Tag: research

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New Year – setback and recovery

The New Year had a more somber tone than usual for me. Sure, I was happy to see 2020 go. But the start to 2021 was not the one I had hoped for: on the second morning of January, I lost my footing on black ice when walking the dog near the sea. Complicated bone fractures in both wrists and a twisted elbow were the unfortunate and painful results, leaving me with both arms in cast to the shoulders! Fortunately recovery is going well, and I will be resuming work and life (brushing my own teeth etc.) over the coming 2-3 weeks.

Setbacks can strike hard when you least expect it; they can also occur as the culmination of a long struggle. In any case, how you recover is largely dependent on your mindset. The most successful (ie non-traumatic) dealings with setbacks acknowledge the hardships as well as the silver linings. There is even a line of study investigating Post Traumatic Growth. This is not to be confused with false optimism, ignoring the pain; I’m skeptical of any approach distorting the truth.

Setbacks are a part of life, and the frequency will logically increase with your courage and exposure to new things. Executing a sweeping digital transformation of uncharted legacy technology? Leading your team from the distance? Home-schooling your children? Setbacks are guaranteed to happen. In my case, balancing on the edge of an icy harbor-front to see the view under a bridge was clearly too much of a physical challenge.

The solution is not resigning from life or not accepting a challenge. Both are negative results of unhealthy perfectionism, hampering sense of adventure and willingness to learn.

To build strength and resilience to better deal with setbacks (and failure, and other stressors of life), the important research of Stanford professor @Carol Dweck recommends cultivating your growth mindset.

An actual exercise in “growth mindset-building” from my online micro-training “Upside-Down View of Stress” goes like below. Think through (write, draw, talk with a friend, whatever works for you) your setback in these four steps:

  1. What happened?
  2. Why was it important to overcome the setback?
  3. Which convictions, attitudes or personal strengths helped you pull through?
  4. Did you get any help from others?

This will activate your self-compassion and sense of connection. It’s not about analyzing deep emotions; there’s no mumbo-jumbo, it’s just looking at the truth, seeing yourself in the context of your own strengths and your important network of people. Not seeing yourself as a failure, or clumsy, or having to do everything yourself again.

The effect is remarkable.

As an example, regarding my own New Year setback, I’ve already mentioned what happened. The motivation for getting back to normal functioning should be obvious. I’m pulling through with my strong sense of personal responsibility for my health and well-being – doing all the ergo-therapy chores in spite of the pain, because I know it works. Did I get any help from others? You bet, for all kinds of things! I’m blessed with (and very grateful for) the dearest husband, family and friends, for the first weeks helping me with literally everything, and now keeping me company.

Can’t wait to be fully back!

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Keep cool

Left to its own devices, the human brain will find negative uncertainty as stressful as actual negative outcomes. Although the statistical probability of falling prey to the Covid-19 pandemic may be a low number, this will not be enough for an individual person to feel safe. The normal access to social support (for most, an effective stress relief) is currently limited by Social Distancing, adding to the problem.

Assuming that everyone is just a bit more worried than normally, and with days in our own company at hand, now is a good time to train how to get rid of worries and keep calm. The skills are always, and they will remain useful when we return to the anthill of modern working life; to overcome challenges more easily and learn more from them; to collaborate more effectively with people we don’t like; to stay cool in the face of provocations; in sum, to not get bogged down by the unexpected crisis, mistake or unwelcome surprise.

In general, humans have a great ability to adjust to new circumstances and become happy (again). This, too, shall pass – but for those able to mobilize their brain’s “discovery” state, the bouncing back will happen with less effort.

Our brains are constantly scanning the environment for threats and rewards – to avoid/defend against or seek out/discover, respectively. Defensive state is comparable to the knee-jerk reaction causing you to respond to emails (too) quickly or sneer at the colleague cutting the line at the coffee machine. It is also keeping you safe in traffic and around predators. The neurological basis is the familiar fight-or-flight response, automated and very fast but also inflexible and not always useful. Thinking back through the thousands of email responses I have seen; I can’t think of a single one that couldn’t wait 10 minutes. The colleague skipping the line could be someone you’d like to have a favorable impression of you.

