Years ago, when I was in graduate school, I wrote a paper called "It Started with a Yawn." I noticed that when people got together and one person yawned, others yawned within seconds afterwards. Some researchers have claimed that yawning could control brain temperature so that it does not reach extremes.

A team of researchers led by Andrew Gallup of Princeton University analyzed the pattern of yawning in people during winters and summers and found that a significantly higher number of participants yawned in the winter then they did during summers. This led the researchers to think that yawning must be serving the purpose of regulating brain temperature so that it stays within permissible limits.

Published in the journal Frontiers in Evolutionary Neuroscience, the study is said to have involved 160 people from Tucson and another 80 from Arizona in both the seasons.

I Observe and I Am Curious...

Since I was young, I have been watching, noticing and wondering why people yawn. I have noticed that people yawn together. When someone yawns, others around them often yawn as well. It is as though they are mimicking each other.

I've also noticed that people yawn when someone they are talking with 'talks for a long time' about a complex subject that they are not fully following. 'Metaphorically it's like communicating "enough, I can't hold that much information in my brain." or "I can't understand what you are saying - I can't grasp it all."

I am curious about the connection between "yawning to regulate temperature" and "people yawning together" - either as a mimicking response or as a possible overload response.

In the case of Overload ... Angelika Dimoka, a neuroscientist from Temple University Fox School of Business has been studying overload and decision-making. 

In her study, researchers gave people a bidding task with lots of information to work with in order to make their decisions. As the researchers gave the bidders more and more information, activity in the dorsolateral PFC suddenly fell off as if a circuit breaker had popped." The bidders reached cognitive and information overload," says Dimoka. They start making stupid mistakes and bad choices because the brain region responsible for smart decision-making has essentially left the premises. For the same reason, their frustration and anxiety soar: the brain's emotion regions -previously held in check by the dorsolateral PFC - run as wild as toddlers on a sugar high. The two effects build on one another. "With too much information, " says Dimoka, "people's decisions make less and less sense." (Newsweek, February 27, 2010, Sharon Beagley)

If we use this new information about cognitive overload, we can see that our whole brain state shifts when we are called upon to deal with and comprehend complex subjects. Overload causes us to shut down the parts of the brain needed to think.

Yawning may help restore a state of equilibrium. Breathing may slow our heart rate and enable us to get into a higher state of coherence. When we yawn, it's possible we are calling upon our ability to restore a state of clarity, openness and receptivity.

In the Case of Mimicking...Is Yawning Contagious?

While yawning is often associated with being tired and needing more oxygen in the bloodstream, people yawn for many reasons including stress, boredom, emotion and over-work.

Yawning together with others suggests another fascinating principle about human behavior. Yawning may be contagious. Is it possible that what triggers people to yawn together is a herding response - a subtle way to communicate group behavior - such as when one bird in a flock flies and the others follow the behavior of that one bird so they all rise together as a whole flock.

When one person yawns it appears to cause another person to yawn. Researchers have found that 40-60% of people who see a picture of someone yawning will yawn themselves. Even reading the word YAWN can make people yawn.

Maybe a yawn is a signal to the group that it's time to go to sleep. Or, if someone yawns when they're bored, it may be a sign to change the topic of conversation.

Yawning is not limited to humans. Animals of all types yawn. If you have a dog or cat, you've probably seen your pet yawn several times. Even some birds yawn, such as cockatiel parrots, Adelie penguins and Emperor penguins.

What we do know is that yawning helps replenish the levels of oxygen in the blood, and may help regulate our body temperature. The same chemicals in our brain that affect our moods and emotions also cause us to yawn.

Ancient Greeks started the ritual of covering your mouth when you yawn so that your soul does not escape!

Notice when people yawn ... what is going on in the conversation? What might trigger the need for more oxygen? Why might a deep breath be needed? Why is this conversation having such an impact at the deep visceral level?

Maybe there are times we need to breathe new life into a situation, a conversation or relationship. Think about it...notice it...reflect on it...and talk about it with others...it's a phenomenon of nature.

Want to learn more about contagious yawning? Check out this cool video from Discovery Channel's MythBusters.

Trust at the Moment of Contact
In my new book on trust, I talk about the most important social forces that are hardwired into our DNA and drive our 'humanity.' Whether we were around three thousand years ago, or we are living today, these forces guide our interactions with each other. We are still struggling to figure it out, to work it through, and to find ways to emerge more whole and more humanized as a global community. You can check out three sample chapters here.

Judith E. Glaser is the author of two best selling business books: Creating WE: Change I-Thinking to We-Thinking & Build a Healthy Thriving Organization - winner of the Bronze Award in the Leadership Category of the 2008 Axiom Business Book Awards, and The DNA of Leadership; the DVD and Workshop titled The Leadership Secret of Gregory Goose; and editor and contributor of 42 Rule for Creating WE, an Amazon bestseller. Learn more about her online at: www.benchmarkcommunicationsinc.com.

Israel took me by surprise. My husband and I celebrated my 10th year cancer-free anniversary this year in Israel, and it was an incredible place to be for this profound time in our lives. Israel is the history of the world found in one small spot on the world map. One small piece of geography filled with so much emotion, so much history, and so much push and pull about who owns what and why.

Our guide, Nachum, was the best storyteller and facilitator of learning I have ever met. As we drove down a particular street in Tel Aviv, he pointed out that this street was the line that separated Palestinians from the Israelis; each with houses facing the other with just a small street separating them. He pointed out that many houses had bullet holes in the stone facing - fresh ones - and many of the windows were closed down to a small opening to avoid the sniper fire that came through the windows. Conflict, fighting, war, hate were just a street apart.

In six days, Nachum brought together the 'now' of Israel with the past 3,000 years of history. For the first time I could understand why the conflict doesn't want to go away.

What we learned was that for thousands of years, each society that came to Israel, tried to wipe out the society before. They leveled the buildings down to the ground and built their edifices on top of the remaining rubble. Each took ownership of the land. Each marked their territory with their culture. Each lived there until the next great fight took place and another stronger power came in to conquer, enslave or exile the existing population.

Learning from History 

People in Israel have rebuilt as much of history as they can so that visitors from around the world can see what happened... experience what happened... relive what happened with the hope that we can open our minds to the forces that continue to bring us together and pull us apart.

In Israel, archeological sites are being rebuilt so visitors can step into a 'recreated' edifice and experience the space, as did those who lived there thousands of years ago. They chart the old and new with a dark thick line on the walls, where below is the actual remaining wall and above is recreated space, allowing visitors to step into that room and its history as though it were now.

One such recreated space we visited was at Masada - King Herod's fortress, where 960 Jewish zealots made their last ditch stand against the Romans, and chose to all commit suicide rather than be slaughtered and have their wives and children taken into slavery by their enemies.

People are drawn to Israel. We want to experience the past in a safe way. We want to see it, and learn from it, yet the learning seems to live at the top of our consciousness and not filter down inside where we are willing to make fundamental changes in how we work together, how we live together and how we thrive together. 

Holding Reality In Our Hands

I was blown away by this... an architect devoted his whole life to recreating the Western Wall and the city of Jerusalem in a 'model' so people would be able to walk around history and see and feel the story of people over thousands of years living through growth and conflict.

As Nachum walked us around the model we experienced what it felt to live back then and now at the same time - starting to understand the mighty forces of humanity and the tensions of people with different beliefs struggling to live together.

In our last day of the trip, we visited a newly unearthed archeological site of a very ancient city that has been the focus of a 29-year old excavation, which began when a mud slide opened up the ground. Below the rows of fully-grown trees emerged remnants of a theater. The archeologists knew that if a theater was there, then the city was near by - and it was!

As the team of archeologists dug the site, they unearthed an incredible city; they found markets for selling wares, spas for daily public bathing and having 'massages,' and a section of city where prostitutes offered their talents daily to those who were interested.

Nachum showed us that this spot was another example of 'many owners'. At one time this land had been 'built up and owned' by the Jews, then taken over by the Byzantines, then by the Greeks and then inhabited by the Romans followed by the Arabs.

The story of ownership and power continued to emerge right in front of our eyes in this archeological excavation, and continues to re-emerge as we return to the present and read the newspapers and talk with our friends about the fate of Israel and the larger story of how 'WE' is being created and destroyed right in front of our eyes.

How do we Create WE today? What are the most important and fundamental principles that we need to consider and practice as we learn to activate the most human parts of our minds, hearts and brains?

Creating WE Social Forces™

Where do these tensions live inside of you? Where do they live inside of your culture? Where do they live inside of your relationships, and what are you doing to understand how to move with them not against them...

• Fairness - how do we work out what is fair for 'us'?  
• Ownership - what do we own, and what are our rules of engagement around ownership?
• Rejection - in what way might we be unnecessarily rejecting that which is different than us?
• Connection - in what ways can we foster connectivity and deeper understanding?
• Expression - how can we give each other space to speak our thoughts and express our voice?
• Status - how might status be getting in the way of creating 'power-with' others? 

If you believe someone would enjoy and benefit from this post, please share it. Just click on the + Share button and you will see lots of options for sharing it with friends including email, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Thanks!

Trust at the Moment of Contact

In my new book on Trust (click here to see three chapters), I talk about the most important social forces that are hardwired into our DNA and drive our 'humanity.' Whether we were around three thousand years ago, or we are living today, these forces guide our interactions with each other. We are still struggling to figure it out, to work it through, and to find ways to emerge more whole and more humanized as a global community.

Many of us learn how to talk to each other without graduating to the next level of conversation that enables us to go after and achieve our greatest aspirations with each other.

How easy it is to fall into discussions that reinforce what we don't want in our present situation, or focuses on what we think is broken. Coming from lack or scarcity and focusing on fixing our problems rather than feeding our passions and what we want to achieve has become such a human habit that we don't even know we're doing it. It's as though that is the way it has always been.

But turning up connectivity in your workspace creates a powerful energy shift that you can master and author in your relationships. The tool that creates this level of connectivity is co-creating conversations. 

Connectivity Within Teams and Organizations

Creating connectivity within a team enables a forward moving power that not only works in the moment to produce syncopated action, but also serves the team members as a fundamental way of being as they interact with each other. 

