The Mindfulness Blog

The Mindful Business Charter ("MBC") is a predominantly European organization (at the moment) that I learned about through a Press Release issued by the Dentons law firm--which this past Summer, created a new role identified as the Europe, Chief Mindfulness Officer!

In its own unique way, the MBC is a rough equivalent of the National Task Force for Lawyer Well-Being, here in the States-- not surprisingly, both groups regard mindfulness and meditation as salutary practices that positively impact well-being, and both are committed to the promotion of well-being throughout the corporate business world.

Now comes the hard part. Moving beyond stated aspirations to design and implement balanced well-being programs that nourish both the mind and body, is not easily accomplished. There are a lot of moving parts, and the coordination of individual privacy concerns, protection of personal medical data, observance of relevant health insurance requirements and scaling of qualified personnel are just the beginning-- which is to say, well-being in the workplace is a job that will require the input of many different skill sets.

The motto of the MBC is, "Be brave". And (if I may add my two cents), "be determined". The MBC describes itself as, "a set of best practice, behavioral principles to reduce avoidable stress in ways of working within the legal sector-- both for solicitors working in private practice, and those in-house... The MBC is the result of a collaborative research exercise involving 9 law firms and 3 in-house bank teams, and designed to be both commercial and responsible".

I don't know about you, but I think all that is way cool, and also, way overdue. Well-being is something that many segments of the business world-- particularly, the legal profession-- have long ignored. And now that we seem to have figured out the body part of well-being, it's time we started working on the mind part.

As the late, great Louis Armstrong sang (in one of my all-time favorite movie soundtracks from the movie, Sleepless in Seattle ), "And I say to myself, what a wonderful world". And mindfulness and meditation will be a big part of it, in 2020.

Happy (and mindful) holidays to all and a safe, prosperous New Year!