"We are losing them. They are getting out of our shops, out of our brands. They are going for food without the food industry. Not only without us, but maybe against us," he said.

Danone has bought U.S. organic food producer WhiteWave in a $12.5 billion (9.87 billion pounds) deal, bringing the company more into line with healthier eating trends.

The deal also aims to boost growth at Danone, whose shares trade at a discount to rivals. The company's depressed valuation was highlighted this week as a reason for it being touted as a potential bid target.

Faber told Reuters that Danone, which has no large controlling shareholder, was "no more and no less than usual" vulnerable to a possible takeover bid.

Danone is seeking to build on the WhiteWave deal with a campaign to promote itself as a leader in terms of healthy eating habits.

"The global industrial food system is reaching its limits," Faber told Reuters in a phone interview before his speech in Berlin. He said evidence of this included obesity and malnutrition, wasting water and food, soil depletion, and climate change.

"Everywhere people want to regain control over their food," said Faber, a rock climber and campaigner for corporate social responsibility.

BUYING INTO THE FUTURE

WhiteWave's products have outsold mainstream packaged food businesses in recent years, highlighting the consumer shift toward natural foods and healthier eating. The deal should also help Danone to cope with tougher market conditions in dairy products in Europe, and babyfood in China.

WhiteWave makes Danone the world's biggest producer of organic food and gives it a stronger foothold in North America, which is becoming its biggest market, accounting for $6 billion, or around 25 percent of group sales against 13 percent previously.

Faber said he hoped the new Danone signature would help to address a general consumer mistrust of big, corporate brands.

"Small brands communicate on their intentions, they are activists. It is key that big brands also state their intentions," he said.

Faber, the first Danone CEO from outside the founding Riboud family, is pushing on with a dual economic and social agenda, which - like that of many blue-chip companies - aims to not only boost shareholder value and profits but also meet other targets on the environment and social policies.

"The big risk is to avoid transforming ourselves and end up only cutting costs to return cash to shareholders," he said.

A pledge at the annual shareholder meeting in April for Danone to be certified as a for-profit corporation that commits to positive social and environmental goals - was in line with that strategy, he said.

BID TALK

Bid speculation around Danone pushed its shares sharply higher this week. Broker Exane said it could be an acquisition target for Kraft Heinz, also citing PepsiCo and Coca Cola as credible suitors.

Analysts at Berenberg wrote in a research note that investors would need concrete evidence of Danone's progress in its new areas.

"We believe investors will need to see further evidence of organic growth and margin momentum to agree with the CEO that Danone is 'uniquely placed to embrace the food revolution' and for its valuation discount to the sector to close fully."

Faber is confident Danone will deliver. "I am absolutely convinced our strategy creates value for the long-term but also the short-term," he said, adding he expected sales growth to improve in the third quarter.

(Reporting by Dominique Vidalon, additional reporting by Emma Thomasson in Berlin; Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Jane Merriman)

Continued here:

Danone Looks to Ride Healthy Food Revolution Wave - New York Times

Whole Foods Buy Out May Increase Sales of Organic and Non-GMO Food

The way food is being marketed and sold to consumers is changing, and this will have an impact on farmers and food producers. The purchase of Whole Foods by Amazon is just the beginning of a revolution in the food retailing industry. According to Richard Feinberg, professor of consumer science at Purdue, It is difficult to overstate the impact that this is going to have in the grocery industry.

Feinberg says Amazon has the ability to deliver food to people quickly, no matter where they are. Amazon brings a technology and distribution ability that no grocery retailer has. This will allow Whole Foods to do what it does, but better and more profitably. Grocery chains like Kroger, Target, and Wal-Mart are not ready for what Amazon brings to the table with the new and improved Whole Foods.

With the purchase of Whole Foods, Amazon will now be able to do that with the unique food products Whole Foods has. Whole Foods is a chain that does not sell GMO food products and stresses organic, antibiotic free, and less processed food items. Amazon will now have the ability to offer and deliver those kind of products anywhere. Whole Foods currently has 430 stories, but after the acquisition, they will have 350 million stores because they will be on every desktop, Feinberg says. About 50 percent of U.S. households have an Amazon Prime membership. Prime membership for groceries cements a relationship with a grocery store, and it encourages members who have not shopped there to shop in Whole Foods.

