Mindfulness and more: Sitting idle for better productivity.

2nd April 2011, Ravi Shastri’s voice and goosebumps, “Dhoni Finishes off in style… India lifts the world cup after 28 years.” This was, and I thought it would forever be, the best moment of Indian cricket I will witness my entire lifetime. But the t20 world cup 2022 gave me another such moment in an India Pakistan classic, it was an intense match, high intensity emotion, drama and Harsha Bogle’s commentary, “Ashwin, goes over… India win a famous win.” Everyone was celebrating the victory that Virat snatched out of the claws of defeat.

Why this Story to begin with??

You can say I was a little disappointed with the Asia Cup match between India and Pakistan being washed out due to rain interruptions today ( the day I started writing this post). Or maybe because whenever I talk I can’t, just can’t leave music, cricket or comedy out of the conversations. My students have witnessed a few Audiology concepts explained using examples from cricket infused with satire, at times.

Well getting back to where we were, although these reasons played their part in the opening of this post the real reason was an interview of R.Ashwin which I saw as an Instagram real where describing Virat Kohli’s knock he said ” I looked at Virat and his eyes seemed like he was possessed.” Now possessed here meant he was functioning at another level, we all saw he was that shot he played off Haris Rauf was one of a kind, people said things along the lines of nobody could have played that short but Virat Kohli. That state of being, as I recently came to know is called FLOW.

FLOW ??

Being in the zone, zoned out, Runner’s high, Peak experience, forever box, Blissed out, are some of common names for being in this state a part of being in this state is described in Disney’s animated movie Soul

Flow is a mental state that occurs when someone is fully immersed in an activity. It can happen during a variety of tasks, such as learning, being creative, or participating in a sport. When in a flow state, people pay no attention to distractions and time seems to pass without any notice.

I was introduced to this term in the book “Dopamine detox” it said when you do something (obviously productive) in a routine over a period of time you may experience flow. Which made sense to me, you need to religiously, with discipline do something to be able to achieve peak performance i.e. flow, like Virat Kohli did in that match, we all know how disciplined he is, when it comes to anything even remotely close to cricket. So, it requires hardwork, dedication and discipline to achieve flow, who wouldn’t want to achieve this state it makes you significantly more productive, reduces learning curves, you can save a lot of time and be ahead of the competition,etc., I know I would, and then I came across something, something that made me giggle in disbelief, something I disregarded as soon as I read, meditation can help you achieve a flow like state. Something that I know could only be achieved by doing something, working hard, with discipline and perseverance, not by any other way but, by doing something, was said could be achieved by merely sitting still for about 10-30 minutes daily, this surely had to be a joke, how can wasting time sitting idle make you more more productive??

I finally gave in and fell flat

If someone would have told me I can access a flow like state without doing anything I would have laughed him off, and blocked him from my life. But then book after book video after video meditation remained a constant in the equation of life, and I constantly avoided it, until one day around 4 weeks back I read a book that changed how I perceived time, productivity and life in general. The author of the book was like the most productive person I ever came across, working on, like 5-6 assignments at any time and handling them well, a teacher, a successful author, a consultant, business owner, story teller, and much more and he suggested taking up meditation as a daily habit, well if he said it works on productivity, what is the harm in trying it??

I referred to a lot of books and videos, to my amusement meditation was the simplest thing to do, just sit relax and observe your breath, just pay attention to the inhalation and exhalation easy-peasy right ?? WRONG turns out as always the practical is much harder than theory, what seemed easy enough on reading or listening to was the hardest thing ever. The mind just couldn’t be still, it wandered and wandered and went anywhere it wanted to. I have never had such vivid thoughts when I needed them, but now when I want to peacefully just listen to my breath for a while, it won’t shut down, my thoughts were on steroids, I understood the meaning of this hindi song “Bavra mann dekhne chala ek sapna” in a different light. 2 minutes felt like 2 hours it was like time stood still and mocked me in my face. I was consistently looking at the stopwatch and praying for my misery to end, it did eventually. At the end of my first attempt at meditation I was left with frustration, anxiety and a question. Did I do it right ??

