The Power of Stillness — Two Frameworks

What if the best solution to your problem shows up the moment you stop looking for it? We're addicted to input — phones, email, notifications. In today's episode, I make the case for being bored on purpose, and give you two frameworks to actually do it.

In this episode: → Why stillness (not more hustle) unlocks your best thinking → The Boredom Practice — a simple walk-and-sit method to decompress → The Margin Method — building white space into your calendar on purpose

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#LeadWithConfidence #Stillness #Focus #Leadership #Productivity

Transcript

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Welcome to Lee with Confidence. I'm JP Warren. Every episode we take a theme from our Monday morning leadership call and apply it to real life scenarios. So you can build your confidence, crush your imposter syndrome, and step into the leader you actually want to be. Short, real, straight to the point. Let's get into it. Welcome back to Lead with Confidence from your host, JP Warren. I want to ask you a question out there real quick. And this may be something that uh you can't even think about because it's been so long since you were actually in the scenario. When was the last time you were bored? When was the last time you were truly bored and didn't have any distractions? I personally think that our phones are stealing a lot of ideas. They're stealing a lot of opportunities to connect, and they're stealing a lot of opportunity to really just sit there and be bored. There's so much power out of being bored, and we're going to talk about how to be bored on this episode and kind of what can kind of come from it. Okay. So the reality is this we're constantly distracted. Think about even when you're surrounding people at a networking event, okay? There's there's there's opportunity out there, there's people you can talk to, there's groups you can enter into and actually expand your business or expand your career. But what do we do? We have our phone as a safety blanket, right? When we're on the couch, when even when we're reading a book, how often are we picking up our phones if we are kind of, you know, nose deep in a book, right? We're it's whether it's a phone, whether it's a computer, whether it's TV, it doesn't matter. Just go, I'm just using the phone right here for an example, okay? How often are you actually sitting there bored, right? And a lot of times you you we're not bored because there's so much distractions out there. It really is kind of robbing us of our creativeness, okay? Creativity-ness. Yeah, go with me on that. Okay. I'm we're going here. Okay. So I've read a book uh called The Art of Stillness or something like that. It was something about the art of stillness or being the you know, being still, okay. And I remember there's one story in it where, you know, back in the day, you know, Napoleon, uh, he'd whenever we get these urgent letters and all that stuff. And actually, a couple of uh leaders in the past did this, they'd actually leave it on their desk and have it wait for two weeks, right? They would just sit on their desk and if they revisit after two weeks and it was still a press and matter, then they address it. Now, the world has sped up since then, and information is going a lot faster. So two weeks might be a bad idea to respond to an email, but the reality is this a lot of times something will come across our desk and we just automatically respond, right? We have to, that's an urgent. Everything is urgent these days, okay? So if we're, if if if everything's urgent and we're constantly being distracted, there's no space for stillness. And in reality, stillness is where some magic comes out. I can think about my previous uh career, you know, my previous career, what I'm doing right now. Um, there's a lot of moving pieces, right? There's a lot of things that I can't control. And sometimes things pop up that really kind of derail my vision for what I really wanted in the future. Okay. So, however, whenever I start kind of, whenever something derails me or something, you know, I get, you know, a new obstacle pops up that I wasn't expecting, I'll automatically respond, right? I'll kind of get into the weeds and I'll start kind of like pivoting and thinking of new things and all that stuff. However, it is such a reaction versus a thought, intentional response. Okay. So whenever I kind of dive into that and all that stuff, I start getting desperate. And it's and you can smell desperation a mile away. I found out the most beautiful ideas that I have or some of the things that are the most creative ways and really just kind of reset me whenever I do feel that, you know, the sky's falling, you know, things are in panic mode, is really just kind of stepping away and finding some stillness. All right. So here's the first framework that I want to introduce. This is called raw dog and walks. Okay. Go for a walk without your headphones. Go for a walk. Um, bring your phone if you want, obviously, bring your phone just in case of emergency and all that stuff, but go for a walk with the intention of not kind of plugging in and kind of not being distracted, not taking a phone call, not listening to a podcast or not listen to anything. The first 10 minutes, I'm not gonna lie, this still happens. I did one this morning. The first 10 minutes is absolutely horrendous, right? We're in our thoughts, we're in our mind. Our mind is starting racing and racing and racing. We're just we feel distracted without distractions, okay? But after about 10 