Losing your "Train of Thought…"
by Christian Recknagel
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It is amazing to me the amount of momentum and inertia that we can experience in our thinking. I often find myself pulled away by thoughts, only realizing, minutes later, that I have not been paying attention to what has been going on right in front of me.
I was talking to a friend not long ago. Janice, was describing a situation that concerned her and how she was affected by it emotionally. She talked about how sad she was because of how the people in the situation were treating each other. They did not seem to be respectful of each other's perspective, overreacted to things, and were yelling. The result was an unproductive conversation with all parties disappointed. Janice was also disappointed and she had no vested interest. She was merely a bystander. She didn't know what she should do and wondered what I thought.
I began to ask Janice some questions about why she was so affected by the situation even though she was not a primary player in it. She seemed somewhat surprised by my question. I suspect she was thinking, "who wouldn't be affected?" I began to talk about the possibility of feeling sad "for" someone rather than being sad "because" of someone or something.
Immediately after I completed my thought, Janice began to defend herself, somewhat disjointedly, without giving herself much time (maybe 1/500th of a second) to consider what I had said.
I softly interjected by asking, "What do you think about what I just said?"
Janice responded by saying something like, "I'm not sure, I am just trying to remember my train of thought."
This was an insight for me. The profundity of the metaphor occurred to me. We do experience thought as a train with momentum and direction. This runaway train is probably the key derailer (pun intended) of most interpersonal interactions. It is why we have so much trouble working in a truly collaborative way. We are walking around with our independent 'trains of thought' with years of momentum and inertia from hundreds of train cars filled with beliefs, attitudes, interpretations, judgments, and expectations of what the world is. No wonder we have so much trouble understanding each other. We are to busy trying to control our own trains of thought that it doesn't occur to us that it might be useful to take a ride on someone else's train.
I asked Janice how well she thought she was listening to me if she was trying to 'not lose her train of thought'. She became a little more reflective and said, "Not great I guess." I asked if she noticed how quickly she responded to my statements as we were talking. She realized that it was immediate if not quicker. As Janice began to "lose her train of thought" and listen more closely to me, I shared with her that as I listened to her when she first began describing the situation to me, I focused on catching her train of thought. My attention was on getting a feeling for what her train of thought was all about. I wanted to understand more than the description she provided. I wanted get a feel for the experience her thoughts were creating for her and how the situation was affecting her. As I began to experience a little of where she was coming from, I then could integrate that experience with my views on individual leadership and effectiveness and responded in collaboration with her. Daniel Goleman, author of books on emotional intelligence, describes this as social awareness or empathy. "Empathy-which includes listening and taking other people's perspectives-allows leaders to tune into the emotional channels between people that create resonance," writes Goleman. This is more than getting an intellectual grasp of what the person is saying, it is getting a taste of their world. Robert Kausen, Author of "We've Got to Start Meeting Like This!" states it this way; "To listen so the speaker feels understood, you cannot allow yourself any extraneous thinking."
(At this point in the conversation, I noticed Janice really listening and she had become much more attentive and reflective. I actually felt we were talking with each other, on the same track, rather than talking at each other.)
This was a big insight for me and I thanked Janice for bringing it to my attention. I had not realized such a clear picture of how we experienced thought until she said "train of thought." We are so used to thinking in particular ways and have so much evidence that the way we think about the world is the right way for us, that our experience of life often is like a train. We make regular stops and announcements in given situations, collect fares, move at consistent speed, and make the same turns. What I have realized, and tried to help Janice see, is that losing our train of thought is not necessarily a bad thing. It is often the best thing for you, especially in navigating relationships at home and work. Our thinking does have an inevitable movement to it, yet we can choose how "caught up" in the movement we become. The less caught up in our own "train of thought" we are, the more opportunity we have to connect with the trains of thought of our colleagues and friends. We then forge new paths of conversation and relationship together rather than roll along tracks we have already seen and are probably tired of. My experience is that our thoughts will always carry us away from time to time. I have noticed, however, that the more I pay attention to the movement of my thoughts and the feeling that movement is giving me, the more easily I can get off the train and relax. This brings me back to the present moment and better able to respond appropriately to the situation at hand. My experience becomes less like a runaway train and more like the ability of a dragon fly to switch direction, and even stop, in mid-flight. At least until the next train snags me up!
©2006 Christian Recknagel