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‘You have the capacity as a human being to use consciousness to rise above impulses, to rise above ways that society is pushing you to be and you can find a kind of clarity of purpose, a clarity of morality, a clarity of dedication. No matter what may be going on in the world around you, you can persist with this internal compass that guides you….’ Dr Dan Siegel, Mindful Leadership Online Training Conference (www. in. gr and https://cyclades24.gr)

‘…. it’s very natural that as creatures of this earth we develop all our defenses and aggressions to survive. We have an active limbic system and most of our thoughts are very fear based…… To be able to deconstruct that we need to call on the most recently evolved part of our brain, which is the frontal cortex, which is correlated with mindfulness and empathy, so meditation is a way of activating these parts of the frontal cortex. Meditation is evolution’s strategy to awaken these qualities that really allow us to move towards our full potential…..’  Tara Brach, Ph.D., Mindful Leadership Online Training Conference (www. in. gr and https://cyclades24.gr) 

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Altered books and visual journaling

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Scan472Mindfulness is paying attention to the present moment with kindness and curiosity (from iBme at https://ibme.info/resources/)

You may also like to read Jessica Morey’s (participant at the Mindful Leadership Online Training Conference (www. in. gr and https://cyclades24.gr) article Finding my way

‘Discernment includes seeing that even as we attempt to see our children for who they are, we also cannot fully know who they are or where their lives will take them. We can only love them, and accept them, and honour the mystery of their being’, Myla and Jon Kabat-Zinn, Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting

Scan471Viveka Chen: Undoing bias from the inside out from Mindful Leadership Online Training Conference (www. in. gr and https://cyclades24.gr)

Viveka Chen talks about how bias operates to keep us repeating limited loops of perception and ways of responding and how this often operates at an unconscious level. She mentions that this implicit bias can occur through our internalizing the Other or certain groups of people as inferior or dangerous during our early years within our familial contexts and then later on at school, through the media, in our social groups, etc, and how it negatively impacts our judgment, decision making and behaviour. She refers to research findings that show that the amygdala (fear response) of participants who are, for instance, shown pictures of people of colour is activated. This occurs automatically and under their conscious awareness. Often our conscious values and ideas about the world and others may be in contradiction with these underlying schemas. Finally, she talks about the possibility to transcend implicit bias and racist attitudes – often below our conscious awareness – through practising mindfulness, which can allow us to become aware of this, and then engage in exploration of our fears, cognitive processing and reframing.

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