And the puppy runs away over and over again

Once again courtesy of the Tricycle Daily Dharma emails (sign up here) -

For some, [the] task of coming back a thousand or ten thousand times in meditation may seem boring or even of questionable importance. But how many times have we gone away from the reality of our life?--perhaps a million or ten million times! If we wish to awaken, we have to find our way back here with our full being, our full attention. . . In this way, meditation is very much like training a puppy. You put the puppy down and say, "Stay." Does the puppy listen? It gets up and runs away. You sit the puppy back down again. "Stay." And the puppy runs away over and over again. Sometimes the puppy jumps up, runs over and pees in the corner, or makes some other mess. Our minds are much the same as the puppy, only they create even bigger messes. In training the mind, or the puppy, we have to start over and over again.--Jack Kornfield, A Path with Heart

I don't know about you, but my puppy also appears when I sit down to write my novel. And when I try to respond to anything in a non-habitual way. And when I exercise (or it would if I ever got round to doing any).

Just look at that face. They can't help it. Be patient with your puppy.