By Simon Chan – Founder of Mindfulness Power
“You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.” Jon Kabat-Zinn
Challenges in work and in life are inevitable. When they surface, our reactions can sometimes takeover, thus shaping the tone of our decisions and performance. This is where workplace mindfulness training has a powerful and helpful impact.
An intentional pause and brief moment of awareness can help you shift from an autopilot reaction to a response that supports clarity, focus and resilience at work.
Indeed, mindfulness isn’t just about relaxation and managing stress. It’s a practical resilience building and performance tool that can help sustain positive results and outcomes over time. Mindfulness allows us to meet challenges head on with compassion and steadiness, and respond with practical intention rather than a knee-jerk stress-fuelled reaction.
Essentially, it offers us a space to pause and make decisions from a place of clarity, which can fuel positive choices.
Throughout the workday, we navigate emails, deadlines and meetings. Each moment brings thoughts and emotions that influence how we behave. Through mindful awareness, we’re able to soften the emotional charge. We’re able to ‘let go’ and ‘accept’ current circumstances with greater ease, helping to maintain our resilience at work.
Practical 30-Second Reflection Exercise
Choose a work-related challenge that you may currently be facing. It could be an important or urgent task that needs completing, perhaps a meeting you are currently preparing for or an e-mail that needs refining.
Where appropriate and in a quiet space sitting comfortably with your feet flat on the floor, bring the situation to mind.
Notice your immediate thoughts and emotional reaction.
Pause.
Drop into present awareness through focusing on your breath for 20–30 seconds. Noticing the inhale and the exhale, and also the rise and fall of the abdomen.
Gently revisit the situation
Has anything shifted?
Is there a calmer, more grounded way you could respond now to the task at hand?
This small tweak and adjustment of dropping into present awareness and moving from reacting to responding is foundational to building resilience at work. Furthermore, it’s a skill that can compound, producing favourable outcomes over time with practice.
If you’d like to bring practical workplace mindfulness training or resilience workshops to your organisation, we offer taster sessions and tailored programmes for teams and leaders. Feel free to connect or reach out to explore options.