“Imagining the future is a kind of nostalgia. (…) You spend your whole life stuck in the labyrinth, thinking about how you’ll escape it one day, and how awesome it will be, and imagining that future keeps you going, but you never do it. You just use the future to escape the present.” ― John Green, Looking for Alaska
Yesterday was World Mental health day and at the company where I work, the HR lead for wellbeing hosted two webinar events on Mindfulness, called “Mind full or Mindful?”.
The webinar is a Web-based seminar, that is transmitted over the Web using video conferencing software to share presentations, videos, and audio. A key feature of a Webinar is its interactive elements: the ability to give, receive and discuss information in real-time.
The webinar was an opportunity to share what world mental health day is all about; a brief overview of what Mindfulness is and a personal view of what Mindfulness is.The HR specialist knows I practice Mindfulness and asked me to come along and present my own journey into mindfulness.
Little did I know what I was letting myself in for. I just thought it was going to be a local event, with a few people dialing into a conference call, such are most of the calls that I have. No, it was not. The event was published across the whole of the UK organization; with emails out to all the staff; an advert on the internal web portal and flyers at major offices. By the end of last week, there were over 200 people registered for the two events.
Come Monday and I traveled to the office to be with the other two presenters for the events. I have spent the weekend thinking about the content for my section:
- How I came to Mindfulness.
- The Programme that I followed and the benefits.
- How I practice on a daily basis.
- What does Mindfulness mean to me and finally,
- how I use Mindfulness at work.
Come the time, come the people.
Over 182 for the first event and 203 for the second. Over 385 people in total tuning in to hear about Mindfulness. The hour for each session flew by. Many people asked really positive questions during the webinars. I have continued to get feedback and corridor conversations a day later. It just goes to show the level of interest people have on the subject of Mindfulness. I plan to blog some further details of what I shared later in the week.
I leave you with the following quote:
“Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michaelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.”
Martin Summerhayes 