We all experience a variety of thoughts and feelings—some brilliant and sublime; some biting, petty, and dark; and everything in between. We might even feel okay with having these experiences in the privacy of own home, but horrors, not at work! We have to have it together, look good, be on and up, right? The common response to these types of inner experiences is to suppress or try to fix them, especially if we have previously acted them out, say through yelling at a subordinate.

When we practice mindfulness, during formal meditation practice and “off the cushion” during the day, we learn how to “sit with” and experience these thoughts and feelings without getting caught in them or acting them out. Authors Susan David and Christina Congleton are pointing to the same concept in their November 2013 Harvard Business Review article, “Emotional Agility.” In this piece, they underscore the inevitability of having undesirable thoughts and feelings, and the ineffectiveness of trying to stamp them out (kind of like Whack-a-Mole!).

“Effective leaders don’t buy into or try to suppress their inner experiences. Instead they approach them in a mindful, values-driven, and productive way—developing what we call emotional agility. In our complex, fast-changing knowledge economy, this ability to manage one’s thoughts and feelings is essential to business success. Numerous studies, from the University of London professor Frank Bond and others, show that emotional agility can help people alleviate stress, reduce errors, become more innovative, and improve job performance.”

Drawing from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, David and Congleton suggest recognizing habitual patterns, labeling thoughts and feelings as thoughts and feelings, slowing down to accept these thoughts and feelings (they are actually going on and may provide some useful information), and acting on your values once you’ve unhooked yourself from the grip of the thoughts and feelings. This is largely what we are doing in meditation practice.