Start by learning to stay

I used to think mindfulness was all about finding peace. A quiet heart. Still body. If I practice it enough, a certain form of peace will wash over me like a warm blanket.

That’s not how my life started. Not even close.

When I was in my twenties, working on mobile TV in a Melbourne warehouse, mindfulness was not peaceful. This is cruel. During breaks, I would sit on my crate, phone in hand, reading about Buddhism while my back ached and my mind kept thinking the same question: What am I doing here? When will this situation improve? Why is my psychology degree worthless in the real world?

I didn’t meditate to find peace. I was just trying to survive in my own head.

I think this is where most people really start to get started with mindfulness. Not calm. Not sure. But in a raw, uncomfortable decision, you decide to stay in something you’d rather escape.

There is a word in psychology to describe this: stress tolerance. This is not a flashy concept. It doesn’t sell wellness retreats. but Peking University Research Stress tolerance was found to be one of the key mechanisms by which mindfulness really works. In other words, mindfulness doesn’t help you eliminate discomfort. It can help you by changing your relationship with it, by developing your ability to stay in the present moment when everything inside you wants to collapse.

When I read about this finding, I wasn’t surprised. It describes something I’ve been through.

Because in that warehouse, I didn’t get enlightened. I just slowly and painfully learned to stop running away from the fact that my life was not what I thought it was. To sit in the gap between where I am and where I want to be instead of numbing myself to distraction or wallowing in self-pity.

That is to stay. And staying is the hardest part.

Most of us come to mindfulness because we are hurt. We’ve read articles, seen apps, and heard that meditation can reduce stress. It can. But what no one warns you is that before it diminishes anything, it increases your awareness of everything. You have been freed from anxiety. You keep scrolling past boredom. Underneath the busyness lies sadness.

Mindfulness does not bring you peace. It hands you a mirror. Then it asks you not to look away.

I remember the first time I tried to fidget during meditation. It lasted about ninety seconds before I grabbed my phone. The second time, two minutes. The third time, I did it five times. Not because I found peace in those five minutes, but because I no longer expected it.

This shift is more important than people realize. You are not training yourself not to feel anything. You are training yourself to feel everything and not hold back. Or at least, back off and come back.

When I finally left Australia and moved to Vietnam, I thought I was making a bold, decisive life change. In some ways I am. But I also carried it all with me: the insecurities, the self-doubt, the habit of chasing the next thing instead of focusing on the present.

Saigon did not solve this problem. It exposes it.

Living in a city of nine million people, with never-ending traffic and constant noise, people can feel a special kind of overwhelmed. I remember walking through District 1 early in the morning, sweating profusely in the tropical heat, motorcycles roaring by, the air filled with exhaust fumes and the smell of pho from roadside kitchens. Everything in me wants to retreat into air conditioning and silence.

But something changed during these runs. Instead of resisting the chaos, I began to…mellow into it. Don’t love or hate, just stay. Feel the heat and not want it to go away. Hear the trumpet without getting nervous. Let the discomfort be there and don’t let it become a problem.

This is practice. Not the sit-on-a-mat-in-a-quiet-room version that looks good on Instagram. In this version, your shirt is soaked, the taxi nearly pinches your elbow, and your leg hurts, but you keep going, not because you’re strong, but because you know the urge to stop doesn’t always mean stopping.

Buddhism has a concept for this, although it took me many years to connect this philosophy to my own experience. The Second Noble Truth states that craving and hatred are the causes of suffering. Not the pain itself, but the desperate need to get more of what feels good and less of what feels bad. Constant reaching and back seat.

Mindfulness interrupts this cycle. Not by eliminating cravings or aversions, but by creating a small gap between feelings and reactions. You notice the urge to check your phone instead of just checking it. You have the urge to get mad at your partner instead of just getting mad. You feel the tug of worry, but for a second, you don’t follow it.

One second. That’s all it takes to change the paradigm.

But there’s one thing no one tells you in this moment: It doesn’t feel like progress. It feels like nothing. It feels like you’re sitting there suffering and not even getting a good sense of distracting satisfaction. Where is dopamine? Where is the relief?

