The Grasshopper was very long-winded during my walk the other day when he said, “When you give a pat answer, you only have access to your knowledge. When you give a reflective answer, you have access to your wisdom.”

What you know pales in comparison to what you have access to. We just have to get out of our head long enough to let our storehouse of creativity and wisdom bubble up.

Sometimes a pat answer is the most appropriate one, especially if it’s a fact based question. “Have you ever driven a lawn tractor?” The patterned answer to that question is going to be “yes” or “no.” You don’t need access to your wisdom to answer that.

Your communication with another will deepen when you go deeper for an answer to their question. You do that by pausing before answering and let you pat answers silently go by before you reply.

Just a slight pause is often all that’s needed to get past a worn out answer, to one that’s more relevant and revealing.

You will surprise yourself when you take a beat before you respond. Answers that you’ve never issued before make their way in to your communications – answers that provide insight, rather than being un-usefully trite.

You show a lot more respect to the person you’re communicating with when you give them access to all of you, rather than regaling them an airbrushed answer that has the nutritional value of cotton candy.

Your communications will greatly improve if you remember to take a mini-breather before responding.

Like the old Coca-Cola commercial said, “It’s the pause that refreshes.”

All the best,

John

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