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VOLUME XIII ISSUE NO. 8 | AUGUST 2021 |
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"Productive insight; clear (often sudden) understanding of a complex situation." Free Dictionary
Pop the bubble of conditioned thinking and emerge into the creative realm of "no absolutes," continuous change, uncertainty and unlimited possibilities.
Then, there can be innovation, adaptation and optimal performance.
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Performance and Open-minded Mindfulness |
Open-minded: questioning everything, accepting diversity and uncertainty.
Mindful: consciously aware; concentrated.
Foundation for blending process, project, engagement and knowledge management into a cohesive approach to optimize performance.
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Beyond Mindfulness to Optimal Performance in Life and Work
By George Pitagorsky
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Mindfulness is all the rage. Mindfulness meditation, just like yoga, has gone mainstream with coaches, authors, teachers, centers, books, and articles galore. It is growing in popularity because mindfulness and meditation practices provide a basis for stress relief, pain management, emotional and social intelligence, healthy relationships, understanding complex concepts, and effective performance.
Mindfulness is the natural capacity to observe objectively whatever is occurring within and without - thoughts, feelings, sounds, sights, and all the rest. Meditation trains the mind to be increasingly and effortlessly mindful and more able to concentrate on whatever you choose.
Uses of Mindfulness
There are two ways to use mindfulness, 1) as a medication to reduce unnecessary stress and improve performance, and 2) to go beyond conditioned living by gaining insight into the nature of mind and realizing freedom from unnecessary, self-imposed, suffering, leading to the realization of enlightenment, nirvana, awareness, or whatever you want to call it.
Self-imposed suffering is the result of a lifetime of conditioning with strong mental habits. For example, the habits of judging everything and everyone, catastrophizing, and perfectionism. Therefore, freedom can take a long time. So, you can skillfully use meditation as a medication, while avoiding dependence on it as a way of avoiding the root cause of the suffering. Mindfulness enables responsiveness rather than reactivity. It is a means to break bad habits.
Mindfulness does not stand alone. It is only part of the prescription. In the Buddhist Eightfold Path, meditation is combined with wisdom and skillful behavior. Mindfulness, along with effort and concentration, are the three aspects of meditation.
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Coaching for Happy, Resilient Effectiveness
George Pitagorsky offers individual and team coaching with a foundation in mindful awareness, systems and process thinking, and wisdom teachings.
The goal is sustained optimal performance - effectiveness, happiness, resilience, and adaptability.
Read more
self-awareliving.com
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Aware of Side Effects
More mindfulness means greater awareness of the subtle things that have been covered over by the distractions of everyday life. Those using mindfulness to manage pain and stress can have great success but should be aware that as one becomes more mindful, they may come in touch with unpleasant thoughts and feelings that have been hiding away in the back of the mind.
Some may find themselves unwilling to face their hidden "stuff." They stop meditating or use meditation techniques and spiritual concepts to bypass their emotions.
Intention
But isn't it smart to avoid painful negative feelings like physical discomfort, anxiety, anger, and depression? Well, that depends on your intention.
If your intention is to get relief, then go for it. Meditation as medication works, but anytime you push away feelings rather than fully experiencing them they resurface in one way or another. It's like taking a drug to alleviate an ache or pain. The drug wears off and the pain is still there.
If your intention is to get the root of your psychic pain and eliminate unnecessary suffering, then experience the pain anger, depression, without getting caught up in wanting things to be different than they can be. Let it be and let it go.
If your intention is enlightenment, that’s a whole other story, beyond the scope of this article.
A Middle Way
Watch it all from awareness. Train the mind to identify with awareness rather than ego. Realize that ego, while useful, is only one part of you. Use meditation until ego takes a back seat and mindful awareness becomes your natural way of being, then non-meditation becomes spontaneous perfection, and you live in flow.
The process of bringing mindfulness to bear is a life's work. At the same time there is nothing to search for, no destination. As a great Tibetan sage said "There is no Buddha elsewhere, look at your own face. There is nothing to search for, rest in your own place."
If you choose to take the journey, skillfully use meditation practice, psychotherapy, medicines, and distractions to make it a comfortable one (but not so comfortable that you fall asleep.)
Then, know that freedom from self-imposed suffering is realized when you rest in the present moment, free of clinging to what you like and pushing away what you dislike. You accept the things you cannot change, do something about the things you can change, and have the wisdom to know the difference between them.
Everything becomes clear. Life flows on.
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How to be Happy Even When You Are Sad, Mad or Scared:
How to be happy...How to be Happy Even When You Are Sad, Mad or Scared is available on Amazon.com. It is a book for children of all ages (including those in adult bodies). Buy it for the children in your life so they can be better able to “feel and deal” - feel and accept their emotions and deal with them in a way that avoids being driven by them. You can order the book at https://www.amazon.com/How-Happy-Even-When-Scared/dp/1072233363
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Performance and Open-minded Mindfulness |
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Open-minded: questioning everything, accepting diversity and uncertainty.
Mindful: consciously aware; concentrated.
Foundation for blending process, project, engagement and knowledge management into a cohesive approach to optimize performance.
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By George Pitagorsky
Success is measured in how well and how regularly you meet expectations. But what exactly are expectations, and how do you effectively manage them when multiple priorities and personalities are involved?
Using the case study of a Project Manager coordinating an organizational transition, this Managing Expectations book explores how to apply a mindful, compassionate, and practical approach to satisfying expectations in any situation. George Pitagorsky describes how to make sure expectations are rational, mutually understood, and accepted by all those with a stake in the project. This process relies on blending a crisp analytical approach with the interpersonal skills needed to negotiate win-win understandings of what is supposed to be delivered, by when, for how much, by who, and under what conditions.
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Managing Conflict in Projects
By George Pitagorsky
Managing Conflict in Projects: Applying Mindfulness and Analysis for Optimal Results by George Pitagorsky charts a course for identifying and dealing with conflict in a project context.
Pitagorsky states up front that conflict management is not a cookbook solution to disagreement-a set of prescribed actions to be applied in all situations. His overall approach seeks to balance two aspects of conflict management: analysis based on a codified process and people-centered behavioral skills.
The book differentiates conflict resolution and conflict management. Management goes beyond resolution to include relationship building that may serve to avoid conflict or facilitate resolution if it occurs.
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The Zen Approach to Project Management
By George Pitagorsky
Projects are often more complex and stressful than they need to be. Far too many of them fail to meet expectations. There are far too many conflicts. There are too few moments of joy and too much anxiety. But there is hope. It is possible to remove the unnecessary stress and complexity. This book is about how to do just that. It links the essential principles and techniques of managing projects to a "wisdom" approach for working with complex, people-based activities.
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