Joel Silverstone proposes building a "Spidey Sense" for better communication through small daily practices: brief meditation, mindful eating, putting your phone down to listen, and sensory walks. These micro-habits strengthen your ability to pick up on non-verbal cues and deepen relationships without the burnout of typical resolutions.
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Hi there and welcome to This Feels Right, TFR. I'm your host, Joel Silverstone. In these podcasts, you'll be hearing from leaders and experts on how you can get a better understanding of yourself and others' communication styles and skills to be able to influence behaviors, shift ideas, and then put them into action How? By speaking to the logic and connecting to the emotions so that it feels right for all. I'm also a speaker, trainer, and coach, and the founder of This Feels Right Effective Communication Skills Training and Coaching, helping leaders, teams, and entrepreneurs be more effective in their communication skills. If this podcast feels right, then please leave a rating, review, or subscribe.
Enjoy the show. Welcome to the first podcast of 2021. Did you make a resolution? You know what, I'm going to share with you, I'm not a big fan of resolutions. I'm not a big fan that at midnight, December 31st, you're making this life-altering change of losing weight or spending more time with your family or Eating better. Drastic change like that is too much and it's been proven that those resolutions don't make it past the first 30 or even 60 days. What I am a fan of is when we can make small changes. And one of the small changes we're going to talk today about is getting your Spidey Sense going. Now, Spidey Sense, if you're not familiar with that, that's that intuition that's telling Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, That something is wrong. He doesn't see it. He feels it. And then he listens to it.
He respects it.
He doesn't dismiss it. Now, as you're hearing that, you might go, hmm, that sounds a lot like mindfulness. Yeah, it's very similar. It's about being in the present moment without any judgment. That's what mindfulness is. To really build up that awareness. That Spidey sense, if you want, of what is going on in front of you. Now the thing about change is that because it feels so overwhelming, the good news about getting your Spidey sense going is that it's about making small adjustments as we go along the way. In fact, I'm going to change that word of small adjustments. I'm going to change it and I'm going to change it and I'm going to call it practice. I'm not even going to call it about training your brain. I'm going to call it—
Practice.
Play. That you get to play with being present in the moment. And let's look at it from a communication standpoint because that's what the show is about. It's about how we can communicate, connect, and collaborate. So from a communication standpoint, when you have your Spidey Sense aware, when you're playing with being present in the moment, when you're able to now pick up on the clues and cues that someone in front of you is giving, Well, that immediately changes the mutual respect you have for each other and brings joy into the relationship. So for example, if someone in front of you is being fidgety, they're not making eye contact, they've gone to a silence, and not a silence like they're listening, or they might even make a statement like, hmm, that doesn't work for me. Instead of taking it personally, Which is an inward. It's about being outward and going, hey, my Spidey Sense is telling me that there's something else going on here. And that's what Spidey Sense is. That's what being present in the moment is. Now focusing yourself on outward. And so I'll share with you some ideas that I've been putting into play to really try to be more mindful and to play with getting my Spidey Sense going. And really, for me, what's causing this is that we're overstimulated. Social media, from the phone to the tablet to the computer to a Zoom meeting to a conference, I'm finding it really hard to stay present and to stay focused. So it's now I got to almost create a new— if you want to, I'm going to use a neural pathway word. I'm going to say a new neural pathway, a new highway if you want, in your brain for having Ability to play and be present in those moments. So one of the things, you know, number one, and this is something I've always struggled with, but I'm now playing with this, is to do meditation. Because if I am going to create a new highway in the brain, and that's what habits are, is they become these highways. They become, you know, cemented in the brain. And that's why we keep doing the same Same thing over and over again because it's, it's the habit is really what our brain is used to. It's what we're comfortable with. And so it's creating a new level of comfort. And so there is that, that sort of beginning, that sort of hurrah feeling when we're trying something new. And the challenges for us is to, is to stick with it. So small things with meditation is to actually just do a couple minutes at a time. And one of the things also is to actually, as I'm doing it right now, is by saying it verbally out loud that this is something you're doing, you're creating a bit more of a commitment for yourself when you say it out loud. And that's been proven that that's the best way to get commitment is to say it out loud. So meditation is one. Small things that you can also play with is, for example, is when you're eating your meal, to slow it down. And actually just pay attention to what it tastes like. What do you see? What does it smell like? To again reinvigorate the senses so that you are now being appreciative. And these are the things that are going to create those new neural pathways to get your Spidey Sense going. Stopping and listening to my kids. Putting my phone down. And actually listening to them. Now, as crazy as that is, you know, I do see that, you know, we've gotten so used to multitasking that we think we're listening, but we're not really being present. And so if you want to create these new neural highways, if you want to be more present, if you want to be able to deepen your relationships with people, it's by being playful in these moments. Eating, when you're going for a walk outside, to actually— what do you smell? What do you see? What do you hear? Maybe even just stop for a second if you're walking outside and do you notice something different? And these are the moments that you can play with to start to develop a new neural pathway, a new highway for your brain to get that spidey sense going. And then you'll be able to put those superhero powers into play. And at the beginning, there will be that, oh, this is so exciting. This is so much fun. And then there'll be the flu-like symptoms afterwards because it fades and then it starts to feel like work. So then it's time to challenge yourself with what are new things that you could be more present with, more mindful of. To, again, to continue to work out those muscles.
So take yourself out of it.
Turn your focus outward and think about how you are going to start to feel when you can start to be able to appreciate small moments and how others are going to react to you when you are picking up on clues and cues, genuinely listening to them. It's going to be a rewarding experience. It's going to feel right.
And scene! Thank you for listening to today's podcast. What questions, comments, or thoughts you may have, then connect with me, Joel Silverstone, on LinkedIn or come on over to thisfeelsright.ca. And again, if this show felt right, then please leave a rating, review, or subscribe. We'll see you next week.
