In business, we’re always talking about getting to the top.

But when it comes to navigating the future of work on a very personal level, staying at the top, at least when it comes to being in your head, is dangerous. So I want you to take the elevator down.

Whether you work on the ground floor or at the top of a gigantic highrise, you will need to cultivate a key skill for the future:  The ability to get out of your head from time to time, and tap into the wisdom within your whole body.

So, why should you care about getting out of your head and into your body?

Because really brilliant, flexible, resilient people know that raw intellect will only get you so far. You know super smart people who are ultra annoying because they rub people the wrong way. They share their ideas without regard to the impact they are having. Or people who get a fixed idea of what needs to happen, and because they are attached to this idea, they miss the signals (including the emotional and interpersonal ones) that it’s time for a change. Or people who are so wedded to the way things “should” be that they fall apart or shut down when change happens.

If you want to be have a positive impact on your business or organization (or a mission or venture that’s vital to you), you need to be able to pay attention to subtle signals, like the way you feel when your manager’s voice changes tone, and she’s expressing displeasure. Or the way you feel when you’re walking down the hall on the way to a meeting, and you bump into a colleague who looks like he’s going to burst. He asks for a moment of your time. If you’re paying attention “below the neck,” you may feel an urge to reach out, or an impulse to keep walking, but if you’re tuned in to your inner wisdom, you’ll make a good decision about your next steps.

The future of work is incredibly fluid, dynamic, and shifting. It’s more like improvisational jazz, less like a practiced symphony that’s been played hundreds of times. Are you ready for these times?

I believe that the people who have the greatest capacity to make the biggest impact in the future of work are those who activate their inner supercomputer, the laser-fast decision making, the intuitive assessment, and the trust-building that comes from tapping into the body’s inner wisdom. I’m not suggesting that you leave your head and the intellect out of your navigating. What I am suggesting is that you widen your base of power by using both mind AND body wisdom. Are you one of these people.

Over the coming weeks, I’ll be articulating a set of skills that I call Smart Sensing to describe this ability to pay attention to your instincts, impulses, and sensations, and to use them in making good decisions, connecting powerfully with others, bouncing back from adversity, staying positive and focused, and adjusting in a dynamic way.

When you activate your Smart Sensing capacity, you feel confident about to respond in complex and ambiguous situations. That confidence derives from from accessing more than just your intellect, but also trusting a deeper, innate wisdom

To navigate change fluidly requires picking up on the signs and signals that something is in flux, trusting the instincts and impulse that harken change, and then being courageous enough to move ahead when the path is not yet clear. This all requires well-developed Smart Sensing. Some people turn off their sensing — their ability to pick up on the information that’s constantly coming to them through their sensations. Like the way they feel a warmth around their heart when they’ve made a customer delighted. Or the way their chest tightens in the middle of a stressful negotiation. Some people learn to numb out, unable to feel these sensations, at least until they get guidance on how to listen to their own inner signals again. Others cultivate their ability to sense, even at subtle levels, so they can read the mood in a room and respond accordingly, or they can adjust their posture and gestures to make people feel welcome.

Those two groups of people — the low-sensing and the high sensing — are like the difference between a stripped down, basic cellular phone and a smartphone. The former only helps you make phone calls. The latter can tap into the weather, the traffic report, and restaurant reviews to help you select the right clothes, route, and venue to impress your new client. The smartphone gathers up-to-the minute information that makes you more adaptable to the conditions around you.

The good news is that you have smart technology built right into you. You have access not only to data and information, but to wisdom, so that you can respond flexibly to new conditions, new challenges, and even new quirks in people. With wisdom, not merely data, you can discern which way to turn. You can judge how your actions will work out. You envision the consequences of your choices. And you sense how you are feeling, moment to moment, so you can manage your energy and continuously renew yourself.

In tumultuous times, some executives default to gathering more data to analyze. Yet when change is so rapid, massive, or uncertain, access to more information tends to either impossible, or leads to analysis paralysis. Instead of analyzing, they need to be proactively adapting. Yet when you’re accustomed to knowing all the ins and outs of your business, and move into a role where no map of the territory exists, finding your way requires new skills. This is especially true when it comes to leading and influencing other people to come along. Instead of more data, you need access to a broader base of inner wisdom, so you can trust yourself and connect with the people involved in this new future.

The core skill in Smart Sensing is the ability to pay attention to what your body is telling you, by listening to your sensations. So let’s start with one activity to help you do that.

Try this activity:  Discovering the Connection Between Your Thoughts & Sensations: I’d like you to bring to mind a positive memory of something you’ve done in the last month or so. It doesn’t need to be monumental or extreme. It just needs to be positive. Remember as many of the details as possible, and bring them to your mind’s eye. Where were you? What time of day was it? Who was around? What was happening? How did you feel emotionally? What were you hearing? What were you saying and doing?

Now, take a mental snapshot of that, and then notice how you feel in your body when you bring this memory to mind. What do you experience? If nothing immediately feels noticeable, pay attention for energy, breathing, tension, and temperature. Write down all the sensations you can notice in your body.

