A Deeper Understanding 15: If You Have to Try It to Get It, This Article Is for You

I’ve known all my life that my primary sensory trait is Kinesthetic. (Vujade™ has also helped me see how much Visual and Auditory shape my life.) Kinesthetics are the largest group in our global Vujade™ population, at 54%.

That may be why so much of the world is built for us: the demo, the test drive, the free sample.

Check out how marketer’s try to appeal to us:

Learning by doing

As I wrote in Anchoring Frees You to Get Into Flow, I learn Kinesthetically. Building, practicing and experimenting stick with me far better than reading or listening.

It shows up in small ways, too. On videocalls I concentrate much better with a baseball in my hand to squeeze. It’s a foul ball from Matt Chapman, the Gold Glove third baseman with the San Francisco Giants, which I caught at Oracle Park. Squeezing it pushes distractions out of my head. With so many of us being primary Kinesthetics, it’s no surprise that squishies are among the most common giveaways at convention expo booths.

Much more than a learning style

Being a primary Kinesthetic is about much more than learning, and one part rarely gets discussed: the link between Kinesthetics and emotion. We’ve found that Kinesthetics are more sensitive to other people’s feelings, and that includes tuning into the moods of an entire group.

I first noticed this in my second business startup (which I ran alongside my first startup). We worked heavily in the customer service industry, and my team and I were incredibly busy training thousands of new Indian call center agents in accent neutralization and American culture. That team played a key role in bringing up numerous call centers across India.

Beyond training, I also reviewed the quality of customer service. I listened to calls, identified significant trends and made recommendations. That usually meant arriving around 9 PM at a call center in Gurgaon (Gurugram) or Andheri (suburbs of New Delhi and Mumbai). I’d walk into an enormous room and stop to take it in: thousands of agents, the hum of conversation. Then I’d get a feeling, a sense of whether the agents were, collectively, having a good evening or a hard one. Call it my Spidey-sense.

I never acted on that feeling alone. It informed me which questions to start asking.

Over time, the more I’ve trusted those feelings, the more aware I’ve become of what my body is telling me. That somatic awareness has helped me trust my instincts and commit fully to the initiatives I take on.

— Doug Breckenridge, Co-Founder of Vujade™ and Cabo™

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Register for a free online Vujade™ Spotlight session on Tuesday, November 17, 2026 where we talk with Tom Lemke and Rev. Dr. Tim Barkett about their new book “The Grateful Pastor” about how to address the current crisis in the clergy with more than 50% seriously considering leaving the ministry at some point since 2020.