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Because mindfulness requires a commitment to regular practice. If there is no commitment, then the mind can easily be drawn back into it’s old ways. Modern life holds so many distractions and it bombards us with so much information that it can lead the mind astray easily. Jon Kabat-Zinn, who pioneered secular mindfulness says the following: “Making a time for formal practice every day is like feeding yourself every day. It is that important.”
This is especially the case when you first begin your practice. Your patterns of thought have been with you your whole life, and you cannot change them overnight. What’s really important to start with is to practise lots and lots, and on a regular basis. Every Day is the title of this page, and whilst it’s not critical that you practise every single day, it’s a good place to aim for. Nor should you beat yourself up for not practising, that would go against everything that mindfulness is all about. The 8-week mindfulness course has been specifically designed for people first starting out their practice, and it is well worth investigating for those coming to mindfulness for the first time.
Over time, it becomes much easier to be mindful, and mindfulness becomes a way of life. Regular practice is still important, but it becomes less critical than it is at the beginning. It becomes easier to bring mindfulness into your everyday life and apply it to tasks like washing the dishes or brushing your teeth. Once the benefits begin to take hold in your life, making time to practise every day isn’t really an issue; it just becomes something that you do because the benefits are so enormous.