Finally, mindfulness seems to increase concentration and focus. Research looking specifically at mindfulness in the workplace is relatively new. But there’s good reason to think it makes employees more satisfied and less stressed. A 2014 study of employees at the Dow Chemical Company, for instance, showed that mindfulness training increased vigor, lowered stress, and gave employees a greater sense of resiliency. Preliminary studies suggest that a program in mindfulness also can increase productivity and reduce the number of sick days.

Mindfulness helps us focus: Studies suggest that mindfulness helps us tune out distractions and improves our memory, attention skills, and decision-making.

No, you don’t need anything to meditate, although it can be helpful to use an app, especially when you’re starting out. Some apps also have timers or other prompts reminding you to meditate, which can help you make it a daily routine.

A Q&A with Jack Kornfield about giving feedback at work, using social media wisely, and the poetry in his teachings.

If you provide content to customers through CloudFront, you can find steps to troubleshoot and help prevent this error by reviewing the CloudFront documentation.

Meditation trains us to notice the traffic without chasing or fighting it — just to let the thought come. Then gently shift vibration raising our focus away from it and back onto our breath — to let the thought go.

Once you finish this practice and get ready to start working, mindfulness can help increase your effectiveness. Two skills define a mindful mind: focus

, argues that there is still much we don’t understand about mindfulness and meditation. Worse, many scientists and practitioners don’t even agree on the definition of those words. They end the paper calling for “truth in advertising by contemplative neuroscience.”

mentally. Then, if possible, end the meeting five minutes before the hour in order to allow all participants a mindful transition to their next meeting.

Doing this helps us become more aware of our thoughts, act more compassionately toward ourselves and others, and connect with the present moment.

JM: Here in the San Francisco Bay area, we’re seeing growing interest. Initially, that was among tech and social media companies. Google has been a pioneer in providing mindfulness practice training for its employees. In fact, an engineer at Google first instituted a mindfulness training program there, which has now become the Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute, offering mindfulness training for companies around the world.

In another study, people with heart disease were randomly assigned to either an online program to help them practice meditation or to a waitlist for the program while undergoing normal treatment for heart disease.

Meditation doesn’t require much. But it’s easiest to get started knowing these meditation basics:

While one review of randomly controlled studies showed that mindfulness may have mixed effects on the physical symptoms of heart disease, a more recent review published by the American Heart Association concluded that, while research remains preliminary, there is enough evidence to suggest mindfulness as an adjunct treatment for coronary disease and its prevention.