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Reconnecting with Yourself Amid the Daily Hustle
26 Plays5 months ago
In this episode we dive into the topic of mindfulness at work with special guest Larry Rosenberg, a senior consultant at Interaction Associates. Larry brings over 30 years of experience in leadership coaching, change management, and business process improvement.
Feeling overwhelmed and burnt out at work? Larry shares insights on why many of us feel constantly stressed and how mindfulness can help us regain control and improve our well-being. From defining what it means to be mindful to exploring practical tips like mindful breathing, yoga, and meditation, this episode offers valuable strategies to help you stay present and effective in your daily life.
Larry also highlights the impact of chronic stress on our bodies and minds and discusses the benefits of incorporating mindfulness practices into our routines. Whether you're new to mindfulness or looking to deepen your practice, this conversation provides a comprehensive guide to managing stress and enhancing your overall productivity and health.
Resources Mentioned:
WorkFlowy App
Be Your Future Self Now by Dr. Benjamin Hardy
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Burnout and Mindfulness
00:00:09
Speaker
Are you feeling burnout at your job? Do you get stressed in your day-to-day tasks or feel like you're frantically chasing every email to hit your inbox?
00:00:18
Speaker
You're not alone. This is unfortunately quite common and is leading to a workforce that's exhausted and frustrated. In today's episode of Water Cooler Wisdom, we'll be joined by leadership coach Larry Rosenberg, where we'll discuss why this is happening and how mindfulness might be a supportive solution. So take three deep breaths and take a listen to this engaging conversation.
Personal Mindfulness Struggles
00:00:45
Speaker
Hello and welcome to another episode
00:00:48
Speaker
of water cooler wisdom. I'm your host, Jake Blocker. And I'm your host, Rachel Grail. So I'm working on my calming voice here in preparation for today's mindfulness conversation. And unfortunately, as we failed miserably, we tried to get a gong noise in there, but it wouldn't work.
00:01:14
Speaker
There it is. That's all we needed. But yeah, this is going to be a great conversation. I'm excited about this. In all seriousness, I'm sure mindfulness is something we all struggle with, as much yoga as I do, and as many failed attempts at meditation that I do. It's a struggle for me. It's all about just welcoming what's here in this moment, isn't it, though?
00:01:42
Speaker
Pretty much. And yeah, in this moment, we are going to have an incredible conversation. So Rachel, you ready to get into it? I am. Let's go, Jake. All
Meet Larry Rosenberg
00:01:53
Speaker
right. Let's introduce our guest, Larry Rosenberg. So Larry is a senior consultant at Interaction Associates and brings over 30 years of experience in leadership coaching and facilitating change across many industries. Larry specializes in leadership training, change management, and business process improvements.
00:02:11
Speaker
His certifications are extensive and include being an ICF certified coach, a brain-based coaching certificate from NLI, and a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt. Larry's expertise has benefited a range of clients including Thermo Fisher Scientific, PPD, Citizens Bank, and General Electric. His commitment to personal growth is evidence in his daily practice of yoga and transcendental meditation.
00:02:41
Speaker
Welcome, Larry. Glad to have you. I'm also really excited to have this conversation with you, Larry.
Mindfulness as Stress Prevention
00:02:49
Speaker
And since we're kind of gathered around the remote water cooler, if you will, I want to talk a little bit about us at work. And I think at least my experience is that when I'm at work, I often check out from myself a little bit.
00:03:05
Speaker
I know that many of us get fully engaged in the work that we're doing, which can be great, but if we forget to take care of ourselves for too long, this can lead to exhaustion, frustration, burnout. So really excited to discuss this with you. Dive deeper into kind of why this happens, how we can lean into more supportive habits for ourselves. So I'm wondering if you could just start at like a high level.
00:03:33
Speaker
It seems like everywhere I go, people are talking about mindfulness. So to you, what does it mean to be mindful? And why would you say this is such a relevant skill for folks today? Yes. That's a lot. So if we're sitting around the cooler and we're talking, I think one of the things we'll notice if I were to say, so Rachel, how are you? The things I tend to hear are busy.
00:04:02
Speaker
crazy busy. I'm hanging in there. Right. I mean, dear, this is what I hear from friends from colleagues. So I believe we are under a constant state of chronic stress. Maybe that's redundant. Is this is this low level stress that's just doesn't turn off. And it's due to many different reasons. So mindfulness to me,
00:04:31
Speaker
Lots of different definitions. It's being fully present where you are noticing your thoughts, you're noticing your feelings, you're noticing your surroundings, but you're not overly attached to those feelings or thoughts or surroundings. There's just a healthy distance and then you don't feel the need to react. Typically, we're on automatic reaction, right?
00:04:58
Speaker
one of my favorite people is Stephen Covey and so he talks about there's reaction and then there's he uses the word responsibility and he changes it to response ability gives you the ability to respond and so mindfulness is a way of being that sets up doing things for more intentional focus or more intentional space so it helps
00:05:28
Speaker
Overall health right you would you talked about this?
Understanding VUCA and Stress
00:05:32
Speaker
Forgetting ourselves so we can talk a little bit about some some practices that can help and And think about a ton of things that are causing this you a minute kind of roll into those Yeah, so there's this term and you know in the us in the OD space maybe you've heard of it VUCA and
00:05:57
Speaker
And so this is our world. These are the four adjectives. So it's volatile. It's uncertain. It's complex. And it's ambiguous. And honestly, just saying those four words out loud, I think my blood pressure just went up a little bit. Maybe my face got a little redder. Because how many people would be like, yeah, let's sign me up. That's the world I want to live in.
00:06:27
Speaker
That is the state at the macro level. At the micro level, the individuals, Rachel, what's your to-do list look like? Oh my gosh. Well, which one? Because I put different lists in different places when I think of them. They're all a little bit chaotic. Yeah. Okay. Big to-do list. Then, Jake, technology. How many ways can I reach you?
00:06:56
Speaker
Oh no. Too many. I don't even have my watch on that's also communicating to me. So that one's away from me right now. But yeah, far too many. So you just called us both out in such an accurate way for us. Just lucky. Just lucky. So right, so there's a ton of technology that can be used for good and it can be overwhelming.
00:07:25
Speaker
It's been a while since I've been to Vegas or any casino for that matter But sometimes I feel like life is like walking into one of those casinos. There's lights flashing. There's bells ringing There's it's an overstimulation. Sure. So we've got a to-do list with multiple priorities We have the technology and we can list all the different devices in different ways there's the 24 7 newsfeed and
00:07:53
Speaker
Most of us know that news is by design built to have a negative slant. Atelic captures our attention. And we'll go into a little bit of brain science in a bit. So all of this stuff can create that chronic stress. So we need a way to combat that for our long term health. And so we can be more effective at work.
00:08:17
Speaker
Well, you talked a little bit about being reactive and want to go back to that. So can you talk about what's happening when we're in this reactive space and how mindfulness calms us down and really what is going on in our bodies when all this is happening?
Mindfulness and the Brain
00:08:32
Speaker
Yes. Yes. Well, our bodies will feel it very differently. I want some things, you know, so Jake, when you're under stress, what's, what's the one thing that, you know, what do you notice?
00:08:46
Speaker
Honestly, I feel like it's hard to notice one thing. I think it's multiple things going on at one time, all competing with one another. It's hard to pinpoint one thing. Yeah, everyone's built differently and feels it differently. Rachel, do you know what's your telltale sign?
00:09:10
Speaker
Yeah, I get really like into action mode, where I'm like, self, self solve. I've heard it said like, mindfulness is kind of, you see, like, there's like, our thoughts are cars on the road. And when we're not being mindful, we're just like chasing after every one of them. And so when I'm stressed, I feel that way where I'm just like running after whatever little thing that I can to make it like,
00:09:38
Speaker
calm, calm down a little bit. Okay. Yes, there's, for me, I can, I can, my palms will get sweaty if I'm really, if I'm really stressed. Occasionally, I can feel my face, I don't know if it can be seen, but my face gets kind of red. Blood pressure goes up, I don't wear a monitor, but I'm sure it does go up. All these are the things that we tend to see. Sometimes people get a little bit, their stomach, like they just get like, oh,
00:10:07
Speaker
little queasy, maybe a little dizzy. Public speaking is something that people tend to stress out quite a bit. And so these are the typical things that they say, this is what I feel. So let's do a little bit of neuroscience. And I'm going to use a model, a brain model. It's a bit dated, but for illustrative purposes, it works fairly well. So there's like three key points of the brain. There's this
00:10:32
Speaker
The cortex, and a lot of people, the prefrontal cortex is a piece of that. That's where our higher functioning is. That's where we think, problem solve, make decisions, plan, regulate emotions. And there's the limbic system and the star front center stage. The limbic system is the amygdala. And this is the thing that picks up on emotions.
00:10:55
Speaker
It's always scanning for threats and it holds our emotions. And then there's this other part, which is kind of the reptilian brain that you think about it as it holds all these subroutines that are automatic. And so when we're not under stress, the cortex, prefrontal cortex runs the show. It's our best self.
00:11:20
Speaker
And then what will happen is we'll notice something and the amygdala goes, wait a second. I'm seeing a threat here. You know, it's like a red alert and it's kind of like pulling resources away from the prefrontal cortex. It's the stress response. Yeah. Are you hearing the Star Trek? You know, red alert, at least yellow alert.
00:11:46
Speaker
And sometimes it's called the fight or flight response as well. Fight, flight, or freeze. And it basically invokes some automatic way, like chase the cars. This is what I do. So somehow in the past, that got programmed in. And so we are under chronic stress. So our prefrontal cortex, where we do all our best thinking
00:12:11
Speaker
is some people just call it being offline for a good portion of the day, or at least inhibited. It's not functioning at its best. And so those are the things that happen. And what's interesting, some of the latest research shows that there's sort of two pathways. There's the something happened, and I have experienced something so similar to this before that the amygdala just takes over. It's this sort of visceral automatic reaction.
00:12:40
Speaker
there's no thought at all, it just happens. The other one is it comes from the prefrontal cortex, like we're just thinking about something and we've been designed to survive, to anticipate threats. So this is where you start thinking, wow,
00:12:58
Speaker
So that meeting, we're making this scenario. We're laying people off. And this is what's in the news. I wonder if I'm at risk. And then maybe I just had a meeting with my boss, and they just didn't seem the same. And so we begin to anticipate risk. And so anticipating risk at a level that's chronic and it's ruminating on it. And then that becomes a worry. And then it becomes anxiety.
00:13:27
Speaker
And it's the same thing. And then the anxiety, the amygdala is like, well, if you're feeling this way, here's what we need to do. And then you're offline again. So there's different strategies to help with either one of those two things. And the punchline is mindfulness practices help with both strategies, like both sources of that hijacking, if you will, of your brain.
Mindfulness Techniques
00:13:56
Speaker
Well, I mean, I'm enrolled, so can you tell us some more of the tips or strategies that people can try out that can help them be more mindful, help them address that hijacking?
00:14:08
Speaker
Yeah, I'm gonna take notes because too much of this is ringing true right now. There's a lot. And I think of, I think of, there's, there's a building of core muscles, if you will, that's like a group of strategies. And then there's some kind of preventative thing that you can do on a periodic basis. And then there's the, the interventions. And this follows some of the, some of the models we've seen before. What do you do in the moment?
00:14:38
Speaker
So the building the muscles, the most common which most of us have heard of is meditation. And there are many flavors of meditation, right? Transcendental meditation, breath work, Zen meditation, and so forth. There's something called mindful breathing, which to me is it just feels like a form of meditation. And so it's you just sitting doing whatever, spending a few moments just taking deep slow breaths.
00:15:08
Speaker
and noticing. What's amazing is any time I'm coaching someone, well, we start off with some type of a transition from the day that they've had. And I say, let's take three deep breaths together. Like, how do you feel? And it's always, oh, better. But you can see it. Well, three deep breaths do not take a lot of time. Do not need any equipment. Don't cost any money. And I always say, I should do this before every meeting.
00:15:38
Speaker
I should do this every hour. And then the dirty little secret is I don't, I still don't, but I'm going to start. And in fact, just preparing to talk to you about this topic has reminded me of the things that I could be doing better that I don't do and that have sort of dropped away. I'll be better going forward. So meditate, mindful breathing, mindful anything, again, being fully present, so mindful eating,
00:16:07
Speaker
Taking your time slowing down, chewing more slowly. I've heard 30, you know, every bite you put in your mouth chew 30 times. And I don't know when sometimes I'm in a hurry. It's like, I'm inhaling this thing. I'm running while I'm doing it. So mindful eating, mindful walking, just
00:16:31
Speaker
slowing things down, walking, noticing what's around. These are some techniques, yoga, and so I'm practicing yoga and it's one of my favorites because it's both physical and you're breathing. I think one of the keys is you're aligning your breath
00:16:52
Speaker
to your movement and so a good yoga practice and there's so many different ones is it's like you breathe in you inhale when you're opening your body and then you exhale when you're closing which is stretching or twisting and to continue to focus on that then your your mind and your body are linked together through your breath and one of the key things about yoga is be in this stance this pose this asana and some of them aren't comfortable
00:17:23
Speaker
For me, most of them aren't comfortable. Notice what your mind is doing while you're in it. I have a fabulous teacher, and she'll put us in the chair pose, which is one of my least favorite. It hurts after eight seconds for me. And she says, and some of you are thinking, when is she going to move on to the next thing? How long do I have to sit here? Is this really helping me? Oh my gosh, I hate this. And that's the mind chatter. And so it's noticing this.
00:17:52
Speaker
and then come back to your breath. And with meditation, same thing, thoughts go by and you can say, oh, that's a thought. And you practice, oh, come back to the breath. Let the thought go. So you're building the muscles to control your brain a little bit more. Those are some key strategies. Let me look, I've got a nice list.
00:18:18
Speaker
One of the things that I like about what you're saying is you've kind of given our listeners like this buffet of options. And I know one of the things that has helped me when I try to take this up this work is to know it doesn't have to be perfect. Like I don't have to sit down in a cushion for 45 minutes in order to get the benefits.
00:18:40
Speaker
of it. Can you talk about like, what's the smallest chunk that people can do and feel really feel really accomplished? Yeah, no, that's great. Right. Because some of the things I mentioned, people are like, Yeah, I don't have time for that. And you don't need much time, every little bit helps. I would say start with noticing your breath. And look for some triggers. So
00:19:07
Speaker
practices are the beginning of forming habits. So maybe do it, maybe you all join me, maybe we can get everyone in our company that before every single meeting, take three deep breaths. When coaching people, Rachel, you know, you're a coach, some of the key questions, well, what is your intention when you did that? And so always come to where we call them desired outcomes. Why are we doing what we're doing?
00:19:35
Speaker
Taking little breaks during the day is something else I think is really helpful. You don't need a half an hour. Stand up, walk around, do three minutes of stretching. Just something good for you. Breathe, think some positive thoughts. Gratitude, that's another one. Gratitude, being grateful. You can journal.
00:20:03
Speaker
which I never do because that takes time. Some people do it. It's great. But the one I like the best is when you notice something fun and positive, just spend 30 minutes enjoying it. I'm sorry, 30 minutes, 30 seconds. It's the I've heard it's the story is that it was I think it was Bernie Brown's daughter. So she's telling the story and her daughter kind of closed her eyes and
00:20:30
Speaker
And he said, are everything okay? All right. She goes, I'm just taking a mental picture of this moment. So I can come back to it whenever I want. I'm like, that's rich. So, and just notice it, right? And relish it. We don't always have our camera with us. We don't always have to post it on Instagram. Just take a few extra seconds to enjoy something that was positive.
00:20:53
Speaker
I think there's a nice quote on that. I think it's Robert Bly and maybe I'm going to totally massacre it, but it's something like, do one thing at a time carefully and with full absorption, time will stop for you if you do.
The Myth of Multitasking
00:21:09
Speaker
And with time suspension, you will gain a taste of bliss in your soul.
00:21:14
Speaker
That is beautiful. My mom used to write these inspirational quotes out in her beautiful writing, and that was one that was over the door. So I remember seeing it. I think it's Robert Bly. I'm going to have to look it up. We'll put it in the notes. But it sounds like this is what you're talking about, really, just stretching the moment with curiosity. Yes. Curiosity instead of judgment.
00:21:44
Speaker
Alright judgment is at least a recurring Pattern of thought that I have probably not alone curiosity is You know, I wonder why that is Or mr. Spock used to just look at things and everyone else is freaking out he would go fascinating Be the casual observer and One of the companies I work for way back when the posters were three words be here now
00:22:15
Speaker
And so one of the things that we tend to do when we look at this large to-do list is, well, how do I get this all done in a given day? Well, I will multitask. Well, multitasking is- Everyone's good at it, right? Let's just say it's not good at all.
00:22:35
Speaker
I'm just kidding. It causes, I mean, the things that your brain is just really switching between things. So multitasking will cause mistakes, will cause stress. And at the end of the day, the way our brain works is when we focus fully on one thing at a time, we're building new neural networks, or in simple terms, we're learning.
00:23:00
Speaker
But when we multitask all the time, we're not learning much because we're not doing anything long enough for it to be building the memories you want. That's the most compelling reason anyone has ever given me. It's not multitasking.
00:23:16
Speaker
Oh my God. I remember back in college, it was like, I remember really professors would tell us you need to be able to multitask when you go into the job. And so I just had this mindset of, all right, I guess I have to be a really good multitasker and have it on my resume and everything else. And then you get into the workforce and realize, yeah, that's not, no, I'm half-assing multiple things and not whole-assing one thing.
00:23:42
Speaker
because I think, what is that? Ron Swanson, I think. I have my really great inspirational quotes as well, Ron Swanson. So there would offer to share this study with you. I love that. Well, that reminds me of something else, which is a whole nother. I think it was King's College in London and did a study, and it was three groups. And there was a control group, which is we're going to give you a series of tasks.
00:24:10
Speaker
in a certain amount of time, get them done and we'll grade how well you did them. That's the control group. The second group, here's the deal, you're going to take a couple of bong hits and you're going to do these tasks and we're going to grade you at the end of the time. Third group was no bong hit, same tasks, but every once in a while we're going to shoot you a text and you just reply to it, it'll be pretty simple. So it was control, high on drugs, being interrupted.
00:24:38
Speaker
Well, of course, the control group did the best. Yeah. But the stoners did the second best. So, you know, and of course, everyone says so you're advocating that I get a high before coming back. Exactly. It's not. It's it's multi tasking really does not produce very good short term results or long term results. Right. Well, the way I cook dinner is going to look different.
00:25:05
Speaker
because that's a fascinating study though. Yeah.
00:25:21
Speaker
Well, let me bring us to a somewhat close here. And so when I asked one more question, although I have like 15 more, but I'm gonna ask one question.
Mindfulness Benefits Recap
00:25:30
Speaker
So let's, let's kind of imagine this ideal state, what's, what's the impact of us being more mindful? Yes. I think there's two, two things. One, you're, you're healthier, we're healthier. We will with
00:25:46
Speaker
with this chronic, because when we're under chronic stress, there's hormone cortisol, there's certain hormones, you know, screaming through our body that are not healthy for us long term. So we will have lower blood pressure. We have a lower resting heart rate. We will sleep better. We will feel better. We'll physically be better. Emotional stability, all these wonderful things for our long term health.
00:26:16
Speaker
And then our effectiveness at work. So that's a being, that's you long-term. You show up at work, you're going to make better decisions. You are going to be a better problem solver. You're going to build better relationships with people because you didn't react to something negative. You stayed calm. You're more intentional. So the goal, you'll set goals and you'll have a better chance of reaching those.
00:26:43
Speaker
So, I don't know, you know, I don't think we're going to make it if we're not more mindful. And you'll see results pretty quickly with minimal effort. That's my promise. We have one final set of questions for you. Do we warn you about this, Larry? I honestly don't remember.
00:27:09
Speaker
Oh, this will be very spontaneous. It's better, okay. Yeah, I'll do it. I think it's my turn. I don't remember, but I'll go for it. All right, Larry, those are very difficult questions and your life is on the line with these questions. I hope you know. So question one, coffee or tea in the morning? Coffee, oh, it's an easy one. Sam, you're still drinking coffee and it's afternoon. Early bird or night owl work style?
00:27:39
Speaker
Early bird. Good for you. What about an app, a platform, or software that you swear by for your work? I like something called WorkFlowy. It is simple list maker that works on a computer and all your iPhone, iPad, and it's instantaneous updates. And there's a free version.
00:28:08
Speaker
And it helps you not multitask. It's a list mate. So I just put stuff, look, it's off my head. Like, Oh, I gotta, let me jot that down. And then I'll have to think about it anymore. Nice. What about a book that has made a significant impact on you? Oh, there are many. The latest, which I really liked was it's called Be Your Future Self Now by Dr. Benjamin Hardy.
00:28:37
Speaker
Written down. All right Last question If you could have a water cooler chat with anyone dead or alive, who would it be and why? That's also pretty it would have to be the Dalai Lama One of the I mean there's a lot he knows about mindfulness for sure and I love the fact that I
00:29:02
Speaker
Despite what's going on we in the world the things that might not be great and there are plenty of those He's compassionate he's always laughing and smiling and it's like Question what's your secret? Like I do this stuff, but I'm not how do I get to your level? And would I look good in that robe Of course you would
00:29:29
Speaker
All right. Well, thank you very much, Larry. This has been a great conversation, a mindful conversation, if we might use that term. I think it fits. I feel a little bit more calm and relaxed after this conversation, so I appreciate it. Same. Every time you mentioned taking deep breaths, I took a deep breath. I did too, yeah. You're all ready. Yeah, it works. And I do have a list. If you have like 10 things, 10 books, or
00:29:59
Speaker
that have to learn more about mindfulness. So I can get that over to you at some point. Love it. I'll add it to the description. Thank you so much. It's been such a delight. Thank you. Have a mindful day. That's how we close the show. That's how we do it, Rachel. We've been trying to figure out how to close the show and maybe that's it to the list. All right. Thank you, everyone.
00:30:24
Speaker
Thanks for listening to Water Cooler Wisdom. This podcast is brought to you by Interaction Associates, a leading professional development and leadership training organization whose mission is to help people work better together. If you'd like to learn more, visit interactionassociates.com. If you have questions, comments, or are interested in collaborating with this podcast, you can email us at watercoolerwisdom at interactionassociates.com.