273: On Powerful Questions and New Neural Pathways

Hi, this is Charles Michael Davis. Toyotathon is on so stop by your local Toyota dealer for incredible year end deals on the cars, trucks and SUVs known for their legendary reliability like the stylish and efficient Camry. The Ready for anything RAV4 or check out a rough and rugged Tacoma or Tundra, all with great financing and lease options available to qualified customers. Visit buyatoyota.com to find out more Toyota let's go places.

If you are looking for more in depth one on one support, navigating next moves, planning your strategy for 2022, figuring out a pivot in progress, even setting a 90 day plan strategy for a pivot you've just recently made. I encourage you to reach out to our coaching team. These are some of my favorite people. They're all incredibly skilled, kind, warm and experienced in their own careers. And as coaches just head to pivotmethod.com coaching where you can meet the team and find a coach that resonates with you. You can set up an intro call and then the way we set things up, there's no minimum or maximum commitment. The minimum just starts with one month. We bill on a recurring basis. It's good until canceled. You can cancel at any time. These coaches are happy to walk you through from confusion to clarity, deepening your values, really figuring out what is most important to you, especially as we round this corner into a whole new year. And because you're here listening, I also wanted to give you a special coupon. If you use the Coupon Code podcast when you check out to sign up for your first month of coaching, you'll get $75 off your first month. Consider this my gift to you. I really just want you all to experience pivot coaching. If it's something that calls to you right now, again, you can go to pivotmethod.com coaching and whenever you are signing up for your first month, enter the promo code PODCAST and you'll get $75 off. That's pivotmethod.com coaching and Whenever you check out Enter the Promo Code Podcast One more thing before we dive in. My new book, as I mentioned, Free Time Lose the Busy Love youe Business. It is now available for pre order, so if you pre order@itsfreetime.com book you'll submit your proof of purchase. You can get instant access to the FreeTime toolkit where there are a ton of worksheets and new templates that go with everything I'm sharing with you today. You'll also get early access to the FreeTime audiobook and you can gift audiobook access to a friend. So that's our Buy one, Get one, Give one pre Order campaign. You pre order the hardcover, submit your proof of purchase. You'll get instant access to the toolkit.

You'll also get early access to the.

Audiobook and you can gift it to a friend. So head on over to itsfreetime.com book. You can learn more about the new book, pre order, get the audiobook, and get a jumpstart on free time in 2022.

What's next? This is a question we're all having to ask and answer more frequently. I'm Jenny Blake, your host of the Pivot podcast and author of Pivot. The only move that matters is your.

Next.

For show notes from this episode, visit pivotmethod.com podcast. If change is the only constant, then.

Let'S get better at it.

Here we go.

Hello friends. This week we have a fantastic listener question from Lindsay. Thank you Lindsay for submitting on. Every time we hear a question that we've never heard, we create new neural pathways in our brain as we reflect on it. Let me turn it over to Lindsay to play her question in full and then I will see you in the answer on the other side. Over to you, Lindsay.

Hi Jenny, this is Lindsay from Denver, Colorado. I've heard you mention on your podcast a few times that each time you ask someone a question that they've never heard before, it creates new neural pathways in their brain. I think this is a really powerful statement and one that really resonates with me because I know I've experienced it in my personal life and so when you said it, it really rung true. But I would love to dive into it a little deeper. And I'm not sure if you've read this from another author or if it's more from your personal experience, but would love to kind of elaborate on it and dive deeper.

