Bouncing Back – Resilience and Stress Management Training: Guest post from Mark Walsh

August 4, 2010 in Guest posts by annlewis | No comments

A huge welcome to Mark Walsh, author of this week’s guest post.   Mark leads Integration Training – specialist stress management training, business leadership training and resilience training providers, based in Brighton (Sussex), Birmingham and London UK. His clients include multi-national blue chip companies, UNICEF and The Institute of Development Studies. Prior to this he worked for a charity in conflict-zones worldwide. In his spare time Mark meditates, dances, practices aikido and enjoys being exploited by two cats.

Mark offers grounded, practical advice to help you to bounce back from stressful situations:

Bouncing Back – Resilience and Stress Management Training

Life is stressful in some way or another for everyone. People vary however in how effective their personal stress management is and how quickly they bounce back from adversity. This article offers a few tips on resilience training for anyone who’s life isn’t always easy. A large proportion of healthy adaptation to stress has been shown to be how people think, manage their physical health and use social support. In other words there is hope as resilience and effective stress management are life-skills that can be learnt.

Mental Stress Management Training

It is not external events but our thinking that create stress. Consider two people stuck in a traffic jam. One may get annoyed thinking about how unfair it and dwelling on the appointment they will miss while another may take it in their stride, saying to themselves “heh, that’s life, at least I can listen to the radio for a change” It’s the thought process that creates stress. The following are some good resilient thinking strategies:

  • Acceptance of what can’t be changed
  • An internal “locus of control”- i.e. not being a victim
  • Creative problem solving
  • Flexibility
  • Realistic optimism
  • Maintaining positive and stable self-esteem
  • Managing (but not repressing) emotions
  • Managing stress and conflict skilfully
  • Humour
  • Mindfulness and Spirituality

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) deals in depth with some of these factors and discusses “thought distortions” such as over-generalising, personalising and (my personal favourite) “catastrophising”.

Resilience Training and The Body

Maintaining good physical health is a key foundation of resilience. The fundamentals of good diet, plenty of exercise, rest, good quality sleep and minimal alcohol and other drug intake cannot be ignored. Beyond the basics of health, physical grounding and centring exercises to manage stress arousal can also build resilience. The following is the ABC “centring” technique to manage stress:

  • Aware – Be mindful of the present moment using the five senses, especially feeling the body, ground (yourself on your chair and feet) and your breath
  • Balance – In posture and attention.  Have an expansive feeling
  • Centre-Line Relaxed – Relax your mouth and stomach – breathe deeply into your belly
  • (Also: Connected to the reason why you are doing this and Connected to other people)

Other forms of stress-busting body awareness practices such as yoga and tai chi are also recommended for resilience.

Social Support, Stress and Resilience

Social support and empathy are critical factors in psychological resilience so if you want to bounce not break build a support network around you and invest in relationships.  Equally if you want to help those around you really listen to them, empathy is a great gift that builds resilience.

Resilience and Environmental Factors

Environmental factors have been shown to significantly effect stress. Background noise is a good example for office workers and contact with the natural world is also a stress-buffer. Even ensuring you receive a little natural light and get a few house plants can make a big difference. Many people also find organising and cleaning their environment to have an impact on stress and wellbeing.

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B is for Bounce

July 30, 2010 in Bullying, Recover Your Balance by annlewis | No comments

I have to confess that Bounce inevitably reminds me of Tigger in A A Milne’s ‘The House at Pooh Corner‘, the classic children’s story of a collection of toy animals brought to life as remarkably recognisable archetypes against the background of the lovely Ashdown Forest in Sussex, England.  If you know the book or the film, you’ll remember that the extreme extrovert Tigger is way too loud for the more thoughtful Pooh, intimidating to nervous Piglet, and annoying to the famously grumpy Eeyore.  Tigger definitely isn’t big on self-awareness. People feel ‘bounced’ into doing what they don’t want to do. He’s completely oblivious to others’ personal space and full of his own self-importance.

Yet there’s something compelling about the bounce that comes from self-aware confidence.  Definitely not Tigger at all. And it can be the first thing that gets lost when things get difficult at work. The work of recovering your balance, by putting you back in touch with your core values, strengths and experience, is designed to help you recover that bounce.

So what characterises the bounce that comes from confidence? It’s most visible when you’re present, centred, aware and responsive to people around you. You connect with it when you’re doing things you do well and you know it. It gives you neither superiority nor inferiority in relation to others – you’re equal and different, complementary. And you feel at ease in the world in the moment. It’s purposeful but not forceful. It’s just you being you without fearing what others think or what they might do to undermine you.

