Citta vritti nirodha. The stilling of the fluctuations of the mind. This is the second sutra. Everything else in the yoga system is commentary on this single instruction.
Aurelius would frame it as the discipline required to govern internal states rather than being governed by them. We are saying the same thing. The practical implication is this: most people arrive at their most important conversations already full — full of anticipation, dread, rehearsed arguments, the morning's small failures. They are not present to what is actually happening. They are present to their commentary on it.
The practice I recommend — which costs nothing and requires no equipment — is a two-minute pause before any significant engagement. Not to calm yourself. Not to optimize. Simply to notice what is already present. What assumption are you carrying in? What verdict have you already reached?
Noticing is not the same as changing. But it is always prior to it.