Discovery state is engaging your deliberate self, noticing what is going on and letting you connect with your best behaviors, goals and intellect. This engine is slower but more advanced, stimulated by feelings of pleasure and reward. Research shows how we’re able to solve more complex issues (most social issues are complex btw) and make more advanced analysis in discovery state, with our minds not being cluttered by the panicky fight-or-flight neurotransmitters.

Defend or discover? As with most functions of the brain, it’s not an either-or; it’s not even a sliding scale from defend to discover or vice versa. It’s two completely different and separate reaction patterns, present at the same time to deal with different types of situations, but with shifting command over your attention. You may open a call prepared and with all the best intentions, but a comment challenging your professional capability instantly activates a defensive reaction pattern.

Defensive state is not good for business, ever! No sneering at the coffee machine, no snappy email responses (no matter how fast), no surly skype comments, etc etc. Letting off steam should only happen in 100% friendly environments, and only upon prior explicit agreement with everyone involved. Not very likely to be part of anyone’s working environment.

So, back to the training of coolness skills. Evidence-based interventions you can rehearse on your own come in different varieties, and can help you improve how to manage your reaction to a sudden unwelcome surprise, to move on from unpleasant feelings that have been nagging you for a while, and improve your ability to manage uncertainty.

  • Affect labeling is where you label your emotions, call them out clearly by their official name. Clearly articulating the fact that there is a problem will cause the brain to silence its alarm bells. Mind you, this is the exact opposite of “sucking it up”: suppressing negative emotions will cause your physiological stress response to increase. Affect labelling is not pondering endlessly about your negative emotions – this could lead to draining rumination and sleepless nights. It’s merely to acknowledge how you feel, before you start working out what to do next, in writing or verbally with someone you trust.
  • Distancing; here, it’s not about social distance – it’s about making a distance to your own perspective, trying to see your situation from the outside.  You can trick your brain by simply talking to yourself, addressing yourself in second person – in stead of saying “I’m really worried about this meeting tomorrow”, say “You’re really worried about this meeting tomorrow”. Or imagine you’ll be advising a friend about a similar situation.
  • Mobilize your Discovery state by asking yourself reward questions (no, not bonus. You’re looking for reward which materializes much faster, plus it needs to be totally within your own control). Examples are “How have I managed to overcome difficulties like these in the past?”. “What capabilities helped me last time?”. “What can I learn from this?”.  A strong sense of purpose is super-rewarding and will always help mobilize the discovery state, however it can be tricky to process when you’re in a negative state of mind – a reduced version will be to focus on “What’s the most important now?”.
  • Breathe, with your belly! Diaphragmatic breathing – deep, slow breathing for 90 seconds – will instantly reduce your level of stress hormones. And no one will notice (not even when we get back into the office!).

Some of these tactics require a bit of time and thinking, which is why I am suggesting you practice them now, in the safe harbor of your home office. Others, like the breathing exercise, is a response that will help instantly and only requires you to remember that you have it at your disposal. This is harder than it sounds, and requires willpower (which can also be trained, check out this previous post for more about how to do that).

Wishing everyone less worries and more discovery.

Findings in this post are sourced from the brilliant book “How to have a good day” by economist and former McKinsey Partner Caroline Webb.

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Come off autopilot – press “pause”

I was recently reminded by a colleague, of Daniel Kahneman’s classic – the amazing: Thinking, Fast and Slow (2011), summarizing research conducted over decades; cognitive biases, happiness and prospect theory among other things. Daniel Kahneman is recognized globally as a true leader in the field of psychology, and the list of honors bestowed upon him is long and glorious, with the Nobel Prize in Economics (the only non-Economist ever to receive this) sitting prominently in 2002.

A favorite, inspirational for a lot of people including me, recognized for his ability to transcend his own field of research and for his determination to make the science of psychology relevant and useful to everyone.

Kahneman talks about our thinking to occur in two brain systems: the deliberate, sophisticated handling of self-control, forward thinking, abstractions, anything unfamiliar. This system is brilliant and creative, but slow; and it has a bottleneck: working memory, consuming loads and loads of energy and getting worn-out and tired through use.

And then the automatic, short-cutting, spam-filtering fast processing system, relieving the slow deliberate system of its hard work but inevitably, also leaving you with blind spots: it needs to base its processing on what is known as heuristics, mental shortcuts or rules-of-thumb.

