The Odd Couple: Corporate Mindfulness and bringing awareness to the city

Corporate mindfulness.  At first glance this might seem like an oxymoron.  The two terms seem to be at odds, at opposite ends of some intangible scale of behaviour and philosophy.  How does the pursuit of career - the high speed, high pressure, high reward life of the city - relate to the practice of meditation?

I am sure that when you hear the term “meditation” there is an involuntary conjuring of images of hippies and eastern mystics sitting under Bodhi trees searching for enlightenment.  This is a common reaction and one which leads to the benefits of meditation being prematurely dismissed. The reality of meditative practice has little in common with these projected clichés.   Meditators cannot be pigeon-holed into stereotypes any more than corporate workers can simply be reduced to the pejoratively intentioned “suits”.

Mindfulness meditation at its core allows the practitioner to learn to come to terms with the stresses, pressures and difficulties of life.  By familiarising yourself with the difficulties, you develop a more skilful approach to the stimuli, robbing them of their power.  Mindfulness has been particularly successful in helping people deal with stress, self-criticism and anxiety that comes from constant pressure. 

Stress, self-criticism and pressure related anxiety.

Do these sound familiar?  Are these not the realities that face people in highly pressured and busy jobs?  We accept these unremitting pressures as normal but the cost to individuals and the companies they work for is immense.  Corporate burnout is a reality while stress related sickness at work has risen sharply.  It was estimated that 11.3 million working days were lost in the UK in 2013/14 due to stress, anxiety and depression.  This is an alarming statistic, but fortunately the need to combat stress is recognised throughout the corporate sector and meditation has proven to be successful.

Imagine if you were able to step outside the behavioural patterns that govern us.  Imagine how it would be to be able to observe how you related to the stresses of work load, deadlines and the desire for career progression, and respond in a way that alleviates rather than adds to the unavoidable pressures of your work.

Mindfulness gives the practitioner the ability to do this.  Beginning by learning to focus on the breath or how the body is physically responding, we anchor ourselves in the present moment, immediately changing our relationship to stresses and pressures.  Rather than worrying about a past that cannot be changed or a future that has not yet happened, meditators can short circuit the cycles of worry-self criticism-stress that exacerbate pressured workplace situations and bulging in-trays. 

Who in their professional life has not found moments of despair, where a tidal wave of paperwork and expectation threatens to overwhelm us?  This reality is often compounded by the undercurrent of self-criticism, thought patterns that further burden us and lead to us re-doubling our efforts as we edge towards burnout.  Mindfulness engenders a different attitude to these thoughts.  Meditators acknowledge but do not react to the destructive thought patters that drive many of us to try and perform until dropping.  The realities and pressures are not denied, in fact the very opposite.  Self-critical thoughts about not being able to cope and with the work and looming deadlines are welcomed, but seen simply as judgements, not reality. This kind of worry is debilitating personally and professionally, not to mention futile, so being able to let it go is essential for a more healthy and productive work force.

It must be understood that this is not a trick or a technique that can be quickly learned.  There are no shortcuts and the work of the mindfulness meditator is ongoing and requires dedication.  Seasoned meditators are still prey to the habitual and destructive patterns of thought but they can notice them and respond accordingly.  It is a discipline that has immediate effect but also has more profound, slow-burn rewards for those willing to practice.  Perhaps today you could find 10, 20, even 30 minutes in your day to meditate – to stop and simply be.  It may change your day, and perhaps your working life.

What's my motivation (or, why should I bother meditating at all?)

Mindfulness is everywhere. It's the buzz word in the fields of health, business, coaching and increasingly varied aspects of life, including sport, and creativity. In many ways this interest in mindfulness is fantastic. Awareness of the subject and its possibilities to help with the way we relate to our life and the world we find ourselves in is extremely important. It is true that mindfulness can help with our stresses and anxieties, our concentration and myriad other concerns, but understanding what motivates us to practice meditation is key in ensuring our continued engagement as practitioners.

Mindfulness is often (mis)sold as a cure all to all the modern world's ills. Stressed? Try Mindfulness. Anxious? Try mindfulness? Low morale at work? Try mindfulness. Want to increase personal motivation? Well here's a novel though, try mindfulness. Your cakes won't rise? Have you tired mindfulness?

