Mindfulness and Remote Collaboration
This blog post is going to explore the benefits and drawbacks of mindful approaches when working remotely through evaluating mine and Josh's experiences of adopting mindful techniques in our practices. This blog post has been inspired by Melinda Rothouse's book, A Mindful Approach to Team Creativity and Collaboration in Organizations, as her writing offers valuable insight into what a mindful approach is, and how it can be achieved.[1] Despite the book being aimed at organisations, it is still useful for mine and Josh's research, as we can still take onboard the premises Rothhouse outlines within it.
Drawing from Buddhist philosophies and techniques, mindfulness encourages 'the idea of learning how to be fully present and engaged in the moment, [being] aware of your thoughts and feelings without distraction or judgment.'[4] Rothhouse's book demonstrates how 'mindfulness and contemplative arts practices can help support team creativity and collaboration in five key areas':
1.Individual-Level Mindfulness: Relaxation, Openness, and Self-Awareness 2. Trust and Authentic Communication 3. Team Cohesion and Collaboration 4. Creative Ideation and Insights 5. Leadership for Creating a Culture of Innovation [3]
From this we can ascertain how a mindful mind-set can be really beneficial to working in collaborative and creative relationships. Covid-19 has, however, had a major impact on mental health, with increased stress and isolation it can make it harder to be creative - and also to reach out for help - so, I'm interested in how mindful techniques can help to alleviate some of that stress, and increase trust within established collaborative relationships.[5]
One of the hallmarks of mindfulness is a sense of openness to, and the ability or willingness to engage with, whatever is occurring in the present moment, which also turns out to be an important component of creativity.[6]
As Josh and I have been friends for over 10 years now, we're in quite a lucky position in that we're comfortable with one another, and have had lots of time to establish trust within our friendship, which has no doubt had positive repercussions on our project. Despite this, we were both keen to see how adopting mindful techniques would impact our creative practices, and ability to work together remotely.
Josh and I tried our hand at doing the 'Mindful Speaking and Listening Exercise' as demonstrated within Chapter 5 of Rothhouses' book. This exercise focuses on 'cultivating empathy, connection, and attunement' by having one person in the role of 'speaker' and the other as 'listener'. The 'speaker should talk (mindfully) for between 3 and 5 minutes about the current creative project, and then both participants should take 'a few moments of mindful breathing in silence' before swapping roles. Following this, they should have a discussion to see how they reacted to being in each role, taking note of body language, emotions and thoughts. The exercise should be finished with mindful breathing and reflection upon what was said.[7]
We thought that this would be a good introduction to mindful techniques, as neither of us had tried mindfulness exercises before, and also it was possible to do over Zoom. Despite this, we still found the barrier of doing over Zoom took away from the experience, make it harder to be as 'present' as possible, as we both became hyper-aware that we were in different places. We both agreed that it would have probably been much more successful if we were doing it in the same physical space as one another.
Conversely, we both found being in the speaker and listener roles to be quite engaging, and helped us both to come to terms with our ideas as we expressed to one another. We did find it a little tricky at times to remain concentrated in these roles, and to not make a joke out of it every now and then - but mindfulness comes with experience, and we are sure that the more we practice it the easier it will become. We also found that discussing and analysing our experiences after to be very beneficial: our self awareness and reflection was heightened as we engaged with what we had said and listened to. From this we found that we had more trust in what the other person was doing, especially as we couldn't work in person and therefore oversee what they were doing. This enabled us to have a better working relationship, and also to take the pressure off a little bit as we became more confident our shared aims and values of the project.
On an individual level, I found that mindful techniques when composing the soundtrack really helped me to engage with the footage that Josh had put together. In doing some breathing exercises and taking time out to reflect on what I had done, I developed more confidence and a clearer aim in what I was trying to achieve. It really helped me to not overthink and add too many ideas in order to keep the narrative central to the film. I intend to continue using mindfulness approaches to creating work - both when working alone and collaborating as it overs valuable perspective and, also insight into the project being worked on and is a good way to establish trust with the person you're collaborating with.
[1] Melinda J. Rothhouse, A Mindful Approach to Team Creativity and Collaboration in Organizations: Creating a Culture of Innovation, (Omahar: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020).
[2] Ibid., 127
[3] Ibid., 127.
[4] Headspace, 'Mindfulness', n.d., https://www.headspace.com/mindfulness, (19th May 2021).
[5] Centers for Disease Control Prevention, 'Mental Health and Coping During COvid-19 Pandemic', January 2021, https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/daily-life-coping/managing-stress-anxiety.html, (19th May 2021).
[6] Rothhouse, A Mindful Approach, 24.
[7] Ibid., 75-77.
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