There is a kickoff meeting. People participate in training. New tools or materials arrive. Leadership explains why the work matters. Everyone is engaged.

But what happens six months later?

What happens when implementation becomes difficult? When the consultant leaves? When funding changes? When a key leader moves on, experienced people leave, or new people join who never heard the original explanation?

Too often, sustainability is treated as a question for later:

Let’s get this launched. Then we can move on.

The problem is that after the initial launch, it is often too late to establish the conditions that determine whether the initiative will last.

Whether the organization is a school district, a company, a community organization, or a nonprofit, the challenge is the same: sustainability needs to be built into the launch.

Sustainability is more than keeping a program alive

An initiative does not become sustainable simply because people liked the training or because the first results were encouraging.

It needs enough ownership, capability, support, capacity, continuity, and adaptability to keep functioning after the initial push disappears.

Sustainability also should not mean preserving every original practice forever.

Schools and any organization made up of people are complex human systems. People respond to one another. Conditions change. Priorities compete. Resources shift. Unexpected problems emerge.

A sustainable initiative is one in which the organization develops the ability to keep pursuing the intended outcome while learning and adapting as conditions change.

How do you prepare for that from the beginning?

Here are six places to look.

1. Who owns the initiative besides the original champion?

Imagine that the superintendent, CEO, executive director, department head, project leader, or consultant most associated with the initiative disappeared tomorrow.

Who would keep the work moving?

If the answer is essentially no one, the initiative may have a champion, but it does not yet have distributed ownership.

There is an important difference between compliance and commitment. People can attend training, complete required tasks, and follow procedures while leadership is watching without becoming invested in the initiative. When the pressure disappears or implementation becomes difficult, so can the behavior.

Ownership grows when people understand the purpose, have meaningful opportunities to influence implementation, and see themselves as participants in improving the work rather than recipients of someone else’s plan.

Ask: Who would care enough about the outcome to keep working on this if the person who launched it were gone?

2. Can people solve problems without waiting for the expert?

No implementation plan can anticipate everything.

A new process conflicts with an existing one. Customers, students, or clients respond differently than expected. Staffing changes. Technology creates a bottleneck. Someone discovers a better way to accomplish part of the work.

What happens next?

If every unexpected situation has to travel upward to one administrator, executive, consultant, or expert, the initiative is fragile.

Training people to follow a procedure is not the same as developing their ability to respond when the procedure no longer fits.

MindShifting emphasizes staying resourceful in those moments: observe what is actually happening, question assumptions, consider alternatives, and decide what to try next.

Ask: When something goes wrong, who will have the knowledge, authority, and confidence to help figure out what to do next?

3. What happens after the training ends?

Training is an event.

Implementation is a process.

People forget things. They misunderstand parts of the training. They encounter situations the trainer never discussed. What seemed straightforward in a workshop can become much harder in a classroom, customer meeting, workplace, or ordinary day.

Where can people ask questions? Who will coach them? When will they have opportunities to practice, compare experiences, and learn from one another? How will successful adaptations spread? How will leadership discover where people are struggling?

An implementation plan that ends with “everyone completes the training” probably does not yet have a sustainability plan.

Ask: What ongoing practice, coaching, feedback, or support will people need after the initial rollout?

4. What else has to give?

New initiatives consume time and attention.

If nothing is removed, simplified, combined, or replaced, people may be asked to implement the new work on top of everything they were already doing.

Eventually something gives.

When staff is overburdened, too often it’s the initiative. People may preserve its visible requirements while quietly dropping the parts that demand the most thought and effort; the ones that deliver results.

Leaders may look at each new requirement individually and think it is reasonable. The people doing the work experience the combined load of the initiative plus everything else expected of them.

Capacity therefore belongs in the sustainability conversation from the beginning.

Ask: What will people stop, simplify, combine, or do differently so they have the capacity to implement this well?

If the answer is “nothing,” maybe that points to a need for more exploration and problem solving.

5. What happens when people change?

Turnover and leadership transitions are normal organizational conditions.

Imagine someone joining your organization two years from now.

Could that person discover what the initiative is trying to accomplish, why it matters, which elements are essential and which can adapt, how to perform the work well, where to get help, and how problems and concerns are surfaced?

If that knowledge lives primarily in the memories of the people who happened to be present at launch, time is working against you.

Ask: If key people leave or new people arrive, what will allow the initiative to continue without blowing up?

6. How will the initiative keep learning?

Perhaps the most important sustainability question is:

How will we keep learning what is working and what needs to change?

Because organizations are complex, some assumptions will prove wrong. Some adaptations will help. Others will not. Unexpected consequences will appear.

A sustainable initiative needs a recurring way to notice what is happening and respond.

A leadership or implementation team might periodically ask: What are we observing? What seems to be working? Where are people struggling? What has surprised us? Which assumptions may no longer be accurate? What should we continue, change, investigate, or try next?

This is the logic of an OODA loop: Observe, Orient, Decide, Act. For more on OODA, read Teaching for Adaptation.

The purpose is not to keep changing the initiative. It is to make sure that changes in reality produce learning rather than drift.

Ask: What recurring process will we use to learn from results, setbacks, and changing conditions and decide what to do next?

The Six-Question Sustainability Cheat Sheet

Choose one initiative you are planning, implementing, or trying to strengthen. Answer these six questions:

1. Ownership: Who would care enough about the outcome to keep working on this if the person who launched it were gone?

2. Problem-solving capability: When something goes wrong, who has the knowledge, authority, and confidence to help figure out what to do next?

3. Ongoing support: What ongoing practice, coaching, feedback, or support will people need after the initial rollout?

4. Capacity: What will people stop, simplify, combine, or do differently so they have the capacity to implement this well?

5. Continuity: If key people leave or new people arrive, what will allow the initiative to continue without having to start over?

6. Learning and adaptation: What recurring process will we use to learn from results, setbacks, and changing conditions and decide what to do next?

