“Every morning I do meditation for one hour to start the day from zero, with a white page, and it does work. I started it not so long ago and I was quite skeptical about it. It takes some time to learn it but it does work. Holistic fashion. It helps to calm the mind.”
“At Urban Zen, we find the calm in the chaos, a little time to go deeper, letting go of my ego, just being. It’s wonderful to meditate in groups; the energy is so strong with a teacher when you feel the energy coming back and forth.”
“Practicing mindfulness and meditation greatly impacts how I show up in the workplace. Be it in difficult situations or with difficult people, I find myself welcoming people in a warmer way. In the company, we have a simple practice that we’ve been doing for about 10 years. We chime a bell and take a moment of silence before every meeting. It helps set the stage to be more present and thoughtful. We can leave behind whatever was going on from the previous meeting or conversation. It allows us to each just pause for a few moments, give ourselves a little space, create awareness and ask, ‘Why am I doing this and why does it matter? Why do I care about it?’ I think it helps us care more about the work itself – the whole of the work, not just about the product that we create.”
“I think more before I speak and act, and for me that sort of self-awareness is really powerful. Especially being a business owner, because you’ve got to make sure that you are responding and replying to people appropriately and not only being kind, but also being mindful of business and not just rushing to do things.”
“Working in the fashion world your job takes you out of the present and into the future. The fashion business is fundamentally about ‘what’s next,’ not about ‘what’s now.’ If you want to have moments of being in the present you have to create those for yourself. I have a very disciplined approach to this. I build in time to be in the present every day — with yoga, meditation or both. I find that by creating those still, calm, present moments when I come back into the space of looking forward and creating the future it’s with more clarity and calmness.”
“I have seen an enormous shift in my focus which has translated into business decisions that I’ve made recently. There is a certain creativity and freedom that I found in learning to meditate. I also find that I benefit from feeling more calm in situations that might usually have been particularly stressful.”
“I practice TM, which means transcendental meditation. I meditate for 20 minutes every morning and 20 minutes every afternoon. The germination of a new idea starts in an empty space. Meditation allows your mind to create that empty space, which in turn, allows for these new ideas. It is an essential part of my design process.”