Organizations struggle with constant change. Or, rather, it’s the employees who struggle with the relentless changes that disrupts their lives and mounts their stress. The problem is there is never enough change management resource to truly help our employees. The responsibility of helping people through change, or ‘change management’ tends to fall upon leaders, change managers, project managers or human…
“Only the contemplative mind has the ability to hold the reality of what is and the possibility of what could be.” -Richard Rohr Reading the headlines these days is a sure way to experience fear and despair. This is especially true about climate change and the environment. After all, what good news is there when Scott Pruitt is finally forced…
A recent New York Times article entitled “Is the Answer to Phone Addiction a Worse Phone?” discussed the phenomenon of “going gray”: purposefully changing one’s phone screen from color to grayscale in order to make it a less alluring and addicting object. After a few days of going gray, the author notes, “It’s remarkable how well it has eased my…
“Drowning in information, starving in wisdom,” E.O. Wilson remarked at the turn of the century. Today, thanks to the stream of news and notifications we get through our smartphones and other devices, our mental lives are more fragmented than ever. In the words of Thich Nhat Hanh, it has never been easier to run away from ourselves. The “attention economy”…
An inch of water wobbles in the handmade bowl cupped between my hands. I raise the clay vessel to the cloudless sky, praising rains long past for nourishing the land, for allowing streams to flow, for recharging the subterranean aquifer whose miracle waters runs through my household tap. Although right now no water comes through the tap; something has gone…
When you were a child, did you ever chant words to yourself, over and over? Did you love the way that made you feel? I don’t think I’ve ever met a young child who isn’t entranced by the way a word or phrase can turn to magic through rhythm and chant. As we grow, we tend to suppress our love…
As part of our “Garrison Talks at the JCC” event series at the Marlene Myerson JCC Manhattan, meditation teacher and author Sharon Salzberg recently spoke with Dr. Chris Willard, a psychologist and educational consultant, and Dr. Mark Bertin, a developmental pediatrician and mindfulness teacher, about how to cultivate resilience in our children. Sharon Salzberg: Do you think it’s harder for kids these…
This post was originally published on July 5, 2018. We have chosen to feature this piece because the insights it contains are as timely as ever. We look forward to our first Social Justice Forum conversation with Rhonda Magee and Jonathan Wiesner on Thursday, June 18th. Please click here to register. For some, mindfulness practice inherently raises awareness of our…