Then ask one final question:

Which one or two of these pose the greatest threat to this initiative over the next year?

You do not need to solve every long-term problem today.

But identifying the vulnerabilities now gives you time to do something about them.

A principal introduces a new policy, and a teacher hears, You don’t trust my judgment. A teacher raises concerns about missing assignments, and a parent hears, You think I’m a bad parent. A colleague questions your proposal, and your brain registers, They’re attacking my competence.

At that point, the problem is no longer just the policy, the assignments, or the proposal. Your brain may have shifted into threat mode. Once that happens, some of the very capacities you need to solve the problem become harder to access: curiosity, perspective, empathy, creativity, and flexible thinking.

That was one of eight ideas Dana Goodier and I explored during my recent appearance on her Out of the Trenches podcast.

The idea I keep coming back to is this:

Before trying to change another person’s behavior or solve the problem in front of you, make sure you are in a mental state capable of solving it.

Sometimes the most useful question in a difficult conversation isn’t: “How do I convince them?”

It’s: “Could I be in limbic mode right now? And what would help me move back into a more resourceful state?”

That small shift in awareness can change what happens next—from defending and convincing to becoming curious about what you might be missing.

I wrote more about why this happens, what it does to conflict, and how “what am I missing?” can change what becomes possible.

Read: “The Goodier-Weisburgh Interview: Can You Solve This Problem?”

https://mindshiftingwithmitch.blog/2026/08/12/the-goodier-weisburgh-interview-can-you-solve-this-problem/

Before trying to change another person’s behavior or solve the problem in front of you, make sure you are in a mental state capable of solving it.

That was the central theme of a conversation I recently had with Dana Goodier on her Out of the Trenches podcast.

Dana uses her podcast and book to share educators’ stories of coming “out of the trenches”—how they have navigated challenges in education and developed the resilience to thrive. In our conversation, we explored why smart, capable, well-intentioned people can still make poor decisions, escalate conflicts, and use approaches that work against what they are trying to accomplish.

We touched on eight ideas:

1. Not every problem has one right answer.

2. Expertise is valuable, but experts shouldn’t automatically determine the solution to complex problems.

3. Under threat, the brain shifts from resourceful thinking to reactive thinking.

4. Conflict often isn’t really about the issue being discussed.

5. You can de-escalate conflict without surrendering authority.

6. Motivation is less about willpower and more about alignment.

7. Burnout needs to be addressed before someone becomes completely overwhelmed.

8. Prepare for difficult conversations rather than relying on yourself to improvise while triggered.

I want to dig a little deeper into #4, because it helps explain why so many conversations go wrong even when both people have legitimate concerns.

When the argument stops being about the argument

At one point Dana observed, “Often when people at work have difficult conversations, sometimes these conversations tend to spiral despite good intentions.”

Despite good intentions, that’s important.

Suppose a principal announces a new instructional policy. A teacher hears it and immediately thinks:

They don’t trust my judgment.

Or a teacher talks with a parent about a student’s missing assignments, and the parent hears:

You’re saying I’m a bad parent.

Or a colleague questions a proposal you’ve spent weeks developing, and what registers in your brain is:

They’re attacking my competence.

The conversation may appear to be about the policy, the assignments, or the proposal. But something else has happened.

The brain has detected a threat.

As I explained to Dana, when we move into that reactive state, “you lose the ability to then say, ‘Well, wait a minute…maybe he’s 10% right.’”

Why is mindset imporant?

That may sound like a small thing, but it is enormously important, and it occurs frequently in our conversations at school, at work, at home, with anyone we try to influence, persuade, coach, or advise.

The term limbic mode describes what happens when our survival-oriented systems begin driving our response. Fight, flight, freeze, following what others are doing, or falling back on familiar habits can take over remarkably quickly.

The term sage mode is when the brain is not treating the situation primarily as a threat. That gives us greater access to the capacities we need for good judgment: perspective, empathy, curiosity, creativity, and flexible problem-solving. Instead of automatically defending ourselves or falling back on familiar responses, we can pause, consider what else might be true, recognize the other person’s point of view, and choose a response based on what is most likely to help rather than what feels most immediately protective.

When limbic mode happens, we lose access to some of the capabilities we most need: perspective, empathy, curiosity, creativity, and flexible problem-solving.

Now imagine what happens when both people react this way.

One person feels threatened and responds defensively. That response feels threatening to the other person, who becomes defensive in return. The first person experiences that reaction as further evidence that the other person is unreasonable.

Pretty soon, two intelligent, well-intentioned people can be fighting about something quite different from the issue that originally brought them together.

This is why one of the most useful things we can learn during conflict isn’t a brilliant argument.

It’s self-awareness.

Near the end of our conversation, Dana asked me for the one thing I most wanted listeners to remember. My answer was:

“Self-awareness is the key first step.”

When I notice that a conversation isn’t going well, one of the questions I try to ask myself is:

Could I be in limbic mode right now? How could I get into sage mode?

Sometimes merely recognizing it changes what becomes possible. Instead of concentrating on how to prove the other person wrong, I can become curious. Instead of preparing my rebuttal, I can listen. Instead of asking, How do I get this person to agree with me? I can ask, What am I missing?

That doesn’t mean giving in, abandoning authority, or pretending every position is equally good.

It means getting yourself into a state where you are actually capable of making a good decision about what to do next.

Dana and I explored these ideas in much more depth in our conversation on Out of the Trenches.

Watch the full interview here:

Two reading specialists normally worked with small groups of students in classrooms at the back of the school. After several days of heavy rain, water had seeped into both rooms. A large section of each floor was covered with standing water.

The rooms were unusable. The rooms presented serious safety concerns.

The principal told the specialists to combine and conduct their lessons in one of the two conference rooms that were sometimes reserved by teachers for meetings, student projects, and other activities.