Heuristics will be individual and learned over time. Your personal autopilot, driving you safely to work following a complex route which you don’t have to even think about. Helping you get on and off the escalator without falling over, without pausing to look for the steps. Opening doors with your primary hand. This is true for all human beings; we are all experiencing the world through the lens of our learned heuristics, nobody is “filter-free”. Reality is subjective, and the good news is that no matter how hard a situation seems, there is always a different perspective.

We learn through the “Slow” system, spending all the time and effort, and once the learning becomes automated, it is managed and perpetually reinforced by the “Fast” system. Very efficient!

But, be aware of the impact of this design on decision-making; in the eyes of the Fast system, the most obvious option is always the best option. And the most obvious option may be a behavioral feature of yourself you’d like to change: a bad habit you’d like to stop, a new behavior you’d like to learn.

To change – whether it’s something you will, you won’t, or you want – means disrupting your heuristics and slowing down the fast system. Otherwise it will drag you around, like the tail wagging the dog. Choosing which kind of restaurant, you want to go to for lunch may be ok to automate; choosing which country to expand your business into may not. Your brain will want to automate both (“Italy!”), since it’s really more convenient.

The very simple, fail-safe method to intervene in your brain’s auto-piloting is: to pause.

A pause, if only for a second or one breath, will bring you off autopilot and mobilize your slow, deliberate brain. You will be able to think, to remember your goals and positive motivation. If pausing is a challenge in itself (and it is, for everyone, don’t be shy), this is a skill in its own right, meaning it can be trained.

Try the following simple “power-pausing workout”: for the rest of today, open all doors with your left hand. (or, right hand if you are left-handed like me). This tiny little change will stop your fast system in its tracks, forcing you to think about why you’re doing this.

Exercise every day for a week, and your ability to pause will have improved massively, to be leveraged across any autopilot function you’d like to disrupt. Pressing send on emails too quickly? Forgetting to say “please” to the staff at the canteen? Having a second glass of wine for dinner? Wanting to be more intentional about meeting planning?

There is no limit, really, so don’t be perfectionist about it. Smaller objectives are always better; it’s the way we learn.

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Feeling stress in a meaningful life

This post is not to deny the massive surge of stress as a cause of real and serious illness, or to make people go and look for more stress. But below findings are also real. The way we think and talk about stress should not ignore its upsides. There is a very strong link between feeling stressed and having a meaningful life. Not the link you may expect – would an absence of stress create the mental space to pursue meaning?

In fact, it’s the other way around: high levels of stress are associated with good public health, national happiness and good economy. Gallup World Poll researchers are keeping an eye on the global levels of happiness in their Global Emotions Report. In a 2005-6 survey of 125.000 people residing in 121 countries, they asked this question: Did you feel a great deal of stress yesterday? The worldwide average was 35% – with values from 67% to 5%. How well did this national variance correspond with other indexes of well-being? The higher a nation’s stress-index, the higher its wellbeing, life expectancy and GDP. With high levels of stress, more people are more satisfied with their life, health, work, standard of living.

Diving deeper into this surprising finding, the researchers discovered a “timing” factor: on the very day a person had felt stressed, that person was also more likely to have felt sad, worried, angry or depressed (like you would expect, right?). But these same people would report overall higher levels of joy, love and laughter on a previous day. So, stress is associated with distress (and a host of other problems) but also with well-being. A happy life is not stress-free, and a stress-free life is no guarantee for happiness. Nations reporting very low stress-levels, also reported high levels of shame and anger, and low levels of joy.

Clearly a controversial and surprising finding, the Stress Paradox: high levels of stress are associated with distress as well as well-being. To understand the underlying links between these seemingly contradictory findings, look to the concept of meaning. Among the best predictors of a meaningful life, stress ranks highly. People with a high number of stressful experiences in their past, will consider their life more meaningful. Time spent worrying about the future is considered meaningful. People with very meaningful lives will worry more and have more stress. Stress seems to be an inevitable consequence of committing yourself to goals and roles that will feed your sense of purpose.

Stress is a by-product of pursuing important and difficult objectives.

