Why Meditation Works and How it Benefits the Workplace The business world can be a stressful place, which is why many business people extol the benefits of meditation.
By Michael Mamas Edited by Dan Bova
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
For many people, meditation has a negative connotation. To be honest, there was a time when I would've seen meditation in that light. But after learning to meditate, and practicing it for some time, my opinion about it has completely changed.
For those of you looking to improve your health, clarity of mind, sense of well-being and productivity, meditation is for you.
At first glance, it's completely reasonable to wonder how one activity could have so many benefits. But the answer is quite simple: Profound rest. After a good night's sleep, different aspects of daily life improve. Our mind is clearer, we feel better, and we are just healthier in every way. Meditation provides a much deeper and more profound level of rest. As a result, every aspect of our life is rejuvenated.
The business world can be a very stressful place. The pressures can be enormous. The demands on the mind, physiology and emotions can be overwhelming. That is why many business people extol the benefits of meditation.
I am speaking of a very specific type of meditation, the Surya Ram Meditation. There are meditations that force people to concentrate; invite people to contemplate; or suggest that people hold their attention on the present moment. There are even meditations that induce a hypnotic state.
What we are talking about here is a meditation, which allows such a significant level of rest, that even the deepest of stresses and strains are released. It is also a meditation that does not impose any sort of artificial or unnatural state. Instead, it allows the physiology to enter a state that is very normal and natural. Actually, whether we meditate or not, we enter that state several times a day. The problem is these brief moments are not sufficient.
Related: How Transcendental Meditation Improves Your Decision Making
We can enjoy this systematic approach to entering that meditative state for 20 minutes, twice daily. That is a sufficient amount of time to bring about the profound benefits. For some business people, the resistance to learning to meditate is because they don't want to take 20 minutes twice a day from their busy schedules. However, once they have learned and practiced the meditation, the benefits are so obvious that they tend to do it regularly.
After experiencing the benefits of regular meditation, a number of businesses have structured meditation time into their daily office hours. They realize that the improved productivity, harmony in the workplace and employee health and satisfaction more than justifies the allotted time.
One of the added benefits of meditation is the enhanced sense of one's own self. It's something that is difficult to describe until it's actually experienced. We become more settled and established in our own being, our own identity as an individual. We become more stable within ourselves. It's as if we're standing on a firmer foundation as we go through our day. The remarkable thing is that we also become more flexible and more adaptable. It can almost sound like a contradiction - more solid and established -- but more flexible and resilient.
Related: 3 Tips for Integrating Meditation Into Your Schedule
It's like the difference between a kite with and without a tail. A kite without a tail just spins wildly. Given a tail, the kite is more stable and soars higher into the air. Like that, through meditation, we become more solid within ourselves, but also more dynamic, soaring ever higher in the workplace.
When more fulfilled within ourselves, things like pettiness, irritability, negativity and anxiety melt away. Interestingly enough, these improvements happen so naturally, the transformation occurs in a manner that almost goes unnoticed. That's because we're not imposing some false behavioral mood, attitude or approach to our lives. It is just a natural blossoming or emergence of our own true nature. We come to realize that most of our undesirable, ineffective and counterproductive qualities are the result of the same thing: Deep fatigue in the physiology. That fatigue is the result of stresses and strains that accumulate over time. Meditation releases all of that.
Related: Meditation, Mindfulness and Sleep Can Radically Impact Your Success
It's a huge relief to realize that down deep inside, we are all fine. It's just the stresses, strains and fatigue in the physiology that create an unhealthy relationship with life.
In fact, regarding my business, someone once asked me, "Where do you find all of those incredible people?" I responded by saying, "Everyone is incredible. I just provide the method through which people naturally discover their own true, incredible nature."
