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Keep Your Cool By having Presence of Mind

Once in an interview a MBA student was asked –

Suppose you are the head in a multinational company. One day you are working in your office and you are busy dispatching an important assignment to a big company. When you were listening to the secretary about the details your mobile phone start ringing. It’s a phone call from your son’s school. On attending the call, you come to know that your son is having a high-grade fever and you are asked by the principal to come and take your son to the doctor. At the same time, you were informed by the plant manager that accidentally a worker has fall in a big boiler.

Few minutes later there is a phone call on your office number which your secretary picks up and informs you that one of our foreign clients is about to land at the airport due to emergency landing of the aircraft. Your boss has asked you to arrange a room in a hotel for his stay till he gets his next flight.

After explaining all the situations, the interviewer asks – how you are going to deal with all these four situations?

What do you think…. the panel of interviewers were really looking for the solution of these situations???

No, they were looking for something more… that is …they wanted to check, in all these situations is the candidate sitting right Infront of them will be able to maintain his cool while tackling these situations. This interview was just a check for “The presence of mind ” of the candidate.

In another interview a candidate was asked – when you were coming up, how many stairs did you climb?

The candidate replied spontaneously – 25 stairs Sir. He was selected.

What do you think… while climbing the stairs, do we really count the number of stairs? No, certainly not. Again, this question was just a check for “The presence of mind” of the candidate.

Presence of mind refers to our ability to remain calm and take quick, wise decisions especially during the times of crises. It involves quick and intelligent thinking as well as control over the feelings of fear, anxiety, and excitement. In other words, presence of mind means keeping cool and not losing head in some sudden emergency.

Presence of mind is one of the greatest gifts of God as it not only helps us in avoiding unnecessary problems but also makes us more focused towards our goals. At any place, a good presence of mind allows us to handle a situation in a very easy way. However, lack of presence of mind can lead to serious disasters.

Our Mentor Says – In order to prevent such things from happening, we should try to increase our presence of mind. Here are some tips that can help us to develop our presence of mind –

1. LISTEN CAREFULLY – One should listen more and speak less. When we do so, we get valuable information from the person who is speaking. We can estimate what is his state of mind. Hence we can act accordingly and use our increased knowledge to solve a situation.
   
   
2. BE OBSERVANT – At any place and in any situation, we should try to observe even the minute things carefully. Presence of mind basically implies concentration and focus. Lack of focus and a distracted mind are signs of low presence of mind. while doing anything, we need to understand and observe the work carefully.
   
   
3. DON’T CARRY EMOTIONAL BAGGAGE – As a human being, it is natural that one cannot completely compartmentalize his/her mind. Many unwanted things come into our mind which cause distraction. Whether at study or at work or doing spiritual practices, people are preoccupied with their worries and problems. as such, we should learn to check our thoughts and emotions while doing any sort of important work.
   
   
4. WORK ON PRIORITY BASIS – Everyday, when we get up, we are enthusiastic about doing many things during the day. For this, we need to work on priority basis. important things or important work should be done at first. If we do the less important things first, we keep on worrying about the important things. Our worry troubles us all through the day. So we need to develop a habit of doing important things first.
   
   
5. LEARN TO RELAX – Stress takes a toll on the brain by spreading harmful chemicals over different brain areas involved in memory. Some scientists believe that living a balanced lifestyle and pursing relaxing activities like yoga, meditation, being with nature, drawing and crafting, may delay memory impairment by reducing stress. Therefore, we should learn to vent out our stress so as to keep our mind fresh. We need to learn to always remain in a joyous mood and destroy our worries. We must never allow our worries to destroy us.
   
   
6. BODY MOVEMENT – The more we move, the more we relax. The best way to still the mind is to move the body. That is why, workout session is considered very good for not only the body, but also for the mind. A movement that expresses emotion is the best. It helps us to clear stored tensions and helps to quieten our mind.
   
   
7. BEING REAL TO OURSELF – We must be always loyal and truthful towards our own self. We must never pretend to become what we are not. We need to give ourself permission to connect to our authentic thoughts and feelings. People with powerful presence of mind are fully aware of their real thoughts and feelings.

So, we should learn to control ourself in times of crises. In case of an emergency situation, when people lose their head, they make a situation become worse. We have to learn to always keep our cool in all circumstances. Never panic. Never become excited or nervous. We must use our intelligence to take wise decisions.

Our Mentor says – To increase our presence of mind we must “ Put God first in everything we do”. 

For this we need to repeat following positive affirmations – 

• I am God’s loving Child.
• Dear God ! I am yours and you are mine.
• Dear God ! when you are with me who can be against me.
• O Lord ! When you are with me, than there is no need to be afraid of anything.
• With the help of God, I can do everything.
• God’s positive energy is filling me with love, peace and joy.
• I am ocean of love.
• Attitude of gratitude fills my body and mind with positive energy .
• This life is the most precious gift given to me by God.
• O Lord ! may this life be completely devoted in your prayer and service.