ROI of Reflection: How Executives Turn Self-Awareness Into a Strategic Advantage with Josh Feigelson

Ask most executives for the ROI of reflection and you'll get a blank stare. Yet self-awareness is the one input you can't delegate, and the patterns you don't examine in yourself quietly become the operating system for everyone you lead. Treated as a discipline, reflection stops being downtime and becomes a strategic advantage. 

In this episode of iCommunicate, Mark Altman sits down with Josh Feigelson, president and CEO of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality and author of Eternal Questions, to unpack why high performers avoid sitting with their own thoughts, why inward accountability is harder than admitting you were wrong out loud, and how the "I'll just do it myself" script keeps leaders isolated and stuck. 

You'll walk away with a working definition of reflection as preparation, a reframe of mindfulness as a discipline with real structure behind it, and the return most executives actually report once they start: clarity on the problems worth solving and the decisions in front of them. Josh closes with the smallest possible starting habit, one minute before you touch your phone, so building the practice doesn't require more time you don't have. 

For leaders building a Culture of Excellence, this is a conversation about what reflection makes possible across an entire organization, not just a personal wellness tip. 

For more information, visit MindsetGo.com, email info@mindsetgo.com or call 978-793-1159. 

Learn more about Josh's work at JewishSpirituality.org. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:08

Most leaders think reflection is rest. It isn't. It's quality control on every decision you make. Welcome to iCommunicate. I'm Mark Altman, founder of Mindset Go, and your host. Today we're exploring why self-awareness is the one input you can't delegate, and how the patterns you don't examine in yourself quietly become the operating operating system for everyone you lead. My guest has spent his career on the thing busy people find hardest, paying attention on purpose. Josh Feigelson is president and CEO of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality, host of the podcast Soulful Jewish Living, and author of, and what a great name of a book, Eternal Questions. Right? What I appreciate about his work is he treats reflection as a discipline with real structure behind it, as a daily practice, not something you save for when you finally have time. Josh, welcome to iCommunicate.

SPEAKER_01 1:12

Thanks so much, Mark. It's great to be here.

SPEAKER_00 1:14

Josh, before we get to the matter at hand, I do need to address the fact that you're a long-suffering Tigers fan because I mean, I'm a long-suffering Red Sox fan. I mean, at least in 2004, we ended the 86-year drought. But if anybody can relate to your long-suffering, it's me.

SPEAKER_01 1:31

Uh, yes, and it were it not for David Ortiz, uh, we we might also, you know, have made it more recently. But, you know, that Torrey Hunter over the fence uh with the cop behind him. My my in my family, we have a special place reserved for that cop with his hands up, cheering uh Torre Hunter tripping over the fence.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

Gosh, I gotta tell you, I was at that game, one of the greatest games I've been to. And I will say one thing on the Tigers before we move on. Probably, arguably, the single best middle infield combination in my lifetime, Lou Whitaker and Alan Trammell. I mean, certainly in my lifetime, if they're not in the top three or four, I don't know where they'd be.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

Yeah, and we got to get Sweet Lou in the Hall of Fame. That's uh that's a communal project. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 2:16

Absolutely. Um, so I want to start out, Josh. I want to pick your brain because I always believe, not always, I often believe when people hear words, they immediately jump to conclusions and associate uh preconceptions or preconceived notions. So what is reflection? In simple terms, how would you define reflection?

SPEAKER_01 2:44

Well, we can think about it physically, right? You can see a reflection. So when you think about seeing your own reflection or the reflection of something else, you're seeing it uh, but not the thing itself. You're seeing, you know, a another perspective of it, right? And so I think when we think about reflecting on ourselves, we're seeing it's the ability to self to be self-aware, right? To see ourselves, um, hopefully from a perspective that others see us, right? To be able to step outside of ourselves and get a sense of what's going on here, right? And not just be inside our thoughts, our emotions, our drives, all the things that are our hormones, all the stuff that's like churning inside of us, um, to be able to create some distance from that for a moment and step out and look, behold, like reflect, uh, is probably what I would call reflection.

SPEAKER_00 3:43

So, Josh, I know, I know when I when I reflect on myself, I've I've been a workaholic most of my adult life, and I I recognize that one of the primary reasons I am a workaholic is because I I won't I don't want to stop and necessarily see what what I'll find out if I stop, so to speak. Now, granted, in the last 10 years, it's something I've been intentionally working on and becoming much better at. I guess reflection can be so daunting for people. And if you listen, the definition you just shared why why are people so afraid to find out what they may find out when they take the time to reflect?

SPEAKER_01 4:27

I think that for a lot of people, being quiet with your own thoughts, not having something distracting us from what's going on, whether that's your phone or that's your work or that's whatever, you know, or drugs or whatever, however else people are um distracting themselves, uh, I think it's because the idea of being alone with your own thoughts can be really terrifying, right? If you just imagine I think that the idea of being alone with our own thoughts can be really terrifying to a lot of people. And why is that? Um, because we are, I mean, so I'm a rabbi, so I I'll I'll I'll just go there. Is, you know, for me, if we're really created in the divine image, then like we have the depths of divinity inside us, right? We have all of the contradictions. I mean, Walt Whitman said that, you know, I contain multitudes. Um, we contain so much. And if we stop to really look inside that, it can be really scary what we might see, right? Um, so I think that keeps a lot of us on that treadmill, or it keeps a lot of us trying to distract ourselves or constantly refresh the phone or whatever it is. But like, God forbid, I should be quiet and silent and have to be alone with my own thoughts for a little bit because I'm really terrified what I might find when I do that reflection.

SPEAKER_00 5:59

So I I have a saying when I work with executives and coach leaders, and I talk about that the two biggest reasons people have repeat conversations with the same people about the same thing are one, because they don't solve the right problem in the first conversation, and two, they don't get to the root causes of that problem in the first conversation. And I bring that up because I want to tie into what you said, because being fearful of reflecting to me is a surface level problem. Because if you begin reflecting and you find out, and then you start to be alone with your thoughts, and then that creates anxiety or stress or uneasiness, then I would argue, and I and I want to hear your thoughts on this, I would argue the real problem is you may not have the coping skills or the reframing skills to deal with what you actually realize. And that to me is more of the real problem. If you get where I'm going with what are your thoughts?

SPEAKER_01 7:01

Yeah, I think yes. I mean, I I think that's another that that's like the next version of the next level is first, what am I gonna find there? And then, and then when I find what's there, what am I gonna do with that? Right. Um what am I gonna do if I find out that the things that I see inside? And it doesn't have to be something terrible, right? I it it can just be uh I actually have to confront the problem, right? And so if I stop and I pause, I I I think uh I don't know about you, I I I watch the show Shrinking, um yeah, right now. And and this is so much, you know, of what that show is about. I mean, and which is just another version of Ted Lasso, because it's the same show written by the same guy. Um, but uh just you know, minus the soccer, you know, uh put in LA and about therapy. But um, but it's especially true, I think, for for men, at least on on that show, it's it's really being highlighted in certain ways about, you know, what am I gonna do, even even if I'm the therapist, right? Um, I actually I'm afraid of what I'm and I and and I so therefore if I'm I'm the even if I'm the therapist and I presumably have the skills, I'm afraid of having to actually deal with it and try to implement those skills, right? Um, when I look inside. That that's kind of the Jason Siegel character's problem, right? So uh so yes, I think I think it's both what am I gonna find and how am I gonna deal with it, whether or not I may have the skills, or certainly if I don't, then I'm really then I'm really screwed.

SPEAKER_00 8:39

Yeah, and I was having an interaction with someone the other day, and one of the things she said to me, I was doing a workshop, and one of the things she said to me is she would not feel comfortable admitting she didn't know something to someone on her team. She thought that would be a sign of weakness and she wasn't comfortable. And it got me thinking when she said that, that when you talk about being personally accountable, right? To be personally accountable and to be outwardly accountable and to share, be vulnerable, I may have been wrong, I was wrong, so on and so forth, that's hard enough for people. But then to be inwardly accountable, right? And in that moment when you do the reflection and you say to yourself, Oh, what was I thinking, or how could I have done that, or why did I make that decision? I actually think in a lot of ways, Josh, the inward accountability is a lot harder than the outward accountability.

