I can kind of scratch #88 off my list of 100 Things You May Not Know. Last Friday, I had the opportunity to hear Meg Wheatley present the keynote and facilitate a World Cafe for the Chesapeake Bay OD Network‘s Annual Conference. Her speech, Can We Be The Leaders The World Needs Now, was dynamic and engaging; it was further complemented with photographs that added another dimension to her words.  And I had the chance to actually meet her one-on-one. The unfortunate thing is that I get a little goofy and starstruck when I meet people I admire. I don’t believe this endeared me to her and a conversation didn’t exactly take hold. Perhaps another time in a more personal venue.

The one quality of Meg’s that I most admire is her ability to ask really deep, soulful questions that provoke interesting responses. As a part of her keynote, she talked about the perniciousness of fear and stress in our personal life and workplace. An interesting physiological phenomenon is that under intense stress, the human brain’s higher functions shut down. When this happens, it becomes extremely difficult to do such activities as create new ideas or take disparate ideas and discern patterns – two keys to driving innovation.

On a personal level, she asked about our own stress levels and then offered some challenging questions. Read them and consider your own responses.

1. Am I stressed?
2. Am I turning toward or away from others?
3. How much do I and colleagues learn from our experiences?
4. Am I more or less trusting now?
5. Am I patient and curious about differences?

The answers will likely change as your state changes. Ask these questions at different points during the day or week and see if the response varies. Personally, I find that when under stress I tend to turn away from people and they become far less interesting. I can say that this new awareness is helpful because it’s when I’m stressed that I need the help and support of others most of all.

With that said, I’m taking a vacation to the beach. It’s a chance for me to spend some special time with my girls and retreat with some good books. I doubt that I’ll be wired; getting an internet connection will be spotty. I’ll be back next week. Until then, enjoy my favorite archived posts; I’ll have a few automatically posted over the course of this week.

Be well.