[On-screen title] Checking in with the Roulettes

Within the Roulettes we have 15 minutes of flying airplanes about three meters apart from each other, so the concept of going into that display with something on your mind, or that is distracting you could be quite detrimental to yourself and also the people around you.

[On-screen text] Why is it so important to check in with the people around you?

In the team I think because we are operating so closely together and we are so dependent on the other individuals being capable and proficient in their role for our safety and their safety, it's important that we check in on them to make sure that they are just as focused as what we need them to be and the way that we are. 

And so sometimes it takes someone else to actually talk to that person and recognise it and point out to them that they are going through something in their life. I think there's often a sense of relief when that is
brought up because perhaps they have been going through something that is on their mind, and it takes someone else to point that out to them.

[On-screen text] Why is it so important to check in with yourself?

We operate in a team so to let the rest of your team mates down because you feel sick or because you're stressed is a really hard decision to make. However, I think in the long term it's respected - rather than press on through that or try and fight through that and deal with it at that moment, and perhaps continuing and end up in a negative outcome, such as an accident or something like that.

[On-screen text] Where does mindfulness fit within all this?

I think probably the thing that it highlighted to me was that at times, we perhaps have an emotional reaction to a circumstance or something that happens to us. Someone said to me "If your car gets a scratch on it or
something like that, you initially feel very upset about that. But in the future that really didn't matter." 

So I guess what I've learned from mindfulness is that we acknowledge the incident but don't allow ourselves to be overly impacted by that - or have a bit of a think of the big picture on how that actually affects me perhaps long-term, because down the track it might not be such a big issue for you. 

But I'm also very conscious of it; I know some of the guys at work that I work with have actually even done it with their children who can't sleep at night. They spend some time having a talk to them about things or thinking about their breathing or something that they did that day. So, I think the exposure and awareness of mindfulness, while it doesn't necessarily have to take the form of a 30-minute session in a room with thirty people, I think it can be applied to just about everything in our all our interactions on a daily basis.

[On-screen logo] ReachOut.com