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Alex Pham
Alex Pham

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Mindfulness Meets Technology

Why is mindfulness important in a technology company?

Technology plays an important role in forming the world of today. Thanks to its existence, millions of problems have been solved to make the world become a better place. A hundred years ago, communicating with people from different places on earth was an impossible thing. A hundred years ago, work took an extensive amount of time to finish, which reduced productivity tremendously. A hundred years ago, everything was so hard to manage. Businesses in the past would constantly go bankrupt because of management inability. Everything was so rough back then. However, technology has done such a great job in keeping the workflow in line. Moreover, it has connected people from different places to urge the diversification of the world. Without technology, we wouldn’t be in the position we’re in today.
Nevertheless, the great impact comes with different influences. In this topic, it’s hard for us to say that the advantages of technology outweigh the disadvantages or vice versa. But, it’s undeniable that both sides exist. The drawbacks of technology have pulled many back from doing things that people are supposed to do. The distraction of that “ting ting” sound on the phone prevents people from following their lectures. The videos on TikTok are so addictive that the kids cannot stop sticking their eyes to the screen. People are afraid of the complete alternative of technology in many industries that could potentially cause the loss of jobs for millions of people.

Therefore, technology and something like “mindfulness” might not seem like 2 ideal partners for each other. But what is mindfulness? It’s a pretty simple one that is extremely near you in everything that you do. So, let’s get a bit closer to its definition before we can better understand the connection between itself and technology.

The definition of mindfulness

Mindfulness is like meditation, it gives you more time to think about yourself and what you have gone through. It’s all about showing your awareness of what you need at the moment. The most common way to carry this out is to deeply breathe and evaluate your needs at present. People usually meditate as a way to keep themselves calm and be at peace. It has gradually become a method in the classroom for individuals to have a proper way of starting their day and reconnecting themselves with one another.
Mindfulness has a lot to offer to those who apply it to their daily routine: it helps reduce stress effectively leading to a happy lifestyle. It’s also proved to be a helpful method for pushing people to live healthier. Mindfulness can connect people through listening and sympathy.

Everything about mindfulness seems opposite to the effect of technology. However, as the world has changed, a bit of creativity in the process has brought both to each other to become excellent assistants in the workplace and classroom. How does that work? Let’s head to the next section.

Technology supports mindfulness

There now have been a lot of technology applications that support the energy of mindfulness. So, no one has to necessarily put down their digital devices to be completely in mindfulness mode.

Mindfulness is a difficult topic to discuss because it has plenty of ways to pull it off. Therefore, it’s gonna be hard for beginners to get started. This is where technology has come into place. Especially during the pandemic, there’s not much physical training of mindfulness you can do besides having it through technology. That’s why there are now a lot of online courses and applications that support mindfulness practice in the classroom. With the help of these tools, everyone will be able to head in the right direction which could yield positive results in the end.
1.SettleYourGlitter: This is a supportive tool that helps students identify their emotions (for example: sad, happy, worried, angry, etc) and what stage their feeling’s at. There’s a lot of features in the app that help students define their emotional state and the activities that they can follow to help them deal with a specific situation. There are clear instructions that students will need to follow step-by-step to make it effective as expected. During a difficult time when people can no longer see each other face to face, this is the right application to solve the problem.

  1. Smiling Minds: This app was created by a technology company in Australia. It aims to help people practice their routines so that they can avoid negative energy by doing different types of activity. It separates different lessons for different ages because the app aims to be age-appropriate. Therefore, when the user gives the app their age, it will instantly give them a suitable lesson plan that all they have to do is follow step by step. The goal of the course is to train the users’ mindfulness skills by setting their breath at a balanced level and providing them different ways to have control over what they think as well as their physical state. The student can decide to start the lesson and end the progress whenever they feel like it. Therefore, no worries if you only have a little time. All the progress will be saved automatically.

  2. Headspace: This app is similar to Smiling Minds, which guides the user to do a proper meditation. The app was created by a company in the UK and it aims to help its users train their mindfulness skills through hundreds of lessons. However, there’s a small charge that you have to pay to unlock other lessons but I guarantee you that it’s worth it.

And there are more apps like these that you can also look up on the internet if you want to know more about different mindfulness training.

The combination between mindfulness and technology has been proved to be a good tool supporting students and even adults with selecting what practice is best for them. By following the instructions on these applications, users can practice being more flexible with decision-making situations, improving their strengths by creating their methods, and showing positive energy towards either good or bad feedback.

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