To help connect with your authentic bounce, try this:

  • Take two deep breaths, and smile, slowly.
  • List five things you are glad to have in your life.
  • List the two things that matter most to you.
  • Write a paragraph about what you love to do most and how it makes you feel (it can be anything at all).
  • Note how you’re feeling when you’ve done these things.

And if you like musical theatre, here’s Audra McDonald with a song that says it all:

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R is for Realism

July 22, 2010 in Bullying, Leadership coaching, Recover Your Balance by annlewis | 2 comments

The trouble with writing blog posts to a mnemonic is that eventually you get stuck.  ‘R’ is for… What?  What would be most helpful to readers on their journey to recovering their balance?

I have the wonderful Chris Johnstone to thank for arriving at R is for Realism.  I’m just reading the new edition of his  book, ‘Find Your Power‘ (Permanent Publications).  His chapter on ‘Bouncing Back from Failure and Crisis’ is full of the sort of down-to-earth, refreshing, woowoo-free  advice you need when you’re in bad situation.

It’s fundamentally about being realistic, and by that I don’t mean the more aggressive, abusive dirivative ‘get real’. I mean building a resilient response that will form your foundation as you move forward.  Chris also talks about ‘realistic optimism’ – seeing the world as it is while still working towards a positive outcome.

Not in a jar…

Recovering your balance is about getting back to your real self.  Not the one you ‘keep in a jar by the door’,  Eleanor Rigby-style. I mean the self that you are when you’re living your values, acknowledging both your strengths and your weaknesses as part of the complexity of your being. It’s the you that is able to weigh up a situation and determine the most authentic way forward, to be in the moment when it matters, to own your equality with others.

When you’re getting negative feedback, especially if it’s abusive, it’s easy to sink back into your least resourceful state and absorb everything that’s thrown at you.  So if someone says you’re useless, and repeats it, eventually you can end up believing it.  But somewhere inside you is the authentic core that knows this feedback is damaging and untrue.

Recovering your balance is enabling the real you to stand up and be counted.  What’s your next step?

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Move on from bullying: Leave a Legacy! Guest post from Dorothy Dalton

July 5, 2010 in Bullying, Guest posts, Recover Your Balance by annlewis | 8 comments

Dorothy Dalton

I’m delighted to welcome Dorothy Dalton to Recover Your Balance. Dorothy is Partner at Hansar Transition Services, an international executive search professional, a certified coach and trainer (direct & online), Motivator, resilience and confidence builder. She’s also a Beginner Golfer, avid reader, tennis fan and Life student.

Here Dorothy reflects on her study of workplace bullying by women, its implications for those in the firing line, and what targets can do both for themselves and for others.

Move on from bullying: Leave a Legacy!

In my research for my series on the bullying of women in the work place by women,  I was contacted by a huge number of women and somewhat surprisingly men too. Most of this communication was private.

Two messages

This sent me two messages: the first was that bullying is still a shame based experience leaving many unable to openly admit  that it had happened. The other was that  individuals who had been targets,  even years later, went to considerable lengths not only to protect the identity of the perpetrators,  but also the organisations where they worked. In many cases little or nothing  had been done to support them. In essence, the bullied had become part of an enabling process which allowed repeat offenders to continue abusive behaviour.

Could I say they these victims had moved on? No not really.

Many had simply resigned and left organisational life to become corporate refugees by working freelance or starting their own business.   Some went on to be bullied in subsequent jobs. Others had abandoned their careers totally.  Most were scarred, still bewildered and angry. Many had had such horrific experiences, which in my naivety I had previously only associated with movie story lines.

Constructive Communication

Premeditated  sabotage strategies  aside,  on a daily basis many accused bullies  (especially women)  have no idea that their behaviour is perceived as «  bullying «  and are quite shocked or even distressed when finally challenged. So it seems that the bullying process  can be viewed as a breakdown,  or absence of,  constructive communication,  with each party needing to assume responsibility for their own role in the  dysfunctional dynamic.

  • The responsibility  of  the “ target” is to communicate his/her perception of the situation and follow through as required . Failure to do this can mean staying stuck  in a negative position,  which is tantamount to  handing over personal power to  both the bully and the organisation.
  • The responsibility of the bully is to change his/her behaviour and communication style to acceptable norms.
  • The responsibility of the organisation is to ensure that it is carried out.

What would I suggest to anyone who feels that they are being bullied?