A classroom teacher had reserved one of the conference rooms for a ninety-minute student activity. When the classroom teacher arrived and saw that the reading specialist was using it, the teacher found the other available room nearby, directed the students there, and started.

An half hour later, however, the class that had reserved that second room arrived. The classroom teacher and students now had to leave.

Already frustrated by the disruption, the classroom teacher approached the reading specialist.

“You and your students need to get out of this room,” the classroom teacher said. “We reserved it.”

The reading specialist explained that the principal had assigned them room for the day because their classrooms were flooded.

“Then go back to your regular classroom,” the classroom teacher replied.

“We can’t,” the reading specialist said. “There is standing water on the floor. It would be dangerous for the students, and we could cause additional damage to the room.”

“Then keep the students on the dry side,” the classroom teacher said. “You can stand near the water.”

“I could slip or come into contact with the electrical cords,” the reading specialist replied. “It isn’t safe for me either.”

“That would still be better than my students losing their room and you can’t expect me to move my class there. If you don’t want to do that, cancel your lessons for today.”

The reading specialist understandably felt attacked. The classroom teacher was not merely questioning the room assignment. The teacher appeared to be saying that the reading specialist’s safety mattered and the welfare of the reading students was less important than the inconvenience being experienced by another class.

That interpretation could quickly push the reading specialist into a fight response.

Imagine that you were the reading specialist and you were already in a reactive state, how might you respond to this statement?

“That would still be better than my students losing their room or someone getting hurt while we move all of our materials again.”

Would you defend yourself? Attack the classroom teacher in return? Point out the selfishness or cruelty of the remark? Would your response make the classroom teacher feel even more threatened, defensive, or determined to win?

But another interpretation was also possible.

The classroom teacher was upset. A carefully planned activity had been disrupted twice. Students were waiting. Materials had to be moved. The classroom teacher felt responsible for keeping the class under control and could not immediately see a workable solution.

There were no solutions that were going to leave everyone completely whole. The principal could have communicated that to everyone.

And none of that made the classroom teacher’s comments appropriate. It did, however, help explain them.

In a limbic mindset, people often lose access to perspective, empathy, and flexible problem-solving. They become focused on eliminating the immediate threat or frustration in front of them. The classroom teacher was no longer considering the safety of the reading specialist, the needs of the students receiving support, or the fact that no solution could give everyone exactly what they wanted.

When we are overwhelmed, we sometimes don’t have the skills or self-awareness to handle our emotions. The classroom teacher might not even have recognized the meaning of what had just been said.

Now imagine that as the reading specialists you had the skills and wherewithall that you were able to pause.

What if you recognized that the classroom teacher was in a limbic state and was not fully in control of what they were saying? What if you understood that the remark was not really a judgment of your value or your safety, but the response of someone who was overwhelmed and temporarily unable to see the situation from anyone else’s perspective?

You would not have to surrender, accept the insult, or place yourself or your students in danger. But you might be able to maintain the boundary without escalating the conflict.

How might your response be different from a limbic reaction to the classroom teacher’s statement?

When people speak to us from a reactive mindset, their words can be deeply personal. Sometimes they feel like a personal attack. But they also reveal much more about the person’s overwhelmed state than about us. And we can control whether we react or we respond.

Understanding that difference—and learning how to pause, reset, and choose a more resourceful response—is a central part of what MindShifting is all about.

I had a fascinating conversation with Jacqueline Kucera, author of Fearless Mind: How Your Human Brain Beats Artificial Intelligence and Lisa Thee author of Go! Reboot your Career in 90 Days.

During the conversation, author and technology leader Lisa Thee described that her work around preventing human trafficking was attracting greater attention worldwide, and she was approaching the possibility of becoming far more publicly visible than she had ever wanted to be. In fact, it scared her.

She understood that visibility might be necessary to fulfill her mission. She wanted to serve as a role model for the next generation, particularly for women entering technology and leadership. Yet being seen also felt dangerous.

Her question was essentially: What do you do when what you feel you should do triggers anxiety or fear?

All of us get that feeling. Kids get it, adults get it, men get it, women get it. It’s human.

We don’t have to let it control us, and we can help our students, family, and coworkers become free as well.

One way to understand that reaction is through what many therapists call Part X: a part of the mind that tries to protect us from danger by scaring us that we aren’t good enough, or aren’t worthy, or that we are bound to fail.

Part X is not primarily concerned with helping us build a meaningful life. Its job is survival. Because anything new involves uncertainty, and uncertainty carries some possibility of failure, embarrassment, rejection, or loss, Part X tries to stop us from taking risks.

It may say:

• Who do you think you are?

• People are going to criticize you!

• You’re going to be a public failure.

• If you do this your life will spin out of control.

These thoughts can feel like objective assessments of reality. They are not. But they are not entirely false, either. Moving forward may involve risk. Greater visibility may bring criticism. A new responsibility may become difficult. An ambitious project may fail.

Part X notices those possibilities and presents them as reasons not to act.

But Part X does not simply warn you about the consequences of one particular choice. It personally attacks you no matter which option you consider.

1. If you think about moving forward, it may say, This is why you are a failure. You are always starting things that do not work out.

2. If you consider not moving forward, it may say, This is why you are a failure. You never have the courage to follow through on anything.

3. If you think about postponing the decision, it may accuse you of procrastinating, avoiding responsibility, or once again being unable to make up your mind.

Part X can take any possible course of action and turn it into evidence that you are incapable, undeserving, or fundamentally flawed. Its voice does not sound like a calm warning. It sounds like a personal attack designed to make you feel unworthy and give up.

If every possible choice triggers criticism, the criticism itself cannot tell you which choice is right. Recognizing this pattern matters. It tells you only that your protective system has detected uncertainty and is warning you about the risks of whatever you are considering.

That distinction gives us back our power.

We do not have to accept Part X’s attacks as the truth about who we are. We can recognize them as stories based on survival instincts, warnings from a protective part of the brain that is scanning for danger.

We can say:

I understand that moving forward carries risks.

