Engagement, Self-Care, and Sanity Checks for Virtual Session Collaborators
— Transforming Organizations, Revitalizing Communities and Developing Human Potential
While we are running from one online meeting to the next, what are some of the ways you try to stay engaged and sane?
I often open a collaborative session with a piece of music - and I find that piano music works especially well. Another suggestion for virtual sessions is to engage in forms of CircleSong singing/chanting with a drone. This works well in a virtual environment, because it isn’t impeded by the delay/latency of virtual engagements that makes more rhythmic music impossible to align [check out 07:40 in the session recording below]. This also works well “all by yourself” when you turn an annoying sound in your environment into a drone to music with, hum with, sing with - when your freezer kicks on or your neighbour is mowing the lawn.
For me music is instrumental (pun intended!), both for engaging virtual meeting participants and as a key ingredient for maintaining my self-care. Mindfulness meditation is another important part of my practice.
If you have friends and family in healthcare in the US and the UK, please note that the headspace app is currently free for all public HealthCare workers in the US and NHS staff in the UK. [Please note that we are not endorsed by headspace, nor supporting it as anything other than a great resource.] Additional mindfulness resources for your session designs is available at tinyurl.com/meetingmindful.
So what do you do?
In a conversation this week, Martin Grimshaw @ThrivingPlanet offered that his self-care practice includes “a whole package of: breaks, exercise, music, laughter, time outdoors where possible, chatting with friends and family, making good food.”
Todd Siler shared that for him, drawing and creating art - often even in the middle of the night, is important. He encouraged us to also offer check-ins for sessions that allow a moment to simply describe “How do I feel?” instead of starting with intense content right off the bat. Lynnea Brinkerhoff added that it helps to check in on: “What’s going on for you, what are you navigating right now?” in order to “hold each other in our humanity and empathy to be able to be present with each other.”
James Green shared that he sometimes has to listen to music for a few minutes ‘in stealth mode,’ to get out of middle-of-meeting-frustrations in virtual session, which allows him to better re-engage. He also offered that to limit the potentially alienating nature of virtual meetings and lack of eye contact, it is meaningful to become aware of the difference between looking at the screen vs. looking at the camera: James invites participants: “Hey Todd, I am looking at the camera and I am thinking of you - will you look at my screen, to have a sense that you are looking me in the eyes?” and then switch.
Barb Bickford reminded us that continuous virtual sessions may have us locked into certain physical positions at our desk/workspace and that daily walks and movement are important. She also has a note next to her camera that says: “Look here and smile!”
Another opportunity to combat the constant onslaught of online meetings was identified by Becky Burns, who reminded us that maybe not every meeting has to be on Zoom: “We forget that we have a telephone that we can pick up and just have a phone call - and just talk to somebody.”
Argerie Vasilakes offered the importance of being more informal AND inclusive - to move around and invite the whole group to move around: Check out the ‘shaky exercise’ [@ 25:00] and the somewhat more formal ‘shoulder shrug’ in the session video. Another idea was to invite everyone’s cats and dogs into the screen to turn Zoom fatigue into Zoom joy.
Other ideas from the group included:
Put the speaker view of a virtual session as close to your camera position as possible to create a sense of connection across the camera and screens.
Encourage informal relaxed session,
Use dual workstations/locations to not be stuck in the same spot,
Have sessions where everyone is on a mobile device and has to take it outside,
Lay down and do Yoga during a meeting with the video off in listen-only mode,
Be a participant in someone else’s virtual session at least once a week,
Seek out ecstatic dance sessions online, and
Go outside with your laptop on your lap.
Stewart Levine reminded us that at this moment, many of us are grieving: “There is a letting go of the life that was, where we don’t really know what it will be like on the other side.” This bardo - the ambivalence and not knowing, takes some getting used to - to be okay with it. One way Stewart offered in dealing with it is through poetry.
Carol Gorelick reminded us that in the midst of all of this, if you are reading this blog post, you are most likely among the privileged in this world in dealing with our new challenges.
Stewart offered this poem & questions for reflection:
Life is learning
Following your yearning
Inspiring rebirth
Revealing worth
Longing peace minimize loss
Stay away from remorse
Don’t lose childlike play
Things rearrange every day
Achievement income drives our world
Seek solace in a mindless swirl
Changes come fast and deep
Changes too hamper sleep
Clutch what calms emotion
Belonging on a world in motion
Myth of control knowing what’s so
Again and again letting go
Emerge from a chrysalis state
See the world with a clean slate
Sorry there is no big plan
Let life reveal what it can
How do you maintain equanimity?
What throws you off?
What keeps you on track?
Check out NEXUS4change’s webinar series of 30-min. high-impact change tool talks. Check our events page [www.NEXUS4change.com/events] for more.