Thank you so much for this phenomenal question, Lindsay. I love that you asked this because this is what I find so fascinating about coaching and even therapy is this potential to expand our minds, expand our way of thinking, and just really push to the edges of who we are as people, how we think, what we think, what's the script in our mind, what movie are we watching and realizing that so much of how we think and act is coming from sort of pre programmed scripts that maybe we picked up in childhood, from society, from pop culture and movies and tv, but that those ways of being, if they're not serving us, can be questioned. You asked about the source of this statement that each time someone asks you a question you've never heard, you create new neural pathways in your brain in order to answer it. I learned that from David Rock. I did a coaching certification back when I worked at Google. Based on his book Quiet Six Steps to Transforming Performance at Work. He wrote that after 10 years of neuroscience research, David Rock and his institute, he really pioneered this intersection of neuroscience and coaching. I went through the Coaches Training Institute, what it was called at the time, back in 2008, and then thankfully through Google, I was able to do some of these ongoing professional development certifications, including David Rock's. The way that David Rock and his teachers taught us about neural pathways is that. And I'll give you the kind of colloquial use of this first and then we'll geek out on the official Wikipedia definition. But he basically said that think about roads, that certain thoughts that we have are like grooves. They just become these well worn roads, like fully paved, fully built out roads in our mind. And that kind of conserves energy because the more built out and well worn these well traveled thought paths are in our mind, the less work we have to do every single time. But sometimes we develop these neural pathways in such a way that doesn't serve us, it's just habitual. So for example, let's say a creative person says to themselves, the market's already saturated. It's already two full, whether it's blogging, some kind of social media account you want to set up. In my case, I often think about that with podcasting, like, is it too late to grow a show? There are so many good shows out there now. And now, even as I'm watching hbo, every single new TV series even has a cool behind the scenes podcast that goes with it. So this becomes a well worn groove, this groove that the market is saturated. It's a story. And the more times I tell it, the more I believe it and the quicker I jump to that when I might think of creating something new. And then a coaching question has this opportunity to take us down a side trail. If any of you ski or snowboard, you know, there's the main ski run or snowboard run and you can traverse that, that's where all the people are. Or you can cut off onto the side, which I never really have the courage to do and go trail skiing or snowboarding. And there's more bumps and grooves and the powder is still fresh, so there's a little more danger involved and it's a little More uncertain. But you're by yourself on this side trail and you're carving the new trail. So it does take more work and effort and concentration to do that. Let's say with my market is already saturated thought, well, I could have a coach that would ask me, what if it wasn't? What if the market is missing exactly what you want to create? What would be worth doing even if there was no market for it? And that by them asking me these new questions, these more expansive questions, you can see whether it would be my own face or you can see the person you're asking, their face tilts to the side and they go, huh? And it's really a powerful moment in coaching because you see that they don't already have the answer. And we can all probably recognize this in each other, that when you say a thought or share something or a new interesting fact or ask a powerful question, the other person almost scrunches their eyebrows and it clicks them out of their habitual thinking and they have to pause for a minute. This often happens. The number one question that can create this response is, let's say someone's spinning out over a decision, they just don't know what to do. And you stop and you ask them, what does your gut say? They will often jump to say, I don't know, I don't know. I just can't think clearly. I'm just not sure. Get quiet for a moment. Really tune in. Take a deep breath.

