Milo McLaughlin is a Mindful Writer

A few years ago I realized I needed to make some changes in my life and I began to take steps to introduce better habits. Mindfulness Meditation was one of the habits I’d read a lot about and after meeting Elise and other people who go a lot out of meditation at the World Domination Summit last year, I decided it was about time I tried it properly. I had tried Transcendental Meditation previously but it didn’t suit me quite as much

It’s been a grounding influence. I think what was most important for me was my initial commitment to practice every day. From there it’s become a foundation habit which has enabled me to introduce other positive behaviors, including running. It’s also helped with clarity and peace of mind of course, and an increased awareness of how I’m spending my time.

As a freelancer writer and blogger who is still learning the ropes it’s easy to be drawn in a variety of directions all at once. It’s been great to have a practice which calms the mind as it makes it much easier to see the path forward.

I’ve been meditating every day for over four months, but there have been a handful occasions when I’ve not managed it, mainly because I forgot. That tended to be when we were travelling and staying with friends or family so the usual routine isn’t there. I also find it’s important to get enough sleep or I tend to drift off instead of being mindful.

“I’ll let you be in my dream if you’ll let me be in yours” – Bob Dylan.

I’m sure this was just a throwaway line for Dylan, who is one of my favourite lyricists – but still it seems to ring very true. We’re all walking around in a dream half the time, but now and again we can get an understanding of what other people are going through. That sense of empathy is essential if we’re to change the world for the better.

Awareness by Anthony De Mello is one of my favourites. It’s based on one of his workshops and so is conversational in style and very easy to read. However it deals with the really big issues in life and he can be pretty hard hitting at times in terms of making you rethink how you react to certain things in life. it just makes you see things very differently (and makes a great accompaniment to a meditation practice).

Music is one of my biggest passions in life and I have very eclectic tastes – genre isn’t important to me as there are great songs and sounds in every style of music. As a writer, great lyricists like Dylan and Cohen are important to me but I also love hip hop, electro and pop, especially if it has innovative production. I’ve just been dancing around the living room to the latest Justin Timberlake album and some quality remixes of the new Daft Punk single, so I was definitely in the moment then!

It’s a fantastic project! The combination of encouraging more people to meditate, which has proven positive effects on both mental and physical health, and raising much-needed funding for Charity: Water (who are one of my favourite charities thanks to the unique way they do things), makes it an absolute “no-brainer”.