I understand that not moving forward carries risks.

Postponing the decision also carries risks.

Thank you for pointing those out.

Usually, just after saying that, we feel lighter.

Part X has done its job. It has alerted us to possible danger. But it does not get to make the final decision.

That decision can be based on our values, goals, priorities, and the kind of life we want to create.

Jacqueline Kucera added another important dimension to the conversation. Today, we know far more about the brain, emotions, and stress responses than previous generations did. That knowledge gives us the ability to become more conscious of what is happening inside us.

Instead of treating every uncomfortable emotion as evidence that we are making the wrong decision, we can become curious:

• What am I feeling?

• What might this reaction be trying to protect me from?

• Is this danger immediate and real, or am I reacting to uncertainty?

• What do I value enough to move toward despite the discomfort?

That reflection is especially important during periods of change. Careers are shifting. Technology, especially AI, is transforming how we work. Many people are reconsidering traditional employment, starting businesses, changing roles, or finding new ways to contribute.

Dr. Kucera pointed out that we need people who are willing to model those transitions—not because they feel no fear, but because they can hear the attacks of Part X, recognize the warnings beneath them, and still decide how they want to move forward.

Anxiety can be a useful signal. It can remind us to slow down, gather information, prepare, and proceed thoughtfully.

But it should not be the boss.

Perhaps the best evidence came from Lisa herself. After hearing this explanation of Part X, she said, “I’m feeling a little brave for once based on what we’ve just discussed, and I think I’m just gonna take a risk.”

Why do I think we will all soon be watching Lisa lead the next generation of women entering technology and leadership?

• Confirmation Bias: The deeply human tendency to actively ignore feedback or information that contradicts what we already believe to be true, while heavily weighting data that supports it.

• The Bandwagon Effect: The inclination to believe or do certain things simply because the rest of the group is doing so, taking the path of least mental resistance.

• Teacher Bias & Gifted Label Bias: Preconceived notions in education where a teacher interprets actions differently based on established feelings or labels assigned to a student.

• Affinity Bias: The illusion that we are objectively measuring competence or generating great ideas, when we are actually just naturally attracted to working with people who look and think exactly like us.

Continue reading …

The challenges are real and familiar.

• Anxiety about difficult conversations or decisions. That inner voice that second-guesses everything.

• Reacting defensively to feedback—even when it’s helpful.

• Feeling overwhelmed by expectations from work or family.

• Self-doubt in moments that matter.

• And for many educators, navigating student dynamics, negativity, or disengagement while trying to stay grounded themselves.

The goal of MindShifting Practice Labs is to explore real problems people are actually facing and connect them to practical tools that help them become more effective, confident, and resourceful. Effective, confident, and resourceful based on what they experiences in their jobs, in their families, with students, everywhere.

One question that came up in our last session was: How do you know if that inner voice is a saboteur—or something you should actually be listening to?

It’s a great question. The distinction we explored is this: saboteur voices tend to criticize no matter what you do. They push you toward inaction, second-guessing, or fear-based decisions. But they can still contain useful information. The key is to treat them as messengers, not decision-makers—listen for what they might be warning you about, then step back and choose your response from a more grounded, intentional place.

Discussing real challenges makes it clear very quickly is that these aren’t isolated issues; every single one of us faces them every single day. We face them, our family members face them, our coworkers face them, and our students face them.

They are as incredibly frustrating and stressful as they are ubiquitous. The more we focus on solving them, they stronger they come back.

That’s where the MindShifting tools come in.

The second session focused on a simple but powerful framework: Awareness → Calm → Change. First, noticing when we’re caught in a reactive pattern. Then calming the emotional response so we’re not operating from stress or fear. And finally, changing the story driving the behavior so we can respond more intentionally.

A big part of that awareness is recognizing what we call “Part X”—the inner saboteur. This is the voice that criticizes, doubts, and often attacks no matter what choice you make. Again, the goal isn’t to eliminate it, but to recognize it and put it in the right role. It’s not “truth.” It’s not “the boss.” It’s one possible story.

From there, we explored the difference between scripts and stories. Stories are the meaning we assign to situations. Scripts are the automatic behaviors that follow. Neither are reality—they’re constructions. And once you’re aware of them, you can rewrite them.

Changing the story is where real shifts begin. Instead of defaulting to fear-based interpretations, we can ask: what do I actually want here? What’s a more useful or empowering way to see this?

We also reviewed more structured tools like SCORE—a process for unpacking recurring challenges by looking at symptoms, causes, desired outcomes, available resources, and the effects of change. SCORE helps move people from stuck patterns into deliberate action.

And then there’s the Emotional Cookie Jar—a simple but powerful way to build confidence by recalling past successes and resourceful states. It’s a reminder that we already have more capability than we often give ourselves credit for.

What makes the Practice Lab work is that these tools aren’t theoretical. They’re applied, tested, and refined in real situations, with real people, in real time.

That’s where the shift happens.

Our next practice lab starts July 8^th. Click here for more information or to register.

Conflict is everywhere.

While this article focuses on school leaders, the same pattern shows up in all workplaces, families, communities, and social interactions, with parents, staff, family members, coworkers, and community members.

A colleague uses a shared space right up until your event begins. A co-chair agrees with you in private and then reverses course in front of the group. A parent comes into a meeting already upset and critical. A spouse makes a comment that feels like an accusation.

Most of us like to think that when conflict happens, we will respond thoughtfully. We will listen. We will ask good questions. We will stay calm.

But that is not what usually happens when our nervous system senses threat.

Why Conflict Escalates So Quickly

When someone approaches us with anger, anxiety, criticism, or defensiveness, our brains tend to pick up that emotional state. Our mirror neurons are constantly reading the people around us. Is this person safe? Angry? Upset? Judging me? Attacking me?

When our brain reads the situation as a threat, our limbic system takes over. Cortisol and adrenaline flood the body. Our focus narrows. We lose access to some of our best thinking, empathy, creativity, and judgment. We become less resourceful, less resilient, and less collaborative.

