I was taking the dog out for a walk today on a grey gloomy winter morning feeling a little like it was a chore – he normally has a dog walker 3 days a week but over Christmas we have walked him every day. Then I met another dog walker a hundred yards or so up the track and he chatted and said what a wonderful day it was for a walk and to enjoy it.
And he was so right. It may have been grey but the woods I was in were still and there was a sense of peace and quiet away from the hustle and bustle of traffic (a dim sound in the distance). The deciduous trees were showing off the shapes of their bare winter branches and the conifers were dark green. I, and needless to say the dog, thoroughly enjoyed our walk.
As we went down a path covered in leaves through the forest this experience made me think how in our working lives in order to achieve the best results we actually should be living in and enjoying the moment. In a negotiation, in any meeting, paying full attention and fully concentrating on what is going on at the time as opposed to worrying about the previous or a future meeting – or something else entirely – tends to lead to far better results. A Cherokee Indian Proverb advises “Don’t let yesterday use up too much of today.”
There was an interesting study in 2010 at Harvard University, described in this Harvard Gazette article Wandering Mind not a Happy Mind which starts People spend 46.9 percent of their waking hours thinking about something other than what they’re doing, and this mind-wandering typically makes them unhappy. So says a study that used an iPhone Web app to gather 250,000 data points on subjects’ thoughts, feelings, and actions as they went about their lives.It describes how Unlike other animals, humans spend a lot of time thinking about what isn’t going on around them: contemplating events that happened in the past, might happen in the future, or may never happen at all. Indeed, mind-wandering appears to be the human brain’s default mode of operation.
My dog clearly had no problem with being completely in the present but for me it was more difficult, and I had to make a conscious effort to do so and as Buddha advised “Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.”
This short blog by Jenny Dearborn senior vice president and chief learning officer at SAP captures this need for “mindfulness” at work commenting that A stretched-thin, stressed-out workplace is not the workplace of the future. and Studies have found that mindfulness at work can increase engagement, productivity, innovation, and measurable business results.
It’s all very well having a great negotiating plan and a strategy but as Helmuth von Moltke the Elder (Chief of Staff of the Prussian army before World War 1) famously said No battle plan survives contact with the enemy. So, we have to be alert to what is happening, picking up the nuances of speech and body language being presented to us – and it is impossible to do this when not really concentrating on the meeting at hand.
Apart from anything else, like me on my walk, we get much more out of living in the present at work and indeed at home and fully appreciating what is going on around us – to quote Ralph Waldo Emerson Life is a journey, not a destination.
Here in this context is a profound and relevant quote from children’s literature and A. A. Milne:
“What day is it?” asked Pooh.
“It’s today,” squeaked Piglet.
“My favourite day,” said Pooh.”
And he was so right. It may have been grey but the woods I was in were still and there was a sense of peace and quiet away from the hustle and bustle of traffic (a dim sound in the distance). The deciduous trees were showing off the shapes of their bare winter branches and the conifers were dark green. I, and needless to say the dog, thoroughly enjoyed our walk.
As we went down a path covered in leaves through the forest this experience made me think how in our working lives in order to achieve the best results we actually should be living in and enjoying the moment. In a negotiation, in any meeting, paying full attention and fully concentrating on what is going on at the time as opposed to worrying about the previous or a future meeting – or something else entirely – tends to lead to far better results. A Cherokee Indian Proverb advises “Don’t let yesterday use up too much of today.”
There was an interesting study in 2010 at Harvard University, described in this Harvard Gazette article Wandering Mind not a Happy Mind which starts People spend 46.9 percent of their waking hours thinking about something other than what they’re doing, and this mind-wandering typically makes them unhappy. So says a study that used an iPhone Web app to gather 250,000 data points on subjects’ thoughts, feelings, and actions as they went about their lives.It describes how Unlike other animals, humans spend a lot of time thinking about what isn’t going on around them: contemplating events that happened in the past, might happen in the future, or may never happen at all. Indeed, mind-wandering appears to be the human brain’s default mode of operation.
My dog clearly had no problem with being completely in the present but for me it was more difficult, and I had to make a conscious effort to do so and as Buddha advised “Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.”
This short blog by Jenny Dearborn senior vice president and chief learning officer at SAP captures this need for “mindfulness” at work commenting that A stretched-thin, stressed-out workplace is not the workplace of the future. and Studies have found that mindfulness at work can increase engagement, productivity, innovation, and measurable business results.
It’s all very well having a great negotiating plan and a strategy but as Helmuth von Moltke the Elder (Chief of Staff of the Prussian army before World War 1) famously said No battle plan survives contact with the enemy. So, we have to be alert to what is happening, picking up the nuances of speech and body language being presented to us – and it is impossible to do this when not really concentrating on the meeting at hand.
Apart from anything else, like me on my walk, we get much more out of living in the present at work and indeed at home and fully appreciating what is going on around us – to quote Ralph Waldo Emerson Life is a journey, not a destination.
Here in this context is a profound and relevant quote from children’s literature and A. A. Milne:
“What day is it?” asked Pooh.
“It’s today,” squeaked Piglet.
“My favourite day,” said Pooh.”
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