Recently I have been spending a lot of time working in and
around the practice of mindfulness; both in daily life at home and also at
work.
During the course of my research into Mindfulness at Work I
came across articles by Shamash Alidina and Tara Healey and with all due credit
to them I have decided to adopt a lot of these practices into my own work and that
is why you are reading them in my blog.
The first of these posts is
10 Ways to Be More Mindful at Work
You don't need to block out 30 minutes to practice
meditation in order to experience the benefits of mindfulness at work. Here are
a few ways you can stay in the present moment to do your best during a busy
day.
Mindfulness may seem like a great idea, but how
do you become more mindful in the context of a busy work day? You may have
emails, phone calls, meetings, and presentations to deal with. And, of course,
your own work! In the middle of all that, how can you apply the principles of
mindfulness so that you feel more alive and present, as well as being
productive? Here are a few popular and other more radical ways to be mindful at
work.
1. Be Consciously Present
Mindfulness
is, above all, about being aware and awake rather than operating unconsciously.
When you’re consciously present at work, you’re aware of two aspects of your
moment-to-moment experience—what’s going on around you and what’s going on
within you. To be mindful at work means to be consciously present in what
you’re doing, while you’re doing it, as well as managing your mental and
emotional state. If you’re writing a report, mindfulness requires you to give
that your full attention. Each time your mind wanders to things like Helen’s
new role or Michael’s argument with the boss, just acknowledge the thoughts and
bring your attention back to the task in hand. This scenario sounds simple, but many aspects of your experience can get in the
way.
Here are some ideas to help you stop being mindless and
unconscious at work and more mindful and consciously present:
Make a clear decision at the start of your workday to be
present as best you can. Pause for a few moments before you start your work day
to set this intention in your mind.
Make an effort to
work more consciously, even if that means that you need to work a little slower at first—doing so pays in the long run.
Keep
all the advantages of working mindfully in mind to motivate you.
Connect with your senses rather than getting lost in trains of
thought when you’re doing a task.
Give your full attention to seemingly
mundane tasks like washing your hands, opening
doors, dialling phone numbers, and even just feeling your breathing as you’re
waiting in a meeting room. These little moments add up to make the day a more
mindful one.
2. Use Short Mindful Exercises at Work
Mindful exercises train your brain to be more mindful. The more
mindful exercises you do, the easier your brain finds it to drop into a mindful
state, thus optimizing your brain function. In the busy workplace, finding time
for a 30-minute mindful exercise can be difficult. So does that mean you can’t
be mindful at all at work? No! Mindful
exercises can be as short as you wish. Even a minute of consciously connecting
with one of your senses can be classified as a mindful exercise. You don’t need
to close your eyes. You don’t even need to be sitting down. Be creative about
finding slots in the day to practice mindfulness exercises. At times of
excessive pressure at work, practicing a short mindfulness
exercise can be a
saviour. The process helps to rebalance your nervous system, toning down the
fight-or-flight response and engaging the wise part of your brain, so that you
make reasoned decisions rather than automatically react to situations.
3. Be a Single-Tasker
Single-tasking is doing one thing at a time. Multi-tasking is
trying to do two or more tasks at the same time or switching back and forth
between tasks. Nobody can actually multi-task. In reality, your brain is madly
switching from one thing to the next, often losing data in the process. Most
people know multitasking is ineffective nowadays. If multi-tasking is so
inefficient, why do people still do it? The reason was uncovered in a study by
Zheng Wang at Ohio
State University.
She tracked students and found that when they multi-tasked, it made them feel
more productive, even though in reality they were being unproductive. Other
studies found that the more you multitask, the more addicted you get to it.
Here are a few ways to kick the multi-tasking habit and become a
mindfulness superhero:
Keep a time journal of what you achieve in a block of
time. Work out when you’re single-tasking and when you’re multi-tasking. Note
down what you achieved in that time block and how mindful you were.
See whether you can notice your productivity going
up when you single-task—noticing the benefits can motivate you to do one thing at a time
in a mindful way.
Group tasks in categories. For example, put together emails, phone calls,
errands, and meetings. Then you can do them all together in one block of time
rather than switching from emails to calls to running an errand.
Switch off as many distractions as you can. Silence your phone, log off from your
email account, and so on. Then set a timer for the amount of time you need to
work, and record how much you get done. Do what works for you to focus on one
task for a fixed period of time.