And then we react.

We snap back. We argue. We justify. We shut down. We try to prove that we are right. Or we retreat and later wish we had said something better.

That reaction often triggers the other person’s nervous system. Their mirror neurons pick up our defensiveness, frustration, or fear. Then they escalate. Then we escalate. Before long, the conversation is no longer about the actual issue. It is about two nervous systems protecting themselves.

That is why conflict can spin out of control so quickly.

When Protection Gets in the Way of Connection

Consider a teacher who receives an angry message from a parent about a child’s evaluation results. The teacher’s natural instinct may be to defend the process: “This is standard procedure. This is what we know works. You are misunderstanding what happened.” The teacher may be right, but the response can still make things worse. If the parent already feels afraid or unheard, logic alone may land as dismissal.

Or imagine something as ordinary as cleaning up after dinner. You are washing dishes and someone says, “You didn’t clean the frying pan. Why do you always forget something?” Your thinking brain may know this is a small moment. But your limbic brain may hear, “You are careless. You are being judged. You are under attack.” Before you know it, you are defending yourself or firing back.

This is not because we are bad people. It is because our nervous systems are doing what they were designed to do: protect us.

The problem is that protection often gets in the way of connection.

Interrupting the Cycle

So how do we interrupt the cycle?

One of the most powerful ways is through what is called a noncomplementary response. That does not mean a response filled with praise. It means a response that does not match the other person’s emotional energy.

If someone attacks with anger, we do not attack back. If someone comes in defensive, we do not become defensive in return. If someone is anxious, we do not amplify the anxiety. Instead, we respond with calm, curiosity, empathy, or concern.

That different response gives the other person’s nervous system a different signal to mirror.

What a Noncomplementary Response Sounds Like

For example, an angry parent might say, “I can’t believe you sent my child to the principal’s office. What kind of teacher are you?”

A complementary response would be to defend yourself: “Your child broke the rules. I followed the policy.”

That may be true. It may also escalate the conversation.

A noncomplementary response might be: “I hear that you’re upset, and it sounds like you’re really concerned about your child. I’m concerned about your child too. Can you help me understand more about how you’re seeing this?”

That response does not surrender authority. It does not mean the teacher agrees with the parent’s accusation. It does something more useful. It reduces threat. It communicates concern. It opens the possibility of dialogue.

The Pause Before the Response

But we usually cannot offer that kind of response unless we pause first.

That pause is crucial. In the moment, our first reaction is often not our best response. We need a few seconds to breathe, notice what is happening in our body, and remind ourselves that we do not have to be run by the survival brain.

One educator in one of our MindShifting courses received a highly accusatory email from a parent. Her immediate instinct was to justify herself. Instead, she paused. She took a few deep breaths. She reminded herself that the parent was probably concerned about the child. Then she wrote back in a calm, connecting way, emphasizing that they both cared about the student and asking how they could work together.

The parent’s next email was gracious and receptive.

The facts had not changed.

The child still had been disciplined. The parents heard their child and responded to the child’s version of what happened by attacking the teacher. The teacher’s initial reaction was anger back at the parents.

What Was the Shift?

What was the shift?

The teacher had the self-awareness to realize she was in limbic mode. She knew one of her strengths was that she had the skills to calm herself down. She asked herself what would be a good outcome for all concerned. And she made a reply to enlist the parents to join her in furthering their child and her student.

We do not train ourselves for dialogue by memorizing perfect words. We train ourselves by learning how to regulate our nervous system before and during difficult conversations.

Here are three free helpful tools from the MindShifting With Mitch website that can be downloaded free.

Tool 1: The Personal Strengths Inventory

The first tool is the Personal Strengths Inventory. When we are calm, we identify strengths we can draw on in challenging moments: curiosity, kindness, persistence, courage, fairness, patience, or compassion. Then we create a statement we can use before entering a difficult conversation. Something like, “I have curiosity and persistence. I can handle this conversation with respect.”

That may sound simple, but positive self-talk can help activate the more resourceful parts of the brain. Afterward, we reflect: What worked well? What strengths did I use? What might I do differently next time? What did I learn about myself?

Tool 2: Strengths-Based Feedback and CASES

Another tool is strengths-based feedback using the CASES method: Context, Action, Strength, Effect, and Step. This approach helps us give feedback in a way that reduces defensiveness.

Instead of saying, “You missed the deadline again,” we might start by saying, “I noticed the report came in two days after the deadline. I appreciated that you reached out for clarification during the process.”

The difference is not just politeness. The first is perceived as an attack, the second disarms that fight instinct with a compliment. The difference is whether the other person’s nervous system hears attack or hears useful information.

Tool 3: The Workplace Conflicts Curiosity Toolkit

A third tool is a Workplace Conflicts Curiosity Toolkit. When we feel ourselves trying to convince, correct, or win, this tool reminds us to get curious instead. What need of mine is not being met? What need of theirs might not be met? What question could I ask that would help us understand each other better?

For example, when a change-averse educator resists a new instructional strategy and says, “That would never work with our students,” the natural reaction is to argue the evidence. But if that colleague is feeling judged, overwhelmed, or dismissed, more evidence does not persuade them. That’s a function of biology and we see that all the time.

A more useful response might be to connect with them first: “It sounds like this feels really overwhelming. You know your classroom best. I’m not here to force anything. What feels most challenging about this right now?”

That response protects autonomy. It lowers defensiveness. It opens a door to a more productive interaction.

The Larger Goal: Resourceful Dialogue

The larger goal is to make progress on initiatives, not to avoid conflict. Conflict is part of life. In schools and organizations, conflict often points to something that matters: unmet needs, unclear expectations, competing priorities, fear, fatigue, or lack of trust.

The path forward is to move from reactive conflict to resourceful dialogue.