SPEAKER_01 9:40

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And it's also because we have an image of ourselves, like the person you're describing, right, has an image of herself as a team leader uh that's supposed to be strong. And um, and she's and she's projecting that, and she's projecting that into herself, it sounds like also. Um, and what would happen if she admitted that she didn't know? Well, to her her own self-image would uh would would suffer. Um, and she wouldn't know how to, maybe she wouldn't, it feels like she would she wouldn't know how to deal with that. Um yeah, and so so I and and I wonder, like, I mean, for I remember as as a as a younger person, um, the very first I I when I was when I was in college, I was uh a music major and I conducted an orchestra. And and I remember the first time I got in front of this orchestra, and I spent so much time, like that whole summer before um my junior year, thinking about like how do I want to show up with this group, right? And I like read and like and watched videos of all these different conductors, like what kind of, you know, what kind of persona do they want to, you know, do you want to project? And there was there's one famous violinist who said, like, the conductor needs to know more about the music than in his little pinky fingernail than all the other musicians put together, right? And I was like, that just intuitively was A, not true, and B didn't sit right with me. And and I also didn't want to be a person who I I played under a conductor once who actually was the polar opposite and like would stop and say, Well, what do you guys think it should sound like, which is also the wrong thing, right? Um, but learning how to construct a self-image for myself as someone who is strong enough to say, you know what, guys, I don't know about this, and we're gonna figure it out together. I mean, that that took a lot of work. Uh, and and I can totally empathize with you know that person. So, anyhow, all right.

SPEAKER_00 11:36

Well, you got me thinking when you said that, Josh, how do I want to show up? And I think of the word preparation, right? So, um, one of my favorite topics to speak on is courageous conversations. And when I think of preparation, you know, how many times in a conversation do people say to themselves, Oh, I wish I had thought of that, or I wish I wish I had anticipated that. And what's interesting is every human being alive prepares in some way, shape, or form for some things, right? They have a value system of this is worth preparing for. It could be stretching before a sporting event. I mean, it could be studying for a test. I mean, there could be a hundred different ways we prepare. Yet the word reflection is an actual great form of preparation. And I don't think people draw that parallel. I think it's rarely do they draw the parallel that reflection is preparation.

SPEAKER_01 12:40

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's interesting, like in so in my line of work, um Shabbat is this moment of both reflection. It's not exactly prep, it's not meant to be necessarily preparation for the week. In fact, the rest of the week is preparation for Shabbat, right? It's like right, that that's what you're really doing. But there's a there's a relationship, right? Because the the consciousness of knowing that Shabbat is coming means you're preparing all week, right? You're preparing for that. And then Shabbat becomes the time when you actually can reflect. So you're preparing to reflect in a certain sense. And then so they go hand in hand. And I find that um one of the things that we talk about a lot in in uh at the Institute for Jewish Spirituality is you know, Shabbat is not just a time during the week from Friday night to Saturday night. It's also it's a it's a state of mind, it's a consciousness. And uh you don't have to wait every seven days, you can do it every seven minutes or every seven moments. Uh, you can practice that kind of a consciousness, which is coming back, like it is pausing. It's literally like Shabbat means like pause, it's stopping. It's um so pausing from what you're doing to then enable yourself to come back to it, it it's that it's actually not even stepping out of reality, it's stepping into reality. The thing that we're doing, the thing that we're doing on the on the treadmill all the time, that's not the real reality. The real reality is like the spiritual thing that's going on inside. And when we pause long enough, I think that's actually what a lot of people are afraid of is like, oh shoot, what what what what if what am I going to encounter when I allow myself to go inside to that spiritual reality?

SPEAKER_00 14:24

Wow, I love that expression, Josh. That's all stepping into versus out of reality. That's outstanding. So one of the things I am very I would say triggered by sensitive to is what I call when people act like victims and they're not really victims. You know, they are truly empowered, but they act like a victim. And my question for you is, and boy, I I am super curious to hear what your thoughts are on this is I think there's a a compartmentalization that goes on that if a person is reflecting and feeling bad for themselves, then there's that sentence you they either say to themselves, or sometimes you hear out loud where they'll follow it up by, well, you know, people have it tougher than me. And I always find that fascinating because I feel like two things can be true. You could be facing adversity and have a difficult situation, and people could have it harder than you. So I'm just curious, what are your thoughts? When people reflect and they immediately diminish their feelings or emotions in that situation. Two-part question, what are your thoughts? And in do you have any recommendations for people who go down that path and what may be a better choice in that moment?

