49% of people who work in Spain claim to suffer stress daily.

Figures like this are recently extracted from the different studies on occupational health that are published each year and which are not exactly encouraging: 12% have requested a leave of absence due to the anxiety they suffer. 44% say they have experienced burnout at some point in their career. Or 37% say that it is difficult for them to disconnect from work at the end of the day.
On the other hand, 85% of companies operating in Spain do not offer emotional support options for their team, but the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 12 billion productive working days are lost each year due to depression and anxiety.

Burnout, recognized as a disease by the WHO a few years ago, is more than just a side effect of long working hours. This serious psychological condition affects millions of people around the world, characterized by chronic stress, emotional exhaustion, and a feeling of mental detachment.

Although the taboo of mental health has ceased to be as a result of the pandemic, the focus must now be placed on the human need to care for and accompany oneself, so that the personal and professional spheres coexist in harmonious synchrony that is not a slave to that wheel of “doing” in which many find themselves immersed.

Sonia Ferre, CEO of MasQi – The Energy House, spoke precisely about the importance of connecting with oneself, at the Visa Marketing Now meeting, designed together with reason.Why. With it, and a powerful meditation with masks, this event started, focused on the now and the importance of the company; because to accompany others on the path – or to let them accompany you – the work has to begin first with oneself. And this is what Sonia offers at MasQi, a magical healing space in the Sierra de Mariola (Alicante), created from her personal experience with burnout and where people from all corners of the world have been coming for years to find their balance.

Sonia’s intervention was marked by a guided meditation, as the opening of the event, which we leave you at the end of this article. But first, in a talk with her, we gather the vision that MasQi offers about the keys and benefits of connecting with oneself.

RW. What would you say is the key to starting that path of connection with yourself?

It all starts with the body, because we are totally disconnected from feeling.
We are afraid of feeling emotions such as frustration, anger, sadness… But if we allow ourselves to feel, if we can take a few minutes to breathe the emotion and calm down, in this way we learn from the experience without disconnecting from our body.

You have to breathe it. Like a pool that is green, when you turn on the filter, oxygen begins to reach the water and everything ends up clearing. For me, an emotion or situation passes by breathing. Taking 5 minutes to sit calmly, close your eyes and simply breathe is enough. And, once there, we can reach the thought that triggered that emotion in us.

RW. So, once we’ve connected, how do we manage what we encounter? Because it is not always liked, and inconsistencies may appear…

Once we have connected with our feelings, we can realize that it comes from having lived an experience that we do not accept as it is. So there is internal conflict, there is discomfort, we feel like we are losing energy… In short, we are not well.

And that’s how we realize the inconsistencies. That’s why it’s essential to ask yourself, what is there in my life that I don’t want to do? Our goal should be to be at peace with our life, creating the one we want, making coherent decisions that have to do with us. Sometimes you have to be brave.

RW. And this is accompanied by the comprehensive approach that you propose from MasQi to achieve healing, right?

Yes, let’s say that self-knowledge is the first step. Knowing who we are and where we come from will allow us to perhaps identify inherited patterns that are defining our way of living and behaving.
On the other hand, the attitude with which we look at life is key. If we place ourselves in the role of victims, we are “sold” without realizing that we are co-creators of our own reality. We must be brave, believe and trust that we can be ourselves.
The third leg is choosing love instead of fear. Because out of fear we will not be able to do anything extraordinary.

RW. What advice would you give to those professionals who need to find vital meaning in what they do?

Maybe there are people who don’t understand it, but the power of meditation is very great and its effects are noticeable from the first moment. Meditating organizes you, it is a way to cleanse or empty your mind and allows you to connect with yourself and realize how you are. But to experience its benefits, you have to start practicing.

The meditation guided by Sonia Ferre at Visa Marketing Now was carried out with the eyes covered by masks for all attendees.

RW. But society lives immersed in the wheel of “doing” and it is not always easy to allow oneself to “be” or have confidence in oneself. How is this managed?

We are each one of us so unique, that there is no one exactly like you in the entire universe. It helps me a lot to observe nature and see how there is perfection in everything: whether it is a poppy that lasts three weeks or a tree that exists for more than 100 years, everything is perfect just the way it is. The same thing happens with humans: each one has a configuration and has come to live life with those characteristics. It is not about changing them, but about giving them permission to “be.”

The point is that we don’t know who we are and we learn it as we live. So trust, for me, is understanding that there is a deeper why in everything. I needed a big crisis to become what I am today. And blessed crisis! Because now I am more true to myself, I am aligned and I do what makes me feel good.

RW. So the “doing” wheel doesn’t have to be bad if we are connected to who we are at our core.

Of course, the interesting thing is doing, because doing is how you learn. Live, experience, do. We are here to live life in an earthly way, not to always sit in meditation. And each of us has a configuration to contribute from our role. But be careful, the ego always sets traps for us. What you don’t do for yourself, without thinking about others, is not going to work.

RW. Your approach changed your life, so much so that you decided to help others follow that path. Is this MasQi’s sales promise?

It’s much deeper than that… I do mentoring sessions with people who have been in therapy for years and the point is that there is nothing to heal, but rather to make a click and realize that, perhaps, we are in the role of victim or live in incoherence. The moment we become aware, align ourselves and make consistent decisions with ourselves, everything flows. That’s why everyone who comes to MasQi leaves better than when they arrived. Because many times all you need to do is stop and become aware of where we are, accept what there is and make a plan to improve it.

After her intervention at Visa Marketing Now, we were able to talk with Sonia Ferre and she explained more about her tools to be in the present, the importance of having a good attitude towards life or how we can enjoy our work more.
You can see more in the following video and here you have the rest of the interviews we did with some of the attendees.

In Spain, a recent study by the University of Zaragoza on burnout and mindfulness has concluded that the practice of meditation acts as a protective factor against professional burnout. Workers with higher levels of mindfulness present fewer symptoms of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, in addition to greater coherence between their personal values ​​and the conditions of the work environment. Regularly integrated into your professional routine, meditation promotes emotional regulation and reduces the impact of chronic stress.

That same idea was visible at the Visa Marketing Now meeting, where the meditation session guided by Sonia Ferre was especially valued by attendees. Many recognized incorporating meditation and moments of disconnection into their daily lives as part of their creative process. Alfonso Aguilar, one of the speakers, summarized it with a simple but powerful methodology: charge, disconnect and connect, a sequence that, as he explained, allows you to free the mind to reach the best ideas.

If you want to enjoy the meditation of the event, we leave you the audio here.
Music therapist Vicky Ros participated alongside Sonia, offering together an immersive experience in which the voice is used as an instrument to generate sound vibrations that travel through the body to release tension, calm the mind and create a space of deep inner connection.