confidence – Workplace Navigator

I recently read an interesting book by Gabriella Kellerman and Martin Seligman called Tomorrowmind. It’s a thought provoking book that looks at thriving at work with resilience, creativity and connection. Since I spent a good deal of my time coaching others, many of the tips resonated for me. They posit that we are naturally better at hunting and gathering and that every other kind of work is fundamentally a mismatch for our brain.

As Kellerman and Seligman wrote, “Today our work is fast, uncertain, and full of complexity. We’ve come to expect that the challenges of next week will eat those of this week for lunch. Hunters and gatherers didn’t have to deal with that. The critical changes they saw were sudden and urgent, so our brains register change as threat. A huge part of the challenge of thriving at work today is overcoming the mental patterns that made sense for hunter-gatherers but no longer serve us today.” I can feel like I’m on high alert all week and yet, I’m never going to be eaten by a lion or the marketing department. The book looks for ways to cope with this mismatch.

Here are 5 tricks to connection and creativity:

Time Famine. It frequently feels as if we don’t have enough time. Feeling like you have little time is detrimental to connecting with others. I can remember our weekly staff meetings at a company I worked for and the first half hour was spent talking about sports and events from the weekend. It was time to connect. I remember thinking it was a waste of time but now I see that it was bringing about connection. In a study called “Giving Times Gives You Time”, they found that, “Doing kind acts for others, even just for 15 minutes, converted people from time famine to time abundance.” When you feel behind think about ways to do something kind for others.

Connection Time. Human beings are really bad at estimating the time something will take. Whether it’s goal setting or how long it will take to make a bed, we are woefully inaccurate. As the authors wrote, A host of studies have been done looking at how long it takes for doctors to make patients feel seen and heard and cared for. It turns out to take less than one minute of kind words for a doctor to connect with their patient deeply enough to influence health outcomes and lower patient anxiety. Even increments as short as 10 seconds can make a difference.” Don’t we all have 10 seconds to connect? Some examples are, “It was so nice to catch up with you today. Let’s please do it again soon.”—three seconds. “I really admire how you navigated that question.”—two seconds. “I can tell you worked hard on this. Thank you for all of your effort. I’m so glad that we’re in this together.”—five seconds.” Spend time connecting.

Novelty. In order to build on your creativity, work in some novelty into your day. Shake up your morning routine, drive a different route to the grocery store or work, or reach out to someone you haven’t talked to in a while. A friend of mine that I haven’t spoken to in a while sent me a text about meditation a few weeks ago. Out of the blue. It made me think about my meditation routine and also introduced a new book for my reading list (Who knows? I might end up writing about it here). Novelty introduces new pathways for your brain. I think this is why I like to travel so much, finding new experiences enhances my creativity.

Embrace Ambiguity. This is definitely a barrier for me. I put off writing this piece for a while because I can feel uneasy about getting started if I can’t picture the whole thing in my mind. This is a cornerstone of procrastination. I want to see the whole thing and get it done in one sitting. That, unfortunately, is rare and difficult in the current state of technology and the world. As they wrote, “The murky uncertainty of the early phases of the creative process can feel uneasy to some of us, and we want to end them as quickly as possible. But when we shortchange the divergent parts of creativity, we put a ceiling on just how imaginative our solutions can be. Know that it’s normal to feel a little uneasy in ambiguity, but you can get used to it and even start to enjoy it. Try stretching this ambiguous phase just a little bit longer each time you hit it.” I know it sounds painful to me. Sitting in discomfort can be the mother of invention.

Creative Confidence. Henry Ford famously said “If you think you can, if you think you can’t, either way you are right.” In the book Limitless by Jim Kwik, he writes about creating a limitless brain and practically every step starts with the belief that you can. If I went around saying I have a bad memory….well…I’ll have a bad memory. My body, my brain are feeding off each other. If I walk around saying I can learn to improve my memory, I will. Think about the language you use in your head. Catch yourself and others when they spark innovation even in the smallest of ways. Create creative confidence in yourself and others.

I love that throughout the book they refer to the whitewater world of work. It can really feel like we are running rapids all day and these are terrific ideas to expand your time and enhance your creative juices. Which one will you try first?

I have pretty much a stone face when I don’t smile. I look like I am pissed off. I remember when I was a restaurant owner of a Sizzler many years ago that the customer’s thought I was angry all the time. I would walk through the restaurant looking for empty plates to bus and half filled water glasses and the whole time, I looked like an army officer reviewing the troops.

A turning point for me was a course I took on presenting skills from Dale Carnegie taught by master facilitator, Jackie Kellso. We had to present about 7 times over the course of two days in front of a group of strangers (classmates). They video taped each time you presented. You can imagine how terrified I was when they said we would be videotaped. After you presented in front of the class, you would take turns reviewing the video tape privately with a coach in another room. Ugh. The first pass? I never cracked a smile. It’s difficult to listen to someone who never smiles. It’s off putting; puts the audience on edge.

The good news is that by the last videotaped presentation, I was learning to smile. The amazing thing was the feedback from my classmates. They all said that my face lit up. I know we’ve all heard that before and it sounds cliché, but when I saw the video tape, they were right. I wanted to listen to that woman. The one in the last video tape.

Here are some ways to find your smile:

1. Paint it On. Put on a forced smile. There is interesting science even about a “forced” smile. In 1988, German scientists did experiments on subjects when they were forced to smile or frown. Psychology Today writer Karen Kleiman wrote that when subjects were forced to smile by holding a pencil between their teeth and then read cartoons, they saw the cartoons as funnier than those who were forced to frown. So paint one on.

2. Lifetime. You’ll need to try and smile consistently over a lifetime. According to a blog post by Leo Widrich, “In the famous yearbook study, they tracked the lives of women who had the best smiles in yearbook photos compared to the rest. Women who smiled the most lived happier lives, happier marriages and had fewer setbacks.” Sounds like something we all need to sign up for. This is not a one time shot.

3. Genuine is better. The thing to remember is that a genuine smile is more effective than a fake smile; even though smiling, period is better than a stone face. So how to you make a genuine smile? It involves your orbicularis oculi. Say what? These are the muscles around your eyes. Fake smiles involve just your mouth where as a genuine smile involves your mouth and the area around your eye sockets. If you have crow’s feet; you’ve been smiling a lot; genuinely smiling a lot. So the secret hand shake is smiling genuinely and often.

4. Be happy. Another trick I use is to think about something happy: Like my dog wagging her tail, my son imitating a Scottish accent, my daughter’s silly sounds that she makes. Keeping the happy moment inventory in my brain helps me bring it out when I need it. It helps me naturally smile.

5. Mirror, Mirror. Stand in front of the mirror and practice. I remember doing this in junior high before yearbook pictures were to be taken. I had evidence that I was a poor “smiler” for school pictures so I worked on smiling so I could remember how my face felt. You don’t have a mirror when they take the photo although now we all have the capabilities of doing “selfies” with our phones but back then…no such luck. Practice making the sincere smile, and etch into your memory. You’ll be able to pull it out on command. “Say Cheese”.

These are just a few ideas from a Recovering Stone Face. What techniques do you use to keep those pearly whites showing? Leave a comment. (The answer is B)