It’s not there. That’s the point.

Relief will come later. In a few weeks, maybe a few months. One day you realize that the things that once got you into trouble now just…haunt you. Still bothers you, but doesn’t consume you. You stay with it long enough that it loses its power to throw you off balance.

I see this in my meditation practice now, the difference is huge. Sometimes I sit for thirty minutes. Some days, five days. When my daughter was a newborn, I would sometimes sit for the exact amount of time between when she fell asleep and when she woke up again, which could be forty-five seconds. The length of time doesn’t matter, what matters is sitting down first and choosing to face whatever is on your mind rather than playing a playlist of distractions that are always available.

The truth is, she taught me more about staying than any book or retreat ever could. Babies don’t care about your need for peace and quiet. They need you to be there right now, in the chaos, the noise, the chaos at 3am. You can’t rationalize your way out of a crying baby. You can only be there.

Perhaps that’s the simplest definition of mindfulness I’ve ever seen: being present. Not calm. Not in the center. There isn’t any particular way at all. No matter what happens, just stay there instead of rushing for the exit.

I think we’re overcomplicating the issue. The wellness industry sells mindfulness as a destination, a state of bliss reached with enough practice and the right app subscription. But in the Buddhist tradition I have studied and tried (imperfectly) to follow for over a decade, mindfulness is not the destination. This is a direction. You move toward experience rather than away from it. That’s it. This is how the whole exercise goes.

It’s the steering that’s difficult. Because what you’re after isn’t always pleasant. Sometimes it’s sad. Sometimes it’s failure. Sometimes, you’ll quietly realize that you’ve been avoiding a conversation you need to have, or a truth you need to face, or a part of yourself you don’t want to see.

I still struggle with this. I still find myself reaching for my phone when an uncomfortable thought comes to mind. I still notice the urge to plan my way out of uncertainty rather than sit there. The difference is not that the urge has ceased. It’s that I recognize them faster and succumb to them less.

Progress in mindfulness looks like this: You catch yourself a second earlier. That’s it. One second earlier than yesterday, earlier than last week, earlier than last year. This is not dramatic. It’s not Instagram worthy. But it is real and it will increase.

As I sit in a cafe in Saigon now, drinking black coffee and watching street life go by, I sometimes think about that warehouse in Melbourne. That version of me sat on a crate, reading about impermanence on a cracked phone screen, trying to make sense of a life that didn’t yet make sense. He was not at peace. He is not smart. He just stayed.

This proved to be enough.

Facts have proved that this simple and ordinary act of staying is the beginning of everything. Not peace. Not clarity. Not a transformation. Just be willing to be where you are, feel exactly what you’re feeling, and take one more breath than you thought you were capable of.

This is mindfulness. It started long before peace. First, learn to stay.

2 minutes practice

The next time you find yourself tempted to reach for your phone, scroll, or otherwise distract yourself, pause.

Set a timer for two minutes.

Do nothing. Don’t meditate in any formal sense.

Just sit back and accept whatever it is you’re trying to avoid. If you can, say: boredom, restlessness, worry, sadness. You don’t need to fix it or analyze it. Let it sit there for two minutes. When the timer goes off, continue with your day.

That’s the whole exercise: two minutes of no running.

Common pitfalls

• Believe that “real” mindfulness should feel peaceful. If you feel restless, irritated, or bored while practicing, you’re not doing anything wrong. You are doing it.
• Use mindfulness as another form of escape, turning meditation into a way to escape difficult emotions rather than facing them.
• Progress is measured by how calm you feel, not how quickly you notice when you’re not calm.
• Give up because of the discomfort in the early stages. This discomfort doesn’t mean mindfulness isn’t working. This is a sign.

A simple takeaway

• Mindfulness does not begin with calmness. When you want to check out, you decide to stay on site.
• Taking pain, rather than relaxing, is one of the core mechanisms by which mindfulness works.
• Progress looks like catching yourself a second ahead of time, rather than a blank slate.
• The urge to avoid discomfort is normal. Noticing this impulse and not obeying it is spiritual practice.
• Just two minutes in something uncomfortable can easily distract you for over an hour.