SPEAKER_01 15:53

Yeah. I think there's a tendency that's that that's especially prevalent in in the society we live in right now, uh to sort of see suffering as a kind of Olympics, right? It's like who's hurting more? And if I can like win the suffering Olympics, then somehow I win something. Um and I think and I I think that I think that's messed up. And I think it's not healthy. I think it's you know, sort of what you're saying. Um it's wonderful that folks can contextualize, like, okay, first world problems, right? When I think about the problems that I have, you know, thank God for the that these are my problems. Like I'm I'm cool with that. And um that doesn't diminish the fact that like whatever suffering I'm experiencing is real. It may, it may be of a different type, it might be of a different, you know, degree or kind. I mean, um, but it's still suffering. And uh so the problems that you've got are the problems that you've got. And rather, and I think you're right to pick up on one of the things that folks might do is again, as a deflection, or in Buddhism they call it aversion, you know, sort of mechanism, is like I'll push that away by saying it's not so bad, right? And that actually allows me not to have to deal with what really is true for me, which is that I'm hurting or something's difficult, and I should like actually feel the feelings and encounter the difficulty and try to um deal with it. Uh again, easier said than done. Um, so yeah, I think you're I think you're definitely right to pick up on that. And it would be great if more people had the both the tools and felt the encouragement and permission to say, yeah, this is what I'm experiencing right now, and I need to deal with that.

SPEAKER_00 17:54

Yeah, the duality of it, right? Like the element of duality in that moment. Josh, I I have um and I often think about this. I I really detest politics. I mean, I really detest politics, and I happen to come from a family who really loves politics. So one of the things I struggle with, and I'm sure I'm not alone on this, is if I choose to not reflect on the state of politics, is that can can can not reflecting be a good thing as a coping tool, or am I confusing accepting what I can and can't control with with reflection? I'm just curious how you see the difference of those.

SPEAKER_01 18:53

Um it's funny because I I I taught a course this past fall for about 250 people online on um how to read the news without losing your mind. And uh and you know, and the news doesn't have to only mean political news, obviously. True, true. But for but but for a lot of people, um, and probably for your family, that is what it means. That generally is what it means. And you know, God knows we have plenty of political news um uh to to feed on if we want to. Um so I think that um to me, actually, I I I mean I I really believe that um I'm a big believer in democracy. I think that I think uh uh I think that Winston Churchill is wrong, that you know, it's it's uh it's the worst form of government that's been tried except for all the other ones. I think it has some inherent goodness. Um and particularly, you know, I guess that stems from my own religious belief, but like if we believe that everybody is made in the divine image, then all of us have a piece of God in us, which is sort of like saying all of us have a piece of the sovereign power, you know, like all of us are holders of that. And uh and the goal should be ultimately that um hopefully we equal, we equal um, we make an uh an equality of the distribution of negative outcomes, right? Um, in a democracy, hopefully uh nobody gets their will all of the time, and nobody is forced to um uh accede to the demands of a majority uh more than their fair share, right? But all of us should be doing that sometime, right? So or just to make that shorter, equal all of us should be equally uncomfortable. Um, that's the goal. And I think, and so so why is this important for like a mindfulness teacher? Because I think the tools, ultimately, the tools of mindfulness are about how do I live with that discomfort, right? That that comes, that should come. If if a democracy is really working, then um that should come my way. At some point, I'm gonna have to live with negative outcomes. My preferred candidate lost an election, right? That's the most, you know, visible one. Um, or uh, you know, I don't like this policy, you know, whatever. Okay, so we have to live with those effects. What we've done today is like it's become this blood sport where it's all about teams and you know, people feel the way about you know about the Democrats and Republicans, the way you or I might feel about the Red Sox or the Tigers. Um and that's a really problematic situation, right? Like that it should not be a matter of identity in that way. I think that that that's actually a confusion. Um, so you know I don't know that directly answered your question, but that's but that that that's my that's my take on it.

