Quietly Visible
Managing Your Energy in High-Stakes Moments
A conversation with Carol Stewart on Quietly Visible. Published May 30, 2025. 34 minutes.
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THE CONVERSATION
Introverted leaders lose energy fast in busy workplaces, and a sudden what do you think can drain the rest. With Carol Stewart, host of Quietly Visible, Salvatore shares the resets he uses himself: the exhale that calms the body, quiet ways to release adrenaline at the table, posture that signals safety, and the pause that holds a room.
KEY IDEAS
Buy a moment of grace
When the spotlight swings to you without warning, Salvatore’s go-to is a breath, a pause, and a signal that the message landed. The delay bias is real: when someone fails to answer immediately, listeners wonder whether they are fully present, and a deer-in-the-headlights look feeds that doubt. So he turns and opens with appreciation: for the question, for the conversation, for the fact that it was raised. That acknowledges the attention and buys a beat. Then let me give this a thought, with a tap on the head or chin to show the wheels turning. Carol’s version: pause, acknowledge, offer initial thoughts, and promise more once she has processed. That moment of grace is when the strategies start.
The exhale calms the body
Most speaking advice says take a deep breath. A deep breath expands the chest cavity, gives the heart more room, and makes it beat faster. Breathe, yes, since passing out helps nobody, and understand that the exhale is what settles the nervous system. Salvatore’s first technique before a high-stakes meeting is box breathing, which Carol also teaches her clients: inhale, hold, lengthen the exhale, then hold the empty breath even longer. It is the exhale and the hold after it that slow the heart. Do at least three rounds before the moment so the physiology is under some control before the content has to be.
Release the energy before it reaches your voice
Energy that stays bottled in the body comes out in the voice, and in strange ways. Given a backstage room, Salvatore dances, usually to funk. Carol does the same before a talk. At a table, on a panel, or in the investor meetings his venture capital clients sit through, movement is off the menu, so the release goes underground: grip and release the hands out of sight, tense the whole body and let go, clench the lower body and expel. The idea came from Jane Goodall’s chimpanzees. When an external stimulus rattles the group, every member moves in reaction, sounding like a fight, and it is nothing more than releasing energy so they can refocus.
Take up space, shoulders away from ears
Leadership presence includes how you occupy the room physically, and under pressure the instinct is to close down: cross the legs, shrink, self-soothe. Salvatore forces himself into openness: palms open on the lap or facing forward, legs uncrossed and grounded. That physicality tells the nervous system it is safe to be fully here. Carol asks about power poses, and he says Amy Cuddy’s methodology has been challenged and the poses still work for him, hands on hips or leaning back in a chair, because the body informs the brain as much as the brain informs the body. Research also links perceived confidence to the distance between shoulder and ear. Between meetings he resets: shoulders rolled back and down, chest up.
Five percent slower, then own the pause
Nerves push people to talk faster. Pulling back to five percent slower than the room conveys composure and authority, and gives an introvert space to self-regulate. It also gives listeners’ ears time to calibrate to your accent. Then the pause, where Salvatore says the magic happens. Listeners change their minds when you stop and let them process, so the pause creates the change you want. Pause at a period and people jump in; pause mid-thought, the anticipatory pause, and attention holds. Every client pushes back on it, and a pause always feels longer to the speaker. Seth Godin’s rule: past three seconds it reads as deliberate, and at ten even the phones look up.
There are two things
Introverts calculate thousands of things before speaking, and being put on the spot cuts that short. Salvatore’s hack is an opening line: there are two things, or I would answer that in two ways. It creates a back door. Say the first thought that came, and while you are talking the brain forms the second, so you can land the plane with a more fully shaped point. If a second never arrives, nobody minds. Metaphors help for a related reason: an introvert often delivers a conclusion without the path to it, and an analogy colors in the route.
IN HIS WORDS
“Energy that’s being bottled up in the body is going to come out in the voice in a very strange way.”
“That sort of physicality sends a message to the nervous system that it’s okay. It’s okay to be fully here and fully present.”
“So the pause is critical to actually create the change that you’re hoping for in your listeners. Take the pause.”
LISTEN AND FOLLOW
Thank you to Carol Stewart for the invitation and the questions. Subscribe to the show for the rest of the catalog.
The frameworks behind this conversation.
Clear and Compelling collects the principles, strategies, techniques, and frameworks Salvatore teaches on shows like this one, written for analytical, technical, and introverted leaders. Morgan James Publishing, October 2026.