Mind Time: How ten mindful minutes can enhance your work, health and happiness. Michael Chaskalson

      The Mind Time practices we taught them allowed our research participants to experience AIM over and over again. So much so, that it began to be habitual. The three aspects of AIM – allowing, inquiry and meta-awareness – became instinctive.

      Let’s take a closer look now at the three elements, so that we can help you to build them with practice.

      ALLOWING

      Allowing involves approaching a situation with an attitude of openness and kindness to yourself and others. It’s not about being passive or giving up; it is about facing up to what is actually going on in each passing moment and using our energy more productively, rather than wasting it wishing things were other than they are.

      Amy is an enthusiastic, but understandably tired, mother of three young children who worked with us for a couple of months to improve her AIM. Absolutely committed to her role as a mother, she wanted to be able to cope with juggling family life with work life, which was also very important to her. She explained allowing like this:

      ‘It’s that ability to let a few things go more easily, and not worry excessively about them. Take it as what it is. There’s also the deeper recognition that there are things you just can’t change. Then the best option is to go towards them and be with them.’

      Without allowing, our criticism of others and ourselves crushes our ability to inquire and observe what is really happening.

      Take the case of Matt, a father who came to us for help. We’ve known Matt for a few years and although we met him in the context of his work initially, the most important thing for him is his family and how he can be a ‘good dad’.

      Matt’s teenage daughter was getting into trouble at school – and it was getting worse. His levels of anxiety had reached a critical point. Every time she got into trouble, he would fly off the handle. That left him feeling thoroughly ineffective as a dad. He had no idea how to get through to her. He was having trouble sleeping and found himself constantly ruminating over the issue. That began to put his marriage under strain as he and his wife began to blame each other for their daughter’s behaviour.

      We saw how Matt’s situation was affecting his work when we observed him during a team meeting. When he stood up to present an update on how his part of the business was doing, his body language and tone of voice gave away how exhausted and anxious he was. He couldn’t meet the eyes of his audience and we saw how he struggled to remember details and answer questions clearly. He stumbled his way through the presentation and left his team awkwardly wondering how to respond.

      Talking with Matt afterwards, we asked what had been going through his mind as he stood up to make his presentation.

      ‘I just knew it wouldn’t go well. I felt so exhausted, so nervous. There was this voice going on in my head – “You’re not going to do well … you’re not going to do well …” so I didn’t. The more I felt it was going badly, the angrier I got with myself. I told myself, “Pull yourself together!” The more I did that, the angrier I got with myself and the tenser I became. The tenser I got, the angrier I got. I kept thinking, “You’re really letting yourself and everyone else down.” I guess it’s no surprise that I did.’

      Things were undeniably tough for Matt and it would have been great if he could somehow have been more open with his colleagues and asked them for help. But that’s not always possible in every workplace. What would also have helped, though, would have been if he had been able to hear the voice in his head and react to it with compassion, rather than anger. In Matt’s case, though, on hearing the voice he became angrier and, as a result, heaped even more pressure on himself.

      Do you recognise this sort of voice? One of the people attending a course we led described it as the Poison Parrot that sits on your shoulder – whispering undermining words in your ear.

      If he’d been able to see in that moment that the thought ‘You’re not going to do well’ was just a thought, not ‘truth’. And then if he could have met that thought with compassion and acceptance – ‘Oh yes, there’s that thought again. It’s just a thought – it’s allowed …’ – then things might have gone differently. He might have been able to regulate his emotional state a little better. That might have given him the opportunity to breathe just a little bit more, to look up a little more, to settle a bit more, and to begin to inquire into what was going on.

      That might have made the difference.

      INQUIRY

      Now let’s look at the second element of AIM.

      Richard, a high-flier, is unusually quick thinking and passionate – he can be fun to be around but also breathtakingly energetic. He leads a successful team in a demanding industry. He has a wife and two children, but he doesn’t see them much because of work. He wants results and seems to get them. But he struggles with one key issue. He is so quick to react that the people who work for him are scared of him. They’re unwilling to open their mouths in case he dismisses their ideas or judges them as incapable. The same is true at home – his wife and kids don’t tend to share concerns with him because they think he will offer quick ‘solutions’ and tell them to just get on with it and stop complaining. Listening and empathising are two things Richard is not known for.

      Richard is determined to change his behaviour. His marriage and his long-term relationship with his children depend on it. He also believes that for his team at work to function even more effectively, there must be more sharing of ideas, learning from mistakes and more confidence in speaking up.

      When we first met Richard, he was aware of his behaviour and the effect it was having but he didn’t know how to stop doing it. Teaching him listening skills, or telling him the benefits of collaboration and empathising – things that he was already well aware of – would make no difference. Coercion, persuasion or teaching: in his case they wouldn’t change anything.

      Instead, what we’ve been helping Richard do is to become interested in how he’s behaving now. To focus less on what he is trying to become and, rather, first inquire about how he is.

      This may sound paradoxical but if you inquire into your current experience with interest, rather than trying to be something else, you may naturally respond and change it.

      If we ask you, right now, what’s your posture like while you read these lines? What position is your spine in at this moment? Which muscles are tight and which are relaxed? While you question and find answers, there’s a good chance that you’ll subtly change your posture in response. This doesn’t come from trying or forcing – or us explaining about good posture and then telling you to do it. It comes from simply noticing. And that noticing doesn’t happen unless you inquire in the first place.

      The people we have worked with tell us of the key role inquiry played in their path towards being more vital and alive. They learned to take an interest in their own experience.

      Jenny is a nurse. She is compassionate and precisely the sort of person you would want to be responsible for your care if you were in hospital. Always wanting to be even better at her job, she practised her AIM with us over several months. She felt that it was her ability to inquire into her present-moment experience that made the most difference to how she dealt with her patients. As she explained:

      ‘I ask myself, “Why am I feeling like this? What’s this feeling? What am I sensing?” And I’m interested in it rather than trying to just make it go away.’

      Exploring these sorts of questions openly and robustly can be very effective. Simply asking a question and exploring all that follows can lead to change – in and of itself.2 This might be in an individual’s working life or their life outside work. For example, asking someone to consider how and when they speak up well to their boss encourages them to realise how they speak up and how effective their boss is at listening.3 They might go away from that conversation with a better understanding and a deeper commitment to speak up more. Or they may walk