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Corporate Zen: How Mindfulness Can Transform Your Workday With Alp Geckelan · Mindful You

0:00
Alan Carroll: Hi, everybody. Welcome to the mindful U
0:05
podcast. My name is Alan Carroll. And I'm going to be
0:11
your host, as we journey together, down the pathway of
0:19
mindfulness, to explore, to experience to hear the stories
0:29
and experiences of other mindful travelers who have been
0:37
traveling the path in various forms, many paths of
0:43
mindfulness. And I want to share a little bit of my background.
0:53
And I'll divide this talk into two parts. First will be my
1:00
background. Which brings me up to the second part, which is
1:07
okay, mindful you podcast. What is this fella know about
1:12
mindfulness. And part two is I'll share with you the
1:17
mindfulness practice that I've been, and my group has been
1:22
teaching for the last 40 years as one of those paths, that
1:29
allows people to experience to experience a sense of
1:33
mindfulness, and all the benefits that come with having a
1:39
mindful state of consciousness. Alright, welcome app to the
1:46
mindful you podcast. And I want to thank you for being here
1:50
today. And I'm excited because you are the ambassador of
1:57
mindfulness for the one of the largest corporate organizations
2:01
in the world, S A. P. So I want to thank you for taking the time
2:06
today to share with our audience. And I'd like to ask a
2:11
question from a background of if, if I was a manager, like you
2:16
work for a corporation. And I was thinking about benefits and
2:21
mindfulness. I've heard about mindfulness. And yet I'm not
2:24
quite clear. And I wish I could hear someone talk about
2:30
mindfulness and share their experiences. So I would feel
2:33
more comfortable, whether or not I can have this conversation
2:37
brought into my, into my organization also. So you've
2:42
been involved with mindfulness at SAP for how many years out?
2:48
Unknown: It's been three years now, three years. All right,
2:51
Alan Carroll: backtracking to three years. What was the vision
2:59
of, of the people in corporate SAP, that they decided that
3:04
mindfulness was a key differentiator are a very
3:09
important characteristic to bring within the organization?
3:15
Alp Geckalan: Thanks, Ellen, first of all, thanks for having
3:17
me. In this podcast, it's incredible to catch up with you.
3:22
We had great experiences together great training sessions
3:26
together. And I'm so happy that mindfulness was at the core of
3:31
what of what you do and what we have been doing as well, as part
3:35
of our training programs. It's been nine years that I'm working
3:39
for SAP, my mindfulness journey started back in 2018 90, where I
3:46
was practicing a mantra meditation. And then in 2020, I
3:53
just bumped into an email came from the sap global mindfulness
3:58
practice, global mindfulness initiative. And they were
4:03
providing his course it's called Search Inside Yourself. Maybe
4:07
you heard about it. Is this the course content, the approach
4:13
built by Google? Actually, they've done lots of research.
4:17
They've done lots of workshop, and then they realize
4:20
mindfulness really increase the productivity, overall wellbeing
4:26
in the company. And it really increased the leadership skills,
4:32
especially for the managers. So SAP has decided to implement the
4:38
same Search Inside Yourself global mindfulness initiative
4:42
across the globe, more than 100,000 people working for SAP.
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It's definitely not an easy task. But it's been 10 years,
4:53
that ASAP implemented this methodology or initiative, let's
4:57
say more than 15,000 people participated in more than 55
5:02
countries. Now we reach out more than 70 internal trainers in
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more than 25 countries. We have 85 Ambassadors, which I'm one of
5:13
them based in Dubai, covering the emir, South countries, and
5:19
our virtual community reach more than 15,000 people. So from my
5:27
perspective, it really helped me to develop my leadership skills.
5:32
I'm running workshops, I'm running, guided meditations for
5:38
the group kickoff meetings, for example, I deal with my team in
5:43
a mindful manner, which I can discuss about the benefits
5:46
later. But what I can say from an ambassador perspective, as a
5:52
receiver of this training, I've seen lots of benefits out of
5:56
this global mindfulness practice.
