hi fivebells (are you the fivebells from LJ buddhists community?),
i work as a computer programmer. i don't know what it means to "abide in body, feelings, mind and mental qualities", but what works for me is -
* goenka-style attention, meaning: pay more and more attention to body sensations, ignoring the affective/mental aspects[1]. eg: experiencing anxiety? pay attention to the body sensations; remain equanimous. ignore anxious feelings/thoughts[1].
* do this style of attention, adding in attention to sights/sounds/smell/etc (anything but feeling/thoughts), consistently and continuously 24x7 ... mostly during such non-intellectual activities as walking, commuting, eating, etc.
* the more and more awareness of body sensations develops, the more and more you become *automatically* tuned to feel them even without trying.
* which means, the more and more it becomes possible to automatically feel them during intellectual activities as well.
it is also worth pointing out that before taking up goenka practice, i have always been keen on becoming happy and harmless and wanting to eradicate any or all affect that hinders that goal. thus, i never equated "Peace" to "The capacity to do what's right regardless of emotional disturbance."
[2] - but to the very absence of those emotions (emotions == disturbance). i though i would mention this, because if one has any vested interest in feeling anxiety (or whatever emotion), then it may not be possible to pay unbalanced attention.
[1] though when attention is anchored in body senstations, i can freely attend to and investigate those aspects as well (which is where actualism's social identity practice comes into picture)