What does your gut say? And they get really quiet. And you can start to see them tuning in and you can see them dropping out of their mind, out of that beehive of their brain, down into a quieter place and generating a new response that maybe they haven't thought of yet or they haven't had the courage to say out loud. There's a fantastic article for a site called Government Executive. I'll put this in the show notes called the Neuroscience of Asking Insightful Questions. This is written by a woman named Mary Jo Azmus, and she says that she often teaches coaching skills to leaders. And I remember having this experience as well when I was teaching coaching to managers and directors at Google, that a lot of what got them to those roles of managing and leading big teams is they're good problem solvers. But whenever any of us jump in to give advice or solve someone's problem, we are modeling that we're the expert, not them. We have the answers, not them. Coaching takes a perspective that each person at cti, they taught us. Each person is creative, resourceful, and whole. If you do not believe that, don't bother being a coach. And a lot of people think, oh, I would be a great coach because I give great advice. But in fact, a lot of teaching people coaching skills is unlearning, teaching them to listen way more than they talk. I teach a 70:20:10 ratio. Listen. 70% of the conversation. If you have an hour with someone, 20% is asking very simple, powerful questions like what else? What's important to you about that? What does your gut say? 10% is replaying back what you're hearing and what you're seeing in their body language. So in this article, Mary Joasmus says, Here is the short version of what happens when you ask an insightful question of one of your team members. She talks about three neuroplasticity, reflection, and action on neuroplasticity. She says the brain isn't hardwired like an electrical appliance. If it was, people would be stuck doing things the way they've always done them forever. Enter something called neuroplasticity, which means our brains can physically change to encourage creative thinking and new knowledge. The neurons can move into new locations in our brain when we learn, questions can act as a catalyst for our brains to change and move forward with new insight. The second point she makes reflection. When you ask a question, instead of giving the answer, the entire brain gets active as it reflects, releasing serotonin, allowing it to relax. This encourages gathering intelligence from all areas of the brain, allowing for more insight than would happen if you provided solutions to others. New neuronal connections begin to be made as the brain moves closer to finding solutions. Finally, the third action, she says, as serotonin is released, a rush of energy or insight occurs. As the brain fires up, moving ahead and discovering the solutions to a problem, the person who is the recipient of the question becomes motivated and ready to do something. This burst of energy to take care of the problem can be short lived. So you can help by asking them to commit to doing something later and then you can ask them how they'll stay accountable to their commitment. She ends the article by saying when someone is stuck, ask an open ended insightful question, the brain becomes activated and you will find the best way to help them discover the solution. And the funny thing is, it might even be better than the one you would have thought of. Brilliant. Let's talk now about what is a neural pathway. So this comes from Wikipedia, where else? A neural pathway is the connection formed by axons that project from neurons to make synapses onto neurons in another location to enable a signal to be sent from one region of the nervous system to another. This is like, we're getting real geeky now. Neurons are connected by a single axon or by a bundle of axons known as a nerve tract or fasciculus. Shorter neural pathways are found within gray matter in the brain, whereas longer projections made up of myelinated axons constitute white matter. Okay, we're now far past, I think, what we really need to know and understand. But let's just say that these neural pathways are helping our synapses fire. It's an incredibly crucial part of the creative process. And this is why it feels so good to have those aha moments and come up with new ideas. And that it does help if we're in a more relaxed state of mind and being to have those synopsis fire. So I don't know if this has ever happened to you, but when someone puts you on the defensive, like they say, why would you do that? Or why on earth would you think about making that career move? You just get defensive. You're not relaxed and you aren't open. They're not helping you expand and create these new neural pathways. This is why focusing on simple, open ended, powerful questions is so enriching for the other person. And a lot of coaches make the mistake of thinking that their question needs to be so brilliant and complex. It really doesn't. One of my favorite things that I learned at CTI was just the simple question of, what topic do you want to discuss? How would you rate yourself currently? On a scale of 1 to 10, what does a 10 look like? You could stay there for a full hour just having them describe to you, what else? What else? What's important to you about that? What else? What else? Say more. Anything else. What about in your wildest dreams, what would a 10 look like? And it can be so exciting to take someone down this path and watch them. If you can see them in front of you or hear them, their voice on the phone, just watch this sense of expansion happening. It is truly so rewarding. In coaching, I call it blowing up idea balloons that sometimes and even in your friendships, when someone might mention something, you hear this little zing of excitement in their voice. And I feel that it's as if a little balloon was just inserted into the conversation and you could blow air into it and help them blow air into it by saying, ooh, I heard the excitement in your voice just now. Or ooh, I just saw your eyes light up when you said that. Tell me more and that that can be a way to encourage your friends and family and colleagues to expand on something that they might not even real realize. They have that special zing of energy when they said it to you. Returning to David Rock, he provides in his coaching framework six steps to transforming performance. I'll give you a very high level because it's been a while since I engaged directly with this material, but of course I'll put a link to his book in the show. Notes the six steps are Step one Think about thinking. This is helping elevate people out of the problem, out of the story. You can actually guide them to think about different lenses on their problems again instead of being in the story. Sometimes people will just start giving you a 10 minute story on what happened or their childhood or what's going on. You can actually pull back and just focus on a different type of thinking and accentuating the positive, talking about the process of your coaching before the content of their story itself. Step 2 Listen for potential. So there's a way of listening deeply. Step three Speak with intent. So on the part of the coaches, be succinct, be specific, be generous, he says. Step four Dance toward insight. This is about really being in the moment with the person, not planning your next question, not thinking too far ahead. It's asking for permission to go deeper on areas that might be sensitive. So let's say that a person that you're coaching or in conversation with says, yeah, well I guess I really struggled with that growing up. You could say, would it be okay for us to dive into that a little bit? And that creates psychological safety by putting these permission forks in the road at every step. And they might say, sure, I'd love that, or no, I really don't want to get into that right now. Clarifying. Making sure not so much that you're understanding exactly what they're saying or the exact nature of their business, but just helping them clarify the big themes of what you're both talking about. Step five Create new thinking. He suggests doing this by looking at the current reality, then exploring alternatives and finally Step six Follow up. This is where he gets into facts, emotions, encouraging them, learning implications and goal setting. So I know that this is a lot in the second part of the or third part of the book, he talks about using these six steps to help someone solve a problem, using them to help make a decision, using them to give feedback. To recap, those six steps are Step 1 Think about thinking. Step 2 Listen for potential Step 3 Speak with intent Step 4 Dance toward insight Step 5 Create new thinking Step 6 Follow up all right, here's what I'm going to give you. Any of you listening and Lindsay, for homework, try crafting a powerful question or two. If you need some more suggestions, check out my friend Michael Bungay Stanier's fantastic book, the Coaching Habit. Try inserting one or two powerful questions in a conversation that you're having in the next few weeks. So instead of jumping straight to advice, open it up and see what happens in the person's body language, voice, expression as you ask this question. You can get kind of wild and crazy with this. Like another question that I often see really gets gears turning is asking someone, who do you admire most? You could say, who do you admire most in the business world? Or whose career do you admire? Okay, let's do a role play of you're going to call them on the phone and I'm going to be you and you're going to be that person. And the level of advice that they give themselves when they're channeling this person they admire is just incredible. It's such a fun experience because they realize they have so many answers already within them. Try this out. I also love the question, well, if I could wave a magic wand and fix anything in your life or work, what would it be? These are all lots of fun. Try them. See if you can ask the type of question and then listen deeply enough that you actually see those new neural pathways forming as the person in front of you contemplates something they have never thought of before. Thank you again, Lindsay, for submitting such a fantastic question. It was really fun to dive back into this material. If any of you listening want to submit a question for a future episode, just head over to pivotmethod.com ask and you can always find the show notes in your podcast player or@pivotmethod.com podcast. Thank you so much for listening, everybody. Have a beautiful rest of your day.