I've read through the issues from the last two weeks, and I realize I made a few mistakes.

1. I haven't started the week's sessions with any specific intention, which has led to a feeling of aimlessness both in my own meditations and in the published journal.
2. I've been trying to "mix it up" as much as possible with my style of meditations, focusing more on content variety than any dedicated schedule.

In an effort to both streamline my process and hopefully keep my readers interested, I'll be going into this week's sessions with an intention in mind, and I'll be doing the same form of meditation each day: 20 minutes, silent with no music or guide, seated, with a focus on the breath.

So, without any further ago, here you go:

My intention this week will be based around Acceptance. There are so many things I'm sure we'd all love to change about our current circumstances – and they need not all be coronavirus-related! However, instinctively pushing against our circumstances without accepting them as they currently are can only foster a sense of negativity and resentment. I'd like to accept things as they are in the current moment, though this does not mean being resigned to negative outcomes.

Meditation focused on acceptance has been shown to increase our ability to deal with stressful situations, so bringing this attitude to my current practice has been a priority for me. Never as good a time to get started as now.

I'm beginning each meditation with about a minute of focused, deep breathing. After closing my eyes and conducting a brief body scan (I tend to go through the body quicker than most guides, for better or worse), I remind myself of my intention. I'll risk the feeling of embarrassment by sharing what I'm silently saying to myself at this point, which I modified from a simple mantra shared on The Daily Positive:

I accept things as they are right now.

I repeat this phrase in my head several times before transitioning my focus to the breath. When thoughts or feelings arise, whether they're positive or negative, I identify the thought, and remind myself:

I accept this frustration/anxiety/restlessness. This, too, is part of my experience.

In this first session, I was conscious of how repeating these phrases in my head by memory each time could serve to dull their effectiveness, so I've made an effort to switch up the wording. The words themselves are not as important as the intention that they convey.

Today, my underlying mood made acceptance a bit more difficult. As with last week, the culmination of a week of work, coupled with the prospect of another weekend – and, realistically, about five more weeks – indoors didn't leave me feeling at my most accepting.

Repeating the words in my head that I've trained myself to think may feel a bit cultish, but I found it was possible to talk myself into the sense of acceptance that came more easily yesterday. The anticipation of "five more weeks" and its ensuing sense of dread melted away. "This moment" was left in its wake, and a single moment is much easier to accept than an unknown, amorphous darkness.

I'm going to combine my Saturday and Sunday meditations into one entry because of the double-edged sword that is The COVID-19 Weekend. My work schedule during the pandemic has not changed dramatically – I still work a relatively normal schedule Monday through Friday, and have the weekends off. But, the last several weekends have presented considerable challenges, with fewer recreational activities to distract from what often becomes hours of ruminating on the unfortunate situation we've found ourselves in. Meditation, while a reprieve, can often be even harder when I have less to do.

All this stacked up to make the first several minutes of my Saturday and Sunday meditations a bit more frustrating than usual. My body wouldn't settle and my focus drifted, even through the body scan and tactical breathing strategies I use to slow things down. However, by virtue of this week's theme of acceptance, I reminded myself that this, too, was part of my experience. The agitation and discomfort are part of this as well – "pushing it away won't help; just accept it," I told myself. That didn't make the discomfort go away by any means. But it rolled into my meditation like another ingredient into the dough. All part of the same big picture.

By the second half of my sessions on both Saturday and Sunday, I was in a different zone. An adjusted, if a little melancholy, sense of calm and focus.

I finished up this week's series with an early morning meditation for two reasons:

1. I woke up well before my alarm went off and wanted to put my best foot forward in terms of bringing acceptance into my day.
2. Sleep is yet another quality of a healthy lifestyle disrupted for many during the pandemic. I've had a tendency to ignore my shattered sleep schedule over the last month, instead of accepting it and taking positive steps to improve it.

By now, the consistency of my meditation introductions was paying some dividends, as I was able to find that grounded sense of intention in my mind with minutes. Though the distractions were still there (along with the remnants of strange dreams that had disturbed my sleep minutes before), I found myself at peace, with less negativity directed at my troubles than I may have expressed over the last several days.

Yes, my sleep was restless. Yes, it is now Monday. Yes, there's another week of isolation and less-than-reassuring virus news ahead. These are all part of my current experience – and indeed, our current experiences. Though I wish there weren't a blanket of unease and suffering over all of us at this moment, I also took comfort in knowing that we are truly sharing this experience right now, living through the pain and uncertainty together. Acceptance is not resignation. It is, in fact, approaching reality and agreeing that it exists. Only then can we respond and move forward.