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Mind Pattern
Mind patterns is really about how we each uniquely communicate, understand, and learn. This is like the hardwiring of your brain. It has nothing to do with personality. It’s really the operating system of your mind. And it starts with attention. Attention is how we attend to things in the world. And what most people don’t realize is that there’s more than one way of paying attention.
States of Attention
We consider attention in one form, paying attention. If you imagine my hands as your mind, this is focused attention. This is where details are apparent. This is where you have a lot of concentration. The mind also moves into a second state of attention. This is sorting attention. This is where confusion happens. This is where you’re listening or experiencing something and you’re attaching it to your own stories, your own history. This is where the brain is deciding, “Am I going to keep this piece of information or am I going to discard it?” The third state of attention is open, wide, wonder. This is where insight happens. This is where you have ah-ha moments.
In this culture, we tend to only value this state of attention [focused]. We will caffeinate ourselves. We will do anything to keep in this state of attention. However, in order to have the type of breakthroughs that we so desperately need we have to give ourselves space and time to go into these wider states of attention. The interesting thing is we each do that in a different way.
Triggers for Shifting Attention
And so for some visual information is very important. It helps them focus. For others, kinesthetic information or hands-on experiences will help them remain focused. This is the person you may see fidgeting around a lot or moving a lot. What their mind is actually doing is trying to pay attention. And still, for others, auditory information helps them keep focused. They’re very quick with their words. The language they use is very ornate. Similarly to get into an open state of attention, for some to get up in the back of a meeting room and pace around helps them have that insight, that ah-ha, that breakthrough.
But, if we’re in that meeting room I may look at that person and go, “Oh my gosh, why are they standing up and walking around?” I may feel disrespected. When, in fact, we understand these types of diversities through the lens of mind patterns with one another. Instead of seeing that person as being difficult we actually are recognizing that their mind needs something different in that moment in order to think.
Key Questions from the CQ Playbook
We introduced this concept of the collaborative intelligence playbook. And this is really applicable for any upcoming meeting or interaction where you’re really seeking to achieve a high level of engagement and connection with that person.
The first thing to consider is: How does your own mind work? What do you need to be present in that moment? Do you need more visual information? Do you need to be able to get up and move around? Do you need to have cues or actual verbal information ready and apparent? So the first thing is to consider your own mind and what you need in order to stay present with that person.
The second step is: What has worked before? And it seems so simple, but we are such a deficit-focused culture. We study everything that’s wrong. We forget to study and notice what is right. And so recall the last time you met with them. What were you actually doing? Forgetting the content. Were you walking with this person? Were you in a café? Were you using visual information? Did you have an experience you could draw on with them? So all of these elements are cues to what was successful in the past. Because that’s what we want to study. We want to notice what did work.
So the third step is: Create a game plan. And this is especially applicable if you haven’t necessarily met a person before because you need to be able to shift how you are communicating in the moment. When you’re not getting through to someone in one channel, perhaps I’m talking too much, I need to be able to quickly shift into another channel. And by that I mean maybe have it in writing, maybe have a PowerPoint, maybe have an experience or a story I can draw on. When we are facile in the way in which we can communicate, the broader chance we have of reaching that person. So a game plan is preparing yourself to be able to speak in many different languages, and by that I mean draw on experience, have keywords or phrases that you want to say, or have a visual that you can use to explain at any moment.
The fourth step is to notice: What effect am I having? And again, it seems simple but it’s something that we just forget to do. We don’t notice what effect we are having on another person. And we may start talking faster or showing them more diagrams or showing them more spreadsheets because we don’t feel that connection happening. And instead of actually stopping and pausing and saying, “Oh, I’m not having the effect I want.” And the key here is you can ask that as a question to the person that you’re interacting with. So, “I notice the effect I’m having on you is perhaps maybe you’re a little bit still confused” or “I find you checking out a little bit. Is that true?” That is a really important step because we make up a lot of stories in our mind that just aren’t true. It just may certainly be that that person uses a different mind pattern than you do. It may be natural for them to actually look away. Our reading of body language is not necessarily accurate so I always like to check out with the person that I’m trying to engage with.
Step five is: What adjustments can I make? And this is after any event and I do this in writing all the time is that you’re constantly trying to find connection and engagement with a person. So the moment that you leave a meeting or an interaction, you recall what you would like to do better the next time. Perhaps you noticed that they that they got really excited on a specific graph that you showed them. Notice the elements in that graph. Did it use color? Was it just black-and-white? Was it linear? Was it organized in a certain way or was there a specific phrase that you said? And make mental notes of those so next time you meet with that person you feel like you already are starting from a place of success.