Feinberg says other retailers will be quick to react and adapt, Other food retailers will have to make changes or disappear. He added that Amazons goal is to be bigger than Wal-Mart in the food business. He predicts this change will come quickly, within the next 3 to 5 years.

Feinberg also says that Amazon has a test store called Amazon Go in Seattle that is displaying how Amazon does groceries. Two features are significant, Customers swipe their Amazon Prime Card when they enter. When they take something off the shelf and put it in their cart, it registers in their account. If they put the item back it, takes it off their account. When they walk out of the store, the payment is instantaneous. No more waiting to check out, which is the biggest complaint that consumers have of grocery stores.

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Whole Foods Buy Out May Increase Sales of Organic and Non-GMO Food - Hoosier Ag Today

When the news broke last Friday morning that online retailer Amazon had purchased organic supermarket chain Whole Foods Market for a cool $13.7 billion, the jokes immediately began to fly. Several people tweeted that maybe Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos had accidentally placed an order for Whole Foodsthe entire companyon his Amazon Echo. Comedian Stephen Colbert quipped on Twitter that Amazon bought Whole Foods, insuring farm to market to door to UPS to redelivery attempt to UPS to missed package to UPS back to market food!

But for many, this is a huge dealand dead serious. If it happensand there are at least a few observers and a congressman who think the merger may violate antitrust lawsAmazons move into the grocery marketplace signals that the giant appears poised to realign consumer habits around how we buy quinoa, cereal, and meat in precisely the same way it changed the way we buy books, clothes, and detergent.

That prospect sent shockwaves through the set-in-its-ways grocery industry, wreaking havoc on the stocks of brick-and-mortar food retailers like Walmart, Target, and Kroger. (Kroger saw its stocks plummet an unbelievable 28 percent Thursday and Friday.)

This is the first step to changing just how society shops for food in general, says Mike Lee, a product consultant and founder of The Future Market.

And, provided the sale doesnt face antitrust challenges, a successful merger of the two companies will likely be a mixed bag for the sustainable food movement in America.

Food Retail is Shifting Toward Healthy, Sustainable

Whether its a trend or shift that is here to stay, food that is perceived to be better for people and the planet is hot. The AmazonWhole Foods deal confirms what organic and other natural food sales trends have been showing us for years. According to the Organic Trade Association, Americans spent $43 billion on organic foods in 2016an increase of more than eight percent over the previous year. And Whole Foods has positioned itself as an alternative to the mainstream, even as it has worked to reach an increasingly mainstream audience over the last decade. And since the hedge fund Jana Partners upped its stake in Amazon in April, a move like this has been on the horizon.

Several CEOs of natural and organic brandseven the companies direct competitorssaid the merger validated their core principles, as they double-down on differentiating themselves.

Bentley Hall, CEO of online grocery-delivery service Good Eggs, shared an internal memo that includes the sentiment The game is on and I am honestly excited and honored to compete against such a worthy new opponent.

Gunnar Lovelace, co-founder of online food retailer Thrive Marketa retailer selling only organic, non-GMO products onlinesays his executive team was not in panic mode Friday morning. Instead, he said the company had recommitted to its principles of high-quality food, environmental sustainability, and fair labor standards in a way they feel goes above and beyond Whole Foods.

Thats a very different value proposition to the consumer who wants value and conveniencebut also wants real alignment with doing better in the world, he says. [Disclosure: The author has in the past worked as a writer for Thrive Markets blog and has written a feature for Whole Foods Magazine.]

Increased Access to Healthy Food

Though the numbers have never been made public, analysts estimate that more than 50 million Americans, from all walks of life, pay for Amazon Prime. By joining forces with an organic grocer like Whole Foods, Amazon is poised to bring natural and organic food directly to more Americans than ever, at prices that could be more competitive with conventional foods. Reports are already surfacing to this effect. Bloomberg is reporting that Amazon wants to shed Whole Foods Whole Paycheck image and make it more competitive with larger retailers like Walmart. If this happens, affordable organic food could become the rule, rather than the exceptionand find its way into more kitchens than ever.