The inherent problem in all this is that we set a clear goal to begin with – be it the removal of stress or anxiety through to better performance at work – and this becomes our sole reason to practice meditation. Once you have set a goal like this then you have also set yourself the possibility of failing. This is contrary to the whole process of mindfulness, which has no inherent goals or states to achieve, and can have serious consequences. Once meditation starts to throw up difficulties or challenges (as it will – we are getting to know the parts of our mind that we often suppress) then we can easily see ourselves as “failing” to achieve a set goal. This quickly leads to disenchantment and giving up.

Mindfulness meditation is not about fixing or changing anything. It is not about achievement or failure. It is teaching us to simply allow what ever arises to exist without suppression and without denial. It is a subtle shift in perspective that enables us to react skilfully rather than automatically.

The paradox here though is that there does have to be some motivation, otherwise why would we give up our time to sit on a cushion in silence and face our inner reality? Furthermore, the motivation has to be constantly reassessed otherwise, like the examples I gave above, we can become fixed on a simple cognitive reason for practicing wherein we can either be put off by not “achieving” a goal, or we can stop practicing because we have done what we set out to do.

The need to reassess was brought home to me recently whilst I was on a week long meditation retreat in Scotland. Five years ago I was drawn to mindfulness because of issues of stress and anxiety that were blighting my life. As much as I told myself I was not setting myself the goal of being “better” there was an underlying goal of reducing my suffering – this was the end in itself. After prolonged periods of practice I found that I did feel much happier, much more placid and the anxieties, while still there, seemed to have been turned down to a much lower volume. I had “won”. I had “achieved” my goal.

So here I was at a retreat centre in Scotland, ready for a blissful week of relaxation. But in this assumption I had set myself up for a fall. When I sat down to meditate I became aware of the well know signs of agitation, discomfort and even anger. Why am I stressed? I’m on retreat. There’s no pressure. Why am I tense? Why is my torso squeezing? I notice subtle striving in wanting a “relaxed” session. The physical response is a slight increase of tension. I try harder to “meditate properly” so I can loosen the knots that are forming in my stomach muscles. But it's not happening. The frustration grows. “But I've beaten this” I say to myself internally.

By pure chance, we were doing a practice on personal motivation so I tried to steer my mind away from fixing the difficulties and to motivate on why I practice. This is a subtle practice because we are not looking for a cognitive answer and this can be frustrating – as it was for me that day. I got up at the end of the meditation without an answer and still feeling stressed.

However, later that day I became aware of the physical sensations again, and I was just immediately aware that this is why I practice. I realised that whilst my outward and cognitive reactions to stress had lessened, they had not gone. I had merely pushed them down to a more subtle level. My body was screaming out in alarm physically, but cognitively I was all Zen and batting the messages of stress away. And then it came to me. The realisation isteslf is the reason I meditate. It's not about fixing but an awareness of how skilfully my mind maintains the very things that cause difficulty and how I can become aware of this and act accordingly. I keep coming back to the cushion, not because of something that clearly forms itself during the meditation, but because of a slow realisation that grows from awareness.

Strangely, this little bit of insight allowed me to take the pressure of myself for not having a clear, cognitive reason for practicing. I even felt less stressed. I realised I was influenced by a subtle goal of having a relaxed and peaceful practice and I was using this to ignore the messages my body was sending me. Stress is part of everybody's life and my goal of overcoming it for ever had merely created a suppression of natural periods of difficulty. It was only through reassessing and letting go that I was able to come to this realisation. For seasoned practitioners through to beginners, this constant assessment of WHY we practice is important and may just keep us going in the difficult times.

Mindfulness by numbers (and colours)

I have the artistic ability of a primary school child. This short coming in the doodling department is constantly exposed by my young daughter and her myriad requests for me to draw different animals. They all end up looking equally vague in regard to what they are meant to be – a sort of rogues gallery of evolutionary stages that didn’t quite make the grade to survive. Colouring in and managing to stay within the lines was, it turned out, the nadir of my artistic achievements. As we grow older we put childish things away so this meant that the joys of scribbling, colouring and doodling were lost to me. Until recently, if an adult had told me that they spent their spare time colouring in pre-drawn black and white pictures I’d have wondered if they were suffering from head trauma.

