In 2017, psychologist Eli Sussman was attending a meditation retreat at Plum Village Mindfulness Center in the south of France. Accustomed to long hours of practice, he told a monk friend one day that he had just finished a three-hour meditation session.
“Three hours?” the monk reportedly answered. “Why not take three breaths? That’s all you need to bring your attention to the present moment.”
It was a lightbulb moment for Sussman. He wondered whether the amount of time spent meditating really matters when it comes to the benefits of such a practice. While working as a clinical research coordinator at Harvard University and then earning her PhD at the University of California, Berkeley, Sussman undertook research to determine how much mindfulness exercise is actually needed to improve well-being.
For example, in one experiment, he and other researchers assigned 135 undergraduate students to a mindfulness practice called self-compassionate touch, or a finger-tapping activity, for 20 seconds a day for one month. Participants then completed assessments of self-compassion, positive emotions, and stress.
They found that touch practice led to perceptual benefits. “Just 20 seconds a day can improve self-compassion, stress, and mental well-being,” Sussman says.
As Sussman and his fellow researchers determined, the key to success was consistency, not time spent practicing. The more days a participant adopts that attitude of self-compassion, the more of those benefits they will experience.
In fact, “shortening your practice can actually help you keep coming back to it,” Sussman says. “And that consistency is where real change happens.”
Sussman’s upcoming book, Micropractices: A Science-Backed Approach to Achieving Calm, Clarity, and Joy in Less than 30 Seconds, is a guide to wellness and includes numerous short techniques. It is scheduled to be released in October.
The number one micropractice Sussman recommends is the self-compassionate touch that is the basis of his research. For those who want to implement it themselves, here’s how.
Close your eyes or soften your gaze. Think about a recent mistake or failure, something you’ve been worrying about about yourself lately, or something that’s made you feel worthless. Notice what happens to your body as you remember. Place one hand on your stomach and the other on your chest. Send yourself some kindness. Ask yourself, “How can I be friends with myself in this moment?”
Again, the exercises only take 20 seconds at a time, and “the benefits are huge if you do them once a day,” Sussman said, nodding to participant reviews, praising improvements like lower stress levels.
It’s okay to take a day or two off. Continue. “The danger is not in skipping a day,” he says. “That means quitting.”