SPEAKER_00 21:57

Fair enough. Um we Know Josh, you and I both know how strong, and I and in this case, I'm not talking about religious or political belief systems. We're talking about just belief systems in our mind we create. We know how impactful that is on our mindset, on our attitude, on our motivation. And I I wonder when it comes to reflection, what are some counterproductive belief systems that you hear that if you had a magic wand and said, Boy, if I could shift some of these belief systems around reflection, this is what it would be. What are they?

SPEAKER_01 22:37

Uh well, I'm the father of uh three boys, two of whom are now in their 20s and one who's a teenager. And um, so I've gone through, you know, kind of a classic developmental thing that a lot of us, all of us go through. Hopefully, most of us get out of, but not necessarily, I think a lot of people still live with, which is that no one has ever been through this experience before. No one else, no one else has ever gotten dumped. No one else has ever, you know, uh lost a job or you know, whatever. There's this this this script of the self-pitying, like, oh my God, no one else has ever done this. So, number one, that's there, there's some self-pitying aspect to that. But number two is like the whole the loner aspect to it, right? To everything. I mean, and then that comes up so often is like, well, you know, I no one else can really I have to do this thing. Um, like I'm the only one who can do it. I mean, look, I'm guilty of this too, um, both uh at home, talking to my wife, at work, talk to some of my colleagues, you know, where I mean we all did, I imagine we all do this on some level. The amount of time it's gonna take me to explain this thing and go through this whole, I'll just do it myself, right? Um so the loner sort of mentality, that script, which is one that I still you know have to work on a lot. Um no, none of us is actually in this by ourselves, right? The fact that you and I now are talking right now, there are so many thousands of people, millions of people who are involved in making this conversation happen right now, right? Because we're both, you know, sitting somewhere with a roof over our heads and we've got electricity that's working and communication systems are working, and all the folks on Zoom who are like making this happen, and then you know, go and everything we had for breakfast and whatever, like all of that. Um so just reminding ourselves that like wow, we are part of this much more interconnected web. And if you really think you're alone, like think again, like we're not you, you we're never you're never as lonely as you might think you are, right? And so those are some of the thought patterns that I find, you know, can we get into. Um, and when we stop and reflect on them, it's like, oh yeah, right, right. I realize that now. And like that can really change the perspective that we take.

SPEAKER_00 24:51

It it's it's funny, Josh, because one of the most common outcomes I see when uh either I or or my team of facilitators do professional development for leadership, is when it's either virtual or in person, and we're all in the room. And at some point during group discussions or breakout activities, one person says, Oh, you have that problem? Jeez, I thought I was the only one that had that problem. And it's literally like the Greek god Atlas, it's almost like you can see the weight of the world going off once they realize that they're not that loner, they're not the only one thing of it. And I tell you what, Josh, I believe if you could get inside everybody's head and see what everybody's thinking, boy, people would feel a lot more comfortable with themselves because they'd find this out.

SPEAKER_01 25:46

Absolutely. Like, I mean, we I keep bringing up like TV shows where I think of the movie Inside Out, right? Uh, the Pixar movie, right? Because it's like, yeah, all of us have like all those little characters are in our heads and like they function differently for each of us. But like, yes, we can all identify when those drives take over. And um, and yes, remember, it's not just you, it's everybody's watching that movie, right? And everybody you see on the street for sure.

SPEAKER_00 26:13

So, Josh, I I I did an experiment a couple of years ago when someone who one of my mentors was, and I I I I have one of these, I have ADHD, and I am one of these people. One of my coping skills, I guess, I'm reading a new book about it, but I I can stay at the computer and lock in and stay focused for like four, five, six hours without even, and the only thing I'm doing is is go in the bathroom in between. Like, I'm not eating, I'm not, I'm locked in. And I remember someone saying to me, and it sounds so obvious now, but they're like, Mark, it's it's really important you get outside during the day. It's really important that even if it's a 10, 15 minute walk, and of course, don't have devices and the whole nine yards. And I remember, like, I really had to get myself to do it. It was not an easy thing for me to do. And I remember saying to the person who was talking, I'm like, but what do you get out of it? Like, what's the ROI for going on a quiet walk of self-reflection? And I remember, and and now I'm like preaching from the mountaintop, Josh, now, since I've had the experience. I said, you know what my ROI was? ROI was, and I'm not I'm not great at like listening to sounds around me and being that present. But I will say that every time I even that first time I did it, every time I did it, I always tell people, you know what my ROI is? Clarity. Clarity. Because every time I'm on that walk and I'm able to be present and think, I'm thinking of things, I'm reflecting on things. And I'm like, sometimes it may be solutions to problems, sometimes it may be clarity on things I was worried about, I don't need to worry about. It's a host of things that I get clarity on. And I I would love your perspective because obviously you believe in it, but that ROI, you want to talk about a belief system that what do I, if I'm gonna allocate time to reflect, what is that roi? How do you how do you coach that? How do you personally deal with that?

