Zoom Meditation Classes for Corporations, Bringing Well-Being into Organizations Virtually

Meditation House teaches Zoom Meditation classes for corporations. These classes are now being taught to corporations as an answer to the COVID-19 pandemic. COVID-19 has brought untold changes into our lives. This year, video conferencing has become an everyday part of life for millions of us. Zoom has become a central part of our vocabulary. How has this affected corporate mindfulness classes? Are virtual mindfulness classes much more difficult to conduct than holding classes on-site and being physically in the same room? Do guided meditations for the workplace work just as well when they are not taught physically in the workplace?

The Challenges of Meditation Classes in The Office

Teaching Mindfulness Meditation classes at work has presented challenges even before virtual classes for employees came into the equation. Many times, the biggest challenge was getting people to turn up for class. A group of maybe 30 or 50 people might turn up for the first class. However, by the next week’s class, these people become distracted by their workload and they see coming to class as a lower priority. This is when attendance starts to drop. Typically, when this happens, HR personnel travel throughout their office to remind people to show up for the Meditation class.

The next challenge faced when teaching classes in offices is to get people to become mindful of being at the Meditation class with their full attention on the purpose of being in the class. It’s more difficult for people to disengage from work when they’re in a work environment. They might be thinking about all the various tasks that they need to get done. They might be feeling stressed about their upcoming evaluation because they know their boss is not happy with their performance. These thoughts accompany the thoughts of all that is going on in their personal lives. It is a lot to work against when trying to guide people through a mindfulness class.

The physical environment where classes are taught in corporations also presents a considerable challenge. Classes are being taught in environments that are not physically conducive for Meditation. Corporate buildings are designed for activity and are typically very noisy. Telephones can ring right in the middle of a mindfulness session. People enter and leave rooms without any consideration of the need for a quiet environment. A person might think they can ‘quickly’ enter the room to check something with another colleague.

Mobile phones are a major distraction in mindfulness classes. People forget to silence their phones. And even when they silence them, they leave them on “vibrate” which can be just as distracting as a ringing phone. And then there is the great temptation to check a cell phone during the Meditation in case anyone has called or texted them. The distractions are all around.

The Benefits Zoom Meditation Classes in The Office

Meditation House started teaching Zoom Meditation classes for corporations as a direct response to measures taken to prevent the spread of COVID-19. When the pandemic measures were officially announced in New York, companies began closing their doors and employees had to work from remote locations. Companies canceled all mindfulness classes and programs. This created a void for employees. Even though there were mindfulness solutions available via apps, via YouTube, and via other avenues, many employees have relied on the mindfulness classes and programs that were offered to them via the organizations that employed them.

“We were concerned that placing our Meditation classes on hold would be detrimental to any results already gained by the employees that we were teaching”, stated Dan Globus, Director and lead Meditation teacher of Meditation House. “With the stress and fear the pandemic brought, mindfulness classes were needed more than ever. So we decided to start utilizing Zoom to bring our Mindfulness classes to employees that were working from home.”

Some companies were incredibly open to the idea of offering Meditation classes via Zoom while other companies were completely against it. The companies that were against it felt that these classes could only be effective if taught o groups of employees in-person. Many of these same companies simply needed time to understand that the COVID-19 effects on corporations were not short-term and they needed to start looking at the long-term health of their employees.

In March, Meditation House started teaching Zoom Meditation classes to employees at the corporations that were open to this new way of delivering Mindfulness classes. However, teaching classes via Zoom brought challenges, especially from a technological angle. Dan Globus of Meditation House felt a certain trepidation when he started. “I didn’t know how I was going to be able to connect with people and thought that there may be technological limitations. Delivering background audio with the meditation was a technology challenge. Initially, I tried playing background music via a speaker that my voice microphone would pick up. This did not work well. However, I was able to play music directly through a computer with Zoom’s share option. This has worked out well.”

Advantages of Using Zoom

It did not take long to realize the advantages of doing Zoom mindfulness classes. There were far fewer disturbances with Zoom presentations than would normally be encountered when teaching at an organization’s office. One of the most significant advantages of teaching via Zoom is that there is no limit to the number of participants. Zoom mindfulness classes typically range anywhere from 15-200+ people.
With in-office classes, space is a limitation. There have typically been anywhere between 5 to 20 people in Meditation House’s in-person classes and sometimes up to 50 people. There have been few corporations with the facilities to allow for such large classes. But with Zoom, a few hundred people can be taught at a time.
All of the normal elements that can negatively impact an in-person Meditation class are removed when teaching via Zoom. This includes people showing up late, telephones ringing, the sound of people walking above or below the office space, and more.

“There can be funny moments too when teaching via Zoom” explains Dan. “I am currently teaching from my home. I have a dog that does something very interesting. When my dog hears a fire engine, he starts to howl. Luckily, fire engines are not constantly dispatched so my dog’s howling is pretty limited. And I of course mute the audio when this happens on occasion.”

Dan finds that technology very liberating. “It really opens up possibilities as people can attend Zoom Meditation classes not only from their computer or laptop, they can use a tablet, iPad, or smartphone. They don’t even have to connect to the Internet. People can call in from their phones.”

Dealing with Zoom Fatigue

What about the problem of Zoom fatigue? People start to suffer stress from too many Zoom calls. Research is showing that rather than contributing to the stress, meditation and mindfulness via Zoom is proving to help alleviate it. The National Center for Biotechnology Information (NDBI) published a paper this month giving three reasons why mindfulness from home may be assisting employees during the crisis. The third reason has to do with how Zoom mindfulness classes allow people to better manage and recover from Zoom or screen fatigue. (1)

Like many other learning institutes, USC (The University of California) professors started offering classes online when the pandemic interrupted regular courses. It was not always a smooth process, but the professor of Mindful USC, Prof. Allen Weiss, found that mindfulness via Zoom went exceptionally well. “People love it. They absolutely love our classes,” he said in their newsletter. “It doesn’t bother them at all. I know many people are Zoom’d out, but the Zoom experience that people have in our classes is completely different from anything else that they’re doing.”
Mindfulness classes have been taking place at USC since 2014, and the responses from students are overwhelmingly positive. The comments are not simply ‘That was great’. They include comments like ‘You’ve changed my life”. Prof. Weiss believes mindfulness’s popularity will only continue to grow now that it is widely available on Zoom. He plans to continue Zoom mindfulness classes when the pandemic is over. In the past, many could not take classes due to work needs or driving home. But now they can join from wherever they are in the world. (2)

Benefits of Mindfulness Meditation at Work

According to Cornell Health, there are over 1,000 studies that have given evidence that meditation has benefits to our well-being. Among the many potential benefits, they say: (3)

Meditation may Increase: