The show’s guest in this episode is Leigh Marz. She is the co-author of GOLDEN: The Power of Silence in a World of Noise and leadership and collaboration consultant.

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Let’s Talk About Silence with Leigh Marz

Hey there, it’s great to be with you today. I’m super excited about today’s show. And I was I’ve been thinking a lot about impostor syndrome, mostly because we’re going to start doing some cool webinars about that. And I had this moment today that I thought was super interesting. So I was swimming because I swim three times a week. And I was swimming. And I had something to say, because I thought that chemicals were out of balance. And, and I was, wanted to talk to the guy who was testing the pool chemicals. And, and so when I was talking to him, this other woman came up, and she said, Oh, the alkalinity is off. And I was pretty sure the alkalinity was an off like, we have a swimming pool at home, we balanced our chemicals. I think there was something off with the chemicals themselves because I had a weird taste in my mouth. And, but I found myself sort of acquiescing. And then I found myself sort of feeling like a little bit of impostor syndrome. And I was really curious about like, Why did I think I couldn’t offer my opinion. And also, I thought she had bad manners, because she just sort of popped in and like, jumped into my conversation when I was trying to give feedback to this person.

And so later when I was thinking about it, I was kind of annoyed by that. But I realized, like, she looks super fit, like she’s a triathlete. And there is no reason in the world that because she’s a triathlete. She should know more about pool chemicals than I do. Like I swim three days a week I have my whole life. Literally, I have as much to offer as she does, but because like she wears a smaller size bathing suit, somehow, she had the ability to tell the sky that and then I was like, Oh, well, what do I know? Surely she knows. And I had all these thoughts rolling around in my head. Anyway, I just had this moment. And I just thought, Gosh, it’s so interesting how fast that can happen to me, and I work in the space, I deal with people and their impostor syndrome all the time. And I got myself out of it pretty well. And I know that she was wrong, because the guy tested the pool chemicals. And it was not too alkaline. Like she said it was something else. But it was an interesting journey for me to go through in my head. And I’m sure all of you have your own interesting journeys in your head. And I’m super excited about our guest today.

Her name is Lee Mars, and she’s a leadership and collaboration consultant with organizations including Harvard, Google, and IKEA. And she’s led a multi year program teaching experimental mindsets to multigenerational teams at NASA. And she’s also a longtime student of pioneering researchers are practitioners of the ritualist ritualized use of psychedelic medicines in the West. And she’s the co author of a cool book called Golden the power of silence in a world of noise, and leadership. And so I want to welcome Leigh Marz to my show today.

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Welcome, Leigh.

Thank you. Great to be here with you.

Well, it’s really fun. And Lee and I actually did a certification for systems coaching together a long time ago.

13 years ago, yeah.

Yeah, a good while ago. So um, so Lee has a really special place in my heart. So I’m super excited to talk about this book. Plus, it’s super cool, because I’ve been, I’ve been listening to it because I like to listen to audiobooks. So welcome. And, and we’re doing this wild book club thing this year. And I know that so we’re gonna start with my book, and we’ll get to your book, perfect. We’re talking about intense at all levels. And before the show, we were talking and you were like, Oh, I see this thing about intense and silence. And now I’m like, super excited to hear what you’re thinking.

Sure, I’ll jump right in. So yeah, our book is about silence. And so we think a lot about what it what the clarity it offers. And I think clarity around our true intents, our true intentions, and perceptions is one of those places, with all the noise of the world. And we’ll get into more of that later. But auditory and informational and even internal noise, it gets really hard to discern. What is our truest intention? What is really needed here? And that discernment, I think, requires silence to sift through the noise. Maybe the noise is what we’ve always done or what we’re what our competitors do or don’t know. You know what I mean? All the things that are happening are it’s truly distraction buzzing, begging the fact that we have back to back meetings and don’t give ourselves even a moment to breathe and reflect. So I think there’s a real connection here to this brilliant work looking at intense and the different layers. And when we really ground in that truest intent, that truest intention for how we move forward, then we can be more we can afford to be more experimental and take those risks and things like this. So I think silence helps can help us get there.

I really, I really love that. And I think I think you’re actually speaking to something around any of the work, I think, you know, there’s a whole variety of things around intense, there’s vision, there’s mission, there’s values, there’s strategic, intense, operational, intense, and tactical, intense, which is a mouthful. But around any one of those things, there’s contemplation that’s needed. And I think that contemplation requires space. And, and I, I always, when I’m talking with my clients, and they’re like, gosh, do I do anything? You know, these are senior leaders, and they’re like, anything, sometimes I don’t work for an afternoon. And I’m like, I think that’s what’s happening for you. I think you, I think they’re taking silence or they’re taking pauses, or they’re taking space. But our, our society doesn’t value that they don’t, they don’t say, Oh, you thought about that for four days? And then you, you know, came up with this great idea. It’s like, what meetings were you in? Who were you talking to you? What were you doing? And so I think all of this kind of work around intense also requires space. So silence is an intention, what do you want to do with the with, with noise or with, you know, doing, but it also requires space to change it?

Yeah, I think when you really get when you take that time to get into these intense, and I love all those layers, it’s super clarifying. It’s so well done. I just can’t say it’s really, really helpful. So when you do take that time for the deepest layers to the even all the way up to the tactical layers, then you can start cranking out the work if that’s your thing, like nothing wrong with that, like ticking off the boxes, because you’re aligned to do that work well. So I think you get to have both, if you really just take that time to make sure that the intent is true. And updated present time. What’s needed all those things? Yeah.

Well, and there’s a, if not silence, there’s peacefulness in the knowing that you’re in alignment with those things with the mission with the values, like the friction, for me, at least creates a lot of voices in my head.

Yeah, same here.

It’s like if I can be in alignment in my head, if I know how it’s going to work, if I know if I can see it, feel it. I don’t know what what channel like I use in my in myself. But if I can, can know how it might happen, then, then it’s quieter. Yeah, it’s cool. All right. Well, let me read just a little bit from my book, and then we’re gonna move we’ll move on. Perfect. I want to talk just a little bit about values. So if the vision and the mission or the why and the what have accompanied company’s business practices, the values are, its how values represent the essence of the company’s beliefs to stay despite being strategically linked to the vision, vision and mission. The values are discrete and need periodic tweaking, we tend to think of values as enduring qualities, but they can change as organizations and their leaders form appropriate reactions to changing realities and challenges and respond to market forces and cultural shifts.

Hey, go I love that. Yeah, I’m just so appreciative of the layers how how deep you go with this in terms of the vision and the mission and then getting to that values piece and that we distinguish between them in their life span, or the need to read visit, you know, and then of course, all those other layers.

Well and how many how many people like I remember being at a, I was at a conference, I think I think it might have been an International Coach Federation conference, where Guy Kawasaki was pulling up mission statements from Dilbert or something. And they were like, Oh, you need a mission statement. Here’s one, here’s what it was, like, kind of the good news and bad news for coaching, like, you could kind of use one of those, they were all kind of good and kind of bad. Yeah. And it’s like, and it’s still a thread that you pull through the organization. So I’m a big fan, for quirkiness, in all of them to you know, that your values are a little quirky, that the company values are a little quirky, that they say something that people you know, will remember, not just like, everybody’s got honesty and integrity, cuz that’s kind of boring. But that there’s, I don’t know, I have a value that’s called Frog Pond that’s about sitting by my, you know, I used to find that I would get outside and I’d be like, Oh, my gosh, I have two acres, and there’s not enough done and I should weed something and I should do something. And then I have this little tiny pond that sometimes we find a frog in our pool, and we put it in the pond. So it’s not like we actually were frog fun. But we sit there and we have a glass of wine. And it’s to remind myself not to get up and do anything, but to be in that space and to. And so I like those kinds of things around about values.

Me too. That sounds great. And I also noticed that sometimes values were out there welcome, people, like, I had a, I had a client who was really into the value of being nimble. And there and that sounds great, especially, you know, to people like us, you know, being experimental being nimble, but they became they got so heavy on the Nimble that it was basically comms didn’t change that finally kind of seemed to develop. So there needed to be some stability, so we can sometimes kind of go, you can overdo our values and maybe need a refresher a slight tweak. Yeah, things like this.

I think that’s really interesting. And it is interesting, because you think that some things are always good. And then they’re not gonna do anything. And not the thing that you want to call forth. And as I’m saying, all this, I’m like, wow, you must have had a really, like, silence must have been really important to you to write this book, like, like, wow, you wanted to spend some time with this?

