To me, these have always been words to live by. You’d be amazed at the amount of suffering I’ve avoided and serenity I’ve cultivated by keeping them in mind. Whether it’s stopping unnecessary frustration at spilling a bottle of olive oil across the table, or mitigating the anxiety bound to arise from the announcement of a government mandated lockdown, this framework applies.

When things happens to us, we tend to react. Often the reaction starts internally, and may eventually trigger external reactions. There’s nothing wrong with reacting, we react to survive. Every action you take, big or small, can be looked at as a “re-action” in the sense that it’s a response to the environment around you, and often heavily influenced by established patterns in your mind.

However, internal reactions are rarely isolated events, they tend to kick off long chains. Left unchecked, these chains can spin out in wild directions, leaving you lost and far away from the initial stimulus that warranted the reaction. To make things worse, we love to think in circles, constantly tracing the same repetitive links, each time strengthening their legitimacy in our minds.

Fortunately, there’s something we can do to stop feeding and growing the chains. It starts with observation. We can train ourselves to carefully watch the way we react to a wide variety of situations, then use this information to break down the reactive chains we identify as harmful, and promote the ones that increase our creativity and well-being.

Here’s a simple exercise you can try to get a sense of what I’m talking about. Sit somewhere comfortable, close your eyes, and take a few deep breaths. Now open a news article about Coronavirus. Read the headline. Stop. Breathe. Notice. Read the first paragraph. Stop. Breathe. Notice.

What did that just do to your mind? What emotions did it evoke? Can you feel anything in your body shift? Can you zoom out for a moment and just watch the chain of internal reactions (maybe even try writing it out on a piece of paper, with snippets of thoughts connected by arrows)? How far did your mind jump into the past or future?

Continue this for as long as you like, then move into a bit of reflection. How many of the thoughts that just whizzed through your head would you consider helpful or useful in terms of your well-being? How many would you consider harmful? If any concerns arose, are they immediately actionable? Which of the thoughts relate to situations outside of your control?

The purpose of this exercise is simply to see how powerful it can be to temporarily remove ourselves from the chain of thought, and observe it with objectivity and curiosity. Such an over-analytical process doesn’t need to be used frequently. However, if you follow the path of regular awareness training (aka mindful meditation), this kind of observational mindset becomes automatic, and doesn’t require diagrams, arrows, or labels.

The goal is not to avoid or suppress reactions that seem harmful. At first it’s just about noticing them. The more you passively watch the chains, the more you begin to understand them. The more you understand them, the more they begin to shift on their own. If you stop adding fuel to the fire, the flames start to die down. If you stop feeding the stray dogs, they eventually won’t come back for food. Bothersome mental patterns you may have assumed were uncontrollable can break down in surprising ways, freeing up space in your mind for clearer cognition.

Some people mistake this method as a way to disconnect from painful reality or unrealistically boost positive thoughts, but this is not the goal either. It’s about staying aware of the whole mental picture, and using the increased understanding to respond to life’s challenges skillfully.

There are things worth worrying about, especially in these challenging times. But worry need not affect your well-being, or your ability to make wise decisions. Worry can be reacted to in a healthy way to stay informed, vigilant, and safe. Or it can be reacted to in a destructive way to induce panic, or travel down endless dark mental tunnels of unfavorable future scenarios.

On the flip side, I’ve heard from countless people that the COVID-19 situation has made them “bored” for the first time in a while. To me, this is excellent news. Boredom, or the lack of having something seemingly important to do, can be a wonderful opportunity to get out of your repetitive thought processes and tune into the world around you. Every little thing you do throughout the day provides an opportunity for observation and curiosity.

We call ourselves human beings, yet these days many of us have evolved into a new race of human doings. We’ve forgotten the amount of joy to be found in simply being without feeling the need to do. Use this new “free” time wisely. Rather than merely replacing regular life activities with virus life activities (i.e. more social media and Netflix) see if you can use this time to reconnect with yourself and the world around you on a more intimate level.

Actually hear the wind as it rustles the leaves in a nearby tree, creating hundreds of individual sounds which merge into a soft murmur. Actually see the thousands of tiny colorful threads that make up the carpet cushioning your feet every day. Actually feel the pleasant sensation of your morning cup of tea as the heat seeps through the ceramic and into the hundreds of thousands of nerve endings in your fingers.

This can be done with minimal effort. We’re observant beings by nature, and there’s an infinite number of interesting things to notice all the time. But we lose this ability to see and feel what’s right in front of us when we get caught in those endless, repetitive chains of internal reaction. Observing what’s happening around us prepares us to observe what’s happening inside us. It’s the same skill, and practicing paying attention to the external environment makes it easier to watch the internal as well.

Being present also helps us to unlock our innate spontaneous and creative nature. Personally, I’m taking advantage of the current lockdown situation in Sri Lanka to get creative with the ingredients in my daily papaya bowl breakfasts. You wouldn’t believe the amount of happiness I’ve found sitting alone in my small apartment, closely tuning into the flavors of ripe papaya, pineapple, banana, coconut milk and cacao nibs as they interweave and caress my tastebuds with each succulent bite.

Finally, I’ve been taking time to zoom out and reflect on the endlessly fascinating interconnectedness of the universe. How we lose sight of this connection by creating illusory boundaries with labels and categorization. How we attempt to “make sense of it all” by distinguishing between self and other, object and subject.

These divisions can serve a purpose and be useful, but it helps me to remember they only exist in our minds. Training in awareness has allowed me to see this. It has made me realize that viruses are just as much a part of the universe as ourselves. This is something I cannot change, and am learning to accept with serenity as I find my way forward one papaya bowl at a time.

As a meditation teacher in an urban industrialized environment, the #1 excuse you hear for not being able to meditate is “not having enough time”. Now, many of us can’t use that excuse anymore. For those of you who have been waiting for “the right time” to start or strengthen a meditation habit, now is it! Replacing one episode per day in your inevitable Netflix binge with a meditation could have life-changing, positive consequences down the line.

In recognition of this worldwide influx of free time, I’m going to be offering some of my own time for any of you who might want to virtually chat about meditation. For at least the next few weeks, I’ll be making myself available (on Sri Lanka time) to video chat with whoever is interested.

Just fill out this form with your availability, and I’ll reach out to set something up.

For those of you who used to work with me at Palantir, I envision a similar format to the meditation coaching I offered there, where you can come with any questions about the practice, and I’ll answer them with my opinions as best I can. We can also do a guided meditation together. Or, if it’s been a while since we’ve chatted and you just want to catch up on life and make fun of my new sun-baked surfer hair, that’s also allowed. My intention is merely to connect with anyone seeking connection or guidance during these turbulent times.