s not something that depends on how your day is going or how others treat you — it depends on what you do on a regular basis.

I remember being unhappy most days, at one point in my life. It wasn’t because I hated the people in my life — I had a lovely wife, great kids, other wonderful family members and friends. It was because I was unhappy with myself, and that caused growing debt problems, unhappiness with my job, health problems and more. I felt like I couldn’t change any of that.

Then one day I sat down and made a list.

I make a lot of lists — it’s one of my favorite habits — but this list seemed to have a magical power. It was a list of the things I was grateful for. Amazingly, there were a lot of things on the list, from things about my wife, kids, relatives, and friends, to things about my job, about nature around me, about my life.

This list was magical because I went from feeling a bit depressed about everything, and hopeless and helpless, to much happier. My mindset shifted from the things I didn’t like or didn’t have, to the things I was really happy I had. And I was in control.

Since then I’ve experimented with a number of habits and have found a couple things to be true:

1. A handful of activities can actually make you happy.
2. If you incorporate them into your life on a regular basis (make them into habits), you’ll be happier regularly.

And those might seem to be small realizations, but actually they’re huge.

The Habits That Make You Happy

So what habits make you happy? Try doing these on a daily basis, and see if you get the same results:

1. List 3 Good Things. Eva & I started a daily evening ritual, at about 7pm each day, where we take a moment to tell each other three good things about our day. We didn’t invent this, but it serves as at least one time in your day when you focus on what you’re grateful for. This can create a mental habit of gratitude that you can use other times in your day, when you’re focused on the things you don’t like or have — when you feel this, think about something you do have, that you love. Find a way to be grateful, and you’re happier.
2. Help Someone. When we focus on ourselves, and the woeful state of our lives, we are self-centered. This shrinks the world to one little place with one little unhappy person. But what if we can expand that worldview, and expand our heart to include at least one other person? Maybe even a few others? Then we see that others are suffering too, even if that just means they’re stressed out. Then we can reach out, and do something to reduce their stress, put a smile on their face, make their lives easier. Help at least one person each day, and you’ll find your entire perspective shifted.
3. Meditate. I’ve called this the Fundamental Habit, because it affects everything else. Meditate for just 2 minutes a day, and you’ll create a habit that will allow you to notice your thoughts throughout the rest of the day, that will help you to be more present (unhappiness comes from not being present), that will help you notice the source of anxiety and distraction. That’s a lot that can be accomplished in 2 minutes! Sit every morning when you wake, and just notice your body, and then your breath. Notice when your mind wanders, and gently return to your breath. You become the watcher of your mind, and you’ll learn some useful things, I promise.
4. Exercise. Everyone knows you should exercise, so I’m not going to belabor this point. But it really does make you happier, both in the moment of exercise (I’m exerting myself, I’m alive!) and throughout the rest of the day. Exercise lightly, if you’re not in the habit yet, and just for a few minutes a day to start out. Who doesn’t have a few minutes a day? If you don’t, you need to loosen up your schedule a bit.

There are a number of other habits that also help: mindful eating, drinking tea, doing yoga, socializing with others. But these incorporate meditation (they’re more active forms of meditation), and exercise and helping others and gratitude (if you’re doing it right). So I wanted to list the most basic habits, and then you can expand to other areas.

How do you form these habits? One at a time, starting as small as possible, with some social accountability.

Set these habits in motion. You’ll notice yourself becoming more present, more grateful, more other-focused. The shift that results is nothing short of a miracle.

Posted: Tuesday, July 9, 2013

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zen habits : breathe

By Leo Babauta

Recently I encouraged my 13-year-old daughter Maia to start a vegan cupcake business, and it’s so exciting to watch her get started.

As I talked to her about starting, she had some worries:

• She didn’t know how.
• She didn’t know what kind of business to create.
• She was worried she’d fail.

Do any of those sound familiar? Those were my worries too, when I had a day job and thought about building something of my own.

