To start off, I want to recognize that I have neglected to post for a few months. My last challenge of drinking tea mindfully ended 2 months ago. Very briefly, what did I learn from this challenge:

• I enjoy the idea of drinking tea much more than the actual practice – This is something I subconsciously already knew, but became readily apparent about a week or so into the challenge. Don’t get me wrong; I do enjoy having tea, but I much more enjoy thinking of myself as a tea drinker. Why this is the case I am not entirely sure, but I think it probably has a lot to do with my correlation of tea drinking to mindfulness.
• I would like to use this as a way to have new sensory experiences – This is definitely true. I get very excited whenever I hear about a type of tea I haven’t had previously. If I’m being honest, my genuine attraction to tea is sensorial. With this in mind, I would like to focus more on experimenting with different types as a way to incorporate new sensory experiences in my life rather than using it as a mindfulness practice.
• If I really want to practice drinking tea mindfully, I need to use a much smaller mug – There are many times I like having a large mug of tea. Peppermint is one of my favorites for this purpose. However, as a mindfulness exercise, having a much smaller cup that I sip out of instead of drink would be preferable.
• I miss tea houses – I did not go to them very often when I lived in Houston, but I liked having them around and the atmosphere they provided. Where I live now, it is only about coffee. There are even tea rooms I looked up that don’t have any type of tea listed on the menu!

For this month, I am going to do something simple and straightforward, yet at the same time something that requires discipline and reflection. I have had passing thoughts of keeping a journal on multiple occasions in the last couple of years. Most prominently, I contemplated starting a chronic pain diary and/or depression/anxiety diary. More recently, however, I decided what would be most helpful for me is to have a motivation journal. The biggest challenge I face today is dealing with my chronic low motivation level, so this will be the primary focus of the journal I am starting.

Here are the details of this month’s challenge:

• Have at least 5 minutes of reflection on my motivation level sometime during each day. This could happen during my morning communion run or check-in, at the end of the day before retiring to bed, or while I am journaling. Basically, I want to make sure that I am reflecting on my motivation level regularly. I would like this practice to continue whether or not I stick with journaling.
• Write something down each day. It can be as little as 3 sentences. I downloaded the desktop application ‘Digital Diary’ yesterday to have a simple program I can use to record my journal entries. I can use my keyboard or my computer microphone to input my thoughts. When I have journaled in the past, the hardest part was just deciding to sit down and write something. Once I did that, I generally would have to stop myself from writing a novel. So the focus is not on amount, but consistency.
• Put up a blog post once a week to share with the world. I have been desirous of increasing my blog posts from once or twice a month to weekly for some time. This will be a perfect opportunity to start reaching this goal without having to put much more time or effort into it, since I will simply be sharing some of my journal thoughts from the week.

I am greatly looking forward to this monthly challenge. If this or any of my monthly challenges inspires any of my readers to do something similar, I would love to hear back from you and to know if there is any way I can support you.

Namaste.