This includes those of many low-income Americans who lack access to affordable, healthy food. Already, John Foraker, CEO of organic food company Annies, has called on Jeff Bezos to commit to ending food desertsurban and rural neighborhoods containing few healthy food optionsby 2027.

The ability for low-income Americans to use supplemental nutrition assistance program (SNAP) benefits online could assist this cause immensely. The United States Department of Agriculture is piloting a program, expected to launch in early 2018, allowing SNAP recipients in seven states to use their benefit to buy food online. Amazon is one of the retailers selected for the program.

Amazon Could Singlehandedly Transform Our Food System

Chef Alice Waters, a leader in the good food movement, expressed her hope for the merger in a strategically crafted open letter to Bezos on Friday.

You have an unprecedented opportunity to change our food system overnight: It is time to demand that produce comes from farmers who are taking care of the land, to require meat and seafood to come from operations that are not depleting natural resources, and to support the entrepreneurial endeavors of those American farmers and food makers who do not enjoy federal subsidies, she wrote.

Its time to do the right thing for our country, our farmers, and our planet, she continued. And were all here to help you do it!

Of course, by essentially asking Amazon to bring its standards up, however, Waters goal may be at odds with the idea of bringing prices of this kind of food down for consumers.

Concerns Abound

If an AmazonWhole Foods deal is allowed to go through, every food retailerbig-box stores, online retailers, and even farmers marketswill feel the crunch, says Future Markets Lee. Meal-kit delivery services like Blue Apron and Plated could suffer the most in the short term. Swallowing up lifestyle services like these would be easy pickings for the new grocery behemoth, Lee says, given Whole Foods access to quality food and Amazons logistics prowess.

According to Barry C. Lynn, Director of the Open Markets Program at New America, thats too much power for one corporation. Lynns organization condemned the deal Friday, calling it anti-competitive and asking regulators to reject the merger.

This private corporation already dominates every corner of online commerce, and uses its power to set terms and prices for many of the most important products Americans buy or sell to one another, Lynn said in a statement. Now Amazon is exploiting that advantage to take over physical retail.

While he does think anti-trust regulators must be vigilant, Parke Wilde, associate professor at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, suggested the combined company is unlikely to be able to control prices as a monopolist does. In a healthy food system, he says, smaller farms and retailers would play a growing role, and he has mixed feelings about a merger of major corporations.

We should never forget that these are big corporations, pursuing their own profits foremost, but I still see some potential in a merger of Amazon and Whole Foods, Parke said.

For others, the deal could create a labor war. Bloomberg reported over the weekend that Amazon may be planning to lay off Whole Foods cashiers and replace them with machines. But beyond in-store employees, Michele Simon, the executive director of the Plant-Based Foods Association and author of Appetite for Profit, worries about the additional pressures being placed on farmers and food manufacturers to lower prices at a time when most of our food prices are not reflective of their true cost.

The driving down of food prices could come at a cost to farmers and every worker throughout the supply chain, she told Civil Eats.

And even as demand for organic food increases in America, less than 1 percent of domestic fields are certified organicand when domestic demand outstrips domestic supply, the practices that underlie USDA Organic-certified foods are sometimes put at risk. Expanding the supply of U.S.-grown organic foods is hampered by federal incentives that give the upper hand to conventionally grown food. So even if tens of millions more Americans begin to demand more humane and environmentally friendly food, the supplyat least here in the U.S.will likely fall short.

We still need a host of policy reforms to fix this problem, Simon said. Will Amazon and Whole Foods join us in that effort? I hope so.

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Will the Amazon-Whole Foods Deal Mean Better Food for All? - Civil Eats

Earlier this month, the North Florida School of Special Education (NFSSE) announced a new partnership with The Arc Jacksonville Village, which would bring organic fruits, vegetables and herbs grown at the schools farm into the residential campus dining hall.

More than 120 adults over the age of 18 with diagnoses including Down syndrome, autism, Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders, cerebral palsy and other developmental disabilities, call The Arc Jacksonville Village home.

Debbie Johnson, board member at The Arc Jacksonville, said prior to the partnership with NFSSE, residents were fed by a full-time chef.

