What challenge inspired this recipe?
The volunteer who shared this best practice discussed that cultivating awareness helped them a great deal during the 1-year long volunteering period in a communal environment. When sharing a lot of time, common spaces, resources and responsibilities with others, tensions and conflicts are guaranteed to happen. Bringing awareness and understanding to these situations is essential to resolve tensions and live in harmony with others.
Ingredients :
Internet, books.
Step by step guide
The methodology is based on developing the habit of practicing meditation and mindfulness. There are several ways to inspire the volunteers to practice these habits, such as implementing common workshops about mindfulness and meditation, and/or providing resources on how they can practice mindfulness and meditation independently (see materials).
Important to highlight!The volunteer shared that after several difficult situations and conflicts, they witnessed how bringing awareness helped them to drop selfishness, one-sided mindset, and to develop an attitude of open communication and understanding. Up-scaling this methodology could be done through workshops or group meditations in communal environments. The internet is full of resources and guidance regarding the practice of meditation and mindfulness. One example is the talks and guided meditations of Thich Nhat Hanh. In addition, there are many applications where volunteers can learn those skills such as Calm, Down Dog, Headspace, Prana Breath, etc. |
Before you start cooking, keep in mind…
When cultivating awareness, we can start to see more clearly our own fears and anxieties, and it takes courage to embrace them. Some people are less motivated to try meditation or mindfulness, maybe they have some prejudice or they find the act of mindfulness difficult as they first try it and lose the interest in developing this skill.
