What learnings did you take from the chapter you read?
I took a bunch of notes while reading the emotional intelligence chapter, but even from reading the introduction and the first couple of paragraphs about what outcomes the book was aiming to give the reader, I learned that the focus on outcome and mindset was pretty much spread throughout each theme (emotional intelligence, self-knowledge and self-mastery, and creating useful mental habits). I actually plan on reading this whole book at some point during the week along with the rest of my assignments. Some things that I took notes on and really resonated with were when the book talked about the attributes and personalities of successful and inspiring leaders, creating conditions for happiness and optimizing yourself, reacting to emotional stimulus and the two minutes of mindfulness.
How did you find the two minutes of mindfulness?
I'll be completely honest with you, person who is reading this - I am not a very mindful person when it comes to myself. I have been described as hyper-empathetic by 80 per cent of the people who know me, including my partner, who sees me every single day and knows me inside out. I can almost immediately get into someone's mindset and feel how they're feeling, think how they're thinking, and find solutions to whatever issues they're having. HowEVER - and it's a big however - when it comes to taking care of myself and knowing how I feel and how to respond to that, I have absolutely NO IDEA what I'm supposed to do half the time. The idea of two minutes (even two measly minutes) of being remotely aware of myself and my surroundings is utterly terrifying. I love being productive, I love trying mind tricks and games to make you more productive, I love those little brain hacks to give you that extra 5 seconds of time per day, but that's about the extent of the amount of 'being mindful of myself' I get most days. I spent my entire life being shoved and pushed by people in my life who expected massive things from me - not even at school like every other person, but even expectations in terms of my own personal achievements such as after-school activities, fitness, et cetera. My parents used to drag me out of bed at 8.30am every single day, weekday or weekend, and I would be expected to make a list of sometimes unreasonable goals and achieve them that day. Some days I got so stressed, I wouldn't sleep that night just to finish my daily goals and go to school the next day with it still weighing on my mind. I remember one day, my mother told me to finish recording the song that I was writing and working on. I had told her it was nearly done, and so she assumed that it could be done in a day. Hell no - it was not even CLOSE to finished, and on top of that I had hayfever and couldn't sing properly because I couldn't breathe through my nose. I didn't sleep that night, doing takes over and over again, and doing nasal flushes and at one point I was taking sips of bourbon to clear my throat between takes. What I think that did to my brain was made me think: "Alright, so basically if I make a goal I have to stick to it no matter what, failure is not an option, there's no time to sit and do nothing because that's not productive".
This contradicts everything I've been taught in my entire adult life - because as we all know now, you HAVE to rest your brain to have continous productivity. Every time I sit down, even for two minutes, I am fighting ruthlessly with the part of my brain that goes "YOU SHOULD NOT BE RESTING, YOU'VE GOT SHIT TO DO BUDDY!". Reading this chapter about being mindful made me feel good, as it reaffirmed my initial thoughts that this is good for you, but it also made me feel reasonably guilty even just thinking about shirking my doubts, worries, stresses and responsibilities for two whole minutes. Side note - I am also quite sick right now and on flu drugs, which might slightly impair my thinking right now, but even in a normal state I think this all still applies. The stresses as a young woman have definitely affected and dragged through to my adulthood, but I guess that's more a reflection on my upbringing rather than a reflection on my mindset, because I could probably change my thinking if I spent a bit more time focusing on changing it. Okay - rant over. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)