We have been in operations at the village for a year and we were evaluating the cost effectiveness of the food service program here, she said. During those series of conversations, we talked to the NFSSE because we knew about their Berry Good Farms culinary program.

NFSSE launched Berry Good Farms in 2011 and it not only provides sustainable food, it serves as a training opportunity for students who are transitioning out of the school, as well as compensated employment for post-graduates.

Johnson said the partnership came out of several conversations with Sally Hazelip, executive director of NFSSE.

We felt that because of the experience the school had with a culinary program that what theyd offer here would be delicious, healthy meals for our residents and that they would offer these quality meals at an affordable price, she said. We saw an opportunity for the school to come here and expand their Berry Good Farms program.

In addition to providing meals to The Arc Jacksonville Village residents, NFSSE will offer a culinary program starting in August.

We want to teach kids how to function in the kitchen as well as learn culinary skills, Hazelip said. The culinary school will be open to The Arc residents and our own students.

The Berry Good Farms launched On the Gos food truck in 2015 as a compensated employment opportunity for students.

Hazelip said the caf at The Arc Jacksonville Village will be an additional opportunity for compensation.

Within a year, well have about 15 to 20 students who will work there and get paid to cook in the afternoons, she said. Well have a caf manager, assistant manager, catering and food truck manager who will be housed there to supervise students.

Johnson said the partnership between the two entities is a natural fit.

Theres a common thread with whom we serve and, oftentimes, NFSSE students come and live here at our village, she said. Over the years, there have been other partnerships and things weve done together, and I can almost say with 100 percent certainty that this isnt the last partnership with the school.

Johnson anticipates expanding the culinary program in the future.

If we see that many of our residents and students are interested in the program, then itll get bigger, she said. If our residents learn that youre not simply watering a leafy plant, but thats a sustainable source of food, that education and awareness is so valuable.

Hazelip said the culinary program is another opportunity that has been given to students.

Whats offered here is so different than 50 years ago and our students are given opportunities they never would have had, she said. Its a gift to have a kitchen that we didnt have to raise money to build and that we can provide this service.

Hazelip added, Im excited for the possibilities of whats to happen in the next year.

Moving forward, Hazelip said volunteers will be crucial to the success of the caf and culinary program at The Arc Jacksonville Village.

Volunteers are an important aspect because we really believe so much in reverse inclusion, which means that instead of typical inclusion where our students are included in activities, people come to us, she said. Id encourage people to volunteer and work alongside our students to give them assistance reading a recipe and using a knife.

To volunteer, contact Ellen Hiser, director of Berry Good Farms, at (904) 724-8323 or ehiser@northfloridaschool.org.

Ann Friedman: (904) 359-4619

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The Arc partners with special education school to bring organic ... - Florida Times-Union

NEVADA COUNTY, Calif. -- Sheriff's deputies are investigating a case of a man who drowned while apparently practicing a face-down meditation technique in a Northern California river, CBS Sacramento station KOVR-TV reports.

Deputies identified the victim as 33-year-old Yoav Timmer of Israel.

"There was nothing at that scene that led them to believe that it was suspicious," Nevada County Sheriff's Capt. Shannon Moon said.

Moon said the death was unlike any she's seen before.

"Face-down meditation is the first one I've heard of in 27 years," Moon said. "Kind of blocking out the distractions of mindfulness in a face-down position under water."

Deputies said Timmer drowned in a section of the Yuba River where the water pools and there's no strong current.

The man's body was discovered by his friend. They were practicing the same meditation technique side by side.

People using the river, where temperatures are colder than normal, were surprised anyone would attempt the risky move.

"If you love your life and love being here," Lucca McCaleb said, "then sometimes I think it's not worth it to kind of take big risks."

Moon said in this particular case the move wasn't safe.

"Don't do this," she said.

The sheriff's department has contacted an Israeli consulate to get in touch with Timmer's family.

2017 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Man dies while performing face-down meditation in river - CBS News

But this process can drain mental resources, she says, just as physical labor tires the body. In past studies at her lab and elsewhere, researchers have found that military recruits and other people experiencing periods of unusually high and sustained stress, especially if the stress is both physical and emotional, begin to perform more poorly on tests of their attention and general happiness.

