Are you the hero or the sidekick?

Do circumstances conspire against you, or are you clever and indefatigable?

What’s your happy ending?

What happens next?

When things aren’t going your way, what story do you tell yourself?

 

You’ve probably read or heard this quote from Maya Angelou:

Of course, she is right. I would add, though, that we often feel a certain way because of something someone says or does.

To this end, it’s worth thinking about the result when we choose to say or do something. “How do I hope this person will feel as a result of what I’m about to say?”

That’s intention. That’s generosity. That’s kindness.

I check the weather before I travel. I want to know what type of clothes to pack, whether I might need an umbrella, what shoes are going to work for what I’m planning to do, etc.

We can check the weather, so to speak, before high-stakes conversations, too. What is the environment like where I’m going? Am I going to need anything special or different? What can I take with me, in terms of planning and intention, that will serve me best?

I was talking to a client recently who bemoaned the fact that a presentation she had given ”felt like I regressed.” She was frustrated that she had rushed, not landed her thoughts, and generally not done as good a job as she thought she was capable of.

Think about cleaning out your attic or basement or closet. It gets worse before it gets better. There’s a moment about halfway through, when the energy of beginning has worn off and now you’re surrounded by boxes and dust and junk, when you think, “Ugh, this is awful and now it’s way more of a mess than it was when I just ignored it.”  But now there’s nothing to do but continue.

The same is true when we are working on becoming more intentional communicators. The habits we have accumulated over the years have to be pulled out and assessed—do I need this? What does it do for me? Do I have space for it? If we’re just cleaning out the attic, this process can be done in a day or a weekend. A trip to Goodwill and one to the dump, and you’re good to go. But clearing out old habits takes longer.

As we look at these habits, we become way more aware of them and how they show up in our bodies and voices and minds. As we work to shift them, they hold on. We improve, then backslide. But as I told my client, this is exactly how we make progress.  You can learn every time you fall into an old habit—what were the circumstances? What was my intention? Who was there? What did it feel like was at stake?  We chip away at it until it’s just a memory.

The first and most important rule of improvisation is “Yes, And.” This means that you accept whatever your scene partner has established, no matter how bizarre, and you build on it.

Example:

The opposite of “Yes, And” is “Yes, But,” or simply “No.”

Example:

“Isn’t this a beautiful day? I never dreamed we would make it to Saturn!”

“We’re not on Saturn! This is a gas station in Akron.”

In the second example, the second actor negates the offer in order to work with his own idea. In the process, he undermines his scene partner, stalls the forward momentum of the scene, and creates mistrust in the audience.

When we show up with our own agendas, and we push them forward with disregard for what other people are trying to do, we are creating the same dynamic. What happens when you “yes, and” that idea instead of shutting it down? What happens when you engage with a spirit of curiosity instead of certainty?

I write a lot here about intentional communication–the idea that the fundamental driver of communication is how you want to affect the person you’re talking to.

But what happens when we are stuck in a pattern with someone we speak with frequently? What happens when we recognize “When I say this, she may feel defensive,” consciously adjust our intention, do our very best not to  be adversarial, and still get a defensive response?

 

 

 

Your feet are your foundation. Your posture begins with the way your feet, the hardest-working appendages in show business, meet the floor.

Check out your feet. Is one doing most of the work of holding up your body while the other hangs out? Is one foot propped up on the other? Are your feet far apart, cowboy-style, or primly side by side?

Our habits have determined what feels like the “natural” place for our feet. It feels comfortable to have more weight on one foot than the other, or to have our feet far apart. But this “naturalness” is something we’ve grown accustomed to, not the way our body actually functions best.

Wherever you are right now, try this. Put both of your feet on the floor, hip-width apart. (This is about the width of your fists placed side by side.) Feel as much of the floor as you can with the bottoms of your feet. Press each toe into the floor; feel the pressure of the floor against your heels and arches. Notice which elements of this may be different from how you typically sit or stand.

This exercise grounds you in your body, brings you into the here and now. When you are standing to speak, start here.

The other day as I was driving, I saw a man walking down the sidewalk in a suit that was far too big for him. The sleeves hung down over his palms, and the jacket swallowed his shoulders.

Speaking words that aren’t yours has the same effect as wearing a suit not meant for your body. Phrases and words that you would never choose won’t roll easily off your tongue; you’ll be preoccupied by them as the man I saw was preoccupied by his too-big suit.

I encounter this most often when clients have a high-stakes speech to give. They have practiced it in front of their peers or their boss, and each audience has tweaked and changed and suggested and polished. What’s left is a speech that the client barely recognizes as her own. Each iteration moves the speaker further away from her original message, and clouds her own understanding of it.

You wouldn’t let some give you clothes that don’t fit to wear to a big event. Don’t let them give you words that aren’t yours, either.