When we last rounded up our staff's Weekly Upgrades, our editors were email batching, meal prepping, cleaning, and scheduling in extra downtime.

When we last rounded up our staff's Weekly Upgrades, our editors were installing our own bidets, cutting back on caffeine, and protecting ourselves from exercise-induced injury.

I have a bad habit of trying to meditate, getting distracted, and immediately giving up, just to try it again six months later. So this observation from redditor Subduction really got me.

Take a deep breath... hold it... breathe out... now wait a sec before breathing in again. Bookmark QuietKit's box breathing for a follow-along animation to help you do this any time you need it.

In this episode we talked with author and psychiatrist Mark Epstein, whose books include Thoughts Without a Thinker, and Going to Pieces Without Falling Apart. His latest book, Advice Not Given: A Guide to Getting Over Yourself, uses Buddhism's Noble Eightfold Path as a roadmap for spiritual and psychological growth. According to Mark, Buddhism and psychotherapy arrive at the same conclusion: When we give the ego free rein, we suffer, but when the ego learns to let go, we are free.

iOS/Android: When I run, my inner monologue sounds like an argument between a good coach and a bad coach. One voice tells me to take it easy, find my best pace, not to look at my watch, just find the right level of effort. Then the other voice butts in to say something like "Oh, look at you, running so slow, and you're already tired! You suck!"

Relaxation? Productivity? These don't go together... normally. If you just want to put butt to couch and think of nothing, that's fine. On the other hand, if you have a few drops of energy in reserve and wouldn't mind spending them while you chill, that's possible too.

Between hygge, the Danish concept of cosiness, and Sweden's lagom, which encourages living a balanced life, there are plenty of buzzy Nordic lifestyle methods that proponents claim will make you a better person. But if your problem is less about finding happiness and more about tuning out the nagging voices in your head, you may want to head slightly south and check out the Dutch concept of niksen.

Mindfulness can be as powerful for children as it is for adults - it can help them regulate their emotions and respond more calmly when life gets stressful. But simply telling your kids to "clear your thoughts!" or "be present!" will probably just make them more confused (and therefore more stressed).

If you're an anxious flyer, here's one way to calm your nerves as your flight begins: count to 100.

During the early days of new parenthood, my husband once asked me when he got home from work, "Would you be mad if I had parked around the corner before reaching our house, and took a nap?" My initial response to any question of his that begins with "Would you be mad if..." is always DEFINITELY, but after thinking about it, I told him, "No, if that's going to help you be refreshed, present and engaged when you step through the door, then do it."

On the latest episode of Lifehacker's podcast The Upgrade, psychologist and science journalist Daniel Goleman talked about self-control (what he called "cognitive control") and its importance as a skill we should all learn as early as possible.

Dear Lifehacker, I keep seeing the word "mindfulness" everywhere, tied to everything from losing weight to being more productive. But what does this vague word actually mean, and how can I apply mindfulness to my life?

If you’re anything like me, you lose control of your day pretty much the moment you wake up. When I get home from coaching a couple of morning classes, I step into a maelstrom of Paw Patrol-inspired chaos featuring breakfast cooking, tea making, dog walking and feeding, child dressing, teeth cleaning, dishwasher stacking, all with the ultimate aim of getting the young ‘un out of the house and up to school.

Our world moves at a breakneck pace, making it easy to feel overwhelmed and stressed out. That's why it's important to find time to take care of yourself -- even if you only have a few minutes here and there. Thankfully, Aura's meditation teachers and therapists had our busy schedules in mind when making Aura Premium, a science-backed mindfulness tool to help you give anxiety the boot.

Android/iOS: If you've ever been a paying Headspace customer, you know the tyranny of the Packs. A pack is a course of meditations, each building on the next. But if you were working through the Anxiety pack, and wanted to check out Creativity one, you'd lose all your progress. Until today.

Every day it seems there's a new health study out. Something that used to be bad for you is good for you, or vice versa. It turns out most of these newsy findings are not really a big deal: Sometimes they only apply to mice, or they're a blip that doesn't change the overall scientific understanding of the topic. So let's take a look at some of this week's stories, and see what's big news and what isn't.

iOS: What if a meditation app didn't ask you to focus on your breathing? What if you didn't have to listen to someone's voice telling you what to think about? A new meditation app, Sway, takes a different approach.

Positive thinking has a ton of benefits, from expanding your creativity to boosting your health, but if you're prone to a more negative outlook, it can be hard to see the glass as half full. Here's how you can retrain your brain to become a more positive thinker.