I was recently speaking on Mindfulness at an event and it was wonderful to see how interested and engaged the audience was. For me, practicing mindfulness has worked like magic! It has helped me cope better with corporate stress, stay healthy, and have better personal and professional relationships.
There are various definitions of mindfulness but the underlying message is that of being “aware or present”. Mindfulness can be simply defined as a state when the mind is fully attending to what is happening in the moment. In today’s world, our lives move at a very fast pace. We pride ourselves in being able to multitask, but the reality is that we live in the continuous state of partial attention. Practicing mindfulness helps move us from the state of partial attention to the state of complete attention which in turn helps focus on the present better, think clearly without judgement and come up ideas that help us be a better version of ourselves.
So how does one practice being mindful? Here is what has worked for me:
- Learn to meditate: Mindfulness is about being present in the moment, to be able to experience the moment without being judgmental. And meditation is one of the techniques that can be used to practice being present. Our world is constantly changing and to lead in this constantly changing environment, we need to train our brain. Harness all the mental power we have to create an ecosystem that is good for us and our community. When you meditate, don’t judge how well you are doing. Know that as you start practicing, your thoughts would drift and that’s okay. The key is know when your thoughts have drifted and bring the attention back to the object. Start with 1 minute, three times a day and then slowly, you can increase it to 2 mins and then 5 mins. Remember you are training your mind so consistency is the key.
- Find ways to detox: To be able to focus, be creative, and have clarity of thought, it is important that we remove all distractions, we detox ourselves periodically. The best way to detoxify is to stop putting toxic things in our body and toxic thoughts in our mind. But that’s the ideal situation. Detox your body by eating healthy, exercising, cleaning clutter and getting a good night sleep. Detox your mind by clearing negative emotions, reducing screen time, meditating and finding the “doing nothing” time. More on detoxing in my next blog.
- Create a strategy to invest in yourself: Remember compassion starts with self. I had to learn to be kind to myself. Often in the list of people we need to take care of, our name is at the end. Which is the exact opposite of what it should be. So make sure to find ways of taking care of yourself: eat healthy, detox, exercise, and take time to heal yourself “both physically and emotionally”.
I would love to hear from you how you practice mindfulness.
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