Worry about not knowing what to do, how to do it, and whether you’ll fail … these stop so many people from starting.

I’ve launched numerous ventures, from ebooks to courses to my Sea Change membership program and more. Next week, I’m launching a new video interview series called The Habits of Entrepreneurs, and can barely wait to show it to you.

Today, I’d like to share the lessons I’ve learned about starting a business, in hopes of encouraging you to get started making something you love.

1. Look for opportunities. This is from my friend Hiten Shah, who will be featured in the Habits of Entrepreneurs series. Keep your eyes open for opportunities — what pain points do people have, what problems need to be solved, how can you make people’s lives better?
2. If you can’t wait to get started, you’re onto something. Every time I’ve gotten my best ideas, I get excited. I tell people about it. I might even stay up at night thinking about it. I can’t sit down for long from the excitement.
3. Start small. People try to build their new business into a massive launch, but this is a mistake. Start as small as possible, giving a minimum viable product to a few friends, and let them test it out. Then a few more people. When you try to do something massive at launch, you make it less likely that you’ll actually start, and you’ll take forever to launch, and you’ll build yourself up for failure, and you’re building something massive without any idea of whether it works or if people like it. Launch is just one moment in the lifespan of a business, and it’s not even one of the most important moments.
4. Not starting is the biggest mistake. I told Maia that the worst-case scenario — if the business fails — is not even bad. If she starts the vegan cupcake business and fails, at least she got to make and eat some delicious cupcakes, and share them with friends, and learn some valuable lessons along the way. She can always start something new after that. In fact, this scenario of learning something and having fun along the way, even in “failure", is demonstrably better than if she’d not started at all.
5. Start a blog. The best way to market a business is by giving away free information. Show that you’re valuable, help people for free, and they’ll want more from you.
6. Don’t do SEO or social media market or viral marketing. Those don’t add any value for your customers.
7. Instead, be super valuable. Build something great, and word of mouth is all the marketing you need (including people passing on your best blog posts). Overdeliver. They’ll love you, and you won’t need to do slimy SEO techniques.
8. Start lean. I started my businesses with zero money, and just found free or cheap services to start with. Only after I started making some revenue did I pay for anything, or hire anyone. Make money as soon as possible by selling something valuable.
9. Advertising is a bad business model. When you make money from ads, what are you selling? Your audience’s attention. This is horrible, and your audience/customers won’t love you for it. Instead, do everything possible to delight your audience/customers, and give them incredible value, and they’ll gladly pay for it.
10. Forget about numbers. More specifically, forget about hitting certain targets. A million pageviews, ten thousand subscribers, half a million in revenues. Those are meaningless and arbitrary. Instead, worry about how much you’re helping your customers. How much value are you giving them? How can you make them smile? Try putting some numbers on those things.
11. The joy doesn’t come later. Lots of times people kill themselves trying to reach a goal, or hit an amazing launch. They hope that achieving this goal will change their lives. Then they get there, and their lives aren’t different. They move on to the next goal. The joy doesn’t come when you hit the goal, or have an amazing launch. The joy comes right now. This is the moment of greatness, of satisfaction with yourself and what you’re doing. Not later.
12. Forget perfection. Too many people get caught up in trying to make a product, website, blog post, launch, etc. perfect. It’ll never be perfect. Perfection is stopping you from shipping. Instead, do what you can, get it out there, get feedback, improve it, repeat.
13. Screw the business plan. Planning, like perfection, is useless and stands in your way. Sure, you want to think things through, but planning is based on faulty information (we can’t know the future). Instead, experiment. Get started. Do. Then see what happens, and adjust. Flexibility is much more important than a good plan.
14. Start from home, and start with friends. You don’t need to have an office for most businesses … even a cupcake business doesn’t need a shop — at least not at first. Start with no extra money, in your spare time if you have to. Let your first customers be your friends, and ask them to be brutally honest. Then let them spread the word to their friends. That’s a Zero-Dollar Launch.
15. Focus on important things. Too often people get caught up in statistics, social media, lots of little tasks that don’t matter. Instead, get moving on what matters most — producing something that will add value to your customers.
16. Surround yourself with interesting people. Having friends who are doing fascinating things is inspiring, and they will give you great advice and feedback. The people around you, and their positive and inspiring attitudes, matter.
17. Learn to be OK with not knowing. You won’t know what will happen with the business. The world is changing. Your business will change. You will change. You don’t know anything, really, and that’s OK. Read more.

