You will work with a variety of approaches in your five good minutes. They include the following:

Mindfulness is the awareness that arises as you pay attention on purpose with a friendly and accepting attitude to whatever is present. Being mindful means being present consciously. Being mindful is at the heart of your five good minutes. Mindfulness of your breath is how you establish presence. These exercises aim to help you become more mindful in different places and in different ways in your daily life.

Meditation is an activity of directing your attention, so you will become more aware and more understanding and wise. Meditation is about much more than simple relaxation. Some meditation methods emphasize narrowing your attention to a single object or a quality. Other meditation practices focus upon developing a clearer and deeper awareness of what is happening. The meditation practices in this book include both approaches. They promote calm attention and awareness for feeling more ease and peace, for greater understanding, and for the development of desirable qualities, such as kindness, compassion, and joy.

Imagery is the thought process that involves and uses the senses: vision, audition, smell, taste, and the senses of movement and position. You use your imagination to facilitate communication between perception, emotion, and bodily change. It is one of the world’s oldest healing resources.

Acting wholeheartedly is central to all the activities. There are suggestions here for doing everyday things just a little differently— being more present and mindful, connecting more completely with what you do in the present moment, then singing, laughing, dancing, eating, listening—in short, participating in a whole array of experiences wholeheartedly. See for yourself the difference being present can make!

What Happens Next?

When you do your five good minutes, it is important to expect nothing more. Just be as present as possible in the five minutes and pay attention throughout the rest of the day. Notice how the exercise you do can echo and inform your experience.

Doing just one of these exercises with presence and intention has the power to change how you feel and relate to your life. Yet don’t be discouraged if it seems nothing is different. You can also think of the five good minutes as planting a seed. It can take some time for a seed to grow. Again, a good idea is to just do it and to expect nothing. You never know when one of these practices will be a doorway for you, or a new beginning, or even a lifeline. Just keep alert to what does happen.

And, of course, you can experiment with more than five minutes in any of the exercises.

And you can do your five good minutes more than once each day.

And you can carry your favorite five good minutes practice further and deeper by doing them more often, by reading and learning more about any subject that the practice suggests, and by associating with others who enjoy similar activities.

In other words, your five good minutes in the morning might just change your life.

Your Gateway to the Present Moment

"Breathe mindfully for about a minute."

You will see this phrase at the beginning of many of these exercises.

Why?

To be mindful means to connect with experience unfolding in the present moment—by paying deep and nonjudging attention. Practicing mindfulness promotes presence—the capacity to sense the immediacy of experience in each moment.

Any action you do, indeed, your involvement in any activity (including your five good minutes), is enormously amplified by the extent you are present with awareness.

Despite a desire to be more present for life, however, everyone has habits of inattention, distraction, and absence. These habits separate you from the richness in life’s moments and from people with whom you wish a closer and more lasting connection.

Learning to practice mindful breathing can help you overcome habits of inattention and be more present for yourself and for life. By practicing even one minute of mindful breathing before setting an intention and doing the rest of your five good minutes, you will be establishing yourself more fully in the present moment. This will add more power to the exercise you are doing.

To breathe mindfully means to become a kind observer of your own breath sensations as they move in and out of your body. As you become an increasingly sensitive observer, you will begin to notice different qualities in each breath, in or out, and the space between the breaths as well.

Mindful breathing (also known as awareness of breathing, or mindfulness of breathing) is one of the most ancient and profound meditation practices available to human beings. Mindful breathing can be done by anyone, regardless of faith. Whoever you are, paying attention on purpose and nonjudgmentally to the sensations of your breath is an effective way to dwell in the present moment and to avoid being lost in the wanderings of your own mind.

In addition to doing these meditation practices , you may want to explore longer periods of meditation using the instructions below for mindful breathing.

Excerpt from Five Good Minutes®: 100 Morning Practices to Help You Stay Calm and Focused All Day Longby Jeffrey Brantley, MD. and Wendy Millstine, NC.