Meditation is a powerful practice that makes us healthier, happier, and more compassionate. However, even knowing this, it can be tough to maintain a regular meditation habit.
If you’ve struggled to meditate daily, it might have affected how you see yourself. You may think you’re just not the kind of person who can meditate every day, and this belief can become a self-fulfilling prophecy that keeps you from trying.
Let’s change that mindset.
I want to share a tool that helped me establish a consistent daily meditation practice.
Although I was aware of the benefits of meditation from scientific studies (it improves health, reduces stress, promotes happiness, slows brain aging, and lessens pain) and personal experience (life feels easier with regular meditation), I still struggled to sit on the cushion every day. Missing a few days made it harder and harder to get back into the habit.
Then I found a technique that worked for me and seems to work for others too. It’s simple: repeat this mantra to yourself: “I meditate every day; it’s just what I do; it’s part of who I am.”
Repeating this mantra reprograms your self-image. It helps replace the belief that you can’t meditate daily with a belief that you can. Over time, this belief takes root and grows.
You might think, “That’s not true. I don’t meditate every day.” You may not want to repeat something that feels untrue. But think of the mantra as a statement of intention about your life from now on, not a reflection of the past.
So, it is true now. As a statement about today or however many days you’ve been consistent, it’s entirely factual! Dismiss the “Yes, but…” thoughts. Acknowledge them, but choose not to believe them.
Repeat these phrases frequently. Say them when you wake up, in the shower, while driving or on public transport, washing dishes, at the gym, walking, or lying in bed waiting to sleep. Say them even while meditating!
Just repeating the mantra won’t suffice. It will make meditating easier, but you still need to sit down to meditate daily. Commit to at least five minutes each day, from morning to night.
Eventually, you’ll realize the mantra fits—you do meditate every day. It becomes a part of who you are, as automatic as brushing your teeth daily.
It really works. Give it a try.