By Noel Brady (United Kingdom)
2014 would appear to be the year that mindfulness has come out of the shadows and moved into the mainstream. We have seen mindfulness sessions at the Davos Economic Summit in Switzerland, widely respected corporate leaders such as Arianna Huffington talked eloquently about mindfulness in her book ‘Thrive’ and a growing number of highly respected world class academics have published numerous research papers and highly readable books on the subject. It’s also easy to plug into this mindfulness movement via online applications such as Headspace and Smiling Mind.
The science (or neuroscience) behind mindfulness is now coming into focus. We are beginning to understand more clearly how it can affect the brain’s thinking process and, perhaps more importantly, how it can positively change the way the brain thinks, how it affects our emotional responses, and our future outcomes in life.
As an executive coach, I have been deeply interested in this whole field on mindfulness for many years, but have definitely noticed that discussions on the subject with executives and HR professionals have moved from the “are you crazy” to the “how can it benefit us.” Mainstream businesses are now looking at the latest research and some leading edge risk takers are even rolling out mindfulness programs, with extraordinary success.
Source: iCN Issue 10 (Business Coaching); pages 45-47
About Noel Brady
Noel Brady is a Senior Partner & Executive Coach of Inside Out®. He works across several business sectors, most notably financial services, FMCG, high technology and professional services. As London and New York are major hubs for many organisations.
