There are infinite possibilities for the meditative mind. Just one meditating person can change the culture of a business. Just one meditating person can affect an entire community. Groups of meditating people can change the mindset of an entire country. And as Sadhguru has often promised, if only one percent of the population becomes meditative, we can change the entire world and transform it into the kind of place we all truly want it to be.
John Lee, movie editor on the recent hit film, “Inception,” said in an interview, “It was very stressful cutting a $160 million dollar film with all the technical challenges of shooting in different formats, not to mention the labyrinthine plot. The crew often remarked on how calm I was. I could not have cut that film if I had not been doing my (meditation) practice.
Michael Grimley, CEO of Voice Prism said in an interview, “I’m a very passionate entrepreneur. I get very excited about what I’m doing. I put my heart and soul into the business. There is so much volatility in a start-up business like this, so I was having wild emotional swings. This was not only affecting me but also my team and my family. The biggest benefit that meditation had for me was giving me control over my emotions. I’ve always been a collaborative manager and listened to ideas. The number one thing is that I’ve been able to control my energy more. If a negative thing happens, I would typically get very angry and upset. Even if I tried to control my external response, such as what I said or my body language, there was no doubt that the negativity would ooze out somewhere. But after meditating, I still don’t even have to try to control those emotions. If something not so good happens, I don’t reactive negatively. It’s amazing. It has improved stability and morale at the company, since the team hasn’t had to deal with my
mood swings.”
One of the main objectives of Project: Bloom is to encourage employee self-development. We do this by offering lunch n’ learns each week, where someone with expertise on a particular topic shares his or her knowledge. Topics include such things as financial planning, Excel and PowerPoint skills, business and email etiquette, how to prevent identity theft, email and file encryption, and how to back up the files on your computer. Another great program is the Blooming Book Club. Our Project: Bloom budget paid for the books, and we alternated between business-related books and self-help books. Each book was read and discussed over a period of three months, with a club meeting once each month over lunch. Membership in the book club was limited to 15 people, so there was usually a waiting list. In fact, at one point we had so many employees on the waiting list that we started a second club. We read some interesting books together such as, Gung Ho, HR from the Heart, and Rich Dad Poor Dad.
Michael Gremley, the CEO of a Voice Prism who was interviewed for Project: Bloom told me that meditation had helped him change the focus of his business. “The story of the business is probably the biggest change that occurred because of learning to meditate,” said Michael. “As I became more aware, the decisions I made and the priorities I had changed. We have a software technology that measures stress and emotion in the voice. We tried many different applications for it: insurance risk assessment, call center monitoring, consumer research, and entertainment. We were working on a believability meter that could appear on TV for politicians, athletes, and movie stars for interviews. It was an interesting business idea, but it became unattractive to me after I was meditating. I realized it was part of America’s problem, the sensationalism of celebrities, and I just didn’t want to be part of that. I wanted to do something that would help people. Instead, I came up with the idea to screen active military personnel for post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as to include our technology in the VA’s suicide hotline. So, it was a dramatic shift in priorities of the business. Becoming more of a force for good in society rather than whatever it takes to maximize shareholder value. All of this has come at a time in the economy when things are the most volatile. Things have been tough for the business, and yet as volatile as things are right now, I’ve been absolutely calm internally through the past couple of years.
A cross-sectional health study was performed in 2010 on more than 500 yoga and meditation practitioners who reported on physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing as well as medication usage. The study found that over 50% reported health improvements ranging from lowered blood pressure to alleviating chronic headaches and insomnia. The results clearly demonstrate that a regular yoga and meditation practice leads to significant decreases in many chronic aliments.
Project: Bloom transformed our office so that it felt more like play instead of work. We had a Game Club that met regularly at lunch in a conference room. We brought our lunches, and played cards and other games. I remember sitting with the Director of Training and several other people playing the game Operation. We each took turns using oversized tweezers to remove small plastic bones and organs buried in the game board. If you touched the edges of the board while removing a body part, the game board buzzed and you lost your turn. It was a silly child’s game, but there we were, a group of adults from various departments, who before Project: Bloom never socialized. We were laughing so hard I almost spewed milk out my nose.
Ravi Venkatesan, former Chairman of Microsoft India, uses meditation as a management tool. In an interview Mr. Venkatesan said, “I can honestly say that it was a turning point in my life in some important ways. If you can’t manage yourself, how can you manage an organization of 5,000 people? It’s really true. If you don’t know how to manage your time and your energy, you don’t know how to manage your reaction to situations, you really can’t be very effective at leading an organization. If you have a significant amount of responsibility at home or at work, stress comes with it. With Shoonya meditation, it gives you a strength and a stability to go through the day without getting overly disturbed.
Roy Powell has an interesting article about meditation at work at his web site: project-meditation.org. In the article, Mr. Powell says that 10 to 15 minutes of meditation each day has been proven to lower stress levels at work, as well as increase productivity and harmony in the work force. My own experience with meditation in the workplace had a similar impact on the work force. And, it doesn’t take everyone in a business meditating to see the results. In my case, with only a small group of us meditating, we totally transformed the workplace culture. The calmness that comes from meditating seems to affect the mood and stress levels of others with whom you come into contact. In Roy Powell’s article, he says that many companies are now employing “meditation companies” to come into the workplace and conduct classes that focus on a non-spiritual or religious approach to meditation.
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