Why Should You Start Meditating During Your Work?

It is no secret to anyone that work can generate a high level of stress. Long working hours and challenges that appear throughout the day can put us in a frustrating position. In the long run, this can directly affect the quality of our work and, more importantly, our physical and mental health. Staying healthy is one of the basic necessities to perform in our jobs, therefore, in recent years, meditation has become popular in the work environment.

This has come hand in hand with rethinking the workspace to make it more enjoyable, dynamic and to generate creativity when solving problems. Employers are putting the well-being of their employees a priority. In the long run, thinking about and opening these types of spaces is beneficial for both employees and the company.

Why meditate at work?

Mental health has gained prominence in recent decades and health systems have been paying more attention to its importance in quality of life. Before this, overwork and long hours were normalized, and although there is still a long way to go before all industries pay attention to the integral well-being of their employees, in the office environment it is more accepted and put into practice.

Also read: Do You Know the Causes Of the Dreaded Sleep Paralysis?

In 2019, the WHO included burnout syndrome in its list of diseases. This disease is better known as burnout and consists of physical, mental and emotional exhaustion as a consequence of chronic stress, stress in the face of work circumstances or dissatisfaction with respect to work. In turn, this can affect other diseases if it is not treated in time.

Meditation has a religious and spiritual origin, but over thousands of years, it has become a practice that aims to calm the mind to have more clarity. Among its benefits at work, we can find that it helps to combat stress when it is already present and that it is even a preventive way to attack these problems.

How can I meditate in my work?

One of the most common myths that revolves around meditation is that to access it you have to be associated in one way or another with a religious or spiritual practice. However, meditation has a more mental than spiritual quality. It is about approaching the serenity of the mind from stillness and from perspective. Meditation is often compared to sitting in front of a road while watching many cars go by. Cars are the thoughts that are in our head, it is impossible for us to stop them, to change their direction, it is about understanding that they are there and that we can observe them, take a step back and take perspective.

It is enough to take a break for 5 to 15 minutes to be able to perform a guided meditation. If this is the first time you are meditating, you can use applications such as Calm, Headspace, Smiling Mind or Aurea that have special programs that last between 15 and 28 days and that have guided meditations focused on work and its approach.

If you are an employee, we recommend proposing workshops and spaces for calm and meditation, and if you are an employer we recommend doing them. Your mind and the people around you will thank you.