Though I try and clear my decks for a true meditation session several times a week, I consider myself a remedial student at best. Worse than remedial, because it seems like it was easier to avoid distractions when I first began than it is now. Not sure why that is!

But in one way this new habit has taken hold, and that is in the practice of deep breathing. My falling-to-sleep routine consists of deep, counted breaths, my falling-back-to-sleep routine too. I have more luck with the former than the latter, but in both areas, I’m definitely better off than I was before.

And then there are those moments. You know the ones I mean: sitting at a long stoplight or in the dentist’s chair. Waiting for a file to load. The small anxieties and trials of daily life. 

Since I began meditating — thanks to my former workplace, which still allows me to join their morning meditation group — I use deep breathing all the time. And it almost never fails to still my racing heart. I’ll be meditating again in a moment. My shoulders are dropping a notch or two right now in anticipation.