Hello, this is David Delmar, your host of SuperPower Creatives. And you’re listening to our episode, Conscious Thinking and Improvisation. I believe everyone is a creator and it’s this inherent birthright that’s the source of our superpowers. Stepping into this personal authority is scary though. This show celebrates creatives that stay true to who they really are, making a living using their creative superpowers. The stories they share will excite and inspire listeners to do the same, making a positive change in the world.
I’m really excited and truly honored to introduce our guest for today’s show. He’s a master of creativity and how he uses it to help others is nothing short of miraculous. Chris Nielson is an awakening coach, speaker, trainer, and consultant who creates one of a kind experiences, and shares big laughs with organizations like Intuit, Sony, San Diego State University, University of California at San Diego, and the San Diego Bar Association to name a few. He specializes in creating safe and successful environments through games that ultimately develop cooperation, communication, creativity, collaboration, and leadership. He’s honed his skills from 30 years of business and sales experience, and his love of improvisational comedy to entertain and educate audiences across the United States. He resides in San Diego and is a very loving father. Chris, hello, welcome. Thank you so much for being here today.
Hello David, I’m inspired by your openings. Thank you for the kind introduction of me, and man I love your show opening. Creative superpowers, conscious thinking, stay true to themselves, I love it.
Yeah.
Thank you for having me.
Not every moment is fearless but I have a lot of those fearless moments.
You’re very welcome, and it’s a true honor and just so great to have you here. It sounds so awesome what you do, helping people laugh and learn in the same setting. You may be a magician too because that’s quite a magic trick from my experience with things. So just thanks for being so fearless with your improvisational art that you demonstrate when you teach others, and showing them what it’s like when you’re being your true self and working life. I think that’s just the service that the world needs the most right now. And just thank you for stepping up and being that powerful leader in that space.
Thanks for saying that. It’s taken me actually, a long time to get here. Not every moment is fearless but I have a lot of those fearless moments. And as you talked about creativity, yeah, we are all creators. And when you create that what I … find something in your life to do creative because it expands you, it moves you. You just feel larger than yourself, actually, you probably realize your truest self when you’re in that place. That’s why we love creating so much.
So true. So true. Well, today we’re talking about out show Conscious Thinking and Improvisation, and specifically what Chris thinks about conscious thinking when he is improvising or when a person’s improvising, and if he is consciously thinking when he uses improvisation for his audiences. And so, Chris, how we like to roll out the show is with our first question that’s the pretty obvious one, but here it is. What is your creative super power?
My creative super power. Well, I found a number of them. I didn’t really know I had much of anything as a kid. I would only dance when no one was around.
I know that feeling.
But I loved to do it. I didn’t write much because I thought that was my weakness. I was focused on sports, and I get basketball especially, and there is a dance in basketball, there’s improvisation in basketball. There is a creativity. And I say for years, that was my place of spirituality, the basketball court. The movement, the connection, to actually let go of thinking and not … it was a beautiful place to be. In the number of years since, I’ve found improv and speaking, and improv changed my life completely. To go from a no but I got a better idea kind of guy, I didn’t realize until my 40s that people don’t really like that kind of guy. I’m too yes, and. Let me say yes to whatever you’re bringing and find a way to add something positive to it and make people better. Today, it’s improv, sharing improv whether it’s with corporations or non-profits in a one-person show or working with a group of people. It feels magical, I also do some poetry and even some spoken word poetry that is playful and moves me and it is still great yeah.
Well, it’s so admiral to have a life experience where it’s finding out what way, what things are gonna work for you. And then when you find that way, how it just flips the script and it moves you into this whole different experience in life. And let me ask you this Chris, why do you do what you do with your superpowers?
Why do I do it, one, because it feels so good. I’ve found that it’s like … I tried to do some things that would make me a lot of money a number of years ago and it felt like I was walking through mud, I couldn’t do it. And I kept going back to it because I thought the money was really close this way. This is can do, it feels light, it feels easy, it feels expansive. And that feels amazing and it touches people’s lives. My girlfriend, Vanessa and I have done living in the present moment workshop with the Alzheimer’s association with Amy Abrams. That’s for Alzheimer caregivers-
Love that.
So many beautiful moments come out of that, it’s magical.
And it’s helping them with their people, and say yes, and versus argue. And so many beautiful moments come out of that, it’s magical. I would do it all day long and never get paid there if I had enough money stacked away to do it. It’s so much fun to do. It’s a blast, and I love working with anywhere from sales teams to leadership teams to creative teams that you wanna burst their imagination wide open like we were in kindergarten.
I just love the part where you described how you and Vanessa had taken your living in the moment program to people with Alzheimer’s and how … a mind that’s obviously having major challenges, you’re able to bring this component of improvisation and comedy, and just your super power into that environment to lift the spirits of people who are struggling. Tell me a little bit, I’m just curious to hear a little bit more about what that experience was like working with people with that sort of condition and what it is that they … what you felt like they really experienced that was for them such a magical experience.
Well, thanks for that question too. And typically, I might not have been so clear. We’ve worked with actually their caregivers. It’s a presentation that actually helps the caregivers connect more to their person with Alzheimer’s.
I love that, yes.
I’ll tell the one story that I’ve told numerous times. So we teach them to say, “yes, and.” when we’re in conflict, we’re not connecting and it doesn’t feel good to us to be in conflict with them. And in this battle no one is feeling good. Their person with Alzheimer’s is not feeling good, they’re not feeling good. And there’s this one story, this grandmother had dementia and her granddaughter would often take care of her and it was a visual hallucination she had. So she would see people constantly in the car, and sometimes the granddaughter would actually take … say “You know there’s not anyone in there.” And actually, take the grandmother out and open the car doors and say, “No one’s here, no one’s here.” And there was just so much upset between them. And she came to one of our workshops, and what she found is this, I can say yes to it and add something to it. Her grandmother said, “There’s a gorilla in the car.” And the granddaughter looked at her and said, “Yeah, that’s my boyfriend.” And the grandmother looks at her, and they’re looking at each other and they just start laughing.
That’s classic, that’s awesome.
Yeah, instead of disconnecting and arguing, no there isn’t let me show you, going into that big battle. She said yes and added something to it and they laughed.
I love that because it’s like you really … and that’s the way that the situation sets up, you don’t have other option but to laugh. I think that’s ingenious. That is very cool stuff. Well, we need to take a quick break. I want to go a little bit deeper with Chris into more detail about what he’s sharing and how it might help people listening to bring come improvisation and some funny laughter into their own lives. But before we do jump into a break, let’s tell people about where they can find out more about you, Chris.
Sure. I love connecting with people, and if something resonates with you reach out to me at chrisnielson.com and if you wanna reach me by email it is [email protected].
Well, that’s capital-A awesome stuff. All right, well, so we’ve been talking with Chris Nielson today about conscious thinking and improvisation. We’re gonna take a quick break and when we come back, we’re gonna have some fun and continue on with Chris on this exciting little journey we’ve got going on here. I’m gonna let you out there listening know how you can start implementing what he’s going to be sharing more about, and to bring in a new level of creativity into your own life.
To listen to the entire show click on the player above or go to the SuperPower Up! podcast on iTunes.
Music Credit: Words and Music written and performed by David Delmar. Engineered and produced by John Keenan.
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