Yeah, it’s been a five year journey. And I would say, what brought Justin, my co author and I to this topic was actually we were at a place of despondency. We’re both working in pretty intense fields. He is legislative director for three members of Congress, I was working with the client, climate scientists at NASA and a lot of other scientists and engineers working on important issues, like removing toxic chemicals. And so there’s a great sense of urgency and service and wanting to do the right thing. And yet those environments felt so packed with content and data, and urgency and noise and distraction. And then you add in politics, and we’re raising a fam, you know, families to get in, not together. But you know, we’re each raising families. Yes, three kids under six. So a lot going on. And we started to wonder if some of the solutions to these seemingly intractable problems could be found beyond the mental stuff beyond the noise and the point and counterpoint culture argumentation and and so we turn to silence that was our intuition. And I’m so glad we did. So silence and it’s many, many facets. And so, we joke that this is a non meditators Guide to Getting beyond the noise. So the punch line isn’t to go meditate, unless that’s your way. And that’s awesome. If it is, but we explore many, many routes to silence in, in very busy lives.

I love this so much because I love silence. And I’m not a meditator. I say like, I’m such a dork. Like, I can’t stand it, but I swim. And so that is where I get that like the being with my head in the water and I and I use a snorkel sometimes so that I don’t. It’s like the most quiet thing. I think one of the questions that you ask is what’s the most silent? I didn’t I was driving.

Yeah, yeah. What’s the deepest silence you’ve ever known?

And I think you said just trust your intuition, like whatever you think is what it is. And I love that question. And that was that’s that moment for me, except the other moment is when I stopped being able to call my mother. That’s also deep silence, like, like, and not in a good way. Like, that’s a good way, like the quiet of someone passing is a deep silence. That’s unwanted. Right. And both were interesting. You know, they’re both really interesting to think about. But I love my time in the pool. And I feel like I get all the benefits of meditation without having to sit still on a stool that looks really uncomfortable for our whatever the heck those people do those people I wish them well, and they’re not my people. Yeah. Or people.

Yeah, we wanted to really touch into something really scalable, accessible, and we argue that silence Yeah, finding our way to silence finding a way to quiet is actually something innate to being human. So this is not a life hack. It’s not newfangled, you don’t need gadgetry. It’s accessible to all. In fact, the main teacher in our book and I don’t know if you’ve gotten to this point yet is Jarvis G. Masters who’s a friend who’s on death row in San Quentin. And he’s finding silence in that impossible situation, and possibly loud. To start with, to the to the IRS it’s cacophonous. people yelling all the time and cement and, you know, mesh wire and steel and keys and boots and all that but the constant cacophony of sound when I’m on the phone with him, and then there’s we also look at informational noise, which most of us not, he’s not in that position. But where it’s like the buzzing gadgetry, the things grabbing for our attention, and our attention is very limited. It is a very scarce resource we have the demands on that attention has gone up exponentially, but we have not increased our ability to process more with our, with our brains. So we’re at a that’s why it feels the way it feels. And then that we argue creates an internal situation of cacophonous noise, internal chatter, rumination fretting, you talked about impostor syndrome, those kinds of things, when things kick in like that. And for Jarvis, what he’s found on on San Quentin stare through is that he has to quiet his response to the noise in order to quiet the noise, because he actually cannot quiet the noise. It is what it is. But he can quiet his response to the noise. And we argue we all can do that to different degrees. So this book is laying out a lot about, you know, why silence is important and how to find it in any situation. And then looking at how we can do that as individuals, as teams in the workplace, as families, as friends, and then what would it mean for our society at large to really value silence? And to turn there for some of the answers instead of more talking and thinking and mental stuff?

How has this book changed you Leigh?

Hmm? Well, Justin, and I joke that yeah, this was like taking on a big curriculum, you know about all about that. You’ve got to walk it, to talk about it. You know, one is not an expert in silence. But I we did get the benefit of talking with neuroscientists and poets and Jarvis on death row, and whirling dervish, and all kinds of, you know, amazing and fascinating people who are devotees to silence. So it’s a real place of experimentation and exploration. And it’s worked me and changed me i value how I find silence, which is really through dance on the day to day like you with your swimming. So I’m dancing five days a week or more. That flow states are just as important for us to find that internal quiet, even though if it’s like something and loud, outside with some great music like it is in my situation. So I value those places in my life more, make time, keep those commitments, and more and more the client work I’m doing is really just helping them find deep reflective silence and also active loud fun silence, you know, all the different types, so that they can work on their issues in a novel way and really get some breakthrough thinking. So like I mentioned, the chemists who are removing toxic chemicals, that’s a complex issue. And if they come at it with conventional thinking, or they come at it, you know, it’s not going to solve this problem. It’s too important so we have a motto in those times to slow down. There isn’t much time huh?

I love that. And I think it’s, it’s so true. You know, I watched my children when they get in a hurry and they get Quick Left fold. And when they get really steady and and slow that it becomes pretty obvious to them. That’s really interesting. Slow down.

