EVALUATE YOUR PRACTICE

Let's begin by recalling the definition of practice:

PRACTICE IS THE CONSISTENT REPETITION
OF AN INTENTIONAL ACTION
TO ACHIEVE A GOAL.
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Practice is intentional. It serves a purpose. If you are going to stay motivated to take time out of every day to practice something, it must have a deep meaning for you. If your practice doesn't have a strong purpose, you'll give it half-hearted effort or skip it altogether. You'll have no staying power. Purpose is the general meaning of your action. It's the "why" you are doing it. Without purpose it's easy for you to say "What's the use? I don't feel like it today."

Purpose gets you out of bed in the morning, or staying up later, or scheduling a break in your day to do something that is important to you. For instance, I work on this web-site a little everyday. The time I set aside is late at night after my family has gone to bed. Instead of going to bed at 10 o'clock, which is what I used to do, I work on my website and then meditate. I've found that I do fine on six and a half to seven hours of sleep and I feel great about what I've accomplished. Meditating right before bed allows me to sink into a deep sleep right away and I wake up more refreshed than if I had taken that time to sleep more instead.

When I'm tired at night and don't feel like practicing, my purpose gets me started. Once I'm into my practice the enjoyment of it takes over. My purpose for doing this site is to share what I've learned over the past thirty years about personal growth. Personal growth is my passion and my service in the world. My purpose in meditating is enlightenment, connecting with the Source, and integrating my self.

I only have so much time in this life. I don't want to miss a day of my purpose in being here.

To be most effective, my practice needs to have goals. Goals are concrete, measurable results that enable me to know that I am accomplishing my purpose. For my website, I give myself time-oriented goals for each piece of the site. I want this section to be done by such and such a date. I set the date for publishing this site as September 1, 2005.

For meditation, my goal is enlightenment and integration of my being in this life-time. (Why go half-way?) I believe this is possible for everyone, yet progress is a little more difficult to quantify. I measure this by the quality of my interactions every day. Do I experience less instances of conflict, clearer communication with those around me, and a greater sense of connection and well-being? One way to judge this is by doing the Daily Recollection exercise which is described on the Self-Observation Tools page. Another way is to rate my practice for the day on a scale of 1 to 10. The Daily Practice Log provides a format for tracking goals and logging practice.

Finally, I clearly define a daily practice to achieve these goals. I define my practices like this:

-I work on my website for at least 30 minutes everyday.
-I meditate for at least 15 minutes everyday.

I define my practice for smaller amounts than what I usually end up doing. Almost always I get into what I am doing and take more time than my minimum commitment. The minimum commitment gets me into my practice when I don't feel like it. Commit to an amount of time that feels like little effort, so you are more likely to do it.
I also define my practice commitment as six days per week. Again, this gives me a day to say "I don't feel like it today." I usually end up practicing seven days a week, but I have the option to skip a day. It's good to take a day off now and again to keep the practice from being compulsive or a drudgery. Usually, when I skip a day, I really miss my practice and come to it with renewed energy the next day.

Here are 12 QUESTIONS to ask your practice to make it more effective:
1) What is the purpose of my practice? What does it mean to me?
2) What is my goal for this practice? What specifically do I want to get out of it?
3) How do I define my daily practice? What is my routine? What is the most effective action to achieve my goal?
4) When will I practice? Define a specific time each day.
5) Where will I practice? Do I need a special type of space? Is it convenient?
6) Do I need any special equipment, tools, or conditions for my practice?
7) How long will I practice? (5, 15, 30, 60 minutes per day?)
8) How many days (and what days) per week will I practice?
9) Do I want to keep track of my practice, log it, journal about it?
10) How often do I evaluate, change, modify my practice? (monthly, quarterly, yearly?)
11) How do I keep my practice fresh and growing? Besides learning by doing, how do I continue to learn about my practice? (read, get a monthly newsletter, join a group, visit related websites, take classes?)
12) How will I remind myself about my practice? (sticky notes, schedule in a daytimer, set an alarm in my cellphone, put a schedule on my frig?)