Top 5 Reasons All Conferences Should Include Mindfulness Meditations by The Path Founder Dina Kaplan

The Path Founder Dina Kaplan guiding a mindfulness meditation at SEO Week in New York City

I was recently hired to guide meditations for a big SEO festival in New York City, and it was awesome — leading meditations for 450 tech-focused executives three times a day for four days in a row was an exercise in mindfulness itself, and the feedback I received was extraordinarily.

But even more rewarding was seeing the impact of the meditations on the conference itself — really infusing the event with a happy, relaxed, warm, positive energy.

I now believe that all conference organizers and hosts should include meditation as part of their programming, even if the event has nothing to do with mindfulness — and here's why:

1. It vastly increases people’s capacity to take in and appreciate wisdom from the speakers.

Even conferences not focused on wellness will greatly benefit from meditations between speakers and breaks.

People have short attention spans these days, and meditation — especially repeated meditations throughout an event — expand people's ability to hear and input the knowledge speakers share. After the first day of SEO week, and having led three meditations for the group (I guided for 5 minutes after every break, all day), I could feel participants begin to settle in. The meditations were having an impact! It was amazing to see attendees, most of whom work in tech for a living, put away their cell phones during talks and begin paying full attention to each speaker on stage. I can't claim full credit for this, but I believe the meditations were part of honing and training people's focus on the speakers and really being in the present moment of this amazing event.

2. Mindfulness meditations help participants connect more deeply with each other (i.e. power networking and friendship-making!).

This conference was incredible at bringing people together, forging work and friendship connections, and I believe the meditations played an important role in this. Mindfulness meditations over time help people to loosen their 'masks,' so they do less showing off about their impressive role or background, and instead simply present to other people as their relaxed selves. When we let down our guard, it's easier to connect with people, and for others to connect with us. I see this happen at the retreats we host, and by the end of the third day at SEO Week, when participants had experienced 9 meditations at this point, people were far more relaxed than you would usually be in NYC, and you could see people really connecting and enjoying being around new friends and potential work partners.

3. Meditation brings a lightness and uplifting energy to events.

Work conferences can feel serious and "important," and this can carry a heavy energy. Meditation is beloved for bringing a lightness to people, and many people meditating together can fill a space, even at a large conference, with incredibly positive energy. This was an SEO conference when SEO is massively changing because of LLMs, and attendees and speakers could have showed up with stress and fear and worry. Instead, when you walked into the event, you could feel an overwhelmingly positive, happy energy. Part of this was the incredible charisma and joy of conference host Mike King from iPullRank — but I also believe the three meditations a day truly contributed to the extraordinarily uplifting energy you felt the moment you stepped through the conference doors!

4. Mindfulness — prepares people to have fun and let loose!

Mike King from iPullRank rapping with Busta Rhymes during SEO Week’s Closing Night Party.

I'll credit Mike and the iPullRank team — and the amazing event organizers — for planning a rocking closing night party, with Busta Rhymes (!) and Mike rapping — but I'll also credit the meditations during the event, throughout each day, with helping the hundreds of people who joined the party to really feel comfortable being themselves. To get a group of business executives dancing and relaxing and 'letting loose' is not obvious, and I think the daily meditations help people feel confident enough to rock out on the dance floor and really have fun.

The Path Founder Dina Kaplan guiding a Metta / Loving-Kindness Meditation at SEO Week

5. Meditation — is great for the mind and body, and to offer this to conference guests is truly a gift.

Hundreds of studies show how beneficial meditation is for the mind and body, including reversing the aging of the brain and even impacting our genetic expression, according to Richie Davidson, a neuroscientist from the University of Wisconsin studying the impact of meditation on the brain. Choosing to provide meditations for attendees is a wonderful offering conference organizers can give to attendees, because these are tools that help to relax the body and mind, focus the brain, and more. So many people, from companies like Marriott and more, came up to thank me for guiding meditations each day and shared that this was the first time they had meditated in their lives.

So for this love and gratitude, to help conference attendees have more fun, to help people focus and take in more wisdom from speakers — and make life-long connections, I believe all conference organizers should include meditation in their programming! I love to do this and come from a tech and business background, so let me know if you'd like to talk about bringing mindfulness to your event, too!

You can reach me at sit@thepath.com or dina@thepath.com!