When teams sync together through co-creating, they are more able to raise the level of their performance. Too often companies "force" alignment in the name of vision and values, rather than inspire it. True connectivity achieved through co-creating conversations enables alignment to come from within. This creates a level of performance that, if directed toward positive and outrageous goals, consistently brings home medals for the performing team - it can't be forced from without by compliance and coercion. 

Once teams and individuals discover true connectivity, they create a broader ripple effect of co-creating behavior with others. Team members begin to listen to connect, and distrust seems to give way to higher levels of bonding and mutual support.

Listening without judgment, sharing ideas without fear of criticism, and with support from associates is co-creating conversations in action. The "been there, done that" or "that idea won't work" type of comments will turn into "let's try that" and "good idea, let's expand on that." 

Co-creating conversations is a shift in mindset from protecting what you have to partnering with others to create something bigger than we could have imagined alone. We move from "being right" to seeking new insights for shared success. 

Research has shown that making the mindset shift also signals the brain to be open to share and discover with others rather than 'persuade' them of our ideas. This also triggers neurochemicals in the brain - which are called the 'feel good hormones' such as dopamine and oxytocin, which reinforces the open state of mind. In addition, when we start to innovate, our brain also releases serotonin and endorphins, which are part of the brain's reward systems reinforcing the sharing process. 

This brain symphony is what moves us from distrust, which releases cortisol - the fear hormone - to trust, which is what releases the beautiful suite of neurochemicals that produce engagement, collaboration and innovation.

Co-creativity, first built on trust, then multiplies into a higher and faster amount of innovation that show up in many surprising ways. It's as though you rise up to a new level in the role you and others play in weaving the tapestry and threads of the topics you are discussing. New insights and new levels of wisdom unfold - surprising insights show up that had been hitherto invisible to you, but now are just in you and your team's consciousness. Using the practices of co-creating conversations enables higher levels of connectivity.

Many people explain moments of connectivity as "a feeling that life is flowing through them. It's a feeling of being on a boat propelled by the force of a river - a current moving you to your next stop on your journey; a blending of control with a higher force propelled by curiosity and discovery." 

Unlock your connectivity with co-creating conversations - just listen with support, appreciate each other - unlock the power of connectivity. 

If you believe someone would enjoy and benefit from this post, please share it. Just click on the + Share button and you will see lots of options for sharing it with friends including email, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Thanks!

Judith E. Glaser is the Author of two best selling business books: Creating WE: Change I-Thinking to We-Thinking & Build a Healthy Thriving Organization - winner of the Bronze Award in the Leadership Category of the 2008 Axiom Business Book Awards, and The DNA of Leadership; the DVD and Workshop titled The Leadership Secret of Gregory Goose; and editor and contributor of 42 Rule for Creating WE, an Amazon bestseller.

Our brains are incredibly sensitive to nuances and meta-messages. Our need to belong and to be important in each others' eyes is strong; yet there are many ways we signal each other that show that we are not. Disagreeing with another's point of view is the case in point.

When we disagree with someone, we are sending very subtle signals about who is up and who is down - who has the power and who does not.
 
Disagreements in the Workplace

Disagreements lead us right into the dance of power - the "alpha-alpha" dynamic. Conflicts and disagreements in the workplace, set off people and cause tensions about power and status.
 
Disagreeing with someone is not just "disagreeing with their point of view, or the information they are sharing. Disagreeing can communicate the following "meta-messages" if not careful:

1. I am right, you are wrong.
2. "You stupid idiot" (YSI) - how could you think such thoughts.
3. How could you see the world that way.
4. You must be blind to the truth.

Truth-telling Instincts

Human beings have built in hard-wiring for truth-telling. When we disagree - our truth-telling sensitivities are activated - and we feel the truth or the absence of truth at the deepest levels of our being. We all want to trust our observations and beliefs; however, disagreeing can challenge US at the core of who we are. Disagreements are not felt as disagreements about 'facts and data.' Disagreements are about 'whose view of reality is true.'

When we challenge each other's perspectives, we trigger the Amygdala - the part of our primitive brain that is associated with 'fight/flight/freeze or appease.' The neurochemical reaction to conflict goes deeper and permeates other parts of our brain such as the Prefrontal Cortex, which are associated with our 'executive functions.' Conflict is such a powerful trigger, that when 'conflicts and disagreements' arise between us - we get 'Amygdala Hijacked,' which means we get emotionally threatened and triggered!

Get Smart...
 
Here are some tips for avoiding getting into an unintended conflict with others:
 
DON'T SAY
Don't say, "yes - but" - and then deliver your perspective. The "but" negates anything that came before that appeared like an agreement - and turns the conversation into a combat.
 
DO SAY
Alternatively, saying "yes - and" creates an extended conversation that builds on ideas - it says, what you said is really important, and let's take it one step further. The "and" invites further development of the conversation and expands perspectives. I call this type of conversation "co-creating" and when people in the workplace make a shift to a co-creating style - even when they don't fully agree with others - it moves people away from adversarial behavior and into collegiality.

DON'T SAY
When a colleague or boss uses the phrase "respectfully speaking"  it is not generally taken for face value. Instead, it is translated into a way of saying.... "I know I should respect your position" - "BUT" I don't' so here goes with what I think.

