Mind Over Money: Meditation is like going to gym for your mind, says Tapan Singhel

With more than three decades of experience under your belt and the majority of it was spent in a leadership position. So how do the leaders stay calm when there is so much happening around?

Okay, so if you look at any storm, the centre of the storm will always be calm. The leader should be at the centre of the storm because then you can see very clearly what is happening and what you should do.

Therefore, if we get embroiled in the storm itself, then we will not be able to pull the company’s situation, out of the storm. You should always be in a position where you can view things very clearly.

Let us say if you have to pull somebody out of the floods or out of a Hurricane and you also become a part of it, then you cannot help the person.

Over time, you handle enough crises and learn to distance yourself from them in a way so that you can maintain objectivity and clarity.

When you become part of a crisis, it is difficult for you to be able to solve it. You have to understand how to see very clearly, and then take action, you learn when to stop and step by.

I think that is what it is. Leaders have to learn to keep their minds very calm to see how to pull through difficult situations.

Any techniques that you use, any meditation that really helps you or aids you in maintaining that calm process, whichever situation that you’re in?

Therefore, there are two things to do. It’s not that you’re perfect from day one; you start to learn from every incident you come across. You will make mistakes and you will be drawn towards the storm.

1) Learning from Mistakes:
If somebody says something, you might get irritated. It is perfectly fine; it is human. Then after it is over, take a step back, look at it and think, what could you have done differently?

So every day before I go to sleep, I evaluate my day, I reflect on the things which I feel did not work out the way I thought they would, and I step back and think, about what I could have done differently.

Over time the mind gets trained to see things differently, you become more observant. This is one way to train your mind.

2) Meditation:
The second is that meditation does help. When you go to a gym, for about five months to six months, you develop strong muscles; and people often look for ways to showcase the same.

However, when you exercise your mind, you are the only person who can feel the muscles developing. You cannot wear tight t-shirts and tell anyone that you build up your mental health.

Therefore, meditation is like going to the gym for your mind. You have to know, try to see how to keep on building your mental strength.

3) Don’t feel bad:
Even if you fail in spite of the best of intentions, don’t even feel bad about it. You have to step back and look at it and then again be prepared. The storms keep on coming. It is not that it happens only once.

In addition, the more senior you become, the more storms you see at the higher frequencies. So, I think it is always a good learning, and that is how you keep on building confidence to handle it.

You have stressed on happiness at work, in life, and wherever you go. Happiness at work, I really like that concept.
If you look at it from the time you turn 23-24, you start working and you work up to 60-65, which means that your entire youth, the best years of your life you spend working.

I tell my people, let us say you only come to work because you get paid for it, it helps you clear your bills and acquires assets.

For that, you are putting yourself to misery every day going to work so that you can just get some money so you can live a life and then one day you realise that you did not live the life at all.

I ask people do they enjoy their work? Are you happy at work and if you are not then you do not have a very good life? That is an unfortunate part of it.

I think two-thirds of your time of the day you are spending at work and two-thirds of your life and your full youth you spend at work.

If you can’t be happy then you better think about it because then you have a very sad life. That is why I know I figure out why you are not happy or what can be done to make you happy or if the profession is wrong or is the workplace wrong and what is that you can correctly improve.

Do you also do any workshops at work for employees so that they can stay mentally fit?
There are 2-3 things that I do, and I encourage to do is that when I go to any of my offices, I often walk around and if I don’t find somebody smiling or looking happy, I stop and have a conversation.

If you figure out why people are not happy, and then you have a conversation, and then I think over time they open up to you. Then you figure out how can we be of assistance or how can we help people?

How can we see that they overcome the crisis they are going through? So that is the first thing that we should always do. It is a regular thing.

It is not like a workshop that happens once a year, and your duty is over. It is something that you have to live by. So every day, every moment, and as more and more leaders do that, it becomes the culture of the company, and people start taking care of each other.

Second, we have a strong HR. We do workshops we do conversations and have a discussion forum. So, those are normal things that any good organisation would do.

As we are talking right now about the culture, figuring out the problem, what is that one thing that is bothering them, is that the organisation or anybody or the work which is stressing them?
I always speak to people when I pass them by or smile at them and ask them some questions. It helps me connect with them and address it.

(This is part 1 of our 2-part series with Tapan Singhel
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