Get started, my friends! You’ll love it.

The Habits of Entrepreneurs

My new video interview series launches Monday:

Why is this series important?

1. Inspiration: these are fascinating entrepreneurs doing amazing things.
2. Habits matter — what you do daily creates your business.
3. Building habits is hard — seeing how others create habits helps overcome obstacles.

More soon!

Posted: Friday, August 23, 2013

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zen habits : breathe

By Leo Babauta

Yesterday I had to drive somewhere, which I don’t do much anymore, and it was a fascinating experience.

I kept checking in on my body, and finding myself clenched, as if ready for an attack.

My entire torso would be tensed, my neck and shoulders were scrunched up, my face was tight. For no good reason other than I had to react to a lot of cars around me.

And so, noticing this, I was able to relax in that moment. Straighten up, let my muscles stop clenching themselves, breathe, smile. Instant calm, because I knew there was nothing actually attacking me.

This is a skill I’ve been getting better at, though I’m far from perfect: becoming aware of when my body is tensed up. It’s a cue, something that indicates what’s going on in my mind, and a way for me to look into what I’m stressing out about and decide whether I really need to be in fight-or-flight mode.

Some of the cues I’ve learned about myself: a clenched jaw (happens a lot), face is scrunched up (eyebrows like I’m mad, mouth is frowning, cheeks tensed), neck and shoulders tensed, sometimes entire torso tensed, legs might be stiff like I’m bracing myself, hands might be clenched sometimes.

And so, during the day (when I remember, which isn’t always), I will check in on these cues. And very often I’ll see them tensed up.

This tells me something’s going on, so I check in with my mind: what are you stressing about? And often it’s something like other cars or people getting in my way, or I’m getting competitive in laser tag or go carts (my daughter’s birthday celebration yesterday), or someone is frustrating me, or someone on the Internet is being less than enlightened (I know, that’s pretty rare).

So when I see that going on, I can see that I have an ideal, an expectation, that other people or life in general aren’t living up to. And I realize that’s a completely made-up ideal that I don’t need to hold on to, and I can just accept this moment. And when I do, nothing is so bad. (Read a short guide to dealing with stress.)

Or sometimes I just relax my body, unscrunch my face, unclench my jaw, breathe and smile, and that’s all I need to get the world in order again.

Posted: Monday, March 24, 2014

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zen habits : breathe

By Leo Babauta

Scott Dinsmore, creator of Live Your Legend, died in a freak accident on Mt. Kilimanjaro a couple days ago. He was one of my best friends in the world.

I’m still in shock — at the suddenness of his death, the senselessness of it, the incredible loss of all he had to give, but most of all, at the gaping hole that his loss leaves in my heart.

I loved (and still love) Scott deeply, and I can’t believe he is gone.

Some of you might know Scott because he delivered a massively inspiring (and popular) TED talk on finding work you love. Others of you have followed his well-known blog for years, and still others have taken his courses on connecting with people and finding your passion. And some of you might be a part of his Live Your Legend Local communities around the world (thousands of people have been touched by this movement).

I know Scott as a running partner. Someone who teased me about my faults, and who I teased about his unabashed love of Taylor Swift (who he found inspiring). I know him as someone who I drank (too much) wine with, someone who pushed me to run and finish a 50-mile ultramarathon when I wanted to quit, someone who would stop to admire the beauty of the hill we had just climbed, someone who drank tea with me as we dreamed big and inspired each other, someone who ordered too much when we went out to dinner.

