In June, some of the Michael Hyatt & Company team signed up for our first month-long mindfulness challenge. Folks meditated every day and reported back in a special Slack channel on what worked and didn\u2019t work for them, and whether or not they found it worthwhile.
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\nYou might wonder why we would do this as an organization and if it was a success.<\/p>\n
We undertook the challenge for two reasons. First, Enneagram expert Ian Cron<\/a> ran a personal development seminar for our entire company at the end of May. He introduced the practice to us, briefly demonstrated it, and suggested we try it out on a larger scale to see if we find it useful. It grows your gray matter.<\/strong> Researchers had expected to find maybe a slight uptick in gray matter in select areas of our brains among folks who regularly meditate. Instead, they are finding<\/a> \u201csignificantly larger gray matter volumes\u201d all over the place.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n It helps with pain management.<\/strong> In fact, after just four days of meditation, one study<\/a> found the unpleasantness and intensity of pain were reduced by 57 and 40 percent, respectively.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n This list represents only a few of the observed benefits of meditation according to science. Psychology Today<\/em> has compiled a much longer list here<\/a>.<\/p>\n We don\u2019t have any metrics yet, but in the rubber-meets-the road-test most of my teammates who took the challenge are still meditating regularly. We asked if any of those folks who took the challenge would like to share their experience. Here's some of their feedback:<\/p>\n Executive Support Director Suzie Barbour was skeptical at first. She thought meditation was \u201csilly and just not for me.\u201d But she \u201cdecided to give it a try.\u201d She said it was hard with two toddlers running around, but she kept at it and now finds herself \u201creally craving the peace that even a few minutes of mindfulness bring.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Our Human Resources Manager Danielle Rodgers said the best thing about meditation was that it reminded her of the \u201cwonderful art of remembering to breathe.\u201d Well after the challenge has passed, Danielle often takes \u201ctime to breathe deep breaths in the morning after my devotions and prayer time while the house is still quiet, even if only for a moment or two, and the results are priceless.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n The meditation that most of my team tried for a month was a kind of mindfulness meditation. If you want to try that or any other kind of meditation for a month, here is a good place<\/a> to get started.
\nHis challenge became our challenge.
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\nSecond, there is a growing body of scientific literature that suggests regular meditation can do great things for people. Here are four likely benefits of meditation, according to researchers:<\/p>\n\n
What It Did for My Team<\/h3>\n
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If You Want to Do It<\/h3>\n
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