Practice mindfulness in your breaks between tasks. Stretch, take deep
breaths, or go for a mindful walk.
4. Use Mindful Reminders
The
word “mindful” means to remember. Most people who’ve read about or undertaken
training in mindfulness appreciate the benefits of mindful living.
Unfortunately, they keep forgetting to be mindful! The reason you forget to be
mindful is because your brain’s normal (default) mode is to be habitually lost
in your own thoughts—running a sort of internal narrative.
When
you’re going about your usual daily activities, your brain switches you into
this low energy state, which is unmindful, almost dreamy. Doing some things
automatically, without thinking, is fine but research undertaken at Harvard University
showed that 47 per cent of a person’s day can be spent lost in thoughts. The
same research found that day dreaming can have a negative impact on well-being.
Being
on auto-pilot means that you’re not fully present and awake to the
opportunities and choices around you. You can’t be creative, plan something new
or respond appropriately if you’re operating mechanically.
By using some form of reminder, you can be mindful again. The
reminder shakes you out of auto-pilot mode. Try these reminders:
Setting an alarm on the phone – even a vibrating alarm that doesn’t disturb others can work
well.
Putting mindfulness in your calendar – setting an appointment with yourself!
A small note or picture on your desk to remind you to be mindful.
Associating certain activities with mindfulness, such as meal times or meetings or
when finishing one task and starting another.
Using the sound of bells and rings in the workplace as “bells
of mindfulness.”
So, every time your phone rings, you take a mindful breath.
Every time you hear the ping of a text message, you pause to be mindful of your
surroundings rather than immediately reacting by checking the message. All these things are
opportunities to come back into the present moment, to see yourself and your
surroundings afresh. You take a small step back and reflect rather than
automatically react to what’s coming at you in the form of demands, tasks, and
challenges.
5. Slow Down To Speed Up
Mindfulness
at work does seem counter-intuitive. You’re considering the fact that, by stopping or slowing down, you can become more efficient,
productive, happy, resilient and healthy at work. You may not think
that slowing down and being conscious can have such an effect.
Imagine being asked to stop sleeping for a week. Sleeping is
resting—and resting isn’t work. So, simply stop sleeping and just keep working.
Maybe you’ve experienced this when studying for exams or trying to meet a
deadline at work. Eventually your efficiency drops to almost zero; you’re
completely living out of the present moment and perhaps even hallucinating! You
need to sleep at least seven hours every night to be able to function
effectively.
Clearly, rest can increase efficiency. If you do manage to get
about seven hours of sleep and achieve a certain amount of work, imagine what
would happen if you also did a few mini-mindfulness exercises during the day?
Your brain would become even more efficient, focused, effective at
communicating with others, and better at learning new skills.
Being in a panicky rush leads to bad decisions and is a misuse
of energy. Instead, pause, focus on listening, stroll rather than run, and
generally take your time when at work. Effective leaders, workers, and
entrepreneurs slow down and reflect to make the best decisions and actions—they
slow down to speed up. That’s a mindful way of working.
6. Make Stress Your Friend
Recent research conducted at the University of Wisconsin-Madison,
asked 30,000 people the same question: “Does the perception that stress affects
health matter?” The results were astonishing.
The researchers found that people experiencing high levels of
stress but who believed that stress was good for them had among the lowest
mortality rates. Whereas highly stressed people who believed that stress was
bad for their health had the highest chance of dying. Your beliefs about stress
clearly affect how they impact on your health and well-being. Another study
even found that the blood vessels constricted (as is seen in those with heart
disease) in people who believed that stress was bad for them, but stayed open
and healthy in those who believed that stress was good for them.
If reading this didn’t make you go “wow,” try reading it again.
It’s the most exciting research I’ve read this year!
So if you want to make stress your friend,
you need to change the way you think about it and, in turn, your body’s
response to it. Mindfulness can help you achieve this change in perception. The
next time you’re facing a challenge at work, notice how your heart rate speeds
up and your breathing accelerates. Observe these responses and then switch your
attitude—respond to your stress creatively rather than negatively. Be grateful
that the stress response is energizing you. Note that your body is preparing
you for your upcoming challenge and that a faster heart rate is sending more
oxygen around your body. Be grateful that the process is sharpening your senses
and boosting your immune system. By viewing the stress response from this
perspective, you see your upcoming problem as a positive challenge and
recognize your body preparing to meet it. This small change in attitude can
literally add years to your life and improve your productivity and achievements
in the workplace.