He was larger than life, and yet as intimate a friend as you can get. You could count on him in so many ways, to be there when you needed him, to show up in a big way, to push you when you needed it, to make you laugh, to dance and do handstands and burpees and drink green juice.

He loved life with a passion we should all find.

Scott was always challenging himself, always on a new diet or workout challenge, always finding a bigger purpose for his business, always looking to do something huge. He would order everything on the menu and roll his eyes in pleasure. He would bite off more than he could possibly chew, and love it.

How I Met Scott

What most people don’t know is that I met Scott when he was in my blogging club, a group of bloggers I mentored for a couple of years. He had a little-known blog called Reading for Your Success, about speed reading and personal development books. We met when I moved to San Francisco and held a meetup for the blogging club, and after the meetup he gave me a three-page letter that he and Chelsea had written for me. It was a list of all their favorite spots in San Francisco, because they knew that I was new to the city and so gave me some amazing recommendations — vegetarian restaurants, places to hike and work out, places to get drinks. It was awesome.

He gave me that thoughtful letter, then invited me on a run.

We went on a run, and it changed both of our lives. It was around the Marina and Presidio, at sunset, and it was gorgeous. Breathtaking. We meant to go out for 30 minutes, and we took 3 hours, stopping to do pushups or enjoy the stunning views. We connected then over that run, and we never stopped running together.

Scott in Paris

The last time I saw him, it was a hot evening in Paris with the sun going down. He and I had cold rosé wine with Chelsea and Eva on a cobbled Paris street, and the sun was bathing him in glory. I’ll always remember him like that, kissed by the gods.

We had just done a meetup with Zen Habits and Live Your Legend readers in a cool Paris park, and it was an amazing experience. We met so many great people, and Scott and I loved doing it together. We both wanted to do another hundred of those.

We won’t be able to do any more of them. That’s the gut-wrenching part of this for me: I won’t have any more of those Scott moments in my life, only the recollection. And Scott won’t be able to give everything he wanted to give to the world.

To Scott’s Family & Friends

I would like to say, to Chelsea, to Scott’s parents and sister and other family members, to his closest friends … I’m deeply sorry. This loss is felt most deeply by you guys, but just know that it is also felt by so many others, and our love is with you right now.

Scott was truly blessed to have Chelsea as his partner, and he knew it. He told me so many times how lucky he was, and going around the world with Chelsea this past year has been a dream come true for him. The two of them were such a gorgeous couple, so much fun, so full of love and life, so generous. I’m so sorry, Chelsea, that this has happened.

Scott talked so lovingly too of his parents, of how his dad was his closest confidant, how he wouldn’t be anywhere without his parents’ support, encouraging him to be bold and experiment. I saw them at our meetup in Paris, and I know how proud they were of him. You could see it in their eyes. Bill and Janet, I don’t know what to say, but that my heart is with you.

This Isn’t Goodbye

Scott will always be in my life. Every time I go on a run, it will be thinking of the time we ran up Twin Peaks and saw a sunset on fire. The excitement about life he showed in every phone call, every email, every time you saw him — that will be infused in my life. He sucked the juice out of life with no apologies, and that changed me.

Scott influenced tens of thousands of people, got them to connect with each other and do something inspiring and seek and create the work they love. That is truly amazing. I know when we went on our first run together, Scott had no idea that this would have happened. And when it started happening, he was blown away by it. He was touched by the stories of people around the world who changed their lives based on what he created. That floored him, daily.

I want to carry on what Scott was doing, in some way. I don’t know what that will be, but I refuse to let his work fade away. What Scott created, in all of us, will live on.

Scott, my friend … you don’t know what you’ve done for me, or how truly, truly grateful I am to have known you and called you a friend. I miss you, I miss you, I love you.

Posted: Monday, September 14, 2015

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