On being mindfulOn being mindful
All In The Mind
Being Mindful in May—mindfulness as a treatment for depression, and why Google is encouraging it in the workplace.
28:50•10 May 2015
On Being Mindful: From 10‑Minute Meditations to Brain Changes and Workplace Calm
Episode Overview
- Mindfulness trains attention to be present, helping people respond rather than react on autopilot.
- Ten minutes of guided meditation a day can be a practical starting point for beginners and may still offer noticeable benefits.
- Research using brain scans suggests mindfulness practice can alter regions involved in memory, ageing, stress and mood.
- Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy provides skills to recognise and step back from negative thinking linked to depressive relapse.
- Workplace initiatives such as group sits and mindful lunches can reduce stress and support better relationships and productivity.
“These people, nothing in their life was changing… But their relationship to the stress changed.”
Curious about how others manage their mental health in a fast-paced world? This conversation from All In The Mind pulls together science, personal practice and workplace culture to look at what being mindful actually means in everyday life. You’ll hear clinical psychologist Willem Kuyken explain mindfulness as a “paradigm shift” from reacting on autopilot to choosing a more responsive way of living.
He describes how mindfulness-based cognitive therapy can help people with recurrent depression spot “wrecking ball thoughts” before they trigger a full relapse, and why regular practice is a bit like going to the mental gym. Dr Elise Bailiu, psychiatrist and founder of Mindful in May, shares how a simple 10‑minute daily guided meditation can get beginners started without feeling overwhelmed.
Her campaign aims to teach mindfulness while raising money for clean water, linking inner awareness with a sense of compassion and responsibility towards others. As she puts it, life is often so busy that people forget they’re “active citizens” with the power to shape the world they want to see.
On the scientific side, Professor Sarah Lazar from Harvard outlines brain scan research showing structural changes after an eight‑week mindfulness programme, including in regions linked to memory, ageing, stress and mood.
Her work suggests that even short, regular practice can reduce self‑reported stress by changing how people relate to difficult experiences: “These people, nothing in their life was changing… But their relationship to the stress changed.” The episode also stops by Google, where Van Riper explains how group sits, mindful lunches and the g‑Pause programme support staff to handle big goals and heavy workloads with greater calm and emotional awareness.
If you’ve wondered whether a few minutes of daily practice could genuinely shift your mood, attention and sense of connection, this might be the nudge to try a breath, a body scan, or a mindful lunch and see what happens next.
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