This monks wisdom can bring career success and end procrastination

This entrepreneur is essentially a Buddha in the boardroom.Walter Gjergja (Shi Xing Mi), co-founder and chief wellness officer of Zing Coach, a personal trainer app, also happens to be the first non-Chinese official 32nd-generation Shaolin Temple master, and has been a secular monk since 2006.As Gjergja explains it, a secular monk is someone who completed the Buddhist studies and took the vows in a temple but then decided to return to regular society to teach his knowledge to a wider audience.“My work broadly consists of sharing Shaolin’s ancient wisdom, augmented by contemporary scientific knowledge and by my own varied experiences,” said Gjergja, who’s based in Lugano, Switzerland.Gjergja uses this wisdom to work with people to improve health and wellness, performance and fitness, mindset and mindfulness, strategy and effectiveness, habits and focus.Over the years, Gjergja has worked with sports teams and athletes, such as the Milan football team, Olympic and world champion medalists in ice skating, professional racing drivers and world champion martial artists.

He’s also worked with medical clinics and research centers and universities across the globe, and founded the European Shaolin Culture Centers in the early 2000s before co-founding ZingCoach in 2020.A typical day in the life for the secular monk includes a 6 a.m.start for energy exercises, meditation, a run, strength training and martial arts.

After breakfast, Gjergja prepares for the day’s tasks, including a “mindful prioritization.”The afternoon features Shaolin movements and stretching, and the evening involves reading, writing, planning and reflecting.With such a disciplined schedule, Gjergja certainly knows a thing or two about work efficiency, especially outsmarting one of the most common ailments of modernity, with all its distractions: procrastination.“Shaolin is a culture of action, and it has taught me time and time again that action is the antithesis of procrastination,” sa...