6:00
Alan Carroll: Wow, that that was wonderful to hear to hear your
6:03
story. Let's take a look at the benefits. Let's say let's just
6:08
backtrack a little bit. And how would you if I'm not clear about
6:13
the definition of mindfulness? And I'm listening to you talk,
6:18
could you just tell me, in your own words, of course, the the
6:23
definition or the the idea of what mindfulness, what
6:27
mindfulness is?
6:30
Unknown: Well, it's gonna be a difficult task to define it to
6:33
you, because I learned mindfulness from you. But my
6:40
definition of mindfulness is basically regulating your
6:46
attention, consciously, your attitude. And then you don't
6:52
judge anything, you just accept everything as it is, in that
6:57
moment. This is how I see mindfulness. So you bring your
7:02
conscious mind into a state, where you don't live in an
7:07
autopilot world, when you actually notice everything
7:12
around you in that moment. This is what mindfulness for me,
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Alan Carroll: that's a very good definition of mindfulness, that,
7:21
that that points to the the fundamental skill is the skill
7:27
of observation, to be able to observe, you're in a situation,
7:33
the organization, something something's happening in front
7:36
of you, your five senses are plugged into it, you can see it,
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you feel it, and something's being stirred up, it feels
7:42
something's being stirred, energy stirred up, got thoughts
7:44
being stirred up, and you're able to step back. Notice that,
7:50
that. And just by noticing it, it begins to settle that energy.
7:57
And so exactly what you said I thought was, was was was
8:00
brilliant, wonderful. It's great to hear the ambassador speak
8:03
with such eloquence about about the idea of mindfulness, because
8:07
you, you hit it right on the head, it's that ability to
8:10
observe your reaction, and then transform it into a response.
8:16
And that that that is mentally balanced, physically balanced,
8:21
emotionally balanced. And and now you have nine years of
8:26
practice at SAP. And it's exciting to hear that the there
8:31
is people who say that things are changing, people are
8:36
changing. And so what are some of the benefits that you have
8:41
noticed, in your organization, with with bringing mindfulness
8:45
in,
8:47
Unknown: there are a couple of things like that I can easily
8:50
mention top of my head, first of all, the meetings become more
8:54
productive. For example, there is a practice what I usually do
9:00
as well before joining a meeting, or just take a minute,
9:06
it's, I would call it like a landing minutes, for example,
9:09
right? When you go to landing with the plane, everybody's kind
9:13
of focusing on the landing, it's the same metaphor, let's say for
9:19
the meeting, I take a minute, focus on my breath. And then I
9:24
go to into meeting to take the most out of it with the good
9:28
intentions. Some of the managers, some of the people, I
9:32
think, we've done it, and I'm still doing it, I'm not perfect.
9:37
You go to a meeting, and then still you're thinking of the
9:40
previous meeting, or you're thinking of the next meeting,
9:44
right? What I'm gonna say in the next meeting, what did they say
9:48
to my What did they make a comment about the previous
9:51
meeting? You basically missed the moment. Basically, that
9:56
meeting is not productive because you're not focusing it
9:59
right now. I think this is the first benefit in terms of
10:02
productivity. If you become conscious about that moment,
10:09
then you become more present. And then you focus on the
10:13
meeting. So the productivity goes up. Second, is a personal
10:18
power. If anyone bothers you, if any, anything bothers you,
10:24
instead of reacting, you take a moment, and then you respond.
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This is where your personal power lies, I think. So you
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become more empowered, you become more powerful and strong,
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because you are in control of the moment, right? So now you
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become free, real hassle free of anxiety, free of salts, free of
10:53
these chatter back of your head, right. So I think these two have
11:02
its moment and the productivity, it's the best outcome.
11:07
Alan Carroll: And the word freedom. Freedom is a another
11:12
word that you said, which is that feeling of, of non
11:19
judgmental, being able to see that you just made a judgment.
11:28
And once again, it goes back to the observation to see I just
11:31
made a judge still, you're good, I'm still gonna make judgments.
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But I noticed that I made a judgment. And I realized that
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the judgment is based on the past. And so I paint this moment
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with paint from the past, rather than be present it with and that
11:50
is, like erasing you can you can erase the judgments that the
11:53
judgment disappear? And an important part of the
11:57
mindfulness, which is the next question I want to get into our
12:00
is the is the embodiment of consciousness, rather than the
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disembodiment, of following the thoughts in your head? Versus is
12:08
there something else I can do? Oh, yeah, there's the breath in
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the body, which allows you to become embodied. And that begins
12:15
to diminish that, that that flow of energy to the thoughts, the
12:19
flow of energy goes to the body where there are no thoughts. So
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what are some of the practices that that you have? seen done
12:30
are do yourself with the teams that SAP?