You are doing it right, don’t worry

After my first attempt failed miserably, “How to train your mind” an audiobook rescued me, it said that I was doing it right, and these things are bound to happen, your mind needs to wander before it settles into calmness. What you should do till the consistent calmness and attention towards your breath is achieved, is get your attention back to your breathing when you notice it wandering off. I have experienced it a lot and I always come back to focusing on my breath, although there is something that I noticed after a while of making this a routine, the wandering did reduce considerably, also if my mind wanders I happen to catch it much faster than before. My belief is, there will come a time when the wandering would be virtually nonexistent and I would meditate with full attention on my breath for 10 minutes, here is to being hopeful.

The Blissful journey of finding flow

Being an Audiologist and speech language pathologist I have always been taught about evidence based practice, I stepped into meditation with the aim of increasing my productivity and finding flow.

Along the way to find evidence on this I studied a few articles which suggest the following:

• Meditation practices have unequivocally demonstrated their ability to enhance concentration and attention. This unwavering focus is a crucial ingredient for achieving the sought-after state of flow, where individuals become fully engrossed in their tasks.
• By alleviating anxiety and self-consciousness, meditation provides a sense of tranquility and unburdens the mind of distractions. This optimal mental state paves the way for experiencing flow, as anxiety and self-doubt are well-known hindrances to achieving it.
• Mindfulness meditation, in particular, cultivates heightened awareness of bodily sensations and movements. This heightened sense of bodily presence further amplifies the sense of agency and control, core characteristics of the flow state.

These are just a few handful insights on how meditation helps with finding flow.

Benefits other than Flow

Meditation requires us to focus on a simple task and specifically requires simple task because our attention can only waver during simple task, tasks those require a lot of attention to begin with there are less chances of your attention wavering and hence will not provide the same benefits.

As we all know trying to focus on a simple tasks, like breathing or walking or sipping a cup of coffee, black coffee for me to be precise we are training our mind to focus on just that moment, just the present hence it reduces anxiety as in anxiety we are lost in worrying about the future or reliving the past in mostly disgust in my case.

Meditation also requires you to get your wavering attention back to breathing which means you train your mind to wander less when you want to do something productive

Most of the self talk we do is negative as per the audiobook “how to train your brain” and for every negative interaction we require about 5 positive interactions for balance so we should either increase positives or decrease the negatives. Meditation helps reduce the negative self dialogue as when we focus completely on a particular activity the negative dialogue tends to shut down. Imagine the positives we can reap out of it.

The increased calmness and awareness helps you understand yourself and also those around you better, that helps you empathise more and understand the emotions and feelings of others better, which may also result in controlling your emotions better, meditation will never let your emotions take over and make you do things you’ll regret later because you’ve learnt self awareness and control you are the one in command.

I have felt the calmness, and the awareness, it is bliss from where I see it, I sincerely hope though that the other benefits are on the way, here is to being hopeful again.

My climb into the bliss

After the initial hiccups with my thoughts going haywire when I sat trying to concentrate on my breath, I believe I have made some progress and have seen some benefits of practicing this daily. How did I reach here, well my crutches along the way once again, were pages from Atomic habits.

While sitting idle was difficult, I mastered the art of showing up, at least for 2 minutes daily focusing on the breathing or mindfully doing something simple, mostly sipping from my morning cup of black coffee. I paired meditation with something I do daily either while sipping my coffee I can’t ever skip the morning coffee so mindfully drinking it can be easily added on a regular basis, or I do it first thing in the sound proof Audiometry room, SOUND PROOF, less distraction even my profession wants me to meditate.

Kehte hain agar kisi cheez ko dil se chaho … to puri kainaat usse tumse milane ki koshish mein lag jaati hai

Om Shanti Om 🤣

Reaching the end 😓

Meditation can be of various kinds although most of them work on the same principles, I prefer either sitting and breathing or mindfully doing something simple although it has given me a lot back in just a few weeks, I want to explore the realms of meditation more in search of FLOW, other benifits are great add ons on the way to flow. It was found in a study that Tibetan Buddhist with 30000 hours of meditation could put their brain in a radical state of consciousness which was very close to FLOW. while 30000 hours is a really long time and I don’t really know if I will ever reach there what is the harm in starting especially if there are a lot of other benefits along the way.

Meditation also helps you live more, as when you are self aware and can concentrate on the present moment your life feels richer experiences are better and you make vibrant memories, although this is just my opinion. Start young live healthy maybe you can make it to the golden 30000 hours.