When you have children, you realize how easy it is to not see them fully, and perhaps miss all those early years. If you are not careful, you can be too absorbed in work, and they will be only too happy to tell you about it later. Being a parent is one of greatest mindfulness practices of all.

Mindfulness is a way to rebalance ourselves. Instead of being lost in thought, or caught up in emotional upheaval, we can tip the scale in the direction of greater equanimity, clarity, wisdom, and self-compassion by actually learning how to inhabit that other dimension of our being.

There are a lot of different ways to talk about mindfulness, but what it really means is awareness.

Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Tibetan, or other historical traditions, are all different streams in the same river, different currents in the same ocean. With the long view, we can trust that the seeds that we're planting are transforming the world.

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

Just watch this moment, without trying to change it at all. What is happening? What do you feel? What do you see? What do you hear?

Living in a chronic state of unawareness can cause us to miss much of what is most beautiful and meaningful in our lives.