Learning Things

Since I was driving several hours this past weekend, I spent some time listening to some podcasts.  One podcast was on "Mindfulness."  According to this lady (Ellen Langer), she was studying mindfulness back in the 70's before mindfulness was cool.  She didn't call it mindfulness, but it's kind of the same thing as her term.  I can't remember what her term was.  Anyway, I guess mindfulness is what one might also call "being present" and paying attention to what is going on around you.  I think it's all the rage these days because we need to take a break from our electronic devices sometimes and do that.

Here are a few little nuggets I gleaned from the podcast.

1. Another term for mindfulness can be "active noticing".
2. One way to practice active noticing is to imagine that everyone can see your thoughts.  That would make you much more conscious of your thoughts, wouldn't it?
3. To keep things in perspective when they happen, ask yourself:  "Is this a tragedy or an inconvenience?"
4. One way to keep things "fresh" in a relationship or when you're doing something familiar is to try to notice 5 new things.
5. If you feel you "need a vacation", then it's possible you're doing your work mindlessly.
6. If you're going to a meeting at work or doing something you don't particularly enjoy, then one way to make it more enjoyable to is notice new things in the meeting and be mindful rather than "tuning out."

This morning I had some leadership training at work, and one of the things they showed was this interesting triangle.  The trainer said this is a very common thing from psychology classes.  Maybe I should have taken a psychology class instead of Intro to Music or Macroeconomics.  There are just so many interesting things to learn, aren't there?

P.S.  The triangle at work was more sanitized and did not include the words sex, excretion, and sexual intimacy.  I don't know who drew this one, but is sex really a physiological need?  I suppose it is for procreation, but I don't think it's on the same level as breathing and water.  Also, "sense of team" was added to the belonging level.