DO SAY
"I understand what you are trying to say - help me with this aspect." I'm having trouble seeing how to get from here to there. This is an invitation to talk more deeply about beliefs or observations, it takes you out of the positional dialogue where you are going back and forth one-upping or arguing about what is right, and it invites people to be open to influence.

Advocating vs. Inquiring

In summary, when we get into conversations that make us feel adversarial. We see people in "persuasion" using high levels of Advocating (their point of view). Sometimes they are Inquiring, however, the intention behind it is to learn what the other person is thinking so you can turn the conversation back to "winning your point."

Sharing and Discovering

As an alternative, "agreements" come more easily when people are open to influence, and when we get into conversations that feel like partnering. Where people share and discover from each other - and where they open the context and framework for both to gain new perspectives. Then agreements are a natural outflow. Even if you agree to disagree - it comes with the spirit of respect.

If you believe someone would enjoy and benefit from this post, please share it. Just click on the + Share button and you will see lots of options for sharing it with friends including email, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Thanks!

If you would like to gain more insights into how to have Co-creating Conversations®, how to move from adversaries to partners, please check out my best-selling book Creating WE: Change I-Thinking to WE-Thinking and Build a Healthy Thriving Organization. 

We are pleased to announce that we are now offering Co-Creating Conversations® workshops and certification courses.

This year has been a very special year of global and cultural awakening.

While human beings are separated by geographic boundaries, the reality is we have more in common with our far away neighbors than we often realize.

What we have in common is fundamental..... we all have a history, or past, that shapes us. We all have our environment shaping us; and we evolve with an essence of both the power of the past and the power of the present influencing us at the same moment as we engage and connect with others to shape the future.

When we open our minds and hearts..... we will discover we share common beliefs about what it means to be a human being in the world today.

As we focus on what we have in common, this act of connectivity will bring us closer rather than push us away from others. The wisdom of connectivity is true whether we choose to connect to people who are in our own back yard, or choose to connect with those who are thousands and thousands of miles away.

To welcome in the New Year and celebrate what we have in common... please take a moment and view this mesmerizing video... Bobby McFerrin uses global audiences to demonstrate a natural sense of shared understanding and connectivity that moves beyond individual interpretations and centers on what 'we instinctively know to be true.'

CLICK IMAGE TO SEE VIDEO

Hope you enjoy watching our Vital Instincts™ in Action...  The Pentatonic Scales

Notes about Pentatonic Scales:
Source - Wikipedia

A pentatonic scale is a musical scale with five notes per octave in contrast to a heptatonic (seven note) scale such as the major scale. Pentatonic scales are very common and are found all over the world, including Celtic folk music, Hungarian folk music, West African music, African-American spirituals, American folk music, Jazz, American blues music and rock music, Sami joik singing, children's songs, the music of ancient Greece and the Greek traditional music and songs from Epirus, Northwest Greece and the music of Southern Albania, the tuning of the Ethiopian krar and the Indonesian gamelan, Philippine Kulintang, melodies of Korea, Malaysia, Japan, China, India and Vietnam (including the folk music of these countries), the Andean music, the Afro-Caribbean tradition, Polish highlanders from the Tatra Mountains, and Western Classical composers such as French composer, Claude Debussy. The pentatonic scale is also used on the Great Highland Bagpipe.

The ubiquity of pentatonic scales, specifically anhemitonic modes, can be attributed to the total lack of the most dissonant intervals between any pitches; there are neither any minor seconds (and therefore also no complementary major sevenths) nor any tritones. This means any pitches of such a scale may be played in any order or combination without clashing.

If you believe someone would enjoy and benefit from this post, please share it. Just click on the + Share button and you will see lots of options for sharing it with friends including email, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Thanks!

Judith Glaser is the world’s leading authority on WE-centric Leadership. Through her dynamic, interactive and provocative keynotes, and leadership summits, and executive coaching, she has introduced her powerful transformative leadership technologies to CEO’s and their teams from major Fortune 500 companies.

Many of us act as though we all see the same reality, yet the truth is we don't. Human Beings have cognitive biases or blind spots.

Blind spots are ways that our mind becomes blocked from seeing reality as it is - blinding us from seeing the real truth about ourselves in relation to others. Once we form a conclusion, we become blind to alternatives, even if they are right in front of their eyes.

Emily Pronin, a social psychologist, along with colleagues Daniel Lin and Lee Ross, at Princeton University's Department of Psychology, created the term "blind spots."  The bias blind spot is named after the visual blind spot.

Passing the Ball

There is a classic experiment that demonstrates one level of blind spots that can be attributed to awareness and focused-attention. When people are instructed to count how many passes the people in white shirts make on the basketball court, they often get the number of passes correct, but fail to see the person in the black bear suit walking right in front of their eyes. Hard to believe but true!

Blind Spots & Denial

However, the story of blind spots gets more interesting when we factor in our cognitive biases that come from our social needs to look good in the eyes of others.

When people operate with blind spots, coupled with a strong ego, they often refuse to adjust their course even in the face of opposition from trusted advisors,  or incontrovertible evidence to the contrary.

