11 January 2016
In
Change, Coaching, Comfort Zone, Communication, Emotions, Habits, Lead From Within, Leadership, Life, Organizational Leadership, Personal & Professional Development, Sales Leadership, Talent Management
By
Lalita Raman
One of my friends is into mindfulness and has engaged in it for past several years. In almost every conversation with him, I have observed that he gets irritated with something that has happened or something that is about to happen. Yet, he is quick to clarify that mindfulness has helped him and he swears by it. I am not sure why he offers this clarification every time.
Mindfulness and courses on mindfulness has grown in geometric progression in the past two years. Anything with a mindfulness angle surely gets noticed.
⇒Are all those who talk about mindfulness and those who promote mindfulness, always mindful ?
⇒How can we be mindful in the time driven world of ours? Does it necessarily involve hours of practice, silent retreats and meditation?⇐
I read an interesting article on HBR that piqued my interest
The title of that article was Mindfulness -Search Inside Yourself
It talks about "just six seconds of mindfulness" can make you more effective. The crux of this article which caught my attention is that you can do away with the mental baggage, during your day, when you approach each new situation with a present, focused mind. You achieve a calm and agitation free mind by consciously taking one
“I’m stuck.â€
“I feel I’m running on a hamster wheel with no scope to get off. “
“I’ve no time to think or look at anything else because I’m always swamped with so many things I’ve to do.â€
How often have you felt this way or heard your friends, partners, colleagues say this at various points in your day or their day?
Several of my coaching relationships start at this point.
We all go through this at several points in our life or at specific points in our day.
Is it a regular phenomena or something you feel at specific points in your day or specific periods of time at a stretch?
If you look around you, you’ll realize many people are stressed out or at a breaking point.
What are these stressors ?
Is it with work?
Is it with some transitions that you are going through at work or in life?
Is it with overall life in general in terms of your dreams and priorities?
What is the cause of these stressors?Â
Is it fear of being dispensable and losing your job or not being able to advance in your area of talent? Or being forced on account of lack of choices ?
What about your day-to-day stressors? Is it because you are
Pauline is sitting at her desk immersed in her own thoughts and going down the memory lane of her past 30 years.
Pauline still remembers the big day when she was 8 years old. She is waiting for her big day, the final competition for being declared "The Best Child Dancer under 10" in the biggest competitions held by a TV channel in her country. Â She is passionate about dancing and spends hours on her practice. The Finale arrives and she gives a mind-blowing performance. She wins the competition. She gets accolades, awards, appreciation of her performance. Â She is exhilarated.
A smile returns to her face when she thinks about this moment.
She has won many awards thereafter not only in her country but also internationally. Dance is her passion but Pauline has always kept it as a hobby rather than make a career out of that. She is multi skilled and has never had any issues in trying out diverse things and out shining in each of those.  She is currently a Senior Executive with a top multinational  - she has spent over 10 years with this Company and has grown in her role.  She is one of the top performers and
