Mindfulness Meditation (For Everyday Life)

as a spiritual discipline in itself: "It was a religious
exercise, and one of the best things I did."
Benjamin Franklin also extolled the virtues of health,
wealth, and wisdom obtained from waking up early in
his well-known adage on the subject But he didn't
mouth it; he practiced too.
The virtues of getting up early have nothing to do with
cramming more hours of busyness and industry into
one's day. Just the opposite. They stem from the
stillness and solitude of the hour, and the potential to
use that time to expand consciousness, to
contemplate, to make time for being, for purposefully
not doing anything. The peacefulness, the darkness,
the dawn, the stillness - all contribute to making early
morning a special time for mindfulness practice.
Waking early has the added value of giving you a
very real head start on the day. If you can begin your
day with a firm foundation in mindfulness and inner
peacefulness, then when you do have to get going
and start doing, it is much more likely that the doing
will flow out of your being. You are more likely to
carry a robust mindfulness, an inner calmness and
balance of mind with you throughout the day, than
had you just jumped out of bed and started in on the
call of demands and responsibilities, however
pressing and important.