Two well-known examples of blind spots are Henry Ford and A&P:

• Ford's success with the Model-T blinded him to the desires of his customers. That gave the fledging General Motors an opportunity to capture a winning share of the automobile market with a broader range of models and options.
• A&P stuck with the grocery chain's private label products even as their customers defected en masse to supermarkets that carried the national brands they saw advertised on TV.

Recovery

The good news is that companies can recover from denial; even when they seem permanently wedded to their histories, their philosophies, or their belief systems. IBM, which had been caught up in its own "bureau-pathology," learned to conquer arrogance and overcome its history and culture, under the leadership of Louis Gerstner.

Intel, DuPont, and Coca-Cola, are more examples of corporations caught in denial traps when launching new products. They demonstrated that when corporate management has strong convictions, or worse yet, hubris about their points of view, they can become blind to their customer's needs - needs that are right in front of their very eyes.

Seeing the real truth is an art and a science. When we get the balance right between what we think is true and what is really true - we are managing our blind spots with integrity, and wisdom.

Fortunately, these well-known brands did not live in denial very long. It was only a passing phase, and they recovered from it by revisiting reality with an open mind. Blind spots explain why the "smartest people in the room" (as Enron's top executives were famously called) can sometimes be very dumb. They do not see the light - they are not open to changing their minds.

The Power of Coaching to Dissolve Blind Spots

Denial and Blind spots are one of the primary reasons why Executive Coaching is so vital for leaders, and why peer coaching is equally important for employees to practice. Coaching can effectively uncover and deal with blind spots and denial and give the decision-makers a fresh perspective on how to handle executive challenges.

Coaching can also help individuals gain a broader and more 'realistic perspective' about situations and themselves. Executive, Team and Organizational Coaching can help leaders calibrate with the world around them, giving them reality checkpoints that position them  to navigate the real world with wisdom and insight.

From time to time, we all need a wake-up call to be sure that we do not allow ourselves to confuse our denial maps with the actual territory.

Check Yourself

Here are 7 Common Blind spots:

1. Denial of Reality - Feeling so strong about our own beliefs that we deny the beliefs of others, or deny facts right in front of our eyes.
2. Control - Seeing ourselves as being more responsible for things than we actually are, or having more control over things and events than we truly do.
3. Made-Up Memories - Making decisions based on memories that did not happen. Often we confuse our imaginations, or our dreams, with reality.  
4. Reality Distortions - Distorting reality to conform to preconceptions.
5. Know it All - Thinking that we know more than what we really do. (We simply don't know what we don't know.)
6. Listening Only to Validate What We Know -  Failure to listen to others.
7. Undervaluing What We Do Know - Listening too much to others, and allowing others' beliefs to talk us out of our beliefs; or in some cases cause us not to trust our instincts.

Neuro-tips: Removing Blind Spots 

Tip #1 - It Takes Thought to Learn
The brain does not always allow us to hear all the facts if they do not fit our prior understanding of a concept. To learn new facts, you must be actively open to accepting opposition.

Tip #2 - Effectively Working Together
Partners who were considered controlling were perceived as critical and rude, and their advice was generally rejected and not trusted. When the same partners showed appreciation, a feeling of rapport and trust developed, creating a deep 'WE-centric' bond.

If you believe someone would enjoy and benefit from this post, please share it. Just click on the + Share button and you will see lots of options for sharing it with friends including email, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Thanks!

Judith E. Glaser is the Author of two best selling business books: Creating WE: Change I-Thinking to We-Thinking & Build a Healthy Thriving Organization - winner of the Bronze Award in the Leadership Category of the 2008 Axiom Business Book Awards, and The DNA of Leadership.

I was destined to be a child psychologist. I did my Research Fellowship in Child Development and was heading into a Ph.D. program in Human Behavior and Development - and then I had a change of mind.

I lived in Kansas at the time, and my husband Rich was getting his Ph.D. in Medicinal, Bio and Pharmaceutical Chemistry - and I took a job at the Bess Stone Center, a Center for Mentally Disabled Adults. On my first day at work, I was introduced to Larry, a 24-year-old mentally challenged adult. He was very tall and thin. Perhaps the most striking feature of his appearance was the wide suspenders that held up his pants. His teeth protruded and his head was over-sized. "His name is Larry," Mary Jean said to me. "He is 24 but has the mind of a 2-year-old." He doesn't talk. He just grunts. As she spoke those words, his head tilted, and I immediately knew he understood her harsh words. Larry looked different, and even though his outward appearance was unusual; I was about to learn that there was much wisdom beneath his surface.

Larry, who did not possess the ability to communicate through words, put his talents to work. He made an invention by inserting the 'foil' from the inside of a ketchup bottle top into a clothespin. Larry could gaze into the small foil 'rear view mirror' for a fully encompassing view of the world. He used his invention to watch the man who came to polish our floors once a week. Larry watched the up-and-down motion in his 'rear-view' mirror, and once his mind mapped the rhythm he was able to imitate floor polishing even when the polisher was not there.

I asked him if he wanted to 'try it' and sure enough, Larry polished the floors everyday and became one of the best floor polishers ever. Then he took me outside and motioned with his arms that he wanted to polish the grass. After it clicked in, I realized he wanted to transfer his new found skills to learn to mow the grass. And he did. He became the best grass mower we had ever seen.