There’s much time.

Oh, how lovely. Um, I’m curious as a parent, and I know you’re a parent, I don’t remember exactly how old your daughter teenager.

Yeah, she’s, she’s 17.

Oh, my kids are 17 Also, staying interesting. I don’t know, if I ever had quite figured that out. But um, you know, when I think of silence, I worry about them. They don’t have so much silence in their worlds there, they’ve always got a device going, and I’m sure you address this in your book. And I sort of want you to be the expert of the tell me what to do. And I also know, I’m also quite aware that, you know, we’re sort of the first generation parenting children, we don’t have any best practices they just gave our kids like, my kids were born this year, our kids were born the same year as YouTube. So it’s like, there’s no, you know, nobody told us what to do, you know, all these ideas, and we try things. And, you know, they, it’s, it seems obvious to some people that we should take their devices away, but I have a kid who wants to go into tech. So maybe I shouldn’t take his device away. Because he actually, you know, it’s it will probably be his profession. So what, what thoughts do you have? What’s the how to, or silence?

And yeah, it is tricky. And you’re right about all, you know, in fact, there’s a problem. And your listeners and watchers know that. There’s just so much evidence coming in that this is taking a real toll on mental health and things like that. And the answer isn’t always just prohibit right. I mean, that’s not the best answer for me either, generally, to prohibit is not doesn’t look good on me. So, but to really gain some awareness about the impact. So when we do get away, which we do, sometimes we’ll sit, go scuba diving is a family. And, and we’re with these other families, and we’re just doing a lot more socializing and putting our phones down. I don’t have to do anything, Ava just reflects upon how different this is. And you can’t take your phone, scuba diving, and you just want to be with the people in real time. And sometimes it’s actually her idea that we step away from technology or even talking, we were once way out in Alaska, and I was a little bit agitated by the amount of group bonding that was happening, which is ironic being a relationship coach, but I had had enough of all the talking. So she said, why don’t we be silent for a day. So we took a day of silence, that was her idea. So I think it’s like, actually, so follow their lead when they have something like that. Help them understand, you know, what, they’re when they’re agitated, and this is true for all of us, the signals that we are saturated by sound is something we should get familiar with. When I’m saturated by sound, just kind of give some examples. I’m irritable, and I’m never irritable, like that’s a foreign emotion. I feel my tightness in my diaphragm. Probably holding my shoulders like up too high, you know, and then I’m, I’m grinding my teeth at night. Oh, you know, anyway, those are some of the things. So that’s, that’s those are lots of signals. I’m also, you know, I’m irritable in my relationships. That’s, those are relationships I care about. And yet, I’m being short, and probably more forgetful, a little bit more fractured and things like that. So I can look on many different levels. What’s the emotional content? What’s the physical body telling me? What are my relationships? What’s happening in my relationships? And how are my managing or not managing my tasks? Those are great places to look. And then the opposite is also true. When I am getting that silence and that quiet, you’re getting your swims, I’m doing my dancing like Wow, well, then what’s happening? Well, all those physical things are not present. I’m not even thinking about it. I’m just more generous with people around me. I’m Kinder I’m more my gratitude, things like that. I’m I just don’t I don’t forget things as much. So for each of your listeners, and then to note, help your kids notice those things by just reflecting no judgment, right? It seems like you’re a little irritated. Do you want a little space for yourself? And it might be with technology. But maybe there’s just something to finding a little bit of quiet there for them. So those are some of my initial thoughts. Then Justin, who has little kids definitely learns a lot about silence because little kids know a lot about silence. Actually. They’re they’re the wizards.

That’s interesting. Yeah, that makes sense. And they Yeah, their play is so different to we have, we go to a summer camp, and the Wi Fi is just terrible. And hard. I can’t take a coaching call. I can’t. I literally say, you know, on my way out of office that I won’t be responding, because I’ll run out of data after a few days. And then, but if somebody wants to come and find me, they can come down, Jerry. Okay, that’s it. Like, I’ll be there. I’m happy to chat. I’m not going to be replying on any sort of media. And so it’s Oh, my little dog has decided to come.

Dogs also know a lot about silence.

Well, we can’t take ourselves too seriously. What are you experimenting on as a leader and your life and your work? In your marketing of your book, and anywhere, I’m always curious to hear how people are experimenting in their worlds.