minutes, something happening. You start calming down, you start seeing your challenges and your problems, your obstacles in a different light, okay? And then when you, whenever you can see things from a different light, or whenever you see challenges, as maybe they're not as big of a challenge as you originally thought, or maybe it's a necessary challenge for you to actually change your business a little bit to make to give more impact, more value, right? Once you actually start becoming bored and start taking this walk after 10 minutes, 15 minutes, whatever that is, you're gonna start thinking about your problems in a different light. But not only that, you're gonna think about the solutions and the and the approach in a different light. Okay. So whenever you are walking next, unplug, take out your uh AirPods or wherever you're listening to, and maybe you find a bench and you just sit there, look around. How often have we looked around in nature lately? I think that's uh a pra a lost art, a practice that we don't do anymore. Okay. So let me see if there's anything else here. So, yeah, so um, so be bored for 10 minutes on your walk, and you're gonna come back uh with a lot more. My experience, you're gonna come back with a lot more inspiration. You're gonna come back with a lot more focus. I know that sometimes whenever things do kind of knock me off track, and before I kind of give my space and the opportunity to be bored, I will be very responsive. Next thing you know, I'm muddying the waters and not really seeing clear. I'm just being very reactive. Take a break, walk away, get a little bit bored. You're gonna come back, you're gonna understand what moves the needle, what doesn't move the needle, what's actually signal and what's actually noise. So I challenge you, take that walk for 10 minutes, be bored. And it's just gonna, first off, it's great to be out in nature. But second off, you're gonna come back much more composed and much more clear about the direction you want to take. Okay. The second thing is, let's say you uh, I don't know, you can't walk or something like that, right? Build in your calendar spaces to be bored, okay? So intentionally build in, maybe it's once a week, maybe it's twice a week, maybe it's, you know, every day for about 20 minutes. You build something in your calendar where you put, you know, you put your close your computer, put your phone down, and sit and be bored. Okay. Sit in your stillness. It's uncomfortable. You feel like you'd be doing better use of your time. Do you feel like you could be doing this? Oh, I got to get this email out. I should be doing this. You're gonna start thinking of a lot of different things that you need to do in that time. You start getting the practice of sitting still and really just kind of breathing and just kind of relaxing a little bit and just kind of like getting your thoughts clear. You're gonna start, again, same thing as the walk. You're gonna start coming to the table with what moves the needle, what doesn't move the needle. What am I focused on that really kind of that that's taking up a lot of my time that really doesn't kind of like have a lot of impact, okay? So intentionally build pauses throughout your day. All right. This sounds stupid, sound might sound unproductive, it might sound like a waste of time, but it's not a waste of time because your biggest strength is you. Your biggest power is your brain and who you are, okay? So take space to kind of get settled again and re-identify kind of your approach on the common challenges, problems, maybe it's being intentional throughout your day. How all how how many people do we know where, and this is our ourselves included, when we wake up, we check the phone, we go on the emails, next thing you know, the day controls us. I really want to flip that around where you control your day, not the other way around. Okay. So my question for you is when was the last time you were truly bored on purpose? And think about that. And it might be a while ago, but when were you actually truly bored? Okay. And what came out of that, right? What came out of that boredom? All right. And the second question I have is what's your calendar telling you about how much margin you actually have? Are you so busy you can't carve out 15 minutes a day to kind of sit, be still, uh, and be intentional about your time, about your thought, about your mind, protect your mind, protect your thoughts? Or is your kind of calendar full where you're being pulled in all these different directions? Okay. So my challenge for you this week is number one, either go out there, unplug, go for that walk, see a little bit of nature, touch grass. And the second thing I challenge you to is bake in a little bit of time throughout the day, 10, 15 minutes uh throughout the day to sit there, be bored, and be still. I guarantee you're gonna come back to the table a lot more charged and also a lot more clear on what matters, what doesn't matter, what direction you should go. And honestly, where we're prioritizing our life. When we sit in stillness, we start thinking about priorities, we start thinking about relationships, we start thinking about creative, innovative ways to tackle problems. Your stillness, your boredom, your lack of activities is just gonna grant you so much more momentum to push you over that finish line or push you in the right direction that you need to go. So that's what we have for today on Lead with Confidence. Thanks for tuning in and go out there and get bored. That's your framework for the day. Go lead with it. I'm JP Warren, lead with confidence.