Then, take a moment and shake out your body. Wiggle, jiggle, and imagine that you can cast off this memory, so you’re clear for the next part of this activity.

Next, bring to mind a recent negative event. Please don’t select something traumatic. Choose something only mildly upsetting. Once again, bring to mind as many of the details as possible, and visualize or sense them. Where were you? What time of day was it? Who was around? What was happening? How did you feel emotionally? What were you hearing? What were you saying and doing?

As you did before, create a mental snapshot of the negative event. Allow the experience to be fresh and novel and get curious about how you feel in your body when you bring this negative memory to mind. What do you experience in your body? Once again, pay attention for energy, breathing, tension, and temperature. Write down all the sensations you can notice in your body associated with this second memory.

Finally, contrast the sensations you felt in your body with each of these memories. What’s different in your body with each of these? What are your sensations telling you?

Sensations are your body’s signals, so you know what feels right, good, and positive for you, and also what feels wrong, bad, and negative for you. Certainly, there are subtleties and nuances. For example, some kinds of fear tells us to avoid danger, while others tell us we’re simply anxious about doing something new. Over time, as you start tracking your sensations, you will enhance your ability to discern these small differences and respond in ways that keep you aligned with what truly matters to you.

What are you sensing now?

Go ahead. Take the elevator down. It’s the thing to do if you want to be on your way up.

Sensitively yours,

Dr. Susan Bernstein, Work from Within

Are you just a floating head?

I know. That’s a weird question. But it arises because I am currently reading the book, New Self, New World: Recovering Our Senses in the Twenty-First Century, by Philip Shepherd, and loving it. It’s so much about the ways that we cut off from the wisdom of our bodies, and live in our minds, not ever stopping to question that practice, just blindly accepting it. His message resonates so much for me. Like Philip Shepherd. I am committed to reawakening people to the innate intelligence of the body. It is a wisdom we know well before we are verbal, the way that newborn babies instinctively turn to hear their mother’s voice, even before they have full sight. Or the way an infant knows to cry to get attention, and an attuned mother can differentiate between the sounds of hunger, pain, and frustration.

This understanding of the wisdom of the body is getting more attention, and I am delighted. Shepherd apparently has attracted the attention of Eve Ensler, author, actress, and activist. This TEDWomen video shares her experience of awakening to her own inner wisdom, where realizes she is not just a floating head.

I love this line from her video: “For a long time, there was me, and my body. Me was composed of stories, of cravings, of strivings, of desires of the future. Me was trying not to be an outcome of my violent past, but the separation that had already occurred between me and my body was a pretty significant outcome. Me was always trying to become something, somebody. Me only existed in the trying. My body was often in the way. Me was a floating head.”

What about you? Are you just a floating head? Do you listen to your mind and ignore your body? Or diminish it’s messages?

We all need help shifting from head to whole self, so please share your experience of feeling more in your head…or more in your body…or somewhere between.

My own story of moving from floating head to being an embodied, vibrant, connected person is this: I had a wake up call to my body in the mid 1990s. About three years into my time in management consulting, I was involved in a car accident. As I drove home from San Francisco International Airport, while returning from a client engagement in Southern California, I was rear-ended by a drunk driver. Although the accident was not serious, I started getting painful migraine headaches immediately afterwards. My doctor wanted to run tests, but I would not allow it. I was determined to show how tough I could be. Even though I was completely stressed out by the nature of the work and the 80 to 100 hour work weeks, and even though I had fantasies about quitting the consulting firm, I was not going to let headaches keep me from working on what I thought was an extremely important client project! Then, two weeks after the car accident, I passed out in front of a group of clients. I literally fainted in front of them from the pain, and the project team took me to the hospital to check my health.

Clearly, I had not been listening to my body. I ignored the migraine symptoms, continuing to push through them so that I could work. I pretended I was fine. Fortunately, the managing partner of my office insisted that I follow my doctor’s orders to take a month off from work to relax and recuperate.

Deep down, I felt conflict. I wanted to demonstrate to my project team that I was as strong as everyone else, and that I fit into the culture, by continuing to work. But I also wished I could simply find work that was more fun, or that I could even stop working for a period. I lost consciousness, but that experience of fainting make me conscious of my need for work that fit me better. I moved into a role within the HR structure, running a global training operation, and loved it.

After starting a new educational program and running it for two years, I felt an impulse to take charge of my career direction, and have been incredibly proactive about seeking out new vistas that draw me in, that pull my energy, that beckon my involvement. They have included counseling, coaching, and teaching, in many ways, including online, in person, and one-on-one.

When this smart sensing capability expanded within me, I could feel my way through uncertainty, navigating more assuredly, more enthusiastically. No longer did I wait for anyone to direct me. I became more and more attuned to the innate intelligence within me, my inner guidance system. And now, I am fortunate enough to teach others to do the same for themselves. I’m not their director, I’m merely there to help guide them to their own wisdom, a boundless capacity.

Where are you residing? In your head? Your heart? Your gut? Your whole self, from head to toe?

Take a stand, and share your tale of learning to inhabit more of your head. Because certainly, we could all use more encouragement to find our whole wisdom.

With heartful appreciation,