The way we talk about stress is not supporting our well-being. We talk about our struggles but not so much about what we learn from them. We reinforce the illusion of a stress-free life, but this would indeed come at a high cost. Avoiding stress can be isolating and a reduced sense of concentration and physical energy. Indeed, avoiding stress can be creating more sources of stress while drying up the resources that should be supporting you. Avoidant coping strategies, to keep yourself away from stressful situations or escape your own feelings, is likely to drive you towards a life without depth, meaning and community.

Understanding what gives meaning to your life will help you live with the unpleasantness of this “by-product”. People who see themselves as someone who overcomes difficulties, will be better able to cope with everyday stress. When you reflect on your values, the mindset you have about stress shifts and you see yourself as someone strong, able to grow from adversity. You’ll be more likely to seek challenges than to avoid them, and to see the meaning in difficult circumstances.

In some situations, avoiding the stress isn’t possible and denying its existence isn’t helpful. Remembering your values can transform your experience – from something happening to you against your will, to something that is a result of your priorities. Feeling stressed can feel like a sign you are inadequate. If you were strong enough, smart enough, you wouldn’t be stressed? Try to think like this instead: stress is not a sign of failure but evidence you are human. You can learn from it. Even in moments of frustration, stress and meaning are connected in the bigger picture of your life.

Findings quoted in this post are from Kelly McGonigal, 2015: “The Upside of Stress”

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Connect with your goals

Will-power is an amazingly accurate predictor of academic success, a flourishing career, effective leadership, a long life, even a happy marriage. We’re all struggling with temptation, addiction, distraction and procrastination as a part of human life. But for some, the bias towards doing “the harder thing” appears to be more consistent and natural, they seem to be sticking to their plan in the face of every challenge.

Your willpower is supported – or not, as the case may be – by your brain, via its powers to bias you to DO certain things (“I Will” – exercise more?) and REFRAIN from other things (“I Won’t” – check emails constantly?). Both of those will-power elements flow from your long term-goals and desires: “I Want”.

However, when you are tired or distracted, your behavior tends to run on autopilot and the decision-making becomes disconnected from your goals. As an example, one study asked people how many food-related decisions they had made in one day. Average response was 14. On careful tracking, the result turned out to be 227!

It’s like we have more than one mind, each with its own point of view on what’s the best behavior. To stay true to your plan, you’ll need to mobilize the “I Want-power”: to make conscious decisions based on your goals, not fly on autopilot where you don’t even realize the consequences of your actions.  

And more: It’s not enough to identify what you want to change, you need to know how, when and why you’ll be likely to fail. If you cannot predict when you will give in, you will expose yourself to more temptation, be likely to be surprised by setbacks and give up on your goals in the face of difficulties.

This means, you will need to understand the impulse you’re giving in to, to be able to flex your “I Wan’t” brain-muscle, activate your goals and remember your original objective. This impulse may be very different from what you thought.

One email-addict wanted to cut back on checking emails but was finding it hard to reach her goal. Although she really wanted to not pick up her phone so often, she didn’t even realize what happened before she was already scrolling down the screen (the autopilot was doing the flying). She needed to stop herself sooner! On careful analysis, she discovered that the impulse to check emails felt almost like an itch, a tension that was relieved when she checked her email. Don’t think this is any different from other forms of addiction! By understanding when she was likely to fail, she was able to mobilize her will-power already on the impulse – a first important step towards “owning up” to the behavior.

Active management of your thoughts is an energy-consuming activity that shouldn’t be overdone; it makes no sense to try to exercise your willpower every minute of the day. Still, it’s real work to be pulling thoughts back to where you (really) want them, doing “the harder thing”. It just feels easier to give in to unwanted impulses (being online, losing your temper, drinking too much, yelling at the kids) or to put off work you really had an intention of completing (preparing for an important meeting, cleaning up your emails, upskilling – you name it).

Meditation specifically trains the willpower and is scientifically evidenced to increase the grey matter (I.e. brain cells) in your prefrontal cortex – your Executive Brain, home of “I Will”, “I Won’t” and “I Want”. Meditation works even without spiritual add-ons and if you’re new to this, there are loads of options available for guided practice.

For a great review of scientific research on will-power, packed with “easy-to-do on your own” exercises, read “The Willpower Instinct” by Health Psychologist, Stanford PhD Kelly McGonigal.