I was very much a tough New York street kid. I went to a school where you had to learn how to get along with everybody or fight with everybody, and I did my fair share of both.

You could think of mindfulness as wise and affectionate attention.

Concentration is a cornerstone of mindfulness practice. Your mindfulness will only be as robust as the capacity of your mind to be calm and stable. Without calmness, the mirror of mindfulness will have an agitated and choppy surface and will not be able to reflect things with any accuracy.

See for yourself whether letting go when a part of you really wants to hold on doesn't bring a deeper satisfaction than clinging.

In any given moment we are either practicing mindfulness, or defacto, we are practicing mindlessness.

Mindfulness means paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally.

Look at other people and ask yourself if you are really seeing them or just your thoughts about them.... Without knowing it, we are coloring everything, putting our spin on it all.