Clarity through Pencil Tips
"Thoughts disentangle themselves passing over the lips and through pencil tips” — Michael Hyatt
Paul McLean tells us we have a triune brain. It’s one brain with three parts, noted bottom to top: the reptilian complex, paleomammalian complex and neomammalian complex. The reptilian part of our brain manages the core body functions such as breathing and basic behaviors such as dominance and ritual displays. The middle part is the paleomammalian complex or the Limbic system. Motivation and emotion live here. The last part is the pre-frontal cortex where our executive functions live (although many Executives I know seem to be missing this part). Language, abstraction and the ability to build bridges live here.
Our brains are complex. Our ability to articulate our emotion requires a dizzying array of bilateral and triunal integration. I used to think my emotional catalog was relegated to happy, sad, hungry, tired. A few years ago, my bride has introduced me to a larger vocabulary to describe what I feel. This additional vocabulary has opened a new world. It’s as if I’ve shifted from the 8-color box of basic crayons to the 196-piece art kit. I’m not sure I know the difference between "calm" and "serene" any more than I know the difference between "ecru" and "ivory", but I can now acknowledge that there is a difference.
Think about the implications of how the mind works: the ‘middleware’ between our core functional, biological processes and our higher-level executive function is our emotions. The greater emotional vocabulary we have and the better our emotional health, the better we are able to navigate our experiences with fluency. Said more directly, until I become emotionally fluent, I will be ineffective in leading myself and others and will lack integration (‘integrity’). Emotional health is critical to leadership.
Hyatt is right: our thoughts (and emotions) become more clear as we do the work to disentangle them. Expanding my emotional vocabulary and wrestling the nuances helps sharpen my understanding of what’s going on inside my heart and mind.
That’s what this blog is. My efforts at disentangling my thoughts and emotions in order to understand them more fully so that I can grow serve more healthfully.