-guest post by #AtlasCorps Alumnos, Karuna Dayal (India, served at CARE International )
One year is a long time to transform how we think, act and react. It surely is a good learning experience of how mindful one should be, and at what levels this technique should be applied. I attended various talks given by international leaders, engaged in discussion with many others and started mapping how mindful each one of them was, while they were talking to me in person, people in larger groups or giving a piece of their mind to a much larger audience beyond whom you could see. It was all about ‘mindfulness.’ Many of us leaders come from various walks of life, and we bring in new ideas, renew the old ones and tread on a path that is truly transformational.
My key take-away, amongst many others, has been to use this technique called ‘mindfulness’ more frequently while I listen, talk, respond to others mindfully. Leadership is not easy and it doesn’t come easily to those who do not use this technique enough.
I recently read how Anderson Cooper started his meditation retreat and how it transformed him as a person. I can say that, as development workers, we are high caliber people who are working consistently between pressures, stipulations and calibrations all the time. Mindfulness becomes a way of life for many of us. Like I said, it doesn’t come easily. It comes with practice – that doesn’t have limitations, displaces the old with the new, and renews the old in this process. It also meant how effectively I could bring back the focus on my own life, the ones around me and my professional and personal commitments.
Serving as an Atlas Corps Fellow has been a transformational experience for me, I will say. I always looked at official retreats as a skeptic when I was in India, but something suddenly changed my mind, when I first started serving at CARE International. Starting a day at the pool, chilling out with colleagues at an official business retreat just brought me out as a convert! This, I obviously realized later, as a part of my ongoing self- analysis.
There were several similar revelations, which also struck me later. My next realization came at the HIVE Global Leaders Program last year, where we started off with an invigorating meditation and yoga session. This was proven as if I longed for this day with a long positive sigh! For a while, I was confused between relaxation and mindfulness. I am still figuring out what mindfulness actually means. Until then, I relate to a working definition of it, which is the awareness that arises through deliberately and non-judgmentally paying attention in the present moment. Mindfully, I realize and because I realize, I believe and thrive. This is my take-away from the Atlas Corps Fellowship.
#GlobalService #socialgood #transformation
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To learn more about the Atlas Corps Fellowship, visit www.atlascorps.org. If you are a nonprofit leader from overseas who wants to apply to become an Atlas Corps Fellow, please visit http://apply.atlascorps.org
