Power of the Pause
A work of art, way before it becomes a masterpiece, must start with a plain white canvass. Hidden, and yet unborn, inside it lie the ponderings, the passions and the promise of hope and beauty. The artist’s creativity would be severely crippled, every time he picked up his brush, if the solitude of white on the canvass did not lure him to conceive and co-create a brand new reality. Just like masterpieces require the emptiness of a canvass to creatively explode upon; our conversations also need momentary silences, pauses, to express and highlight the magic and motivation which lie hidden in our hearts and minds.
Job applicants, job interviewees, salespeople, managers and even senior executives across industries fall into this trap of speaking up without thinking in. We forget to recognize and give way to the feelings within. This constant shooting-from-the-hip-ness adds nothing but more noise to the din and the mindlessness that engulfs our world. This aimless and excessive thoughtless verbosity is a waste of ammunition and a massive waste of human energy.
Power of the Pause
A pause, before, during and even after conversations adds color, rhythm and a panoramic elegance to conversations. A pause, properly orchestrated, is one of the most powerful dynamics of speech. It allows the speaker and the listener to assess thoughts, structure ideas and tap into the deeper recesses of our wisdom and instinct. In the language of Neuro-Linguistic Programming, a pause allows us to align our internal resources of intellect, emotion and authentic self with our external resources of the body, speech and action.
In conversations, before interactions, we can chose to stop, to slow down and be still for a few seconds. This will allow us to put a leash on the chain-reaction of reactive behaviour. This can lessen our spinning off in the usual way of defend, offend, talk up, talk down and constantly justify our past performances. A pause is power and a pause induces empowerment and trust, as it makes the other person feel listened to. This little pause then becomes a source of powerful human energy.
The way to increase the amount of pausing before, during and after all our interactions is to keep a mindful awareness on our breathing. Every now then the din and the clamour of the world that surrounds us tends to take over and engulf us in its toxicity but an awareness on our breath acts as an anchor and helps us manage emotions. A visible sign, and constant life-saver of emotional intelligence is a smooth, deep and a rhythmic flow of breath.
In many of my workshops, I profess the 3P method of powerful connection, engagement and influence. In any interaction plant yourself in a position where you are physically stable, at ease and have good visibility and exposure. After planting, pause deeply to gather your thoughts and visualize empowerment of the listeners and a successful outcome of the conversation. Finally, project yourself with power and confidence keeping the goals of the interaction authentic, integral and driven by purpose. This will align your internal and external resources and also evoke excellence from others. That, in essence, is leadership and coaching for excellence in action.
Pausing consciously is a momentary respite between being completely self-absorbed to being awake and present for others and for life. Our conversations need these momentary silences and pauses, to express and high-light the magic and motivation which lie hidden in our hearts and minds. Watch Video