SPEAKER_01 28:23

Well, I mean, I'll uh I'll I'll give you the I'll give you the ROI answer and then I'll give you and then I'll give you a different answer. Um I mean there's there's there's so much documentation now um scientifically on like the value of mindfulness. And um, you know, my my my son who's um uh turning 21 this month, he when he was in high school, I remember his older brother coming to me and saying, you know that like he meditates every morning. And um, you know, and like I'm like that's interesting because he's never mentioned it to me. I was like, um why does he meditate? And he said, well, because Kobe Bryant meditated, and you know, so he wants to do, and like, you know, it's gonna make him a better bulb, which it did. I mean, like, you know, that that certainly helped, like, you know, helped Kobe. I mean, Phil Jackson made a whole you know movement out of that. Um, but so so I think there's all sorts of levels um physiologically, uh, in terms of focus, all those things. Um I would say though, I mean, I want setting aside the ROI answer for a second is also like it's also just a reminder to us that like we are not fundamentally here to be necessarily have to be productive beings, right? We're not here to make a product. Um, we're here to live. We're here to live. And um, and to be creative, yes, to be create absolutely exercising creativity. And in our tradition, like what when we say that on the seventh day God rested, in the Jewish tradition, that's part of creation. That actually the act of resting is part of creating. It's not like Aristotle says, is like you rest in order to create more, you know, the next day. Or like my my guy, you know, my my my favorite Peloton instructor, you know, says like, you know, you do you you you do the rest so that you know you can cut it's about what's gonna happen next and like what's the next ride you're gonna do. Actually, I mean that's important. And there's another perspective of just saying, like I said before, stepping into reality. Like I'm actually, I need to set aside the um that exterior, that exterior reality that I live in six days a week where I gotta make a living and I gotta feed myself and I gotta do all the things. Um, but one day a week, I live like the world is perfect for you know for 25 hours. That's what I do. And so um I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna be worried about fixing it. And what does that do for me? It allows me just like to breathe more deeply and to enjoy being in this body that I have, this gift of being alive and being in the world. Um, it also has the benefits of like in my family, you know, folks set the we we set aside our devices and we, you know, people actually talk to each other. Um, and that's a great thing. But uh, but I think mostly it's just like remembering what it is to be alive in my body uh and and activate like my soul that like be aware of that uh in a more in a fuller way than I am, you know, a lot during the rest of the week.

SPEAKER_00 31:33

And the irony to me a little bit is I think whether it's breathing, meditation, reflecting, it it takes practice. And it and the irony to me is the way you know you're getting better at it is is because you're more present. Like it's almost like it's like feeding the the improvement, is the actual doing of the act even better and being more present, which is kind of crazy, but it it makes perfect sense, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:05

And you know, I mean the the interesting thing is you you talk to if you talk to you know the Zen masters or whoever, I think I I think I I heard a quote of Norman Fisher, who is the abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center. Um, you know, like after 20 years, I mean if somebody asked him, like, you know, how how are you, like, how's your practice? He said, after doing it for 20 years, I feel like I'm an experienced beginner, you know, and it's and and and that's really what it is, that like there are there are beginners and there are experienced beginners. Um, but it's always kind of approaching it for the first time, and you can't do it without doing it, right? There's not really um, there's not a shortcut. Um, you you you just have to do it. To quote a shoe company.