When we can pause, regulate ourselves, and respond with curiosity instead of threat, we change what becomes possible. We are more likely to hear what is really going on. We are more likely to help the other person feel safe enough to think. We are more likely to solve the actual problem instead of escalating the emotional one.

That is the movement from fight-or-flight to flow.

Three Free Resources

To help with this, the three free resources above are available on the MindShifting With Mitch website:

The Personal Strengths Inventory helps you identify, use, and refine your strengths before and after difficult conversations.

The Strengths-Based Feedback Guide introduces the CASES method for offering feedback in a way that reduces defensiveness.

The Workplace Conflicts Curiosity Toolkit helps you stop trying to convince and start asking the kinds of questions that can turn conflict into collaboration.

You can download these free resources at https://mindshiftingwithmitch.org/GetInvolved.

What State Do You Bring Into the Room?

The next time you walk into a difficult conversation, the question is not just, “What should I say?”, or “How can I get this person to agree?”, or “How do I get this person to do what they should?”

A better question is, “What state do I want to bring into the room?” The three tools above can help, and they are a sampling of the concepts and techniques in the MindShifting: Conflict and Collaboration book and course. The course is offered in January and is free for educators in NY and Washington states.

The way we show up shapes what becomes possible.

The S.C.O.R.E. model was developed in 1987 by Robert Dilts and Todd Epstein. Dilts and Epstein gave courses in Neural Linguistic Programming (NLP) for therapists and coaches. One area that kept tripping up their course participants was helping others become resourceful when they were stuck in fight, freeze, or fawn mode. Dilts and Epstein devised the S.C.O.R.E. method as a way to coach patients or clients to be curious and confident.

The technique is specifically designed for recurring situations where you know you get blocked, allowing you to replace anxiety or frustration with a playful, curious, and resourceful state.

The core mechanism involves using an anchor—a specific stimulus like a touch, a word, or taking a deep breath—which triggers a feeling of competence from a past success. You then bring that anchored resourcefulness over to the specific situation that usually triggers your limbic state.

The S.C.O.R.E. Acronym

The letters stand for a method that takes people through a way of exploring the situation itself, what causes our reactions, and how to maintain a feeling of calm and resourcefulness so that we can achieve better outcomes.

• Symptoms: The immediate signs that tell you there is a problem, such as feeling blocked, used, or angry.

• Causes: The antecedent conditions, underlying triggers, or constraints that give rise to the symptoms (e.g., the person making the recurring request).

• Outcomes: Your desired result, goal, or the resourceful way you want to feel instead of the problem.

• Resources: The qualities, capabilities, reserves, and anchors you can bring to bear on solving the problem.

• Effects: The longer-term, systemic, and higher-level results that achieving the outcome will have on your life, family, or team.

Continue reading

Many of you know I helped organize and run a cooking program for preteens at our local Hispanic center, the Community Resource Center (CRC) in Mamaroneck.

Now that our first cohort has graduated, we and the center made plans for it to continue. They found a director of the program, we scheduled the next series, we already had a waiting list based on the enthusiasm of the kids and parents in the first cohort.

And then I brought up, “Well, how is this going to be funded?”

Our contacts that the center were crestfallen. “Well, we really don’t have the funding. We are thinking of reducing the number of children, not starting now, and we will reach out to finance and the development office.”

I did come up with a few ideas, and the CRC sent an email out to us, the executive director of the center, and the head of development.

Within ten minutes Jirandy Martinez, the Executive Director replied.

“This is a successful program we have to continue. Please proceed to start the next cohort and hiring the new director. We will find the funds. Don’t worry about the funding.”

My response was, “Sorry, it is in my nature to worry. We at Rotary will help however you need us both in the program and assisting with fundraising.”

The director of fundraising replied, “Mitch, that’s my job to worry about! This is what I do. We have many options.”

Don’t you love it when things work out?

The image above is just one of the pictures of the joy from this program. If you want to see the collection of photos, here is the link.

It’s not that expensive. Twelve kids over seven weeks. Including the costs of the new director, food, and cleanup, about $2,000 for the whole thing, now that we have all the equipment. We hope to offer 5 programs a year. And I and the entire Larchmont Rotary team are invited back to participate!

And even though I am really happy, I still can’t help but worry. If you want to support the program, here is the donation link for the Community Resource Center, and make sure you stipulate, “Please use this to support the Cooking to Grow program”.

But our brains pretend they’re simple, because that’s more comfortable.

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Have you ever offered someone perfectly good advice, only to have it blow up in your face? We’ve all been there. We see a coworker, a student, or a family member struggling, and we know exactly how to fix their problem. So, we step in and tell them what to do. But instead of thanking us, they get defensive, argue, or shut down, and suddenly we find ourselves in a conflict.

Why does this happen? When we tell people what to do, their brains automatically perceive it as a threat to their autonomy. The moment this happens, their fast, automatic “survival brain” takes over, triggering a fight, flight, or freeze response. When they enter this survival mode, they literally lose access to their “resourceful brain”—the prefrontal cortex where critical thinking, creativity, and problem-solving reside. They become biologically incapable of absorbing your good advice.

This resistance creates a trap for the advice-giver. When the other person pushes back, it triggers our own survival brain. We get frustrated and start using logic, facts, or our authority to force them to agree. This only causes the other person to double down, locking both parties into an escalating “limbic-to-limbic” battle.

To break this destructive cycle, sixty years of research shows we must shift from telling to asking. Two highly effective frameworks for this are Motivational Interviewing (MI) and Nonviolent Communication (NVC).

Motivational Interviewing is based on the premise that people are far more likely to follow through on a solution if they author it themselves. When people are prompted to consider their own actions and goals, they are able to understand what is missing—a concept known as “developing discrepancy”—and use their resourceful brains to brainstorm ways to address it. MI teaches us how to approach these conversations by focusing on curiosity-based requests rather than demands. It requires us to:

• Adopt an attitude of curiosity: MI is done with another person, not to them. Stay in your resourceful brain and avoid the urge to judge.

