Category Archives: mindfulness

Ask Me Anything

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NaBloPoMo 2020 – Today’s Lesson

Ozan Varol’s Inner Circle is still going strong.  I visit every day to see what people are doing.  Jeff has recently picked up ukulele playing.  Prior to this week I would have spelled ukulele totally wrong.  Ozan will host an Ask Me Anything (AMA) call next week, and solicited questions in advance.  I submitted three.  I never ask questions that I’m unwilling to answer myself, so here goes:

What are you working/playing on now?

Working on:  Mindful, Humble, and Learning Leadership.  Every day feels so intense right now, every encounter important.  I know I’m messing up, but I don’t always notice right away.  So I’m working on awareness, prevention, and accountability.

Playing on:  Piano.  I love our baby grand, and wish daily to commune with it.  Gotta wait for the kids to be up, and when the hubs is not on a call.  I’ll get good at this one song, maybe two, and keep going from there.

What really stands out to you about this year?

Disparity.  Clarity.  Reality.  Humanity.  Never before has it been more clear to me who we are, how we relate, and how everything is interconnected.  Core values, minimum requirements, and default priorities emerge, sometimes in harsh light.  We are called now to be deeply honest, and better.

What unexpected lesson are you really grateful to have learned in 2020?

I have a long way yet to go in truly living out my ideals.  Once again, I see that diligent study and cognitive understanding do not necessarily translate into limbic motivation or competent ability.  But I’m already stronger in my self-compassion practice, understanding that most skills require training to hone, and competence derives from cumulative experience.  So I’m okay.

Hope Ozan finds these questions as fun as I did.

At My Best

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NaBloPoMo 2020 – Today’s Lesson

Tonight’s lesson emerges from my Engaging with Difference class.  It’s a classic “Duh-HA!” (Duh + ah-HA!, thank you Tony & Diane!) epiphany, arising from a novel (to me) and profound mindfulness practice that I plan to adopt permanently.

Duh-HA!  At my best, I am relentlessly curious and ask excellent, open and honest questions.  When I’m hijacked or triggered, I speak in unqualified declarations and generalizations, which I hate. 

What is the worst version of yourself, is it what you loathe most in others?

The practice is Critical Moment Dialogue (CMD), developed by the Personal Leadership folks.  In a nutshell, when I feel “something’s up,” ie I notice some kind of internal hijack occurring in real time, I can choose to react as usual, or do a CMD and find a better way through. 

I reflected on a recent, disconcerting conversation with a colleague.  One of the six elements of CMD practice is attending to physical sensation.  The Duh-HA occurred when I recalled my desire to raise an eyebrow, cock my head, and curl my lip, which manifested as left temporalis muscle tightening.  The CMD exercise helped me understand my subjective experience in that moment:  I felt a disconnect.  My counterpart and I were enacting our usual misunderstanding pattern.  I usually blame him for being vague and self-absorbed, but now I realize that we probably grasp divergent meanings for the words we choose.  Just this one insight, in the instant I apprehended it, reoriented my entire attitude toward him and our future conversations. 

The next time we meet, I can breathe slower and more deeply, and slacken my jaw.  Evoking my commitment to curiosity, I can remember to ask more clarifying questions before making false assumptions and jumping to antagonistic judgments.

Seriously, DUH.  HA!

Walking the Talk

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NaBloPoMo 2020 – Today’s Lesson

Where do you fall into dogma traps?

Back in March I told friends not to wear masks in public.  I was angry at people for hoarding PPE for personal use when hospital workers did not have enough.  My classmates sewed cloth masks for nurses while people perused grocery stores wearing N95s around their chins.  I stated my opinions strongly and ate those words later.

This week I find myself softening previously strong opinions about in person school and personal gatherings.  I have successfully sought varying perspectives on these issues, and not always so successfully incorporated contrary information into my perspective.  At the end of summer I could not imagine how hordes of kids could be brought back to school safely.  Now I have seen multiple accounts of schools and universities that did it safely.  The keys:  Cogent plans based on local conditions; heavy investment of myriad resources; and constant, clear communication.  While I worry increasingly about family gatherings for the holidays, it looks like restaurants, bars, and churches may still be the chief culprits of the current COVID surge.

I still get a little palpitative hearing some patients’ plans for Thanksgiving, and picturing college students coming home this week.  It could be bad. But thinking in broad, overgeneralized terms, and especially making skeptical assumptions about people and their motives, doesn’t help anything.  I just get grumpy, and my neck hurts.  We messaged our patients about how to do the holidays safely.  Though not quarantining, many have tried earnestly to minimize exposures in advance of gathering.  It could be okay, maybe.

We are all doing our best.  I speak and write about withholding judgment and being present with generosity.  Now is a good time to hold myself accountable to that standard.