This week in the second part of our series about Mindfulness we take a look at some ideas based on an article written by Tara Healey of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care
No matter where you work your working life can be full of drama…… the changing moods of colleagues, changing perspectives, computers that have endless updates, bosses who are mini dictators, and the thorny office politics. Add to that the issues of uncertainty with the 21st Century employment, uncertainty where it seems that no-one has job security. So who would blame us for thinking that we are living inside a ticking time bomb?
Most of us are dependent upon the income we receive from our jobs, and beyond that, we get up and go to work because we have a real desire to contribute to the greater good. Turning away from work is not an option for most of us, so we grit our teeth and throw ourselves into the challenges of the workplace.
Some of us find that we adapt to this quite well and we find that we are doing ok, we are somewhat successful and even satisfied. However there are many of us who are simply not happy at work, we find ourselves stressed and confused. On the surface we might appear to be effective but below the surface these stresses can make going to and being at work, a chore! This situation is not good for us nor is it a walk in the park for the people we are working alongside.
How can we change this and improve our working lives?
Probably the best place to begin is with the mind. Here are a couple of questions you can ask yourselves:-
Is my mind working to its best capability?
What is happening in my mind as the days go by?
How is my mind when I am at work?
We have amazing resources and possibilities within our mind, some of which are kindness, wisdom, insight, creativity and also tremendous drive. It can also be very annoying and sometimes we wish we could shut it down and get some peace.
ENTER MINDFULNESS
We may not be able to turn our mind off but we can train it to behave in a good and useful way.
If we get our mind to pay moment by moment attention to what we are doing and where we are, we can use mindfulness to assist us in choosing how we behave, in other words getting us out off auto pilot. So here are some thoughts about how to bring mindfulness into our workplace: we will find that we get relief from stress and change the way in which we work.
So here are a few examples of how we can train our mind to work better -
Are we seeing clearly?
Is what we are seeing really there or are we viewing through filters created by our thoughts and ideas of reality. Maybe we should really check how we seeing before we try to change what we are seeing.
A lot of the discomfort we experience at work comes from our own deeply held opinions and views – the lenses that we see through. Because we stick to these set patterns of seeing, every day living can appear limiting and miserable.
If someone acts in a different way to what we want we are suffering, if we do not get what we want when we want it we are suffering, if we believe that things should be a certain way and they are not the we are suffering.
So really what we should be considering is this:- does what we see really come from the workplace or is it because we have put our default beliefs into play.
Our mind will try to make things conform to its own ways of perceiving things and will become distressed if it experiences resistance.
A contact told me that a few years ago she had a colleague who would do certain things in a particular way and that constantly caused my contact aggravation and she thought that if this person did things differently with would create a much happier / more productive situation.
Eventually my contact realised that she was expecting change in her colleague but in fact she had the ability to choose how she felt about the other person.
The upshot of this was that when she had the realisation that she did not require the colleague to change because she had.
It is worth noting that
“To discover the ways of perceiving you’re apt to blindly apply, experiment with keeping yourself curious, attentive, and receptive” Tara Healey
When you find that your dropping into an old and familiar pattern, check with yourself to see what is going on. Notice the physical and emotional feelings and the stories that you are creating within your mind.
However do not chastise yourself for having them, accept that they are there, and then make the decision that moving forward you are going to be in control, not the pattern.
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About Dave I am a coach; speaker; radio presenter and founder of The Blue Sky Company. I am also a therapist and my therapy work includes music therapy; crystal therapy and Reiki. Currently I am studying towards a Diploma in Mindfulness
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