• Ask open-ended questions: Avoid questions that trigger defensiveness, like “Why did you do that?” Instead, ask questions that prompt them to think about their goals, like “What would you like to happen?”.

• Use reflective listening: Neutrally repeat back their concerns so they feel heard and can clarify their own thoughts.

• Affirm their ability to change: Acknowledge their strengths and past successes to lower their defenses.

Nonviolent Communication complements this by providing a structured way to make requests without sounding like you are giving orders. It involves neutrally stating an observation, expressing your feelings, connecting those feelings to a need, and finishing with a clear, actionable request.

Why You Should Host an “Asking Instead of Telling” Conversation Circle

Understanding this shift is one thing; putting it into practice is another. Changing our habit of demanding takes repetition, which is why I highly recommend downloading our free “Asking Instead of Telling” Conversation Circle packet.

Holding a 45-minute guided conversation with your team, family, or friends is a powerful way to transform how your group communicates. Here is why you should host one:

• It builds shared awareness: The packet guides your group through exploring what it feels like to be told versus asked, helping everyone recognize the physical and emotional signs of their reactive brains.

• It creates a common vocabulary: By discussing why telling feels easier than asking, your group develops a shared language to catch themselves before making demands.

• It provides safe practice: The guide includes a “Try It” phase where partners can take a recent demand they made that isn’t working and safely practice rephrasing it into a curiosity-based question.

• It requires no expertise: Everything is built for you, from icebreakers to discussion questions. You just need to be willing to start the conversation.

When we ask genuine questions, we invite the other person’s resourceful brain to start thinking and collaborating. Download the packet today, gather your group, and save your organization from countless unnecessary conflicts.

Click to Download

And please forgive me for my scheduling snafu. Next week MindShifting Monday with Mitch really will take place on Monday.

wrote a Substack article on May 10 that really delineated the difference between pain and suffering. The title of the article is Anticipation Is Its Own Kind of Suffering.

When something happens that hurts us, physically or emotionally, we feel pain.

When we anticipate that pain before an event that may or may not happen, or when we dwell on that pain long after it happened, we suffer.

We often don’t recognize suffering, because we think of it as merely waiting (for whatever it is to happen) or remembering (whatever happened). We fixate on the situation and it triggers our anterior cingulate cortex, amygdala, and prefrontal cortex to flood us with negative thoughts and feelings. And that’s what suffering is.

Prolonged suffering is especially hard because we cannot fix the event: it hasn’t happened yet or it happened in the past. Human beings are story-telling machines; that’s how we predict what might happen and how we remember what did. But prolonged suffering is storytelling changes the body and brain: chest tightening, nausea, anger, fear, restlessness.

The fact is, what we remember or what we are waiting for are just stories. The stories are real because that’s what we tell ourselves, and we suffer.

Suffering hijacks the brain and is very difficult to interrupt. It has long-term consequences for mental and physical health, and in fact permeates all our decision making. Over the long-term people describe themselves as “foggy, depleted, emotionally brittle, physically off, or unlike themselves.”

Can we stop suffering?

As author Haruki Mruakami wrote, “Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.” That quote is about running, and extending it to life is a little glib, but there’s a lot of truth in it.

I’ve talked with people who have read the MindShifting: Stop Your Brain from Sabotaging Your Happiness and Success book or taken the MindShifting: Mastering Your Resourceful Brain Course.

They point to quite a few concepts and techniques that help them reframe suffering, and I’d like to focus on a few connected techniques that are related to what Shirzad Chamine calls The Sage Mindset. The Sage Mindset is a way of being that is brought about through four questions.

No concept or technique works for every person, and no concept or technique works for every situation. Still, a lot of people have found these four questions helpful.

Question 1: In ten years will this make a difference?

The Pareto Principle states that only 20% of the things we concern ourselves with make 80% of the difference in our lives; and that 80% of the things we concern ourselves with make only 20% of the difference in our lives.

When we ask ourselves, “is this in the 20% or the 80%?” we can often reduce the intensity of the suffering. If it’s not going to make much of a difference, then our fears, anxiety, or concern diminish.

Question 2: What will I (or what did I) learn?

This question moves us from focusing on whatever the event was to what we learned from it. This reframe of our focus by itself often reduces the pain, plus, our brains are designed to emit dopamine and endorphins when we learn. Between the reframe and the pleasure hormones, our suffering is often reduced.

Question 3: What will I (or what did I) practice?

Maybe you didn’t learn something, but you got or will get a chance to practice something that you are working on, self-control, interrupting negative emotions, skillful questioning techniques, establishing rapport.

If you can make a game out of practicing, you take your mental and emotional focus away from the suffering and direct it to something positive. You can even map your progress and improvement.

Question 4: What will I do now?

Taking action is one of the best ways to redirect our attention. We can take an action that might improve our results next time (such as practicing, simulating, talking with others, researching, and so on) or we can just take an action that rewards ourself (such as doing some activity, buying ourself some little pleasure). In the book, I talk about how, when someone gets me upset, I buy a few bottles of wine; just saying to myself, “I’m going to reward myself by buying some wine,” has a calming effect on me.

Dr. Hart points out, “Most people can survive very hard things once they finally know what is happening… Even painful truth gives a person something solid to face, grieve, resist, accept, or begin adapting to.”

Or as my coach Robbi Nierenberg would say, “The Sage Perspective is to Accept or Convert. Accept what has or will happen, or convert it into a gift or opportunity.”

Speaking of suffering, the image is of a petrified waterfall. Not petrified in the sense of scared; it’s not water, this is a rock formation. Our minds make it seem like a waterfall.

Walk into almost any school or district office right now and you can feel it.

The tension. The fatigue. The burnout. The short fuses.

