16/07/26 - Stillness: The Two Minute Practice

Most people who try to build a stillness practice give up in the first two weeks.

Not because they don't want it. Because they try to start too big. Twenty minutes of contemplative prayer before breakfast, when they can barely manage two minutes of silence anywhere in the day. It fails. They feel guilty. They quit.

This week's theme: Stillness.

Today, the practical one. A two minute practice that actually works, and how to build it into a life you already have.

THE PRACTICE

The bar for today is deliberately low. Two minutes.

Not because two minutes is impressive. Because two minutes is achievable, and a small thing done daily beats a big thing done never.

Here is the whole practice.

Once a day, at a time you can protect, sit somewhere quiet with your phone in another room. Set a timer for two minutes. Then do these three things, in order.

One. Land.

Take one slow breath in through your nose, and let it out through your mouth. Do that three times. Feel your feet on the floor. Feel where your body is touching the chair. You are not trying to empty your mind. You are just landing in the room you are actually in, which is where God is actually meeting you.

Two. Offer.

Once you feel landed, say one sentence to God, silently or out loud. Not a request. An offering. "Here I am." Or, "I'm listening." Or, "This is yours today." Whatever fits your current honest state. If today is a rough day, you can say, "I'm tired." That counts.

Three. Wait.

Then just wait. For the remainder of the timer, don't perform anything. Don't try to hear anything specific. Don't pray for anyone. Don't run through your to-do list disguised as intercession. Just sit and be with him.

Your mind will wander. That's fine. Every time you notice it wandering, gently come back to your breath and to the sentence you offered. Every time you come back is the practice. That coming back is what is being trained.

That's it. Two minutes.

Notice the word "waits." The Hebrew is dumiyyah again, the same word we looked at yesterday. Silent waiting. Not silent striving. Not silent producing. Waiting.

Waiting is the thing modern life has almost entirely stripped out of us. We wait for nothing. We fill every gap. Even sixty seconds at a red light gets filled by a glance at the phone. The muscle for waiting has atrophied.

The two minute practice is the gym for that muscle.

It will feel long the first few days. It will feel like nothing is happening. You will wonder if you are doing it wrong. You are not. You are just noticing, possibly for the first time in a long time, what it is like to not be producing anything for two whole minutes.

Stay with it. After two weeks it stops feeling long. After a month, you will start to want more.

That is how a stillness practice actually builds. Not by trying to be a monk on day one. By doing something small enough that you can keep doing it, until doing it becomes normal.

Two minutes. Once a day. Land, offer, wait. That is the whole thing.

Start today.

YOUR ONE THING FOR TODAY

Do the practice today. Land, offer, wait. Two minutes.

Pick a time you can protect. First thing in the morning tends to work best, before the day has grabbed you. But any time is better than no time.

Set a repeat alarm on your phone if you need to. This is that important.

WATCH THE NEW VIDEO

If the two minute practice today lands for you, my new video walks through a slightly different version of the same idea. A two minute "changing of the watch" practice for the nights you cannot sleep, and four specific things God is doing in those hours you have been lying awake.

OVER TO YOU

When are you going to do your two minutes today? Hit reply with the time. I read every one, and knowing you've committed to a time makes you far more likely to actually do it.

God bless you, my friend.

P.S. Known: Discovering Who God Says You Are is out now. Newsletter readers still get 50% off for a limited time.