7. Feel Gratitude
Humans
have a “negativity bias.” Essentially,
this means that you’re much more likely to focus and dwell on something that’s
gone wrong than on things that have gone well. Behaving in this way every day
means that you ultimately adopt an excessively negative and unbalanced way of
thinking.
Gratitude is the antidote. Plenty of evidence suggests that
actively practicing gratitude makes you feel better and has a positive impact
on your creativity, health, working relationships, and quality of work.
Gratitude makes being at both work and home more positive experiences.
If you feel like you’re stuck in a job you don’t enjoy, the
first step is to practice gratitude. What’s going well in your job? Maybe
you’re grateful for the money? Even though it may be less than you’d like, you
probably prefer it to having no salary at all. You may not like your manager,
but maybe you’re friends with a couple of colleagues? You hate the office
politics, but they give you insight into what you don’t like in a job, so in
the future you know what to look for. After practicing gratitude, you can then
consider whether you want to continue in that role or need to find another job.
Being mindful of what’s going well at work helps to improve
your resilience. Rather than allowing your mind to spiral into anxiety or dip
into low moods as you brood over all the aspects of the job you don’t like, you
can feed your mind with thoughts of gratitude to raise your well-being. Then,
if you do decide to find another job, your positive mental state can help you
select an appropriate position and optimize your performance in the interview.
People hire positive people, not those who just complain about what’s going
wrong. Use gratitude to neutralize your brain’s natural negativity bias.
8. Cultivate Humility
Humility
comes from the Latin humilis, meaning
grounded. Humble people have a quiet confidence about themselves and don’t feel
the need to continuously remind others of their achievements. Humility may seem
counter to our culture of glorifying those who make the most noise about
themselves, grabbing our attention. But actually, humility is attractive—no one
enjoys being around those who continually sing their own praises, and most
people enjoy the company of those who are willing to listen to them rather than
talk about themselves all the time.
In
Jim Collin’s hugely popular book Good to Great, he
identified leaders who turned good companies into great ones. He found that the
companies exhibiting the greatest long-term success (at least 15 years of
exceptional growth) had leaders demonstrating all the skills of your standard
leader but with one extra quality—personal humility. They were willing to work
hard, but not for themselves—or the company. If things went wrong, they didn’t
seek to blame other to protect themselves. And if things went well, they
immediately looked outside of themselves to congratulate others. They didn’t
have an inflated ego that needed protecting all the time.
Humility is often confused with meekness or timidity but they’re
not the same. Humility does not mean seeing yourself as inferior; rather, it
means being aware of your natural dependence on and equity with those around
you.
How is humility linked to mindfulness? Mindfulness is about
accepting yourself just as you are, and being open to listening to and learning
from others. Mindfulness is also synonymous with gratitude—you appreciate how
others have helped you. And someone who is grateful for the contribution of
others is naturally humble.
To develop a little more humility, try the following:
Undertake mindful exercises: Mindfulness reduces activity in the
part of the brain that generates the story of your self—sometimes called the
narrative self. Giving too much attention to you and your own story is
unhealthy. Mindfulness practice helps you to be more connected with your
senses—the present self. Your attention widens and you can see how much others
contribute to your everyday successes.
Consider who has helped you right now: Spend a few minutes thinking about
the number of people who have enabled you to read this page: your parents,
guardians, or teachers who taught you to read; your employers who help you
afford to pay for it; the people involved in writing, editing and producing the
copy; the distributors, sales people, providers of ink; the trees that were
used to make the paper. We could go on. Think in this way from time to time to
identify just how many people help you every day.
Show appreciation: When someone helps you out, in
whatever way, show appreciation. It sounds obvious, but doing so is an act of
humility and reminds you to value the contribution of others: the driver who
let you into her lane; the postman who delivered your letters; the person who
held the door open and the cleaner who vacuumed your office—they all count.
Value other people’s opinions: If someone makes a point that
challenges yours, suspend judgement. You can easily jump in and argue—but that
implies that they’re wrong and you’re right. How can you be so sure? Stop and
consider in what ways they may be right, too. This is true mindfulness in
action—non-judgemental awareness together with curiosity and respect.
9. Accept What You Cannot Change
Acceptance lies
at the heart of mindfulness. To be mindful means to accept this present moment
just as it is. And it means to accept yourself, just as you are now. It doesn’t
mean resignation or giving up. But it does mean acknowledging the truth of how
things are at this time before trying to change anything.
