“Train my mind to adapt to any circumstance.” — Epictetus
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about uncertainty — not just the abstract kind, but the very real, in-your-face, everyday kind. The kind that shows up when you’re learning something new, navigating a relationship shift, facing work unknowns, or simply trying to sit with your thoughts.
For me, this theme hit home while training in jiu-jitsu. Each time I step on the mat, I have no idea what to expect. Who I’ll spar with. What I’ll learn. Whether I’ll get folded like laundry or find flow, it’s a humbling practice, one that constantly takes me off-script and asks: Can you be with what’s here, not what you hoped would be here?
This is exactly where meditation enters.
Training for the Mind
In this week’s Sit, Walk, Work episode, I guide you through a practice that helps train the mind to remain adaptable, especially when things don’t go as planned. Rather than chasing certainty in a sea of change, the practice invites us to anchor in something deeper: our breath, our awareness, and the space of witnessing.
Meditation isn’t about escaping what’s hard or pretending things are fine when they’re not. It’s about building the capacity to stay present in the middle of it all — distractions, discomfort, and all.
Your breath, in its rising and falling, becomes a rhythm for returning.
Your attention, in its wandering and settling, becomes a tool for self-discovery.
Noticing What Changes — and What Doesn’t
As the practice unfolds, I guide you to scan your body, observe your breath, and open up your awareness to everything arising in the present moment — sensations, sounds, even thoughts that feel like run-on sentences. And then, we contrast that with what remains steady. That witnessing space. The stillness within.
This contrast is powerful. Because in a world that’s always changing, it’s easy to forget: There’s a part of you that doesn’t.
And from that part — the quiet, grounded observer — you can begin to build a different kind of certainty. One that isn’t based on controlling outcomes, but on your capacity to respond with care.
The Gift of Being Breathed
Toward the end of the practice, I invite you to feel into the rhythm of sound, just as you did with the breath. And in that moment, it becomes clear: so much of life arrives. The inhale. The song of birds. The hum of the fridge. These moments ask nothing from us, except presence.
And maybe a little reverence.
Because to be breathed by life is no small thing.
Closing Reflection
If you’re feeling tossed about by life right now, I invite you to practice with me. Not because it will fix everything, but because it will remind you: you don’t have to be certain to be steady. You just have to return to the body, to the breath, to yourself.
Where do you feel the contrast between change and stillness most clearly?
With metta,
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