Larry's energy and passion for learning became contagious. Soon enough, everyone at the Bess Stone Center became alive in a new way. Bertha wanted to play the piano, and she did, in her own way. Albert wanted to have 'money in his pocket' and so Mary Jean gave him money to carry to the store for food shopping. Mark wanted to build a house, and so we gave him some wood to build a miniature house which upon its completion was donated by the Bess Stone Center to its 'sister home' for mentally disabled children. The local newspaper heard about the change at Bess Stone and wrote a feature story, which greatly inspired our small town in Kansas

Larry taught me about trust. Rather than see him as a 'retarded adult' with no capabilities to do much of anything, I saw him as a whole, creative human being. At the movement of contact, I experienced him as someone special, someone I wanted to get to know and understand, and someone of value.  Larry changed my life. He was one of the reasons I wanted to understand more about how our minds work, how our brains work, and why we do what we do.

Music to Your Ears

Three minutes went by and a middle-aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried on to meet his schedule.

A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw money into the till and without stopping, continued to walk.

A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly, he was late for work.

The one who paid the most attention was a 3-year-old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped and looked at the violinist. Finally, the mother pushed hard, and the child continued to walk, turning his head all the time. Several other children repeated this action, yet all the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.

In the 45 minutes the musician played, only six people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars.

Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston, and the seats averaged $100.

This is a real story. Joshua Bell played incognito in the Metro station and was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people. 

Think about the labels that frame your world - narrow your appreciation, and stop you from seeing others through a lens of their strengths.

• How do labels influence you?
• What do you perceive and why?
• Do you stop to appreciate what is going on around you?
• What blinds you? What influences your sense of reality?
• Do you recognize the talents of others in an unexpected context?

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Judith E. Glaser is the Author of two best selling business books: Creating WE: Change I-Thinking to We-Thinking & Build a Healthy Thriving Organization - winner of the Bronze Award in the Leadership Category of the 2008 Axiom Business Book Awards, and The DNA of Leadership.

This month I had the incredible opportunity to speak in Dubai to an audience of over 450 people for the 9th HR Conference put on by Etisalat Academy, the largest single-source provider of training and development solutions in the Middle East.

The attendees included hundreds of forward thinking HR Executives, who wanted to learn more about how HR can take the lead in supporting the C-suite in creating alignment and transformation in their businesses. In addition, in the audience was almost 100 Senior Executives, who were eager to step up and partner with HR. In the front row, there were eight high level diplomats - some of the top people ruling Dubai, who wanted to know 'what was new and groundbreaking.'

As it turned out, the original keynote speaker took ill - I became the opening keynote. Fortunately, my topic - The Alignment Journey - was a perfect set up for the other speakers who covered topics from Innovation and Creativity, to Social Learning, Filling the Pipeline and Pro-activity.

The city of Dubai is everything you see in magazines and on TV. I called it Miami on steroids when I first saw it in daylight after my 16-hour flight. Its skyline, created by the world's best architects - is magnificent.

Minds Wide Open

The conference was in a spectacular hotel located on the Palms, another real estate phenomenon. The audience was eager to listen, and I was ready to share my ideas and frameworks. The interpreter sat in the back of the room in a small booth. Half of the audience understood English; the rest listened through the headsets provided.

My talk contained ideas about a 'new normal' that is emerging around the world. "We are at a time of great change, and the world is discovering we are all connected. Creating environments for candid and caring conversations to take place is essential for all leaders, all countries, and for the world to experience and create shared success."

I talked about the Neuroscience of WE, and the Wisdom of the Five Brains, and how we are connected through conversations. I introduced the notion of "I-centric" and "WE-centric" leadership. This struck a cord, which I learned later was because many of the concepts about the power of the heart, lie deep inside of the Koran.  I stepped into a new world of dialogue and conversation - an intersection of business, science and religion - in an auditorium with strangers eager to hear and learn what is fresh and provocative and worthy of discussion...

Turning Doubt into Understanding

During my keynote, one of the Sheiks in the front row raised his hand and asked if I could 'roll back my slides.' He realized I was presenting some new ideas and he wanted to understand the true depth of my comments. He wanted to delve deeper into the distinctions between an "I-centric" and a "WE-centric" leader.

He asked about how I defined "I and WE" and he wanted to know what was good and what was not good about I-centric and WE-centric. He asked out of curiosity, and eagerness to learn, not in a challenging or judgmental way. We were in a dialogue with 450 people listening. I had no idea how important our sharing of ideas was until much later.

I said that when leader's derail - and when their companies start to fail, it's when the leader makes themselves the center of the universe and the dynamics within the organization become all about pleasing the boss. However, when it's "WE-centric" - the company mission and the relationship with their customer become the center of the universe - all work together to achieve outrageous goals. Winning takes on a new definition - and the profits follow. The room was silent - heads were bobbing in agreement - something I will never forget.

We talked a lot about 'having a voice' - and how hierarchy and fear of authority can cause people to feel afraid to speak up.  I talked about how important it is for leaders to set the tone and encourage pushback. I shared that too often 'leaders are the last to know' because people are afraid of them - and so all the observations and ideas that employees might contribute get lost behind the leader's power. When this happens a company starts to disconnect from reality - denial sets in and businesses, at the extreme, go out of business.

