What an Indie Film Project Taught Me about Communication

Nowadays, as a business leader, you feel like you have to engage the public constantly – without stop.

So why do you feel like you can’t connect with anybody?

Maybe, just maybe, all you need is some practice sharing experiences with other people.

In this hyper-connected world, there is this constant pressure to message. But at the same time, constant exposure starts to feel like constant peril. Litigation. Haters. The Competition. You need to succeed, but you also really can’t afford to fail. So, you risk-mitigate. Hyper-analyze your audience until they no longer feel like people. And you power-strategize with a 25-page communications plan (I've made them) that makes all your content read like it was generated by a computer. Or maybe you just do a selfie and an emoji because everybody else is doing it.

How do you get your wonder back?

I had my recent epiphany on the subject when helping two good friends, the married team of Jim Christy and Mary Phillipuk, generate support for their independent film project. The project is titled “Love and Communication,” and it will be based on the award-winning play that Jim wrote on the experiences he and Mary have had raising their 14-year-old son Jimmy, who has autism.

The play is beautiful. More than that, it is thrilling – a rare experience for a kitchen-sink drama. And it achieves this thrill by asking this most basic question: how do you communicate your love to someone who doesn’t experience the world by your rules?

I won’t ruin any surprises, but I will note that both Jim and Mary have devoted their lives to becoming students of how Jimmy lives and experiences. It is a never-ending education. And one important way they do this – you guessed it – is by simply sharing experiences with him.

It sounds painfully simple, because it is both simple, and painful. It’s not easy just sharing an experience with someone: without narrating it; without strategizing it; without judging it by the rules you've developed from other previous experiences. Without your mind wandering to today’s grocery shopping or your client meeting at 3 p.m.

Just do the thing. Be it a walk or planting a shrub or mixing bread dough, yada. Share it. Be there.

If you want, over-communicate the goobers out of the experience after the fact. But not then. Just share.

So why I am pushing you to try this zen-like mishegas? Simple. Because it forces you to recognize a connection with someone without all the blah blah blah.

Sometimes you have to reboot something by going beyond the words. And when it comes to connecting, we used to do it so easily when we were young. As kids, we just played with other kids, without trying to outflank each other for promotions or obsessing over our 401(k)s. (Of course I’m idealizing. Go find cynicism about childhood elsewhere.)

This is important because we connect in ways that go beyond whatever words we are in the habit of using. Beyond our risk-mitigation, strategic optimization and audience analyses. And when you forget how that feels, nothing you do will connect.

But when you do remember, it can be thrilling. It’s like rediscovering the fact that every person you talk to has their own mysteries and you haven’t discovered them all. That the connection you are looking for is ever so-slightly out of your complete control. It’s humbling. It’s exciting. It brings back your wonder. Like riding a bike.

Now, will this crazy little exercise solve all of your leadership communication problems. Um,...No. But it should solve a few – like remind you why you talk to people in the first place.

And that’s always worth remembering.

[If you MUST be academic about the subject of non-verbal communication, look into the work of such researchers as Prof. Albert Mehrabian at UCLA, Prof. Carrie Keating at Colgate University and Prof. Robin Akert at Wellesley College. But don't forget about the point of this simple zen-exercise and over-analyze the thing.]

P.S. IF YOU WANT TO BE PART OF THE INDIE FILM PROJECT.

They are, of course, looking for investors, sponsors, distributors and other allies for the funding and development of the film.

However, they would also be just as happy meeting with people to educate them on the subject, as well as network with parents and relatives who have loved ones on the spectrum. They want to share this experience as well.

You can learn more about the project by going to this website: https://www.loveandcommunication.com/

You can learn more about Jim at this website:

https://pwcenter.org/profile/james-christy

You can learn more about Mary, who is an architect and engineer, at this website:

https://phillipuk.com/about.html

This blog item has also been published on my website:

https://enchanted-loom.com/blog/