People not being fully present is a big problem because the most effective interactions occur when two people are mutually present to each other. That’s when rapport happens. That’s when chemistry happens. That’s when you’re going to have the most powerful communication and mutual understanding. If your attention is over there, it means you’re not over here with the person you’re with. Lack of attention also impacts your performance. Your ability to do your job on your own is directly related to how well you can concentrate and focus....

People naturally tend to empathize with others, report C. Daryl Cameron and Barbara Fredrickson in the January issue of the journal Mindfulness. But empathy can go wrong when it leads to distress. We might help out of guilt, or the help might cause resentment, which could lead us to avoid helping people in the future. Or sometimes, absorbing the feelings of someone in trouble may lead us to turn away, if we can’t deal with those feelings of suffering....

For example, Ray Dalio, founder of Bridgewater Associates, a $130-billion hedge fund firm, meditates, and he explained in an interview with Georgetown University why. “Meditation more than anything in my life was the biggest ingredient for whatever success I’ve had […] (Meditation) gives me a centeredness, it gives me an ability to look at things without the emotional hijacking, without the ego, in a way that gives me a certain clarity....

Ten thousand hours of practice may or may not bring you to the top of your game, and the reason is this: if you are a so-so golfer and you have a so-so golf stroke and you practice that golf stroke in a so-so way, in 10,000 hours you are still going to have the same poor golf stroke. A psychologist named Dr. Anders Ericsson from Florida State University came up with the 10,000-hour rule....

This year’s conference boasts more than 25 presenters, including such tech leaders such as: Dustin Muskovitz, co-founder, Facebook and Asana; Padmasree Warrior, Chief Technology Officer, Cisco Systems; Karen May, Vice President, Google; and Premal Shah, co-founder of Paypal and president of kiva.org. They will share the stage with mindfulness teacher Jon Kabat-Zinn; Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield; yoga activist, Seane Corn; and for the first time, Eckhart Tolle, whom Oprah Winfrey calls “the father of the now....

In the social sciences, data on individuals’ happiness are obtained from nationally representative surveys in which a question such as the following is asked: Taken all together, how would you say things are these days, would you say that you are very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy? There are many variants of this question. Instead of happiness, the question may be about your overall satisfaction with life, you might be asked to place yourself on a “ladder of life”, running from the best possible to the worst....

Through very few words, and familliar, intimate social scenes, deGuzman captures a day in the life of a phone-less person. And if that poignant (and depressing) film makes you reflect on your own gadget use, you might want to take a look at our Take Control of Your Tech chart, from the August issue of Mindful magazine. You may also want to read the accompanying article, “A User’s Guide to Living Well in Screenworld,” where we speak to three tech insiders about making tech work for us—and not the other way around....

It seems like everyone is talking about mindfulness and meditation nowadays, from the cover of Time magazine to a member of the US Congress to corporate leaders. But is meditation realistic for those of us with demanding jobs and ambitious goals? Is compassion incompatible with high-stakes, competitive professions? Can meditation really make you happier? Join Dan Harris, author of 10% Happier, as he explores these questions and more. Reception and book-signing with all the presenters to follow the program....

Soren Gordhamer works with individuals and groups on living with greater mindfulness and purpose in our technology-rich age. He is founder and host of the Wisdom 2.0 Conference, and the author of Wisdom 2.0: Ancient Secrets for the Creative and Constantly Connected (HarperOne, 2009), one of the first books to explore living with mindfulness and wisdom within the context of our modern technology age. As project director for Richard Gere’s public charity, Healing the Divide, he organized The Healing through Great Difficulty conference with his Holiness, the Dalai Lama....

A conference held at the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care and Society on March 31, 2011, presented a project called “Of Avatars and Virtual Yoga: MBSR for Veterans in Second Life, A Pilot Project”. The program intends to knock down barriers of distance, disability, anxiety and culture between veterans worldwide. Second Life is part of a larger project known as Coming Home. This research project teaches American veterans in a private and safe atmosphere on the World Wide Web....

Much like the Slow Food Movement, which emphasizes growing your own food, sustainably and organically, cooking it without microwaves—or not cooking it at all, as “raw” foodists do—and taking the time to create beautiful, healthy and delicious meals, The Slow Flower Movement calls us to plant and tend to flowers in an organic, sustainable, and life-affirming manner. In “Beyond Slow” we not only grow our own—or buy local—we create a flower “meal” using the art of ikebana (Japanese Flower Arranging) to honor the ingredients of flowers, leaves, and branches....

My granddaughters, though, took to it with vigor and rigor. Starting first thing in the morning, patiently and gleefully piecing it together. With the whole family joining in, after several weeks, the picture began to reveal itself. So proud were they of what they were accomplishing, they wanted it framed. Me? Still not so much into it. As we neared completion, it became clear that 10 pieces were missing! The maker informed me that there is a form online to fill out....

Though environmentalists have yet to register the fact, human longevity has now become a central factor in the demography of industrial society, one of the most rapid and massive changes on the part of any species, let alone the species that purports to be the most dominant on the planet. Acknowledging this transition is as simple as recognizing that elders see life from a very different angle than their children, and so choose different priorities....

Kabat-Zinn recounts this incident to illustrate that a crucial reason for the acceptance and spread of MBSR is that, in essence, it’s simply about helping people. However, another key component is the way that he and Saki Santorelli, director of the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society, have protected the integrity of the eight-week program—now completed by more than eighteen thousand people and offered in over 250 hospitals—without trying to exert strong control over it....

No one would successfully summit Mt. Everest for another 30 years, and many lives would be lost in the pursuit of this elusive goal—including Mallory’s own during the 1924 expedition. But his words have lived on. Perhaps one reason for the almost iconic nature of Mallory’s line is that his words are both so satisfying and unsatisfying at the same time. In some ways, they provide a complete answer, yet they also leave us begging for more....

Here are three ways to feel refreshed and renewed, without the resolutions: 1) First, befriend your life as it is It’s common to daydream about an idyllic and successful future (who amongst us hasn’t practiced their Oscar acceptance speech?) but spending too much time thinking about how things could be “one day” prevents us from appreciating how things are right now. Learning to befriend all moments places us firmly in the life we are living, rather than the ideal life we are prone to imagine or strive towards....

Listen to the podcast of Congressman Tim Ryan and Saki Santorelli at the Jewish Cultural Center last October. More on Tim Ryan and A Mindful Nation on Mindful.org: VIDEO: Ohio Congressman Tim Ryan talks about “A Mindful Nation” The Mainstreaming of Mindfulness Meeting of the Mindful 11/08/12 [Photo © Nancy Adler. All Rights Reserved.]

“I’ve been in the trenches for a long time with people who are really good at what they do,” Gervais says in the introductory podcast for the show. But it’s not often that conversations take place around how the path to greatness gets carved. Gervais says each episode covers the guest’s life path, their framework for understanding how the world works, and the mental skills they’ve developed in the pursuit of mastery....