Transformation of Everyday Life

My session finished after much interaction with the audience about power, winning, neuroscience of leadership, and the human behavior behind 'why we do what we do.' During the breaks, attendees came over to tell me how thoughtful and provocative the session was. Most of all, people talked about how my session touched their heart.

What I pieced together by the session close was that I gave them a new framework to 'include their heart' in an explanation of how we connect with others - how we connect to history - how we connect to the future. While I was speaking, the audience was listening through a broader lens of history which was more steeped in strong religious beliefs than the place I was speaking from - science and business. As our two perspectives joined in a spirit of open discovery, it ignited a new way of talking about science, relations, life and the future.

After the meeting and my profound conversations with the participants - I saw Dubai in a new way. I saw the people as compassionate, intimate, open, generous of spirit and deeply willing to learn. I felt welcomed, appreciated, and understood.

Conventional wisdom has suggested that it's better not to talk about negative emotions as a way of handling them. So, we turn to alternative strategies such as holding our negative emotions in (as suggested by Anger Management and Emotional Intelligence programs), suppressing them, managing them, or sharing them with others (gossip/triangulation) just to get them out.

However, recent discoveries at neuroscience research centers are revealing how to handle negative emotions in new and healthy ways. This updated wisdom takes us down another path. Rather than suppressing or ignoring emotions, which only damages our internal healthy functioning, we need to learn to express our emotions in constructive ways. Learning how to label emotions in healthy ways has a big impact on emotions - both for the speaker and the receiver.

Careful labeling of an emotion enables us to regulate the emotion. If the emotion is "rage" or "frustration"- labeling it causes the rage and frustration to settle down. Constructive labeling enables the speaker and listener to clarify the emotional distress. It prevents the speaker from bringing a higher emotional tone to the situation and brings a more logical frame of reference to the situation. This practice regulates the brain and provides a calming effect.

Learning how to label emotions and express our discomfort enables us to quell the fear and pain centers of the brain (amygdala) and activates our reasoning and forward-thinking centers in the brain (prefrontal cortex) where our strategic and social skills reside. Our pleasure centers are more closely linked to the prefrontal cortex, so we feel better when we come up with more effective strategies for handling our emotions and creating new strategies for the future.
 
Neuro-tips

We are at a critical inflection point in the world today. In this WE-centric universe we need to acknowledge our vital role and responsibilities to each other on our journey. Our new WE-centric world is built on candor and caring, which expand positive powers in the world. In a WE-centric world, leaders understand that human beings are designed to be social. We either pull people toward us, or we push them away.
 
Rejection = pushing people away and is experienced as pain by those rejected. Compassion and caring = pulling people toward us and is experienced as pleasure by those who are accepted. You can become a game-changer and shift your culture into a "WE-centric" culture by applying these neuro-tips at work.
 
NEURO-TIP #1: Our brains are designed to be social

Our need for belonging is as or more powerful than our need for safety. When we are rejected, we experience pain in the same centers in the brain and body as when we break a leg. Being emotionally orphaned is more painful than death. When others show us love, respect, and honor us, it triggers the same centers in the brain as when we eat chocolate, have sex, or are on drugs. Understanding this dynamic will change how you lead.

QUESTION: Knowing that our brains are designed to be social, what Leadershift could you make in your life starting tomorrow to create greater positive connectivity with others at work?

NEURO-TIP #2: Appreciation reshapes our neural networks to give us a broader perspective of the world

When we feel sad, depressed, alone, fearful and disconnected from others, our mind closes down. Messages from the amygdala say "protect" and our brains are hardwired and designed to protect us from harm. Through co-creating conversations that focus on how we can tackle our challenges and difficult situations together, we activate an appreciative mindset. Our neural chemistry changes; we 'turn off' the fear-based neuro-messages from the amygdala, and 'turn on' the brain connections that feed up into the prefrontal cortex - our 'executive brain.'  We see that our 'perspective has shifted' and it's because that part of our brain - our prefrontal cortex - is now engaged.

QUESTION: Knowing that appreciation is the food that enhances the health of our brains, minds and souls, what Co-creating Conversations could you initiate tomorrow and with whom - that could shift the feel of your workplace from judging to appreciating?
 
NEURO-TIP #3: We avoid what is painful; we engage in what is pleasurable

From birth, we learn to avoid physical pain and move toward physical pleasure. We learn to protect ourselves from ego pain, building habits and patterns of behavior that protect us from feeling belittled, embarrassed, or devalued.

At work this tendency translates into avoiding a colleague who appears to compete with you when you speak up or avoiding a boss who sends you silent signals of disappointment. Pain can also come from what you anticipate-not from what is real. If you imagine that telling colleagues they are annoying you will lead to a fight or argument, just the thought of having that conversation will produce the social pain of being rejected or being in an uncomfortable conversation. We often avoid the conversation and hold the frustration inside. The feared implications of pain become so real for us that we turn to avoidance, since confronting a person with a difficult conversation may lead to yelling, rejection, or embarrassment.

QUESTION: Knowing that avoiding others to avoid perceived pain of a difficult conversation may only create greater pain down the road, what person and what conversation could you have starting tomorrow to build greater trust and candor with a colleague?

