From the course: Mindfulness Practices

Lead with trust and influence

From the course: Mindfulness Practices

Lead with trust and influence

- Bring to mind someone you like and trust. How easy is it to partner, collaborate, and influence them? What would it be like if you could have a wider circle of people with whom you had that trusted connection and influence? At work, we often need to influence others over whom we have no authority. If we don't trust each other, our influence is limited. If you're like me, trusted partnerships happen organically. We meet somebody and our brain quickly forms an impression of them. In fact, neuroscience suggests that the first thing our brain scans for when we meet somebody is to see if they're trustworthy. However, our brain has a negative bias because our survival instinct scans for threats to keep us safe. This is particularly true when stress is high. We wait for others to become trustworthy, so we can trust them. What if we could retrain our brain to be more accepting and less vigilant of others? Social science research actually shows that when we, ourselves, are trusting of others, they become more trustworthy. So my friends, we have more power to create trust in a relationship than we think. Mindfulness practice can help us become aware of when there is insufficient trust. We can start to notice our own judgments of another person maybe standing in the way of us fully connecting with them. We can practice letting go of these judging thoughts and bring more authentic connection to the relationship. As we experiment with these practices, we grow in our own emotional intelligence and our ability to create trusted partnerships. Research actually shows that micro moments of connection we have with others are good for our own wellbeing. As we grow our own ability to trust, we help create a culture of greater trust and collaboration in our organizations.

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