SPEAKER_00 32:52

Yeah. So, Josh, you know, a couple last things for me. You you mentioned uh the productivity element before, and that we weren't necessarily put on this earth to be productive. I I I think that what I see a lot in the workplace is high performers, the term high performers is equated with productivity and being task-oriented. And even CEOs or C-suite executives who have that belief system, I think if you hook them up to a lie detector test in most cases, and they said, Can you honestly say that if people allocated time for reflection and had space, you don't think they'd be even more productive than they already are? I think most of them would even acknowledge that. However, it's it's still it's still not like comfortable to say out loud, you know. And so I just wonder from we we have a that mindset go, the core of what we do is we help companies create a blueprint for a culture of excellence. And this is part of our blueprint, right? Is creating that space and time for reflection. So my question to you is do you have any thoughts, recommendations? How do we make this more of a common language in culture to talk about what everybody, what many people already know to be true anyway? How do we make it more mainstream and complex to just state the elephant in the room and and and and and leverage it?

SPEAKER_01 34:29

Yeah, yeah, that's great. Um I guess one one way that I would uh maybe describe it I think I I I get the sense that our culture around sleep has started to shift. Um maybe since the pandemic, maybe since people have gotten off of like appointment viewing on television. And so like who in their right mind would stay up to watch the 11 o'clock news? Um I I wouldn't, but uh but um uh but I wonder my senses and also as more science has come out about like the importance of sleep and rest for like you know, it prevent is correlations with dementia and like you know, all sorts of stuff. Um I wonder if we're starting to wake up, ironically, we're starting to wake up to the importance of like, okay, rest, right? We used to, we we used to, I I certainly grew up with, you know, you you'll sleep when you're dead, like, you know, just like let's let's let's get it done, right? Um, and now it's like I'm not so sure about that, you know, because uh like take care of yourself, like take care of your body. Um certainly the athletes, you know, will tell you that, uh, you know, high-performing athletes. And um, and so we know, and we and we know so much more now, also about just how this whole body-mind, spirit mechanism, this whole thing is like so interconnected in a way that um we used to think these were very separate systems, and now we're recognizing now they're so much more deeply connected than they are. So I think when we start getting that more holistic view, um I think it's there's an opportunity to say in an age when also in the age of AI, when the whole question, the jury's out right now about like, like, is that gonna make us more productive? Is it gonna make it like, is it gonna take our jobs? I mean, what's gonna happen there? Um, but it's it what it's really asking us, and like we're talking the week after the Pope, you know, made his big um encyclical on AI, what it's he's right to say, it's actually asking us like, what does it mean to be human? Like, what what what what is the what is the what's the value proposition of human beings, which has to do with like, yeah, we have bodies, we have hormones, we have feelings, we have emotions, we have spirits, we have all these things that like you know, just typing into a chat box, you know, right now like is not gonna do. And so I I I I I'm not like directly answering your question. I so I need to give you a direct answer, which is like how to make this more of a shared culture. I think it's just well, ironically, it's like, yeah, let's pause and reflect for a second, like take a breath and recognize what does it feel like to be a human being? You know, and if we stop and do that, like hopefully, you know, you do that for a lot of the science on mindfulness, which is like even with three breaths that the bot the system starts the you know starts to re-regulate itself, like you know, we we calm down. And I think also we start to like get a whiff of each other's humanity to borrow a friend of mine, the phrase of a friend of mine. So maybe that's just the answer. Is like, let's stop and reflect, and maybe that's how we build the culture.

SPEAKER_00 38:05

So, Josh, where if if I am a person for all our listeners out there, we have a great following on i communicate. For our listeners out there, um, there's a lot of things in life that intellectually we know would help us that are valuable for us, exercise, sleep, reflection, things like this. So if I'm listening to this podcast, I'm like, Josh, help me out. I don't typically reflect. Give me some something incremental that I can start the habit somehow. What what's what's a first or first or first and second step that if someone wants to try to build this habit, what what would you recommend as a starting point?

SPEAKER_01 38:46

Um I mean you gotta talk to the atomic habits people. I love him. Yeah, love him. Yeah. Um so I would say like a very just like a small thing to start with that um it if it depends. If you're a morning person uh and you give yourself time in the morning, I tend to be an early riser and go go to bed early. Um uh, but just before you get out your phone, first of all, the best thing you can do, don't sleep with your phone. Put your phone in a different room from where you sleep. Like just bar nut. That that to me, that is like the number one thing any of us can do for ourselves right now. But um, but what I would also just say is before you, you know, just jump right into your morning mindlessly, give yourself a minute. You can like put it on a timer if you want.

