Keeping Beginners Mind In Practice

The hardest stretch of any long practice is not the beginning, when everything is new, but the long middle, when nothing seems to be. Years into a meditation habit, a yoga practice, or a daily walk, competence quietly becomes autopilot: the body performs while attention wanders off. Beginner's mind — approaching the familiar as if meeting it for the first time — is the antidote, and in a long practice it stops being a charming attitude and becomes a discipline in its own right.