Here
is a workplace example. If you went £30,000 over budget, that’s a fact. It’s
already happened. As soon as you accept that, you can move forward and try to
deal with the situation. Lack of acceptance can lead to denial of the fact
(maybe causing you to go even more over budget) or avoidance (you keep skipping
meetings with your boss) or aggression (you vent your anger at your team
unnecessarily, adversely affecting relationships and motivation). Instead, you
can accept the situation, talk to the necessary people, learn from your
mistakes, and move on. Acceptance actually leads to change.
Personal acceptance is even
more powerful. Self-acceptance is embracing all facets of yourself—your
weaknesses, shortcomings, aspects you don’t like and those you admire. When you
accept yourself, you cut down on energy-draining self-criticism. You’re then
much better able to enjoy your successes and smile at your shortcomings.
Through self-acceptance, you can create a clarity of mind that allows you to
work on those aspects of yourself you wish to improve. The starting point of
self-improvement and personal development is self-acceptance.
10. Adopt a Growth Mindset
According
to Carol Dweck and her team at Stanford
University researcher,
people essentially adhere to one of two mindsets—a growth or a fixed mindset.
People with a fixed mindset believe that their basic qualities,
such as their intelligence and talents, are fixed traits. Instead of developing
their intelligence and talents, they spend their time hoping their traits will
lead to success. They don’t seek to develop themselves, because they think that
talent alone leads to success. They turn out to be wrong—brain science has
proved otherwise.
People with a growth mindset believe that they can improve their
intelligence and talents with effort. By applying themselves, they think that
they can get better. They see brains and talent as just the starting point, and
build on them with hard work and determination. Brain scans have actually
revealed that effort does lead to growth in intelligence and enhancement of initial talent over
time. People with this mindset have a love of learning and demonstrate greater
resilience. Success at work depends on having a growth mindset.
Mindfulness is about adopting a growth mindset. Mindfulness is
about giving attention to the present moment and not judging your innate talent
or intelligence, but being open to new possibilities. When you adopt a growth
mindset at work, you don’t mind getting negative feedback as you view it as a
chance to discover something new. You don’t mind taking on new responsibilities
because you’re curious about how you’ll cope. You expect and move towards
challenges, seeing them as opportunities for inner growth. That’s the essence
of mindfulness at work—believing that you can improve and grow with experience,
moving towards challenges, living in the moment, and discovering new things
about yourself and others.
Use the following four steps to develop a growth mindset, based
on research by Dweck and colleagues:
1. Listen to the voice of a fixed
mindset in your head. This is about being mindful of your own thoughts when faced
with a challenge. Notice if the thoughts are telling you that you don’t have
the talent, the intelligence or if you find yourself reacting with anxiety or
anger when someone offers feedback to you.
2. Notice that you have a choice. You can accept those fixed mindset thoughts or question them.
Take a few moments to practice a mindful pause.
3. Question the fixed mindset
attitudes. When your
fixed mindset says “What if I fail? I’ll be a failure,” you can ask yourself
“Is that true? Most successful people fail. That’s how they learn.” Or if fixed
mindset says “What if I can’t do this project? I don’t have the skills,” reply
with “Can I be absolutely sure I don’t have the skills? In truth, I can only
know if I try. And if I don’t have the skills, doing this will help me to learn
them.”
4. Take action on the growth
mindset. This will make
you enjoy the challenges in the workplace, seeing them as opportunity to grow
rather than avoid. Use the above system if you mind starts leaning towards the
fixed mindset.
Over time, you’ll find yourself habitually of a growth rather
than fixed mindset, leading to greater success and personal mastery that
before.
If this has made you think about how you
act, or if it has prompted any questions, then please feel free to add them as
a comment in the box below or to email me:- blueskycompany2@europe.com
About Dave I am a
coach; speaker; radio presenter and founder of The Blue Sky Company. I am
also a therapist and co-own a virtual light centre called The Crystal Spring. My
therapy work includes music therapy; reiki; crystal therapy
LINKS
I have recently discovered that a book
written by a friend of mine is available via Amazon so I would like to share a
link to that book with you. This lady is
an amazing person and I am sure that if you have enjoyed reading my blog you will
also find her work of interest.
And above all
Don't Predict The Future - CREATE IT!
DAve
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