Meditation and other strategies to start NOW!

WHAT IS MINDFULNESS?

Mindfulness is the awareness of being in the moment for yourself and your environment. It has the ability to allow people to focus on being present and ‘in the moment’. Check out this super cool video on why mindfulness is a superpower.

WHY IS MINDFULNESS IMPORTANT TO YOUR EMPLOYEES?

Practicing mindfulness in our lives has huge psychological benefits on the individual and has the ability to cultivate aspects of a healthy workplace through improving wellbeing, manifesting strong relationships through communication and enhancing creativity.

WHY SHOULD EMPLOYEE WELLNESS PROGRAMS OFFER MINDFULNESS?

The leading use of mindfulness in the workplace is geared towards stress management.  Who at work has never complained of stress at one point in time?  It is obvious that coping with an issue such as stress is instrumental in the workplace and initiatives should be actively embedded in any workplace wellness program across all sectors. Employee wellness programs should include some level of mindfulness training as it can have a multitude of benefits in and out of the workplace. 

SOME BENEFITS INCLUDE

  1. Resilience and ability to deal with challenging situations 
  2. Ability to understand emotions, stress levels and how to manage them
  3. Reduction of burnout and strategies to cope 
  4. Higher job performance rating 
  5. And so many more!

HOW TO PRACTICE MINDFULNESS

There are several strategies that can be adopted to include some mindfulness in your day

MEDITATION being the most well known. Not sure if meditation is right for you? Take 10 minutes and try this guided meditation for yourself 

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Keep in mind daily meditation is not the only way to experience more mindfulness at work.  Here are a few ways to include mindful experiences to cope with stress and have the best day you can at work.

  1. Be present: Increased awareness at the start of your day and say that you want to be engaged and conscious of what you are doing in your day.
  2. Single-tasking: Focus and give your attention to one task at a time.  Nobody can actually multi-task effectively and efficiently. One idea is to keep a schedule dividing your day in time blocks where you plan to work on a given task in that given time.
  3. Use reminders: Being on auto-pilot and running through the motions of the day is the exact definition of being ‘UNmindful’. This state prevents us from being creative, think of new ideas, plan something or respond appropriately.  Using small reminders throughout the day can be all you need to shake OFF the auto-pilot mode and switch ON the mindful-mode.
  4. Positivity and gratitude: As humans, we have a tendency to focus on the negative and linger our thoughts on bad experiences. Our goal is to now target our mindset on the areas that ARE going well and what we ARE grateful for having.  We all learn lessons from bad experiences, focus on the lessons and change your own narrative based on these learnings.
  5. Self-learning: instead of focusing on the skills you don’t have, focus on developing or  enhancing NEW skills. Growth in intelligence and enhancing talent can be done through additional learning and being open to new opportunities.