Tag: Mindfulness

On the path of self-transformation

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Currently reading an excellent book in order to prepare for a ‘mindfulness in the workplace’ training I am going to attend, it struck me how easy it can be to bring calm and quietness into our daily lives. If you ever had anything to do with psychology, yoga, coaching, stress-reduction techniques or mediation you will certainly know this but bringing it all together to the point is what really makes a difference.

Did you for example know that:

  • What happens in your mind changes your brain and vice versa? You can actually train your mind to change your brain in lasting ways.
  • Small positive actions every day will add up to large changes over time? You will gradually build up new neural structures.
  • Human beings evolved to pay great attention to unpleasant experiences? This negativity bias highlights bad news and creates anxiety and pessimism. It takes about five positive interactions to overcome the effects of a single negative one.
  • Psychological pain draws on many of the same networks as physical pain and can thus trigger the same negative experience and suffering?

Little steps you can do on your path to change:

  • Turn positive facts into positive experiences. Bring your mindful attention to these facts, be open and allow them in. Let them affect you!
  • Hold these moments/experiences in awareness, being fully with them, savoring every moment. Focusing on your body sensations and emotions, let the experience fill your body and be as intense as possible so that both your body and mind can absorb it. Every time you do this, you build a little bit of neural structure. This will gradually and over time change how you feel and act.
  • Relax your body whenever you can by taking a deep breath for example or by focusing systematically on different parts of your body. There are many ways to train this from simple methods to yoga, meditation etc. Practicing ‘offline’ will allow you to foster and build strategies for your body which will then also be available to you when a stressful situation arises.

Let me finish for today with a quote:

“We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.” – Buddha Quotes (Sources of Insight)

Have an excellent day/evening/morning! Jenny

My “Best Moment Award”

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First-Best-Moment-Award-WinnerI recently received the “Best Moment Award” from Moment Matters for my post “The fight for attention in communication”. I must say that receiving two awards in one week really made me feel happy about the fact that people around the world actually read and appreciate what I have to say. This post – as all the others I write – got kicked-off by a real-life event where I had to deal with people who asked for a meeting and then were not really interested about what I had to say (or maybe it is a new way of multitasking where one ear listens to the person sitting in front and the eyes and brain concentrate on what the hands are writing to somebody else per e-mail). 😉

For me writing about mindful leadership and intercultural communication, being a humble ‘beginner’ on the path of awakening and meditation, it felt like a milestone to have received this award. Somehow, I moved forward (or maybe sideward) in this journey called life trying to look inside myself in order to pull out a “new and improved” me or better: the knowledge and peace that sits there anyways and that I was simply not able to hear until now. The “Best Moment Award” actually goes to people who

“live in the moment,
The noble who write and capture the best in life,
The bold who reminded us what really mattered –
Savoring the experience of quality time.”

Let the journey begin! Every second of your life deserves to be lived at its fullest! Thank you Moment Matters!

Let me now award 10 people or posts as I don’t know more than that (yet). I have selected:

  1. The post “Teach peace” written by Gina
  2. The wind horse blog http://windhorseblog.wordpress.com/ inspiring, amazing and touching words
  3. The post “Feather Inspiration” by Ruby
  4. Evan’s post “An Inspirational Snack” and also his blog
  5. Business Life Asia with this post on the Lunar New Year in Hong Kong
  6. The Post on “Metta” by Khalil Bodhi
  7. The Post “What we long for” from Mindfulbalance.org
  8. “A call for mindful leadership” from Ellen Langer
  9. The “Zen of doing” by Leo Babauta
  10. “Connecting with nature” by Sakshi Vashist

A mindful approach for dealing with procedures and processes

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wiresIf you ever worked in big structures, be it in the private or in the public sector, you will have encountered a lot of procedures and processes. Imagine you need a specific software or an upgrade to an existing programme in order to carry on with your work. Normally, you can’t simply buy the latter yourself but you have to follow a certain procedure, i.e. find, fill in and submit a form somewhere and then hope that you get what you wanted as quickly as possible. Or you want to hire the services of a specific vendor and thus have to work yourself through procurement and other regulations in order to be able to pay the bill after the job has been delivered.

I am sure you all know loads of examples where you had to overcome  – in your opinion – unnecessary hurdles to be able to simply deliver what you have been hired for in the required time frame. It is true that on first sight, procedures are complicated, slow down what could have been a straight forward job and might even end up in a lot of frustrations, if things get stuck somewhere and nobody knows anymore why and what to do to solve the problem.

Well, let me tell you one very important thing: take it easy! You cannot change the way things are set up anyways and usually there is a reason behind the procedures even if sometimes it is quite difficult to see this. Instead of losing your precious energy in the process, focus on tackling it in a mindful way. As I have outlined in one of my previous posts about the basics of mindfulness, patience and letting go are two main ingredients on your path to positively dealing with a tough situation.

Hence, if you encounter a process which is tedious and long and you have the impression that nothing moves forward:

  1. Take a step back and smile at yourself
  2. Remember that behind every procedure, online form and ‘hotline’ there are people just trying to do their job as much as you want to do yours.
  3. Be friendly with these people, it will make your life easier
  4. Concentrate your energy on things that you can influence and where your impact can be felt. These might be very small things, like helping a team member or pursuing another task.
  5. Pay close attention to what the frustration does to your body, i.e. how the stress can be felt and where.
  6. Let it go!
  7. Now you can write a message to your internal stakeholders telling them that there is a delay in delivering your objectives because of xyz reason but that you are doing all you can to speed things up.
  8. Let the things unfold, watch and breathe

Please try this out for yourself and let me know what you experienced. I have to say that for me it works very well… life itself is short, so enjoying every part of it and focusing on things that matter and that you can influence should be your main concern! Enjoy the rest of your week! Jenny

What it takes to lead multicultural teams

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Today I want to write a short note about leadership in international teams as I get a lot of questions about what is important, what works and what not.

Well, one thing is for sure: leading teams composed of members from the whole world is certainly a lot of fun but also takes a lot of effort so that it can function in the right way, meaning that team members can realise their full potential and don’t feel threatened, not understood or unwell.

In a multicultural team it is very important that different opinions, views, understandings are always:

  • addressed,
  • explained and
  • understood.

By operating that way, you ensure that problems are discussed directly when they arise, so that no frictions – in the worst case leading to dysfunctional teams – can arise. What you are trying to do is to achieve the best possible synergies, not the adaptation of some individuals to the ideas and concepts of the others (this would create an asymmetric team dynamic) or even the resistance of some team members to the perceptions of the others which can lead to team members wanting to leave the team).

As all the team members are from different cultural backgrounds, they will all have different values and norms. By discussing these and finding synergies, you will create an atmosphere of convergence and trust, where all team members will make an effort to find a common ground of understanding. This in turn forms the basis on which you and your team can work together… and achieve your objectives, of course.

Don’t expect the basis you created to be there forever though! It has to be re-negotiated every time when a new issue arises as what is acceptable to one person doesn’t have to be acceptable for the other. A good and functioning international team relies on constant discussions, give and takes as well as on working out the synergies to balance the different opinions, ideas and strengths in your team. All the time!

Mindful listening, empathy and of course patience are the main ingredients that support the above mentioned processes. Being interculturally competent is a main skill nowadays which is required in nearly all workplaces (and even at home when two different nationalities decide to live together under one roof); without it, living and working in our present world becomes difficult.

What do you think?

Resources: Check out:

  • This blog for example, very interesting articles on Germans/Americans
  • This blog for great tools and articles about culture and intercultural competence