So for the new study, which was published in April in the Journal of Cognitive Enhancement, she and her colleagues wondered whether teaching people to relax or to hone their focus might improve their overall well-being. In effect, they wanted to find out whether training the athletes minds while they were also taxing their bodies might help to mitigate some of the undesirable effects of exercise on their thinking and emotions.

To find out, she and her colleagues turned to a group of athletes who face reliably outsize levels of physical and mental stress: Division I football players.

With the cooperation of the teams coaches and student captains, Dr. Jha and her colleagues gathered players for the University of Miami team just as they were about to start four weeks of preseason training. During this time, the players would be attending summer classes while also undertaking a grueling regimen of aerobic and strength training, culminating in evaluations from coaches about starting positions. It is a particularly stressful period for the athletes.

Dr. Jha and her colleagues asked each player to complete a computerized test of his ability to focus and rapidly respond to various combinations of numbers flashing on the screen. The players also filled out questionnaires about their current mood and sense of well-being.

The researchers then divided 100 of the athletes into two groups.

One began a program of supervised relaxation training, during which they listened to calming music and learned to systematically relax their muscles.

The other group was taught mindfulness meditation, which involves paying close attention to breathing and to the present moment.

These sessions, whether of relaxation or meditation, were short, lasting for about 12 minutes, and usually took place immediately after the players had finished strength training and were still gathered in the team gym. The students also were asked to practice the same mental techniques on their own throughout the week.

The mental training was voluntary, though, and some players attended more sessions and practiced more frequently at home than others.

At the end of four weeks of the intense preseason, the players repeated the original tests of their attention and happiness.

The results showed that, in general, they were feeling the strain. For most of them, performance on the test of sustained attention dropped significantly, meaning that they were far more apt to lose focus now. They also were gloomier, according to questionnaires about their moods.

But there were differences. The more an athlete in the relaxation group had practiced relaxing, the less his mood had tended to decline, the researchers found.

And those in the meditation group, if they had practiced often, showed considerable mental resilience, with higher scores than the other athletes in either group on the measures of both attention and mood.

Over all, these data suggest that mental training of almost any kind may help to alleviate some of the emotional and cognitive strains that otherwise occur during physical training, Dr. Jha says.

But mindfulness meditation was more effective than simple relaxation at helping athletes to maintain their ability to focus, she points out.

This study was, of course, specialized, involving young, male, elite football players, whose lives and bodies are not representative of those of the rest of us. The study was also short-term and its scope limited. The researchers did not examine whether mental training improved players performance on the field, although Dr. Jha says that they hope to study that issue in the future.

Still, the results are promising, she says, in part because the commitment required was so slight.

We only asked for about 12 minutes a day of mental training, Dr. Jha says.

For the rest of us, she says, the studys message would seem to be that if we plan to substantially ramp up our normal exercise routine, perhaps in anticipation of our first triathlon or a faster 5-kilometer race time, we might wish also to learn to mindfully meditate. (You can find advice about how to start in the Well Meditation Guide.)

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To Train an Athlete, Add 12 Minutes of Meditation to the Daily Mix - New York Times

This fall, scientist, chef, and author Nathan Myhrvold, baker Francisco Migoya, and the team behind culinary incubator Modernist Cuisine release the much-anticipated Modernist Bread, a miniature library of five volumes of study, meditation, and recipes for bread. This is the groups first multi-volume release since 2011s groundbreaking Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking.

Modernist Bread: The Art and Science was originally to be published this past spring, but now arrives in November. Composed of 2,642 pages and more than 1,200 recipes, the book represents four years of study and testing.

Heres a first look at the books lengthy table of contents:

Volume 1 details breads history from ancient times to the future; the science and physics of bread, and how its consumption affects human health. Volume 2 deals with bread basics and its building blocks, from grains to leavening. Volume 3 gets into technique and baking; Volumes 4 and 5 include a variety of recipes from starters and basic loaves to enriched breads and bread machine breads. A sixth book in the set is a spiral-bound recipe manual meant for kitchen use (so you dont get the five bound books messy with flour or dough).

