There will always be people who seek to score cheap points by denigrating an “outside” group — these tactics appeal to our base instincts and get us to ignore the real causes of problems. The mindful person commits to avoiding rhetoric that pits one against another. Mindfulness requires vigilance of mind and heart and will not accept emotion without intelligence.

Try this meditation for one minute today, or longer if you wish:

TAKE A MOMENT to watch people as they play, come home from work, as they shop or dine. If any stereotypes arise in your mind, just let them go. Simply observe each person without comment.

Our sense of reality here is an entire delusion; we know nothing of things, of people, as they are; all that we know of them are the impressions they make on our senses, and the conclusions, often erroneous, which our reason deduces from the aggregate of these impressions.
—Annie Besant, British activist

How did this meditation go for you? Share your experience with your fellow North Shore Bank employees at shorelines@northshorebank.com and you’ll be entered to win a copy of Mindfulness in Plain English, by Bhante Gunaratana.

If you’d like a daily email reminder to practice one minute of mindfulness, email us with the subject “Mindfulness reminder.”