Hello,
Thanks for joining me.
Today we're gonna get curious.
I define curiosity as a willingness to be open to new experiences,
To learn something new,
To see something you haven't seen before.
That's curiosity.
You have to be curious to press play on this mindful performance practice.
So sitting comfortably or if you're still standing,
That's totally cool too.
Just make sure your spine is straight and you can breathe comfortably.
If it feels cool to do so,
Just close your eyes.
Breathing naturally in and out.
I'd like you to use curiosity to slowly scan through your body looking for any areas of tension or stress.
We often find these in the shoulders or in the jaw or in our backs,
But you might find it in some interesting places.
Just take a look.
Invoke a feeling of curiosity and look through your body.
It's that simple.
What did you find?
Any areas of tension,
I just want you to use your mind to loosen them up.
Just free them up.
You can do it.
Bring a feeling of warmth into those areas and just experience them as relaxed.
You may need to use curiosity again to just play with what this feels like.
Being curious is one of the great unlocks to performance.
I like to think about curiosity as one of the big three.
Agility,
Curiosity,
And empathy.
These are three central ways of being that we will explore more fully inside of our mindful performance practice.
But for now,
I just want you to become aware of your breath.
How does it feel?
Will you experience it first in your body?
You're going to have to use curiosity to find this.
Now you've found it,
I want you to sit there as an observer and really just experience what it's like to be breathing.
Now our curiosity is warmed up,
We're going to put it to work.
I'd like you to invoke the feeling of being curious.
For some of you,
It might mean seeing the word in your mind.
For others,
It might be seeing a scene play out where someone is being curious.
However it is for you,
What's important is that you bring the feeling of curiosity into your experience.
Curiosity can be our greatest teacher.
By simply observing how something looks and digging a little bit deeper,
Shifting perspectives,
We may see something we haven't seen before.
Just breathing normally,
Sitting in the feeling of being curious.
I'd like you to just slowly scan through different parts of your life,
Different relationships,
Conversations,
Things you're working on and just see where perhaps you haven't been curious.
Look for areas where you've made an assumption or you've got a fixed view about how something is or someone is.
Any area of resistance is probably an area where you're not being curious enough.
Don't force the inquiry,
Just see what bubbles up inside your state of curiosity.
Now I'd like you to pick an area you want to do some digging on.
It's important to remember that curiosity by its very nature is playful.
It doesn't have to be serious.
This is just seeing what arises when we give ourselves the time and space to dig a little bit deeper.
Got something?
Cool.
What I'd like you to do is bring that very clearly into your mind so you can see it in full colour,
Full detail,
Just as it is.
Remember,
The most curious person in the room is the ultimate observer,
Unattached from what they might find or see,
Always willing to dig a little bit deeper.
So with that,
What I'd like you to do is with a hand inside your mind,
Just as if whatever it is you want to dig a little bit deeper on was the lid of a box,
Just lift it up.
What do you see?
Discover anything new?
I really want you to play with whatever it is that you're looking at.
Look at it with fresh eyes.
Dig deeper.
Look from a different perspective.
Be curious.
Go looking for that thing that you don't want to find.
I'm going to leave you for a couple of minutes to do the looking and do the digging.
If it helps,
Pretend you're Sherlock Holmes or some private eye investigator searching for something that may or may not be there.
If at any stage you get lost,
Just start at the top again and begin your inquiry new.
You can always return to the breath as a receipt.
You How was that?
Did you find something?
Whatever you experienced,
It's totally cool.
There is no right or wrong way to experience curiosity.
When you're ready,
I'd like you to take a deep breath in through the nose,
Holding at the top,
And when you're ready,
Blow it all out.
Do that one more time.
Being curious is always a tool available to us,
To help us work through areas where we're blocked.
At work,
It really can be the difference between projects delivering what's required,
Relationships with clients,
Our colleagues,
Or our bosses,
Actually being productive,
And us having an opportunity to learn and grow from those around us.
So next time you're receiving feedback,
Or you're experiencing something that you're just simply not enjoying,
How about get a little bit curious,
Do the digging,
And see what it is perhaps you don't really want to see.
Be curious.
Thanks for hanging out.
