Acquire: Engagement

We've all been there. We have a thought dissipate just in time to realize that someone is in fact speaking to us. The panic of realizing that they might have been speaking for a while and we had tuned out. Perhaps you decide that the person was a snore and move on. Perhaps you feel bad about it but no big deal. If it happens to everyone why should we care?

What if I told you that this issue is definitely related to those brain weasels we've been discussing all week?

Many of the scripts we call brain weasels can be traced to a behind-the-scenes understanding that we are not fully engaged in the world around us. At their core, they are our imagination running amok and using the blind spots in our knowledge to torment us. Ultimately, shining a light in those corners will tell you whether there is danger there or not. Engagement is the solution.

Luckily for us, engagement doesn't have to be charismatic. You don't have to be the funniest, or the smartest in order to be connected to people. You just have to decide to be human with them. To spend your precious air speaking to people, caring about them, and being curious. It is about attention and it takes effort.

Engagement may not the easy way but it is the most fulfilling. If you care about how you connect with others it is unlikely that you would fail to hear even the most boring of your colleagues. Better still, engagement invites engagement. This means that your attention, far from just improving your experience, can shift the environments in which you live.