12:36
Unknown: Individual level, if I talk about myself, I'm pretty
12:42
judgmental person. And what I realize these judgments, as you
12:46
said, it's coming from a programming, maybe from my
12:50
childhood, maybe from the culture that I've been raised
12:52
in, maybe from my parents, maybe the society, maybe the school,
12:57
maybe the previous companies, right? This is absorbed by my
13:02
subconscious mind. And then I'm judging everything, right? What
13:08
I start to do, still not perfect, but I'm just a student,
13:13
as you said, always,
13:15
Alan Carroll: so am I try,
13:17
Unknown: try to notice it, label it, and then let it go focus on
13:23
your breathing. It's easy to say, difficult to make, right?
13:28
You're in a moment you say, Oh, this email is bad. Wow. bad or
13:34
wrong? Or whom or from what perspective, right? Because I'm
13:39
just literally judging it. But instead of charging, I could
13:42
just, I'm judging it right now. Let it be, just breathe. And
13:49
then think about your response. This is what I'm trying to do.
13:53
It's good for self awareness.
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Alan Carroll: So let's just let's just go back on that one.
13:59
Because it's real, real important that that people
14:04
understand clearly what step one is. And step one is, before I
14:11
try to stick my hands out into the world and make changes, I
14:15
better stick hands into myself, and make sure that the
14:19
instrument that is doing the perception is in a is stable.
14:25
And the more stable it is, the clearer you are about
14:30
appropriate courses of action. And often what I see is that
14:34
people react to things in the outer world from a platform that
14:40
is unstable. And you can you can see if you're looking the the
14:45
unstability simply by the pattern and control of their
14:51
speaking, because when you're out of control, you're out of
14:53
control. You're speaking but if you are you're speaking big
15:00
sounds a lot more grounded, a lot more powerful, a lot more
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clear. You're not caught by a hook by a story. And this I I'm
15:11
pretty sure we're both on the same page. Is that correct?
15:14
Unknown: 100% 100%.
15:19
Alan Carroll: Go ahead and, and talk about so you had mentioned
15:23
guided meditations, that that to me is a wonderful tool. So share
15:29
some of the, the guided, what is a guided meditation? And what
15:35
are some of the guided meditations. And as a matter of
15:38
fact, I would like you if you would to lead us all in a guided
15:42
meditation, a couple of minute guided meditations so people can
15:45
actually experience a guided meditation, whoa, okay, what was
15:49
that.
15:52
Unknown: And, for example, just a couple of weeks ago, I was
15:57
invited to a team kickoff meeting, where the regional
16:03
heads wanted to create an awareness of the mindfulness and
16:07
a bit of practice as well. And before we do the practice, I
16:13
wanted to make them aware of themself, and also their
16:18
surrounding, right. So I always start with a concept of the VUCA
16:27
world, we are living in a very volatile, uncertain, complex,
16:32
complex and ambiguity, environments, right. So they're
16:37
aware that everything is changing, sometimes in their
16:41
control, sometimes out of their control. Right. So their mind is
16:47
constantly all there is a popup, it says, You got an email, there
16:52
is a pop up, you got an SMS message there is something is
16:56
happening. And it's all distractions, our mind is
17:00
constantly on. However, by default, I think our body
17:06
designed to be in the rest and digest situation or status,
17:13
let's say. So how are we going to bring our mind and body into
17:19
rest and digest status, right? Meditation is one of them. So
17:25
this is how I build this story. Make sure that they're aware
17:29
that this world is out of their control, but what they can
17:33
control is their body and the reaction.
17:37
Alan Carroll: When I say that, again, they can control that,
17:42
again, you can't control what's outside of yourself, but you can
17:45
control
17:47
Unknown: your reactions, your attitudes, and your state of
17:52
mind.
