Question

Masterclass

Part 5

Get Comfortable with Silence

When you ask someone one of the Seven Essential Questions,
sometimes what follows is silence.
Echoing, endless silence.
And by “endless” I mean sometimes as long as three or four
seconds.
In those moments, as everything slows to Matrix-style “bullet
time,” every part of you is desperate to fill the void.
Put this existential angst aside.

Silence is often a measure of success.

It may be that the person you’re coaching is the type who needs
a moment or three to formulate the answer in his head before
speaking it. In which case you’re giving him that space.
Or it may be that, like me, he’s the type who typically just
launches into an answer without knowing what he’s going to say.
In either case, it means he’s thinking, searching for the answer.
He’s creating new neural pathways, and in doing so literally
increasing his potential and capacity.