That was until recently when a good friend bought me “The Mindful Colouring Book”. My friends’ reaction to my embracing of mindfulness has been mixed over the years, ranging from indulgent scepticism to quizzical interest and it was in this spirit that the book was bought. I have to admit, while touched I was sceptical. The voice in my head saying “this is not mindfulness, this is the sort of thing that will make it easy for the doubters to sneer at”. I was both right and wrong.

The sneerers will sneer, especially when given something so seemingly easy to laugh at, but like so much of mindfulness, you dismiss it at quite a cost. Like all meditative practices, the mindfulness colouring book is an engrossing, experiential practice, one that combines mindful awareness, breathing and movement in a simple to do task (even for someone as artistically challenged as me). More than easy it’s really fun. Once I got past the bit of my mind recoiling at the idea of doing something we have label as “childish” I quickly found myself really enjoying the experience. The doing mode of mind was questioning “is this really mindfulness” but I let this go and immersed myself in the feel of the pencil, the sound of the it on the page and the sense of fulfilment and satisfaction as I filled the page with colour.

For those still doubting its mindful efficacy, simply colouring in – much like focusing on the breath – quickly exposed the endless undercurrent of chatter that is the doing mind. I could feel competitiveness in wanting to finish it quickly and well. I noticed thoughts about making sure I used the “correct” colours to ensure that it looked “good”. I could only imagine the looks of dumbfounded incomprehension if my colleagues (and perhaps even friends and family!) could see what I was doing.....a man approaching his 40s lying on the floor colouring in a picture of spirals and whirls. And, much like in mindfulness of breath, I was able to watch all of this and let it go and really enjoy 10 minutes of unadulterated experiential joy. I may even have had my tongue stuck out to the side in the stereotype of childlike concentration.

I didn't care and, I believe, neither would you if you actually gave it a try.

This is why I meditate

Mindfulness practice is something that we are not supposed to measure.  There’s no right, no wrong.  You can’t be “good” or “bad” at it, you are just in the moment or you’re not.  You begin, again and again, not in order to achieve a special state, but just to be exactly as you are right now.  I repeatedly use these terms when guiding practice and as best I can I do try to live by this idea of non-attachment and non-striving.

However, it will inevitably get the better of us.  We all have that doing mind that wants to know if this is “working” or bringing some tangible benefit.  This is quite natural.  After all, regular mindfulness meditation practice demands a radical shift in perspective and lifestyle as we repeatedly find time in our busy schedules to sit and be.  The question of “why do I do this?” will inevitably arise.  So for today, I’m going to indulge myself for a few moments and reflect on a profound change in my attitude that occurred to me whilst practicing:

“I take myself and my life way less seriously than I used to”. 

Is that it?  That’s the big change that makes all this sitting worthwhile?!? Well, yes.  Hidden in that phrase “I take myself less seriously” is the development of an attitude that embraces self-compassion, acceptance and a willingness to be imperfect and to fail.  It doesn’t mean resignation or not trying to achieve goals – it just lets us off the hook of not being allowed to fail.

This is the greatest gift that anyone could’ve given me and it arose spontaneously through my personal meditative practice, although I must emphasise the slowness of this change.  There was no “a-ha” moment or sudden flash of realisation.  This atttude was built imperceptibly, like the very slow flowing of grains of sand from one locale to another until a small mound of change in attitude is visible.

The great thing about mindfulness practice is that compassion, both towards other but crucially towards the self, develops naturally.  It is this resource that allows one to have self-belief and self-acceptance without reference or in comparison to others.  This means that your self worth is a lot more stable as it does not rely on competing or striving with an “other”, be they real or imagined (we all have that invisible ideal that drivers us endlessly whilst punishing us for not reaching impossible levels or goals we set and re-set).  Kristin Neff has some excellent work on this very subject, all of which is accessible, inspiring and reliable.  She points to the idea that self-compassion is obtainable and better for us as we do not need to see ourselves only in relation to the achievements or lack thereof of others. 

