One of the best ways to do this is very simply something that all of you have already done, all of you have done Special Mindfulness Activities. If you are very good with being mindful of grabbing your doors, that means that every time you go to a door you're going to stop the speedy mind rush. If you're mindful standing up, if you're mindful sitting down, every time it happens in your life, you're going to stop the rush.
The example that I like to give for most people: it's Monday morning, they wake up to the alarm clock and they are already in speed, they don't like this, today is work, I have to go to work, I love the weekend. So in the very beginning they're starting to move their stress levels up and also the rush factor. They go to the bathroom, they go eat their food and think, "Oh, it's getting too late I have to hurry", more rush, rush. They get to their car, they get to the subway, whatever it is, "I have to get to work" and they are speeding more and more. By the time they get to work, they're already a bit stressed. They come into work and their boss wants something, or their workmates want something from them, and they have to perform, and they get more stress and more stress. And the stress continues to build up as the day goes by, then the end of the day comes and they're stressed out, they have to go home and collapse, and for lot of them a little bit of alcohol will do it. Okay, that's very typical for many people in the world. Not everyone but especially people who get caught up in stress.
Now, how do we work with it? If we've done this practice, if we've been mindful of little things, here's an example of what might happen: we wake up in the morning, it's Monday morning, the alarm clock rings, we don't like it; we go, "Oh, okay, aversion, aversion", and the stress reduces. We realize it's Monday, I have to go to work, and all those similar sorts of thoughts - we're getting a little more stressed, no wait we get up out of bed, we're mindful getting up, the stress reduces. We go to the bathroom, we realize we're a bit slow this morning, the stress starts growing, no wait we open a couple of doors and we're mindful of that and the stress reduces. And throughout the day, every time the stress starts to build, we're able to reduce it. By the end of the day, the stress level is so small compared to normal people that we feel nice and peaceful.
Whenever you can reduce your stress, whenever you can reduce the rush, the pressure, it's true, you're not going to make so many mistakes as you would otherwise. You perform better in your life, you make less mistakes. People like that get promotions, get nice things coming to them, lots of good things happen and so on. So all these special mindfulness activities are not just something to do just here in retreat, take them with you and build on them back in your normal life.