Myhrvold worked closely with Migoya an ex-pastry chef at the French Laundry and culinary instructor at the Culinary Institute of America to look into the history of every aspect of yeasted doughs. Though European techniques are discussed at length, the book also details recipes for injera, dosa, naan, and bao.

Heres a first look inside the book, below. As was to be expected, using photographs and graphic design, the authors break each topic into easily digestible visual spreads, much like a textbook.

Techniques such as bread scoring are explained and demonstrated in successions of photographs.

After Modernist Cuisine, Myhrvold and his team put out Modernist Cuisine at Home in 2012 and the Photography of Modernist Cuisine in 2013. Modernist Bread: The Art and Science, the groups fourth publication, is available for pre-order now. Its listed retail price is $625 but its been marked down to $562 on Amazon. Here, below, is what the covers look like.

Exclusive: 'Modernist Bread' Is Six Volumes of Extreme Bread Geekery [E]

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Peek Inside 'Modernist Bread,' a Five-Volume Meditation on Bread - Eater

When it comes to doing something good for your cognitive health, skip the brain games and try meditation. Regular meditation has proven benefits for your brain, which can sharpen your memory, boost your mood, and even make you more compassionate.

Build Your Brain

A major health benefit of regular meditation is that it reduces stress, which prevents a lot of wear and tear on our bodies, as well as prevents damage to our brains. More importantly, studies show that meditation can actually grow, or increase the volume of, areas of the brain responsible for:

complex cognitive processes including planning, goal setting, decision making, attention, and short-term memory

positive mood

improving awareness of body, gut feeling, and empathy

long-term memory

paying attention (which is crucial to improving memory)

When you meditate, you are training your attention by tuning out the information overload and jumbled thoughts we live with constantlyand better attention means a sharper memory. Preliminary research seems to strengthen this theory, suggesting that mindfulness meditation may enhance certain brain functions, including working memory.

A Local Example

Residents of Splendido, an all-inclusive community in Tucson for those 55 and better, have the opportunity to take a weekly class led by a trained instructor who leads them through an hour-long meditation.

Florence Jaffe takes the class because she is familiar with research findings on meditation and brain health benefits. I try to practice on my own a few times during the week, she says. Ive noticed I have a little bit less stress.

Cathy White has lived at Splendido for nearly nine years and says, Theyve had several meditation classes while Ive been here, and Ive participated in all of them. I cant quantify the benefits the class has given me, but I know Ive benefitted.

She says that meditation helps with some of her symptoms of multiple sclerosis. Depression and anxiety are a couple of the psychological effects of MS, Cathy explains. I was never an anxious person before, but now I do have some anxiety. This class is sort of a lifeline in terms of connecting me to how I want to be. These emotional benefits carry over to days between classes.

Chuck Jonaitis has practiced spiritual meditation for many years, and enjoys the Splendido class as well. My wife and I try to attend every week when were not traveling, he says. I believe were getting [the brain benefits] from regular mediation.

Types of Meditation

Meditation is simple and takes as little as a few minutes a day. But rememberif you want to enjoy the brain benefits, youll need to meditate regularly, and ideally that means every day.

Here are a few types of meditation to consider:

Mindfulness sitting meditation is the most common form of meditation. Sit comfortably with your back, neck, and head straight but not stiff. Concentrate on your breathing and the sensations it creates. When your mind wanders or you become distracted, gently return your focus to your breath. Try this for just five minutes at first, gradually increasing the time.

Visualization meditation involves mental visualization of an image, which is usually meaningful or religious. While you meditate (as above), you try to mentally visualize your chosen image in as much detail as possible. As you do so, you may also reflect on the meaning of your image.

Walking meditation is similar to sitting meditation. Slowly and comfortably walk, focusing your attention on each step, the movement of your body, and the feel of each foot on the ground. When your mind wanders, gently bring it back to the movement of walking.

Loving-kindness meditation focuses on practicing compassion. As you practice cultivating feelings of loving kindness, gradually move your focus from feeling this toward yourself, then to loved ones, and then to people who are less close to you. The Splendido group occasionally adds a loving-kindness meditation. These meditations have changed my attitude toward other people, says Florence. I like that Im more objective, and not as judgmental.