Parents are worried about their children’s futures, and that fear often comes into schools as anger, blame, or defensiveness. Teachers are exhausted from accountability pressures, student behavior challenges, trauma, staffing shortages, and now the rapid disruption of AI. Students are dealing with anxiety, apathy, dysregulation, social pressure, cell phone dependence, and conflict they often do not yet have the tools to manage. Superintendents and principals are trying to respond to all of this while also navigating budgets, staffing, state requirements, community expectations, and political pressure.

In other words, we are in a pressure cooker, and that pressure cooker is whistling.

And school leaders are doing everything they can to keep the lid on.

Why is change so hard?

The problem is not that educators are not working hard enough. They are. In fact, they are working so hard they are omitting the self-care they desperately need.

The problem is that much of what schools and districts are doing to improve student outcomes is aimed at the visible symptoms rather than the root causes.

I call this the weed whacker approach.

When a problem shows up, we fix what we can see. A cell phone issue? Create a stricter policy. Student behavior problem? Increase consequences. Teacher resistance? Issue a clearer mandate. Parent conflict? Tighten procedures. Low performance? Add a new initiative. And the cure-all? Just buy some new tech.

The dandelion has been cut down. We saw a problem.. We made a decision. We took action. We led.

For a moment, it may look better.

But the root is still there.

Is the problem the problem or only what we notice?

And because the root is intact, the problem grows back. Sometimes it comes back in the same form. Sometimes it shows up somewhere else: yelling, demanding, opposing, threatening. running away, panicking, shutting down, isolating, not responding, mock compliance, exhaustion, zoning out, quitting, dropping out, or giving up.

This is why so many district initiatives fail to produce the results leaders hoped for. The goals aren’t wrong. At their core, everyone cares. But the approach unintentionally triggers the very survival-brain reactions that make improvement impossible.

• When teachers feel controlled instead of included, their brains read that as a threat.

• When parents feel dismissed or afraid for their child, their brains read that as a threat.

• When students feel overwhelmed, embarrassed, criticized, or powerless, their brains read that as a threat.

And when people are in that survival state, they lose access to the parts of the brain responsible for empathy, collaboration, flexible thinking, and problem-solving. The survival brain defaults to one or more of the fifteen behaviors of two paragraphs ago. They may comply on the surface, but underneath they are resisting, shutting down, blaming, defending, or waiting for the pressure to pass.

That is neurobiology.

This is one of the biggest reasons schools are under so much stress right now. We are trying to solve complex human problems with tools designed for simple compliance. It’s not a red pill/blue pill problem. It’s not a soup question. (If you don’t know that analogy, see the movie Finding Forrester. You’ll thank me.)

Schools are not simple machines. They are living systems made up of students, adults, families, emotions, histories, fears, hopes, and competing pressures. Rapidly changing.

That means the work of leadership has changed.

How has the role of leadership changed?

It is no longer enough to announce the right answer. Leaders have to create the conditions where people can become resourceful enough to act on workable answers.

That requires a different skill set.

It means recognizing when we are reacting from our own survival brain instead of responding from our more thoughtful, creative, collaborative brain. It means learning how to pause before escalating. It means helping staff, students, and families move out of defensiveness and back into problem-solving. It means replacing the instinct to mandate with the ability to build agency, buy-in, and ownership.

I have seen what happens when educators learn these tools.

One educator shared that her instinct in conflict had always been to argue her case and win. But once she learned to recognize when her survival brain was taking over, she began to pause. That pause changed the tone of her interactions and made her more effective. And that type of change is scalable.

A secondary music teacher talked about receiving accusatory emails from parents. Her old pattern was to defend herself and prove her point. But when she learned to stay more resourceful, she began validating the parent’s underlying concern instead of reacting to the attack. The hostility dropped, and the conversation became productive. And this type of change is scalable, too.

Another teacher working with students who often shut down began using role play and curiosity-based questioning outside of fight-or-flight moments. Instead of simply telling students what to do, she helped them practice how to work through challenge. Students began to see that not all stress is bad, and that they could build the capacity to move through difficulty instead of freezing. Also scalable.

That is the shift schools need.

What can work to change schools?

Not another quick fix. Not another mandate. Not another initiative that adds pressure to an already overloaded system.

Schools need the capacity to out-learn their obstacles.

That is why I am offering a free 60-minute master class for K-12 leaders on Wednesday, May 13, from 11:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Eastern: The 3 Biggest Mistakes Districts Make When Trying to Improve Student Performance: Equipping Schools to Out-Learn Obstacles and Improve Outcomes.

In this session, I will share the three common traps districts fall into when trying to improve student outcomes, and the three shifts that help leaders build more resilient, collaborative schools from the inside out.

We will look at how to move staff and students out of reactive survival-brain patterns and into more resourceful thinking. We will explore how to stop treating setbacks as failures and start using results as feedback. And we will examine how leaders can communicate in ways that reduce defensiveness instead of breeding resentment.

The timing matters.

If you are a superintendent, principal, district administrator, or education leader, you cannot wait until the middle of next year to address burnout, conflict, and resistance. The beginning of the year sets the tone. What you do over the summer can determine whether your schools enter August and September already bracing for another exhausting year — or prepared to become more collaborative, adaptive, and resourceful.

When you register, you will also receive the 30-Second Conflict De-Escalator Guide, a practical tool you can use the next time a student, parent, colleague, or staff member escalates — or the next time you feel yourself slipping into fight-or-flight.

Right now, too many schools feel like pressure cookers; the whistle is already wailing.

When the pressure is already that high, the answer is not to press harder on the lid.

Yet that is often what schools unintentionally do. We add more rules, more directives, more consequences, and more urgency, hoping the system will settle down. But pressure does not disappear because we demand compliance. It eases when people have the tools to regulate, reconnect, and respond more resourcefully.

Take action today

Schools do not need more pressure. They need better tools for working through pressure.

That is what MindShifting is designed to provide.

You can learn more and register (free) here: The 3 Biggest Mistakes Districts Make When Trying to Improve Student Performance.

For more info or to register