17:53
Alan Carroll: Yes, yes. And your physical body. Absolutely. And
17:57
you can control your breath. So so these are things that are
18:00
under your control. It's like, oh, I didn't know that. Oh,
18:03
yeah. Yeah, you got under your control. And now that are under
18:06
my control, what did you do next?
18:09
Unknown: And so we're talking about the neurological system
18:16
that we have. So if there isn't something out of our control,
18:22
our body, our mind is designed to attach. So it's like a flight
18:27
and fight mood all the time. So we perceive everything is a
18:31
danger, danger. So like, it's like a lion wants to eat us.
18:36
Yes. You know, this dinosaur wants to attack us or something.
18:41
Yeah. However, it's just the perceived danger. Again, it
18:47
comes from our back of our head, all of our programming. Yep.
18:53
Programming coming from our previous life. When you get to
18:58
that level, when you increase your awareness, then you say,
19:03
wait a minute, it's, I don't need to fight with everything,
19:07
it's coming to me, I can choose the battles. So they, you start
19:12
to control your body, your breath, your reactions, your
19:16
attitude, basically everything. So this is this leads to the
19:22
next to the next, let's say metaphor that I usually use,
19:27
it's imagine the waves in the ocean, you cannot control the
19:34
ocean or the waves, but you can learn how to surf on it. So
19:40
basically, the world is going to happen, it's going to turn
19:43
regardless, if you worry about it. If you get anxious about it,
19:47
if you get angry about it. It's okay. But you need to learn how
19:51
to surf on these waves. That's the metaphor I'm using.
19:57
Alan Carroll: Those are great, great metaphors. It's the There
20:00
is a waking up kind of experience, from the dream of
20:06
thought. And, and what I noticed in the work that I do is, if I
20:14
can have you wake up from the dream of speaking, by
20:20
consciously putting an empty space between the thoughts, you
20:26
got to be present in the moment to be able to stop speaking
20:32
consciously. And so that's another way of bringing
20:37
mindfulness into into a corporation. It's through this,
20:43
just the speaking piece. And that goes back to the leadership
20:47
piece you talked about, what are some of the things that you see
20:53
as a leader and a leader bringing mindfulness into their
20:57
own way of being? What are some of the observations that you
21:02
have seen?
21:08
Unknown: There are scientific evidences that cool, let's say
21:13
it's been put out there, that it really physically builds your
21:17
brain, neuroplasticity, that I like to also mention in any any
21:24
mindfulness. Conversation, it's like, working out, when you work
21:31
out your muscles, then you get bigger muscles, right? Like
21:34
biceps, and so on. And meditation is similar to that
21:38
when you do meditation. It physically, physically helps
21:44
your brain to grow. The gray matter is actually growing. This
21:48
is incredible, really. And what I see as a benefit, when I when
21:53
I talk to my colleagues in the global mindfulness initiative,
21:57
the decision making process in a complex world we talk about the
22:02
VUCA world, it makes it easier because you make more conscious
22:07
decisions rather than reacting something you're responding to
22:11
something right. So in the complex environment, you make a
22:15
better decision. I can talk about the creativity. So
22:22
remember, dictation, absolutely as in, increase your creativity,
22:27
right? And maybe last thing that I can talk about is the
22:34
emotional regulation. Yes. So basically, you control your
22:39
emotions, you just sometimes with your emotions array, and
22:46
with potions, you are trying to respond to a situation. That I
22:53
think is
22:54
Alan Carroll: the regulating of emotions is like there's there's
22:58
so many things that you could get emotional about going on
23:01
outside and the outside world across the planet, that if you
23:05
had a way that you could regulate your emotions, so that
23:09
you didn't get hooked by your emotions that I have emotions,
23:12
but I have control of the emotions, rather than the
23:16
emotions have control of me. That would be that would be a
23:19
major major underlying it. Many, many times benefit of
23:24
mindfulness in a corporation.
23:27
Unknown: I think I asked you this during our one of the
23:30
training sessions, what about the feelings and I remember you
23:34
said, feelings are like it, like traffic signs, or an indicator.
23:40
It shows there is a red flag over here. When you're getting
23:43
angry at a situation. The situation is not making you
23:47
angry. You're feeling anger because of that situation. So
23:52
basically, as you said, we need to turn ourselves and regulate
23:56
that emotion. Why am I feeling anger at this very moment?
