Peace. It does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble or hard work. It means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart. (unknown)
Do you ever feel like you’re about to pull a Milton Waddams and start the building on fire? Like every day is a series of fire drills, of running around frantically trying to squash one fire before sprinting on to the next? It’s no secret that this isn’t exactly the best environment for solid decision making.
So what can you do? Well, you may or may not be able to change the environment, but what you absolutely can do is get your mind out of fire drill mode, and into what Martha Beck calls your Core of Peace. How you respond to situations depends on what state of mind you are in when you encounter them. Everything is handled better when you are operating from your Core of Peace. Everything seems to slow down. You can process what people are saying to you and be present for the immediate issue. You feel more in control. You make better decisions. Most importantly, you don’t feel like you’re about to run screaming from the office.
“Well”, you may be thinking, “that’s just awesome Jess, but how can I go about achieving this Core of Peace?” One way you can “engineer” your Core of Peace is through meditation, and luckily there is a simple and easy way to meditate, even at work. What you are trying to achieve is a still and quiet mind. Since you might look a bit funny sitting at your desk in Padmasana with mala beads in hand, and since it’s tough to achieve peace when your cube mate won’t stop hacking and coughing, step one is to
- Find someplace quiet
Preferably go outside, although if you live in the Northeast like me this particular luxury is only available for about 3 months out of the year. If you can’t get outside, try to find an empty office or conference room, or even your car. You may want to get some calming music, or you may want to enjoy silence, the rhythmic sound of highway traffic, cicadas, whatever relaxes you. The point is that you do not want any distractions or interruptions.
- Breathe
With your eyes closed, breathe in deeply through your nose (count to 5), then exhale slowly through your mouth (count to 5). I like to envision drawing the stress up out of my pores and muscles during the inhale, then blowing all of that stress out on the exhale. Repeat until you feel your heart rate slowing.
- Quiet your body and your mind
To quiet your body, work slowly up from your toes, squeezing and releasing each muscle and body part, up through your legs, torso, and all the way up through your head. Don’t forget to keep breathing (you would be surprised how often we do).
To quiet your mind, you must give neither energy nor consideration to your thoughts. Ideally, and eventually, they will go away. But for most of us, thoughts are persistent little buggers and just won’t lay off. A method I find very helpful in this situation is to imagine my thoughts parading across my vision like a ticker tape, not trying to address or judge them but instead just labeling them for what they are “e.g. Fear, Anticipation, Worry, Excitement” and letting them go on by. There are lots of methods for dealing with these pesky thoughts, but the most important thing is to not let their presence upset you, but instead to just observe them and return to the moment.
- Keep this up for 5 to 20 minutes depending on the time you have available. Then, slowly open your eyes. Try to sit for a few more minutes before returning to work.
It is when you feel most tense and stressed that you most desperately need to operate from your Core of Peace. If you can practice this simple meditation on a regular basis, when you are actually in the throes of a stressful situation you will be able to return to your Core more easily, as you will be practiced and it will be familiar to you. So take time each day to stop what you are doing and take a meditation break. Ideally, meditation is practiced daily and becomes a real habit, allowing you to walk around every day with enough Zen to deal calmly with even the most rabid manager.
How do you engineer your Core of Peace?
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