SPEAKER_00 39:40

One minute.

SPEAKER_01 39:41

Where you're you could just start with one minute. One minute, right? I mean, I would say five, but like why say five? Five could be intimidating. Just start with one. Yep, one minute. And before you do anything else, like you can have your coffee sitting there, that's fine, but just be quiet and observe what's happening in your mind, right? Observe yourself breathing. Just notice like I'm in this body. This is happening. I breathe tens of thousands of times a day. And most of the time we're never aware of that, right? Our heart beats tens of thousands of times a day and we're and and we're not aware of it. Um, so just feel those things just for one minute before you do anything else. And then you can like, you know, open up whatever apps you gotta open up. Fine, okay. But um I think if we did that, like that would be like the smallest, most bite-sized thing that I can imagine doing. Um, try that and then build up to two minutes, you know, and then the next week do three. Like, see where it takes you. Um, and how does that feel? And if that works for you, then great. If not, try something else.

SPEAKER_00 40:46

Well, I'll tell you, I have an activity I use when I'm teaching, um, building an action plan to improve coaching or coach performance habits and whatever. And it's really a little it's really a little sneaky because I don't let them know what I'm doing. If people who listen are gonna know now, but so let's say I'm teaching any level of leadership how to coach people. So one of the things we talk about is before the conversation uh ends, what's the plan? And the saying I always have is if you have a human being that isn't doing something at all, isn't doing it consistently, or isn't doing it well, that's change, right? Like that's change in some form. So the question I always say have them sit down in groups and say, now map out a three-step action plan, and I'll use something like you've got a team member that's constantly missing deadlines. Map out a three-step action plan and how they're not going to miss deadlines. And the sneaky part is I say, I've got great news for you. Step one in the action plan is always the same, regardless of the habit. And it is you can't change a habit until you recognize the opportunity to change the habit. So it's self-awareness, that's always step one. And I think it's it's a hard, it's again, it it seems very logical when it's said out loud, but to think self-awareness is the first step, and it is, but it it's not it's not tangible for people to grab as a first step. So that's what makes it tricky, you know.

SPEAKER_01 42:24

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 42:26

Josh, before we go, I would love for you just to give us a plug for the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. I I I would love to, if you could just briefly explain what what it's about and how people could become involved if they wanted to.

SPEAKER_01 42:40

Absolutely. Um, so first of all, Institute for Jewish Spirituality, you don't have to be Jewish to come to the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. Um, we welcome people of all backgrounds, and uh what we do is teach uh Jewish mindfulness practices. So um if you've ever done mindfulness meditation, uh we do that and we do it through a um in relation to sources from and and traditions from um Jewish life. Uh so we have a daily free online um meditation set that we started during COVID and is still going today. Um, in fact, that's how your mother found us uh years ago, and she's one of our one of our wonderful uh uh participants in that group. Um we have that's free daily at 12:30 Eastern on Zoom. Um we have on our website, jewishspirituality.org, we have all sorts of courses, podcasts, uh, other offerings that people can do, retreats, uh written stuff that they can subscribe to, and just all sorts of ways that they can engage with us. And what we find overwhelmingly is um so many people who get involved with us and are like, I never realized that Judaism could be understood this way, uh, that it could be understood not just as a tradition that's about upholding ancient practices or you know, doing it because my grandparents and parents did, um, but that it's this reservoir of mindfulness practices, essentially. It's for helping us live better, more intentional uh lives uh that are helping us flourish as human beings. So um I definitely encourage, welcome everybody to come check us out. Jewishspirituality.org is the uh is the website, and we look forward to meeting you.

SPEAKER_00 44:24

Josh, I want to thank you for joining. And I also want to thank you. I know you you're very uh social justice oriented, and I know you really value having an impact on the people around you. So thank you for doing what you do. Um, and thank you for joining the podcast, and uh so appreciate that very much.

SPEAKER_01 44:43

Awesome. Thank you so much for having me.

SPEAKER_00 44:45

So for uh Josh Feiglson, I am Mark Altman. Thank you for joining us for another edition of I Communicate. And for Josh and I, we say stay reflecting. Have a good one.