A settled mind

Here's a passage from The Essence of Buddhism by Traleg Kyabgon about tranquility:

The meditation of tranquility teaches us how to become settled and calm and to concentrate so that our minds are not always reaching out, grabbing on to this and that, and becoming scattered. We learn how to focus our minds, to become centered. We also learn how to be present and not dwell on our past achievements, failures, regrets, or guilt associated with all kinds of things that we may have done or failed to do. Likewise, we learn how not to dwell on or feel anxious about the future: what we would like to achieve, the possibility of not being able to achieve our goals, the imminent obstacles that we can foresee, and so on. We can learn how to be in the present and remain focused. If we indulge in all these mental activities without focus, we lose our perspective and start to react to things more and more from habitual responses rather than from clear understanding. Through the practice of meditation, we can learn how to be attentive and in the present.

It's wonderful to have a strategy for interrupting habitual tendency. Without mindfulness we are taken hostage by habitual tendency, aren't we? But the mindfulness practice frees us and gives us access to our choices. At the end of the day, it's all about alleviating suffering. It's worth the work because this way we can find another way of living besides being imprisoned by repeated suffering.