At my coaching school I was excited to see my teachers present mindfulness as a key element to the process. The word wasn't widely known back then, but by pure chance I already had years of mindfulness training under my belt.

It began when I met former Buddhist monk Stephen Schettini, and became co-director of Quiet Mind Seminars. There, I helped design mindfulness workshops and connected to hundreds of students.

My mindfulness mentor is now my husband and colleague- visit schettini.com. Mindfulness is how we live, work and love.  It enables us to be thoughtful communicators, respectful of each other's need to express freely and to be heard. 

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Try this simple 60 second mindfulness exercise 

Your  goal is to practice stopping a few times each day to just sit and be with your breath. You are not adding to your to-do list, you are training your mind to slow down and focus better so you can deal with things that matter with more clarity. 

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 Choose a comfortable spot where you will sit for one minute.  

-  Take off your shoes and sit cross legged on the floor/carpet. A chair will do too.

-  Try to keep your back straight, (a cushion at the base of your spine helps).

-  Set a timer at 60 seconds.

-  Close your eyes and focus on your breath. 

-  Don’t try to control your breath, simply allow it to come and go naturally.

-  Notice how the breath changes, sometimes deep and slow, sometimes quick and shallow; notice the still-point where the breath changes direction from inhale to exhale.  

-  When you catch yourself drift away in a string of thoughts, we all do, be patient, accept the drifting away as something that just happened. 

-  Notice if you judge whether you are good at it or not, let it go then return to paying attention to your breath. 

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