The burden of responsible leadership rests on the shoulders of the leader. That's why as we prepare ourselves to be responsible leaders we must arm ourselves with all of the resources and knowledge we can find at our disposal to be the most effective leaders possible. After this week's readings I believe one of the most powerful knowledge bases we can obtain is a solid understanding of mindfulness.

What is mindfulness?

Mindfulness is the ability to be an accurate observer of your current actions and state of mind. A leader who is aware of one’s own metal state makes it possible to be more effective in interactions with others.

For me, I feel as if I have been able to work over the past several years to hone in my skills to become aware of what was going on in the atmosphere around me, both externally and internally, and utilize that information to shape my actions. However the one thing I now realize that I may have been overlooking is that mindfulness is not about just analyzing one problem or situation, it is a constant state of being that should come second nature.

One of my goals for the remainder of this semester will be to find ways to make these actions a more natural part of my automatic reflexes and thought processes versus something on a checklist for individual scenarios.

During my research for this post, here is video I found interesting and worth sharing: