Real Life Mindfulness: Three Reframes for Entrepreneurial Problems
Inspired by Ellen Langer
In my work with clients, I pull from psychologist Ellen Langer often. Ellen Langer changed the landscape of psychology with her work on mindfulness and has a bestselling book of the same title, Mindfulness, (now in a 25th anniversary printing). She also had a fantastic conversation with Krista Tippett for OnBeing a handful of years ago which is well worth a listen (or two).
Her words are ‘pocket wisdoms’ for any of us, but especially those of us who aspire to be more effective leaders. The lines below are applicable as everyday ways to help us manage ourselves by managing what we are seeing and how we are looking at our reality. Applying a mindfulness lens, we learn how to ask better questions to unlock not only a more mindful way of seeing but also more possibilities.
“I’m unsure how we are going to solve this challenge, and I am sure we can with this team.”
This is a wonderful way to inspire creativity and innovation in teams. Oftentimes, leaders are looked at as the ones with all of the answers, like a student looks at a teacher or a child looks at a parent. The reality is that leaders are often just working it out as they go along. Making it up as they go. This sets up the default mode on the team where they say: “I’m stuck, let me ask the boss.”
When that happens, the ideas and solutions never get any bigger than the leader. When the leader takes a stance of being confident and unsure — “I’m unsure of how we will solve this challenge, however, I am confident that with this team we can and will” — it invites the team members to participate in the solution. It invites people in to play, make mistakes, and innovate. It also takes the pressure off the leader to have all of the answers.
Where can you bring this framework into your leadership?
“No worry before it’s time.”
When talking about this, Langer adds:
“I think it’s more not about what’s happening, but it’s about the presumption of something that’s going to happen. What I’m saying is that I think stress follows from the belief that this future event will happen. When you’re in the middle of the event, you’re dealing with it, one way or the other. But I think that it goes back in some sense to Epictetus, who said, not in English and not with my accent, but that “Events don’t cause stress. What causes stress are the views you take of events.”
As entrepreneurs in the midst of tending to fires, we’re always looking out for the next event of doom. While both are part of the job, how can we make sure we’re focusing our mental energies where we really need them — where the issues in front of us have our clearest thinking?
How often do you worry about a future that hasn’t materialized? How often does that worry zap your resources, keep you from getting good sleep, and keep you from what’s really happening right in front of you? How can you shift to thinking about what you’d like to have happen — Wouldn’t it be great if?
“The difference between “can” and “how can.” It seems so similar, but they’re vastly different.”
When you ask yourself, “How do you do something?” you invite curiosity and play into looking for a solution. Approaching something this way, Langer notes is bypassing your ego. Instead, there’s a ‘Let’s have fun and see what we can make here’ vibe.
By asking, “How can we get this shipped by Friday?”, we, in turn, become more curious and open to problem-solving. On the contrary, when we ask, “Can you ship this by Friday?”, all we can do is look to our past to figure out what we have done, compare it to the current situation, and give a binary answer. Inquiring into the ‘how’ is an open invitation to see what else is here and what’s possible.
How can you use this more in your daily interactions?
