To begin with, I want to thank you professor for including this exceptional assignment within the

curriculum and want to tell you that this exercise has brought some positive changes in both my
professional and personal life.

On the first day, when we were discussing the syllabus, and the “mindfulness through meditation” came
across, the first question that crossed my mind was “how is this even relevant to the class: becoming a
global leader”. In the past, I have been impatient and doubtful about many projects/assignments from
the beginning itself, and those qualities have many times taught me to have a bit of faith and patience to
uncover the answers for the doubts down the line. I went on a very similar journey with this assignment.
At the beginning, I kept think how is this activity of meditating going to help me become a global leader?
How? How? How? But I remembered the earlier mistakes that I had done, and decided to begin
meditating thinking that, maybe I am looking at this in a very curriculum oriented activity rather than
recognizing the core phenomenon meditation provides you: Mindfulness OR as I would like to phrase:
befriending your consciousness.

I started meditating slowly and in a limited manner (3 times a week for 10 minutes each session). The
first thing I realized when I started meditating is that I overestimated my ability to meditate. I could not
stop my thoughts and/or focus my attention towards a focal point, which as traditional books say is
something every individual should try to focus on to attain mindfulness through meditation. For the first
2 weeks I struggled quite hard to maintain that focus and not let myself get lost within the million
thoughts that occurred within the five minutes time frame. The second thing I learned from meditation
was that the speed of thoughts is greater than the speed of light and the number of thoughts occurring
surprised me that: Wow! I never knew there were so many thoughts lurking around in my head, and this
inability to focus and/or get rid of the thoughts was my greatest challenge. The tide of thoughts made
me feel that I am never going to be able to focus on the “focal point” or reach the state of mindfulness. I
tried chanting a mantra to focus on the wording or the hymn, efforts to get rid of the tide of thoughts.

I felt that I my approach may not be right. I downloaded the “headspace” application. There are a bunch
of modules within the headspace, and I started with ten minutes of meditation. As I started the
meditation, I learned a very thoughtful and realistic idea that most of us do not exactly know what
meditation is. Meditation is not sitting in a specific position: eyes closed with hands and legs folded,
chanting a mantra, or trying to focus on a focal point. Meditation is realizing that within all the thoughts
that occur, within all the commotion around, it is the realization that “YOU” are present within all of
that. Meditation is more of becoming friends with your conscience and guiding it to have a clearer
vision. The third and the most important lesson that I learned was: Meditation is NOT getting rid of the
recurring numerous thoughts, but rather to recognize them and mindfully setting them aside. I learned
that the biggest struggle while meditating is the constant fight we have trying to get rid of the thoughts
that should rather be recognized for their existence and then mindfully setting them aside to focus on
the greater thought: YOU. Assume you are sitting on a milestone on the road, and the traffic are the
thoughts that are occurring within your head. There is a lot of commotion, but what meditation taught
me is to recognize that traffic, accept that commotion, and then mindfully letting the traffic pass to
understand and welcome the greater thought: my conscience. Gradually, I started realizing that I am
now more aware of the thoughts, the surrounding, and most importantly me. I started realizing the
changes that took place: I became more aware of the surrounding, the drastic movements of my
eyeballs were suddenly calmer and steadier, I started feeling the presence of an unseen energy around
me (my vibe!!!). However, the most important lesson I learned from meditation, is that I could now filter

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the million thoughts and recognize the most important ones. I realized that this ability to filter down the
thoughts and recognizing the most immediate and crucial thoughts that need attention and resolution is
going to help me immensely.

This new gained ability to recognize the most important thought, helped me immensely in both my
personal and professional life. For every challenge I faced, I was able to filter down the main cause of
that challenge and realize that in many instances a small change in my behavior or perception could
untangle the entire knot leading to a challenge. In the past, I used to resolve these challenges on a
surface, and naturally they used to present themselves again. But with the help of meditation, I could
find out the root cause of the challenge and resolve them for good. As a global leader, accepting the
diversity in personalities, thoughts, culture, and approach is necessary for a smoother and efficient
operation. However, time and again, I found it difficult to accept drastically different thought processes
and at every instance, I tried to justify and argue that my thought process was right and should be
adopted, and my ways of justification at times had illogical reasoning behind them and I knew that. I
tried to resolve these challenges, by trying to be more accepting (a surface level resolution), but such an
effort lasts only up to a certain limit. With the help of meditation, I tried to acknowledge each level of
thought barring me from having a global outlook, a more accepting outlook. With the newly gained
ability I was able to recognize that the root cause was the thoughts that I was surrounded and fed upon
during the growth years. As psychologists say that childhood is the mold that makes the man we see
today. The realization was overwhelming, but I was happier that I now have the cause of the challenge,
and hence I can now resolve the root problem, untangling the knot holding me back from becoming and
“authentic” global leader.

Mindful meditation has introduced me to a skill that has helped me recognize my conscience, and in
doing so helped me authentically become a more accepting and culturally aware individual. I wish to
restate the notion that meditation is not closing your eyes and focusing on a focal point but is a way to
accept the million thoughts and mindfully filtering them to meet your consciousness.

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