Centering Prayer is a simple meditation that involves focusing for 20 minutes or longer on a word or a concept that has special meaning for you. The goal is to allow your mind to reflect on the qualities associated with your selected word or phrase.

Look for a local meditation class, or purchase audio recordings of guided meditations. Once youve mastered the basics of your chosen type of meditation, it will become a matter of practicingand enjoying the benefits that come with it.

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Aging Well: The Many Ways That Meditation Benefits Your Brain - Tucson Local Media

Once considered too new age for most Westerners, meditation has become a respected leadership skill in the digital age and for good reason. Technology evolves almost overnight, changing business models and management paradigms in the process. And change is stressful. To transform businesses requires heavy lifting, new learning curves, taking risks and handling pushback from people who would prefer to remain in their comfort zones.

Its no surprise, then, that many Silicon Valley CEOs now practice mindfulness and Zen meditation techniques to combat these changes. However, this isnt the only C-suite role that can benefit from this kind of mental clarity. Here are some ways CIOs can incorporate meditation techniques into an agile routine as a natural way to neutralize stress and inspire innovation:

In todays fast-paced digital world, its not hard to believe mindfulness has become a billion-dollar industry, according to Fortune. However, its ironic that tech executives are among the loudest advocates for slowing down and disconnecting.

An early pioneer of Zen agility, Steve Jobs meditated for decades and credited this practice with helping him innovate, reported Inc. As he explained to his biographer, Walter Isaacson, if you just sit and observe, you will see how restless your mind is. If you try to calm it, it only makes it worse, but over time, it does calm, and when it does, theres room to hear more subtle things. Thats when your intuition starts to blossom and you start to see things more clearly and be in the present more.

Jobs isnt alone. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and Google co-founder Sergey Brin all meditate and provide opportunities for their employees to meditate as well. For example, Forbes reported that at the urging of a group of Buddhist monks who visited the Salesforce headquarters, Benioff put meditation rooms on every floor of the tech firms new corporate offices in San Francisco.

Why has meditation become a high priority in the high-tech industry? According to Harvard Business Review, a mounting pile of scientific research shows it helps relieve stress and anxiety, improves concentration and memory, inspires creativity and strategic thinking and fosters a more collaborative environment all of which are competitive advantages for CEOs in Silicon Valley and for agile CIOs anywhere.

Learn how to relax and let your data work for you

Meditation for stress relief sounds good in theory, but for busy CIOs, the idea of adding one more thing to their to-do lists is stressful in itself. But, for one company, by instituting a mindfulness program they gained about $3,000 per employee in productivity and $2,000 per employee in healthcare costs. The health and monetary benefits are there, so how can CIOs make time to meditate during a hectic workday?

In Work: How to Find Joy and Meaning in Each Hour of the Day, internationally renowned Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh suggests 10 minutes of meditation first thing in the morning. By starting the day with just 10 minutes of mindfulness, rather than reaching for the closest internet-connected device, CIOs can approach each day with mental clarity, calm and focus.

For CIOs who are new to meditation or who need a refresher, there are plenty of books, podcasts and apps with guided meditations and instruction. For example, Simple Habit is a popular app designed by a team of Harvard psychologists and meditation experts that offers guided meditations that are personalized for many types of life situations.

Whats not on the calendar isnt a priority, and what isnt a priority usually doesnt get done. By blocking off 10 to 30 minutes for meditation each day, whether in the morning, in the middle of the day, or at night, CIOs acknowledge to themselves and their teams that meditation is not just a break. It has business value. It contributes to innovation and agility and is worthy of time on the CIOs schedule.

All it takes to meditate at work is a quiet mind and a quiet place an office or empty conference room will do. The Mindfulness Edge is a great podcast to listen to for leaders looking to learn more about how to rewire their brain for leadership and personal excellence without adding to their schedule.

Thirty minutes might sound impossible to busy executives, especially those who are new to meditation. The good news is that even a minute or two of meditation can be beneficial, and many meditation techniques can be practiced anywhere at any time.