This compassion allows me to be imperfect, allows me to fail and to accept the “mud” that is part of my existence and this is why I take my life less seriously.  A perfect example came to me recently when teaching a group, several of whom really did not want to be practicing any kind of meditation.  During my talk I could see several people rolling their eyes and giggling amongst themselves.  I could also overhear disparaging comments about mindfulness and myself in their group discussions.  Previously this would’ve triggered my insecurities about not being good enough.  I would’ve either closed down or perhaps even become verbally belligerent, trying to win through force of knowledge and intellect.  Surprisingly I actually found their reaction amusing.  I could recall how at an earlier point in my life I too would’ve been the sceptic dismissing the idea of meditation as a valid practice.  Rather than rile me I actually was able to take it in good humour and most importantly, I didn't feel the need to assert my opinion or worth to others in order to feel comfortable. 

This, I believe, is because of the way I have shifted my perspective on myself, what I do and, crucially, what I need to be in order to be accepted.  I still “stumble”.  I still regularly find the old habits of wanting to do things right so other people will accept me rearing their head but they have less impact and I’m able to be me – warts and all – with a much higher level of comfort.

As Thich Nhat Hahn says: “To be beautiful means to be yourself.  You don’t need to be accepted by others.  You need to be yourself”.  Being myself is something I am now happy to be.

Tougher than it Sounds

"Well, that's just sitting on a cushion isn't it? Just common sense. Anyone can do that. Why would we need to employ someone to do that?"

These are the words of a senior manager I spoke to about adopting a mindfulness meditation as part the company's wellness programme. I had been asked to suggest cost-effective and innovative approaches for dealing with employee stress at a time when staff morale was low and staff sickness was rising monthly. I was taken aback by the dismissive response. I had couched the pitch in modern language, had presented empirical research findings of the efficacy of mindfulness for reducing stress in the workplace and had finished by listing a number of large corporations who use mindfulness for similar ends. I had not expected it to be an easy sell and I thought I had prepared for the inevitable scepticism with enough scientific evidence to satisfy the most cynical of individuals, but alas no.

Why such a response? Mindfulness, it would seem, is everywhere at the moment. Articles abound in the serious press, it is featured on the BBC, both on television and radio and there are endless documentaries and talks on the likes of Ted and YouTube. It permeates the mainstream to such a degree that it has even been lampooned on the latest series of gangster comedy-drama "Lillyhammer". Surely then people must know what mindfulness is and understand it?

Well, in my experience, not really. The TV ribbing and the attitude of the manager quoted above point to a wider problem that mindfulness faces. In reality many people may have heard of it but do not understand it, seeing it as easy, self-indulgent and a perfect target for satire. And this is the crux of the misunderstanding. It often boils down (once you get past the scepticism, references to hippies and the other such off-target clichés) the fact that people do not understand how difficult "just sitting on a cushion" can be and what the mind will do when one attempts to do this.

Not convinced? Still scratching your head and thinking "really, what can be so difficult?" Just try this little experiment - it will only take a minute.

Find a quiet place where you won't be disturbed. Take a seat, preferably on a cushion on the floor, but for now any surface that will bear your weight will suffice. If possible (unless you have back problems) ensure that you are seated away from any back support so that your spine is self-supporting. Close your eyes, and for a minute just concentrate on the breath as it enters and leaves your body. For a whole minute just focus with a sense of curiosity on the breath alone, simply coming and going...........not as easy as it sounds is it? Within seconds you probably noticed that the mind wanted to do anything but stay focused on the breath. There is nothing wrong here, this is what minds do. You are not failing or being rubbish at meditation, you are just being introduced to how difficult it actually is to let the mind rest without the need to do something, to search for distraction, to fill ever second with something that is not what is happening in this very second.
It is being alone with ourselves in the present that we are uncomfortable with.

Why would we be? Our whole culture is geared towards constant entertainment, striving, games, phones, food, stuff, stuff and stuff. You're a long time dead they say, but without stopping to pause you will miss many of the actual moments of the one life you get, the one life you are living. It can be uncomfortable stopping and getting to know the workings of our mind. We may need to confront fears and difficulties we have ignored and buried under a plethora of thinking and, well, stuff but speaking from personal experience, the positives far outweigh the negatives.