This episode is a little different than most…Today I do some live-coaching for Rashmi Sharma, a Global HR executive and TedX speaker, on shifting what she wants to be known for, evolving what she wants to offer to the world and how her work can heal for others, while she heals herself.

I’m so grateful that Rashmi reached out to me for some coaching after we were both speaking at a virtual conference in Southeast Asia. As Rashmi has evolved as a leader, she wanted to do some deeper thinking about how she can evolve her thought leadership, and offer something to her community from a deeper place in herself.

I really commend Rashmi’s courage in sharing her process with so much vulnerability. As you’ll hear in the conversation ahead, Rashmi and I talk about (although very indirectly) the ideas of sublimation - healing your own wounds through helping others.

We also dive deep into how she can hold space and create more depth in her conversations, as she interviews her community to understand what wellness and wholeness really means to them.

Make sure you check out the show notes for Rashmi’s full notes reflecting on her insights from the coaching conversation, but, two that I want to highlight here are:

Using all of yourself to Lead

Joseph Campell famously said “it’s the privilege of a lifetime to be as you are”...

Finding and highlighting her phrase “use all of me to help people” was a golden nugget in the conversation. This is what Rashmi’s interest and work on wholeness and wellbeing is really about - allowing our whole selves to be accessed in our lives. So, it makes sense that Rashmi wants to do the same for herself!

Creating Depth in Conversations

One powerful way to create more depth is to go there yourself...Rashmi and I talk about asking and listening from a deeper place in herself.

We also highlight the idea that "Slow is smooth and smooth is fast," a motto from the Navy Seals. As she interviews her community to gain insights on her new area of focus, Rashmi realized that slowness and smoothness allows people to get comfortable and to think more deeply in her interviews.

Slow and Smooth can mean slowing down your own voice, creating a little bit more space between your words, and it also means waiting a little bit between what they've said and your second question, your response. (Extra credit for not thinking about what you’re going to say or ask next while they’re talking!)

Slowing yourself down can help others slow down and connect. Active listening helps me really hear, and also helps my partner hear themselves. Depth in a conversation can be hard at high velocity.

One piece of advice I shared with Rashmi as she prepared to head into her next round of community interviews was to simply take a deep breath and ask her partner to tell a story. Narratives can pull a conversation from a back-and-forth of questions and answers. Narratives can help you more deeply enter into the world of the person you’re talking to and hoping to get insights from.

I love to work with leaders trying to define their thought leadership, leaders trying to scale their impact and leaders working to transform their organizations. I only work with a handful of high-performing folks each year. If you’d like to reach out about coaching, head over to DanielStillman.com/coaching

Links from this episode:

Rashmi on LinkedIn

Rashmi’s TedX talk

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