For example, mindful breathing and observation can be done standing or sitting and dont require a quiet place. The goal is simply to shut out all the noise by focusing on just one thing. With mindful breathing, the practitioner breathes in and out slowly for one minute, focusing only on their breath how it sounds and how it feels. With mindful observation, the practitioner focuses on a natural object (such as a flower, insect or tree) without thinking of anything other than the sight of it.

This can be especially helpful in high-stress situations in which the CIO is expected to be the ultimate decision-maker. Analytics is beneficial to fuel these types of decisions, but a conscious perspective must balance it out. Its crucial CIOs charge forward equipped not only with a concrete strategy, but most importantly, mental clarity. Sometimes all it takes is a short break to reset and discover the best way forward. To learn more about how to use meditation techniques as a leadership tool, CIOs should check out The Mindful Leader: Awakening Your Natural Management Skills Through Mindfulness and Meditation.

Most popular meditation books and mobile apps also offer short guided meditations that take no more than a couple minutes. So, whether CIOs are on the go, in between meetings or just need a short mental health break during a chaotic day, they can get a quick fix of Zen agility to help themselves and their teams.

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How meditation techniques and mindfulness boost CIO leadership skills - Mobile Business Insights (blog)

Rogers Park

7244 Shoal Line Blvd, Spring Hill, FL 34607 OPEN 24/7

Rogers Park is a 3 -acre county park located on the Weeki Wachee River. Amenities include a boat ramp, canoe launch, swimming area, showers, seasonal lifeguards, observation deck, restrooms, picnic tables and shelter, playground, barbecue grills and a volleyball court. There are also restaurants nearby, so if you dont pack a picnic lunch you could find a meal at the Riverside Restaurant across the street or at Upper Deck across the river. Riverside is a casual diner and Upper Deck is a Bar and Grill style restaurant that overlooks the river. There is a parking fee for the Rogers Park lot. If youre looking for a spot to play around in the crystal clear, sandy bottom Weeki Wachee River, Rogers Park is your best bet.

1300 Mariner Boulevard Spring Hill, FL 34609

The pool at the YMCA is an 8-lane Junior Olympic-size heated pool (domed in the winter). The YMCA provides swim lessons, family swim, lap swim and water excercise opportunities. It is best to check their schedule so that you go at the correct time for the activity youd like to participate in. The YMCA offers a variety of monthly membership options. The pool opens at 5:30AM and closes at 9:30PM Monday through Friday. Saturday hours are 7AM to 5:30PM and Sunday hours are 12-5PM. Go to https://www.ymcasuncoast.org for additional information.

10800 Pine Island Dr, Weeki Wachee, FL 34607 Open 8AM - 8PM

The Alfred McKethan/Pine Island Beach Park is located on the Gulf of Mexico and is the only beach in the county. The water gradually gets deeper so you can walk out quite a ways. During some tides you can wade to nearby islands. The park abuts salt marshes which serve as an estuary for many animals. Small fish are plentiful and there are many blue crabs that scurry along bottom. There are also areas where there are sea grasses. To get out to the beach park, you drive across a 2 and a half mile causeway through the saltmarshes, which is a beautiful drive. The three acre park can accommodate a little over a hundred cars. Besides the beach, the park has a concession stand, restrooms, picnic tables, bbq grills, and a volleyball court. The park fills up quickly on a nice day, so if you would like to be assured of a place to park you have to arrive early. The park is open from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m and parking costs $5. Remember that the Gulf of Mexico can get quite warm in the summer months, so you may want to stop at Rogers Park for a refreshing dip in the river after your beach day.

6131 Commercial Way, Spring Hill, FL 34606 Open daily from 9am to 5:30pm.

Buccaneer Bay is located within Weeki Wachee Springs State Park. There are several slides, a lazy river run and a free swim area. Lifeguards are on duty in the swimming area. All activities are open daily for the summer through August 13th. You can bring a picnic lunch or eat at the concessions within the park. The water park is free with admission to the state park. Tube rentals are extra. They do not allow grilling or cooking within the park since it is a state park. Buccaneer Bay is very busy on weekends. The waterslides close 30 minutes prior to park closing. Tube rental rates: Single Inner Tube: $8 Double Tube: $12 Triple Tube: $15

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Get in, get wet in Hernando County - Hernando Sun