Well, I just actually went on a hike yesterday. And this is a planning hike. So that’s actually something I’ve been doing with this client for a decade, because she’s a mountaineer. And so I never, you know, she never has to convince me and I never have to convince her that hiking and walking is a good idea for our brains, especially on the early end of thinking through. So this is a 10th year doing a retreat. And it seems like there while there are certain things that we we know we want to do in terms of evaluating how past our work has been over time and what might need to happen in the future. We just agreed that we’re gonna create a whole big space, for we don’t know what for the fact that there are brilliant minds coming together. And there’s certainly a ton of environmental needs. So she brought out this idea that like the Hudson River used to be completely just full of sewage, and completely disgusting. And the Clean Water Act was passed 50 years ago. And now it’s like the life the Osprey, the fish in the muscles, and all these things is coming back. And it’s such a success story. What’s that version of things we could do here? So we’re, in order to get to that question. In the four days, we have together in the Redwoods with these really brilliant minds from all different sectors, my job is going to be to create a lot of space and silence and ability for them to form connections and relationships and have conversations and be a little bit more risk taking in terms of proposing ideas that may be like completely ludicrous. But you know, or they could be the next Clean Water Act, or the next who knows what, or they could spark the person who thinks so that next thing. So I’m more and more, I like to do less and less than give people more and more permission to do less and less. That’s kind of my experimental strategy. And that requires a little bit of courage, especially now, because like you’ve pointed out, there’s just such a bias towards content, and doing in meetings and ironing, and all the things all the time. And, you know, we that’s our bias. So it’s actually quite courageous, to step away from that or out of time, or to try something different, and then instead lean into the collective intelligence of this group, and what’s actually really needed in the world versus what we think is needed in the world, we could actually sense that with our entire body’s emotions, you know, and who knows what else where we find our intelligence? So I think I hope I answered your question that I have more and more interested in being kind of more and more wildly quiet and so you know, silent and, and experimental, and we’ll see. And so it’s a big privilege to be able to do that. But this group has earned it they’ve been getting together for a decade, and they’re changing the way we we address chemicals and they want to keep doing that. So hopefully.

I love your answers so much. And one thing I noticed is often, you know, after silence after you give people space, you talk about the level of the conversation. And, and I am so struck by that, that’s to me is also the gift that if I give myself space, then the the level of the conversation improves. And so it’s you It almost sounds acts like an like. That’s what silence brings you as better conversation.

Oh, yeah, it does. It does. It’s painful thing.

Yeah. Yeah, I really love that.

We turn to the Quakers for that just so that the quality it’s like the quality of silence and the quality of speaking truth to power that’s that those are both Quaker values and principles are somewhere in there. You know, the value to both and for sure.

Yeah, my husband and I have done a lot of consensus work following and and looked at what the Quakers do and holding silence to see if there are any voices that need to be heard. Although I hadn’t thought about that with your book this morning. So it’s it’s lovely to think about we where can people find you and your book?

Well, so you can find Justin Zorn, my co author and myself, www.astreastrategies.com. And that’s where we really tried to bridge contemplation and action. And I’m this type of work with scientists, engineers, and climate activists and people like that. So there’s a lot of lot of resources there. Also, for business, folks, we’ve done a good number of articles for Harvard Business Review and time and Fast Company. So there’s some little bite sized morsels. The book can be found anywhere you buy books, Amazon, but also independent booksellers. It’s called Golden the power of silence in a world of noise and the reader if you’re into that, if you like the auditory channel, print zone. Me has a real, he’s a real gem, he brings quiet and just makes it all better. So that’s how you find him. And we’re both on LinkedIn. We’re not super social media people as you might imagine. But we can be found on LinkedIn if people want to reach out.

Thank you so much for being here today. It’s been a joy to get to spend time with you and to have conversation and just to see you. Thank you for your time.

Thank you for the honor of being here. Great to see you.

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It’s amazing to be here with Leigh Marz today and her book “Golden.” I really want to challenge you to think about yourself and think about paying attention to your needs around silence, and to be curious about how you find it in your life. I know how I find it. I’m sure you have ways that you do it. And then my second challenge is to find it. It’s it’s been super fun to be here with you on the experimental leader podcast. Go experiment!

Important Links: 

• Leigh Marz – LinkedIn
• Astrea Strategies- Website

Leigh Marz

Leigh Marz is a leadership and collaboration consultant with organizations including Harvard, Google, and IKEA.

She has led a multi-year program teaching experimental mindsets to multigenerational teams at NASA.

Leigh is also a longtime student of pioneering researchers and practitioners of the ritualized use of psychedelic medicines in the West.

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