4 ms·
As a coach to similar-level people and professor/coach to elite students at NYU and Columbia Business School, I'm also impressed by how much the social and emot
by spodek 7y ago
As a coach to similar-level people and professor/coach to elite students at NYU and Columbia Business School, I'm also impressed by how much the social and emotional challenges can be overcome with a few exercises that teach social and emotional skills.
It amazes me that our educational system at every level teaches so much information, knowledge, and analytical skill but virtually ignores teaching social and emotional skills, I guess because we can't test them in a way to stratify learners.
Most of my practice is leading clients and students through these exercises, which I call the basics or fundamentals of leadership, initiative, and entrepreneurship. In every other performance-based field we don't lecture and test but teach the basics and perform -- sports, acting, singing, musical instruments, the military (basic training).
A few exercises make master the following a matter of rehearsal and practice, not necessarily easy or fast, but straightforward and effective:
> The hardest of hard things to deal with for all these people (including myself, when I work with my own coach), no matter the level of success, is the perpetual, ever-recurring loop of mental chatter, difficult emotions and body sensations. To frame differently, it’s our capacity to be with what’s alive and right in front of us, whether we like that or not in any given moment.
- snawster 7y ago> perpetual, ever-recurring loop of mental chatter, difficult emotions and body sensations I find this interesting to read because I don't know what such a loop feels like - "blank" is the most common content of my "mental chatter" and "blank" is the emotion I feel most often - only rarely anything else, mostly just when provoked by emotional music, or during times of high stress. Edit: I guess the "mental chatter" part is simply because I don't think in words, only impressions or concepts, maybe that is why I don't know this sensation...
- dd36 7y agoAnd what are those few exercises?
- jt2190 7y agoTake a peek in the user's profile: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=spodek https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=spodek
- spodek 7y agoI haven't found writing them in internet forum conveys them effectively. It's like telling people how to play a scale or hit tennis ground strokes. You generally need some demonstration and practice, which most people forego. I wrote a couple up in my blog with examples and video to illustrate. Since the original post mentioned inner monologue, copying just the action from http://joshuaspodek.com/effective-self-awareness-exercise http://joshuaspodek.com/effective-self-awareness-exercise 1. Carry a notebook or a few sheets of paper for a week or two 2. A few times each day write your exact thoughts — not the general 3. Note the following - What prompts each instance - What emotions relate to it - How the instances relate to each other, what categories they fit in Each time you write will probably take a few minutes. The whole exercise will take about an hour over a week or two. --- Another example is how to make a meaningful connection: http://joshuaspodek.com/meaningful-connection http://joshuaspodek.com/meaningful-connection --- Each exercise is valuable on its own, but their greatest value comes in building to others, as scales lead to playing musical pieces and ground strokes lead to playing tennis. Practice and rehearsal in any active, social, experiential, emotional, performance-based field leads to self-awareness, self-expression, mastery, and freedom.
- sjg007 7y agoThe first one sounds similar to a daily mood log ..
- mattmanser 7y agoHe's got a book to sell after all, and done not ONE but TWO TEDx (not TED) talks.
- cynusx 7y agoThere are well-researched emotional intelligence tests that give you a scientific measurement of your abilities (e.g. EQ-i 2.0 model). In fact, they have been personally very helpful to realize that I went through life being unaware of the majority of my own emotional states. I started a game to label how I feel for a few months and that led to some in-depth life changes that I had to make and closed some gaps I had in understanding how others feel.
- IsaacL 7y agoI read your blog a ton back in the day! Good to see that you're still around. Whenever people start talking about introverts vs extroverts I still think "it's only a model!"
- Epokhe 7y agoHey, unrelated to this message but, I think you don't wanna miss this https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21941170 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21941170