This is a post well-nigh trying and failing. And trying again, and lightweight again. Trying and lightweight so often, in fact, that I’ve forgotten how many times attempts I’ve made. In some ways, this is a post well-nigh meditation (and I’ve written a few of those posts before). But it’s moreover a post well-nigh stuff resilient, and staying unshut minded. Most importantly, it’s well-nigh the valuable lesson I learned when it comes to mental health. If at first you don’t succeed…well, it might not unchangingly work. But sometimes trying then can be just what you need.

The inspiration for this post was reflecting on my relationship with meditation. The way I view meditation has ebbed and flowed over the years. When I first heard well-nigh it, I was hoping and praying I’d found a way to solve my anxiety. I read up on the benefits of meditation, the value and importance of the practice. I listened to people talk well-nigh mindfulness and requite advice, and I learned what I could.

I did my weightier to learn what I could well-nigh meditation and the first time I decided to requite it a real try, I failed. Spectacularly, I might add. It put me increasingly on edge, and made me plane angrier at myself. It was having the opposite effect, and this first struggle didn’t last long. I left meditation vacated for a while without that. I tried other things to manage my peepers and anxiety, doing my weightier to grow my mental health toolboox.

But at least once (sometimes twice) a year, I would try and come when to meditation. And it was a struggle for me every. Single. Time. In fact, it wasn’t until last year – without nine years of experiencing peepers and uneasiness – that meditation became part of my daily practice. And plane that process is still ongoing, increasingly than a year later.

There will be other posts where I reflect on the specifics virtually my journey with meditation. Today, though, I want to focus on my mindset. When I first learned well-nigh meditation, I was excited. I thought it would be an important part of my mental health toolkit.

As it turns out I was right, but not for the reasons I thought. The main reason I wanted to modernize at meditation was that I thought it would help me “get rid” of my mental illness. If I could conquer mindfulness, I could stop my depression. And this problematic theorizing didn’t solve a thing.

I wouldn’t say that it was my resiliency that led me when to meditation time and again. I felt resilient, but that wasn’t the main motivation in coming when to it. What pulled me when in was the idea that I’d had the wrong mindset well-nigh meditation in previous attempts. And that’s the lesson I’ve learned time and then in a decade of living with uneasiness and depression.

There’s a famous saying: “if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again,” that I’d like to add to. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try then – and if trying over and over isn’t working, that’s okay. But that what might not work for you today could be something that works for you in the future. We’re unchangingly waffly and unchangingly evolving, and our mental health can be the same way. Sometimes, trying then is exactly what you need. Here’s hoping that second (or third, or fourth) try works in your favor.

Now I want to hear from you! What is something that took you awhile to learn, or took some time surpassing you found success? Have you overly succeeded at something without lightweight in the past? I want to know! Let me know in the comments below.