Why EVERYONE Needs a Mindfulness Mentor

Whether you are a pro at mindfulness and meditation, or you’re new to the practice, we recommend you find someone in your life you interact with on a relatively consistent basis to be your Mindfulness Mentor.

What does this mean exactly? It’s essentially a role model. It’s someone who embodies mindful living. It doesn’t mean they are a professional necessarily, nor does it mean they are perfect; it just means they get it and they’re at a more advanced stage of mindful living than you are. They either got there intuitively or because of years of diligent training, education or practice.

Why is this important for everyone?

We’ve made the argument before that everybody can benefit from living a more mindful life. It can improve overall health and quality of life. And with the exception of the very rare mindfulness super guru, we can ALL use a little help with inspiration and reminders to stay present.

This means, depending on where you are in your journey, you could potentially be someone else’s mentor even if you are not a pro. Sometimes just having the knowledge about how mindfulness improves your overall well-being brings someone else value.

One of my motivations for writing about mindfulness is I need help remembering to stay present in my hectic day to day life. I wanted to rewire my brain to stop worrying about the future specifically. I needed a mindfulness mentor in a major way.

As luck would have it I actually live with someone who intuitively practices mindfulness every single day. Again, he’s not perfect, and he does have his ‘mindless’ moments, but overall he is much better at it than me and I can learn so much from him.

His mindful ‘quirks’ used to puzzle me or be downright frustrating. But the more I learned about mindfulness, the more I realized his habits were ingrained in him over years and they are what help him remain a calm and organized man.

My Mindfulness Mentor is my husband.

Ah, my husband. I love him dearly. He’s hard working, organized and calm. He doesn’t yell at the children and never honks his horn out of anger. He doesn’t rush from place to place, he’s rarely late, and he uses his time wisely.

There’s a lot to admire about him but the number one thing I wish I could steal from him and bottle up to sell, is his uncanny ability to practice mindfulness.

He doesn’t need daily reminders, a subscription to a mindfulness magazine, nor does he need to read countless books on the subject just to remember to do it. It comes to him naturally.

He unknowingly recommends things to me that are intuitively mindful. I don’t know if it’s his personality, hormonal balance, or upbringing but whatever it is, I want it! He does have his own mindfulness mentor in his father, that I’m sure helped wire his brain from birth.

As someone who is often scatterbrained, I write about mindfulness not because I’m good at it, but because I need help remembering to do it. He helps me in a lot of ways through his daily habits.

Here are some of the ways my husband naturally practices mindfulness without even thinking about it:

1. He goes for a jog every single day. Outside if the weather permits.
2. He puts things back exactly where they belong. Nothing is ever thrown on the floor. Ever. It’s fascinating.
3. He tracks in a planner what he did that day, every day. Nothing emotional, just fact based information. He hasn’t missed a day in 21 years.
4. He eats three meals a day, never snacks, and savors every bite.
5. As a connoisseur of quality beer, he tracks every one he drinks (around 3-5 per week) and rates how much he likes it.
6. He puts on headphones and listens to music while raking the leaves or mowing the lawn. Totally in the zone during one of the hardest chores.
7. He likes to cook and when he does, he gets all the fresh ingredients and patiently and methodically follows recipes.
8. He checks in on me every day at the same time. He’s so mindful about how I’m doing and genuinely wants to know.
9. He adjusts the sheets just so before getting into bed. They are always in order.
10. He’ll zone out and when I ask him what he’s thinking about, he reflects for a moment and replies with ‘nothing’ – and he means it! Meditating without even trying.

There are even more mindful habits he implements daily, but you get the idea. I’m lucky to have such a consistent Mindful Mentor living with me. It makes me realize how far I have to go with my mindfulness practice.

Your Mindfulness Mentor does not have to live with you. They don’t even need to live in your same state, although seeing them in action can be beneficial. It just needs to be someone you know personally and trust, that is leading a more mindful life than you.

This person could change as you go through stages in your life of being more or less mindful. During a high stress time it may seem like everyone is more mindful than you! But having this person as a touch point can truly help you feel more at peace and help you get more out of your day to day life.

Do you have anyone in your life who serves as a role model for their intuitive ability to be mindful? We’d love to hear about how this person inspires you to slow down and reconnect with the present moment. Good luck and HAPPY MINDING!