Rituals for 2010

It's another year ending and a New Year beginning. My guess is that many of us would like this year to be a 'one of a kind,' and not something we intentionally repeat. Often actions with high emotion become patterns, which become rituals even without intention.

So as 2009 ends and we step into a hopeful and exciting 2010, think about the rituals that you would like to hardwire into your organization, and work on rituals that build community and empathy.

Here are some ideas of how to think about rituals. I put this together with Barbara Biziou, one of the founding members of Creating WE Institute, who is a ritual guru.

Healthy Rituals

Healthy Rituals that build community bring individuals together, awaken the spirit of the team, and they enable individuals to build healthy thriving relationships. In this changing and uncertain time, our relationships are more important than ever before. They become our anchors in the sea of uncertainty, and help us quell the hardwired fear centers that live inside our brain. 

Power of Relationship Rituals

Our research shows that if you are having an unhealthy relationship with someone in your team, the impact on you and others will be unhealthy - and the negative influence may go on for weeks, or months and spread to others on the team. When something is wrong in a relationship, the other person may tend to 'blow you off.' However, if you do have a healthy relationship with people, they will take the time to work through the difficult conversations with you. Relationship Building Rituals are the keystones to building successful business relationships at work. Connection breeds loyalty, trust and compassion.

If we do not feel connected to others, we won't feel connected to the job; we lose motivation and become apathetic. We check out, we give up and give in, and we lose our voice, or we get angry or resistant to change.

Pay Attention to the Meta Messages 

Why and how do rituals impact the brain? Rituals communicate inclusion, acceptance, and send messages to the brain, saying: "you are part of the team." These 'relational messages' are non-verbal and could account for as much as 90% of the impact you have on others.

Notice the impact: our pupils will dilate when we are interested in something. Looking at someone directly can show him or her that we care. We tend to put higher trust in and believe more in these signals than the words spoken. For example, saying, "you did a good job" while scowling and rolling your eyes sends a mixed message causing a breakdown in communication, which leads us to distrust others.

Rituals You Can Experiment With: A Venting Ritual

When we interact with others, conflicts may arise - that's normal. Each of us has our own ideas for what we want to make happen, and when others disagree, we can get mad, emotional, angry, upset and sometimes avoid others when we can't find a way to work through the conflict.

There is an Ancient Ritual, which was called Stenia. The younger women got a chance to complain, and moan about what was bothering her, releasing anger and resentment they would have held onto. The 21st century version of this is called It's Okay to Vent Once a Day. Venting can be positive if it is done correctly. It releases stuck energy from the body and quiets the mind. Venting is the process of giving each other permission for venting time with others, rather than letting it go on forever. We can choose to vent for 7 seconds, 7 minutes, even 7 hours.

Releasing Emotions

We all have interactions with life that create emotional responses that often don't end at the time that the interaction ends. It's like striking a guitar cord. After your hand leaves the strings, the cord you've played continues to reverberate. Sour notes create music we don't like to hear, and we complain.

Here are the steps:

   1. Establish a timeframe for venting.
   2. Pick a partner that you totally trust to keep the information confidential.
   3. Choose the role you want your partner to play in order to help you "work through it."
   4. Decide if the role should be to:

• Listen.
• Listen for something specific. 
• Listen with the intention of helping creating a  new strategy for reentering the relationship or situation with a fresh point of view: to re-contract, or reconnect.
• Listen so you can give the person coaching-a new perspective on the situation.
• Listen to help you interrupt a negative cycle you may be having and transform it into a positive  cycle.

   5. Take turns so each of you have a chance to be a coach and coachee.
   6. Ask your colleague to try different roles to see which one helps you the most.

Healthy Rituals

Healthy Rituals allow individuals, teams and organizations to practice what we call "self-regulation," which doesn't mean suppression - it means 'self-expression' and that is healthy. Suppression is a form of holding in emotions - such as frustration, anger, disappointment. When we suppress, we cause a cascade of stress hormones to 'own us' - hence the term Amygdala Hijacking (Amygdala is our 'flight, fight, freeze and fear' mechanism in our older Reptilian Brain).

Creating Healthy Check Ins

Check in with people to create positive rituals that meet the needs of team members.

   1.  Ask for input from the members of the organization so people feel included in the rituals.
   2.  Be creative.
   3.  Listen non-judgmentally.
   4.  Be consistent, be mindful and be open to change.
   5.  Rituals can open the door to new behavior and pave the way for new business results.

Neuro-tips: Rituals enable us to meet the needs of connectivity, our most profound and powerful need.

Neuro-tip #1: When needs are unmet in a relationship, we become more emotional and frustrated. We become dissatisfied with the person, which over time will increase and can turn into dislike. (Shifting from friend to foe).

Neuro-tip #2: Positive mood states in one person encourage positive mood states in others. Oxytocin, a bonding hormone in men and women, is released during human contact, connecting and bonding, which reduces aggressions and increases cooperation.

Neuro-tip #3: Empathy for others is expanded through community rituals. Empathy is more than a feeling; it leads us to actions. By experiencing positive community rituals, we trigger our 'mirror-neuron' systems, which are located in the parietal lobes and prefrontal cortex. Positive Rituals expand our ability to empathize with others.