A recent study finds that hope appears to be more beneficial than mindfulness at helping people manage stress and stay professionally engaged during periods of prolonged stress at work. The study underscores the importance of looking ahead, rather than living "in the moment," during hard times. Mindfulness refers to the ability of an individual to focus attention on the present, in a way that is open, curious and not judgmental.
Essentially, the ability to be fully in the moment. There's a lot of discussion about the benefits of mindfulness, but it poses two challenges when you're going through periods of stress. First, it's hard to be mindful when you're experiencing stress.
Second, if it's a truly difficult time, you don't necessarily want to dwell too much on the experience you're going through. Tom Zagenczyk, co-author of a paper on the work and professor of management in North Carolina State University's Poole College of Management "Because hope is inherently forward looking, while mindfulness is about appreciating your current circumstances, we wanted to see how each of these two mindsets influenced people's well-being and professional attitudes during difficult times," Zagenczyk says. "The COVID pandemic presented us with an unfortunate, but useful, opportunity to explore this topic.
And we chose to focus on the performing arts since that sector was particularly hard hit by the pandemic." For the study, researchers recruited 247 professional musicians from the organiza.