24:04
Alan Carroll: So many good things anger. What would it be
24:09
like to be in an environment in which anger attack thoughts were
24:15
totally eliminated, that people could regulate, they could still
24:20
get upset. Yet they're able to control the upset so that when
24:26
they spoke, they didn't spoke from an ego human in it, but
24:31
they spoke from a being of compassion, inclusion, seeing
24:37
the different 360 points of view about it and and my physical
24:42
body went on speaking is totally relaxed. And that would be what
24:53
a vision that that would be and I believe that mindfulness that
24:58
sap in the conversation of Mindfulness is a pathway to that
25:04
conscious, keeping my body physically relaxed, no matter
25:07
what's going on outside of me kind of stuff. And one of the
25:11
ways that I'd like to complete our conversation is by having
25:15
you to do a two or two or three minute mindfulness guided
25:20
meditation with us, we'll have our we'll close our eyes and
25:23
relax our body, so that people in the audience can actually
25:27
experientially taste a little bit of the of the secret sauce
25:33
of mindfulness.
25:35
Unknown: Okay, all right. And we can, so we just need to find the
25:42
posture that feels both relax, alert at the same time. So we
25:48
make sure that we are not sleeping, you can put your feet
25:53
on the floor, hand on the size,
25:57
Alan Carroll: and we're not driving a car by the way, we're
25:59
we are safe.
26:02
Unknown: If your eyes close, or with a soft focus, you don't
26:06
need to close, maybe soft focus just in front of you. Make sure
26:10
that you're not getting distracted, allowing the spine
26:14
to live, shoulders relax. Let's start with getting into focus
26:20
state of being become aware of your feet, contacting on the
26:26
ground, then your weight pressure on the sitting bones on
26:31
the chair. Then the sensation in your upper body, take a deep
26:38
breath. And that really is it you can feel the sensation of
26:49
your breathing in your upper body. Whenever the sensation is
26:54
most vivid for you become your attention to your breath there.
27:09
Consider your chosen sensation as the stabilizer of your
27:14
attention to come back to your focal point whenever needed.
27:30
You may get distracted with some thoughts, sounds or something
27:35
you see. Just bring your attention back to your breath.
27:42
Breath is your anchor to the present moment.
27:57
Distractions are coming, they're going instead of hooked up with
28:03
that or fighting with them. Notice it, label it. Let it be
28:14
and then bring your attention to your breath.
28:33
You can take one long inhale and then deep exhale. And then
28:45
slowly you can open your eye
28:56
Alan Carroll: very relaxing, very relaxing. And if I was
29:00
listening to this podcast, then I could actually use that guided
29:06
meditation with my team. It's a short one. I think it lasts
29:10
about two or three minutes. And it just gets people to begin to
29:17
disconnect from the outer world and focus more on what's going
29:22
on on the inner world. I remember someone said that the
29:28
The way out is to go in. If you want to get out of whatever that
29:32
complex world that we live in with all the emotional things I
29:36
want to get out of going crazy. You got to go in to get out. And
29:42
so mindfulness is that journey inward. So I want to thank you
29:44
out for sharing with us the journey that you're on
29:49
personally and professionally. It was exciting to hear you
29:53
share it. And I'm just so happy that now when we send it out
29:57
into the universe, other managers and other their
30:00
corporate people, and other people can begin to integrate
30:04
these these easily gotten mindfulness tools. And a couple
30:11
of the questions. One was, if I was wanting to get a hold of you
30:14
or connect with you, is there a way that I can connect with you
30:18
an email or website or something?
30:21
Unknown: LinkedIn would be great place to reach out to me. I'll
30:25
catch Golan, you can reach out to me on LinkedIn. It's, I have
30:29
quite a big network, over 10,000 people and it's growing. So I'm
30:34
happy to accept people who are listening to this podcast. And
30:39
I'm happy to respond to them if they have any questions.
30:42
Alan Carroll: Wonderful. Well, thank you very much. It's been a
30:45
wonderful opportunity and exciting to hear you speak and I
30:49
look forward to having more conversations because you are a
30:53
rich resource. So thank you very much.
30:57
Unknown: Thanks for having me. Thank you so much. Thanks.