  • Research corporate and sector guidelines. Most countries have no legislation to deal with bullying, although that is changing.  Benchmark your experience against those checklists.
  • Seek professional help early in the process.  This is good investment. You are experiencing a trauma!  If you were suffering a wound to your leg,  would you try and treat it yourself? No!  You’d see a doctor!
  • Work on strategies to self advocate and heal. Focus on becoming “unstuck” and taking responsibility for retreiving your own position .
  • In tandem set up an audit trail of abusive treatment. Document and note each incident. This will be useful in any internal inquires or even eventual legal action.
  • Find a mentor. Someone who can support and validate you professionally.

Letting go

Walking away from a bad experience maybe sufficient for some  to heal and I agree that in a number of instances, “letting go” will do it. However, the individuals who seemed be in the best place,  were the very few who had found the courage to challenge the bully in a constructive and strategic way,  as well as tenaciously dealing with the organisations where the bullying had occurred, even to the point of legal action.

Public awareness

This is not about revenge, although I’m sure for some individuals that might play a satisfying part.   Stepping up in this way is also about contributing to the cultural change of what is acceptable workplace behaviour. It will raise public awareness to prevent the same thing happening to others.   This transparency also obliges organisations to enforce (rather than pay lip service to) workplace protocols instead of intervening only when the bottom line is negatively impacted.  Think of the significant advances that have happened over the last 40 years   in the areas of discrimination against women, minorities or the physically impaired.    This has been the cumulative result of individual as well as group action.

Leave a legacy

So somehow, and easier said than done I know, the targets of bullying need to dig deep to find the courage to step up,   not just for their own recovery, but for the protection of our future working environments. To quote Martin Luther King “Justice denied anywhere, diminishes justice everywhere”

That is when personal moving on also leaves a legacy.

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U is for Uplifting

June 14, 2010 in Recover Your Balance by annlewis | 2 comments

Recovering your balance isn’t just about getting back to business as usual. It’s an opportunity to create a better way of living that works for you. It’s a time to ask yourself what really answers your deepest purpose, and what uplifts your spirit.

We often think of commitments as those things that stop us from doing what we would prefer to do. Purposeful commitment is the opposite. It is congruent with your values and following through with it keeps you feeling on track, buoyant and alive.

As you become clearer about what life you want to create try getting into the habit of evaluating everything you do, and everything you consider bringing into your life. How do you feel when you think about it? Does it bring you joy, or does your heart sink? Do you feel good about it, or do you drag your heels and see it as a ‘should’ or an ‘ought to’? Does it use your best strengths, experience and inclinations? Does it stretch you or leave you feeling empty and unfulfilled? Do you need to think differently about it, or are you hanging on when you need to let go and move forward?

Ask yourself these questions, and use your answers to guide you:

  • What makes your heart sing?
  • What commitment do you make to living on purpose?
  • What actions does that imply?
  • What commitments impede your purpose, joy and fulfilment?
  • What will you do about them?

Here’s something I find extraordinary and uplifting too. I hope you enjoy it:

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O is for Ow!

June 3, 2010 in Bullying, Leadership coaching, Recover Your Balance, Redundancy by annlewis | 6 comments

I often say that life throws up the same problems until I get the message and do something different. Yesterday I met an ‘in your face’ obstacle that pulled me up sharp, both literally and energetically.

Imagine the scene. It’s a beautiful morning in deepest Surrey, England.  The sun’s shining.  The birds are singing.  My sat nav has taken me down narrow country lanes to within a stone’s throw of Lead Change’s equestrian centre, where I’m due to meet the wonderful Harry (Harry’s a horse) and his person, Andrew, for a coaching session.  I’m early – half a mile away with twenty minutes until my appointment.

Suddenly, without warning, I drive round a bend and see barriers across the road and a ‘Road Closed’ notice. The next 20 minutes or so is spent in a futile attempt to get guided to a different route to the stables, in between driving round and round the road junction to get out of the way of buses and workmen’s lorries.  Eventually, after taking down the barrier and driving the half mile to where two bemused BT guys are digging a hole right across the road, I admit defeat, accept that I am now late (I hate being late) and turn around the car.  Whereupon said sat nav tells me exactly where to go, and I’m there in 10 minutes, meeting a few other lost drivers on the way.

OK I can hear you all saying ‘why didn’t you just turn the car around in the first place?’ You know, if I stay in my head I have no idea. I KNOW that the whole point of sat nav is that it can get you to your destination (most of the time) even if you have to change routes.

My energy was wrong though. This was a case of unhelpful thoughts blocking my resourcefulness. I went into hapless, passive, ‘somebody rescue me’ mode.  My second state Presence deserted me.  By the time I arrived, I had recovered my balance enough to realise how easy it would have been just to sit, breathe and let the right solution appear. And it was a great starting point for my conversation with Andrew and my session with Harry.

Like all Andrew’s horses, Harry works exclusively with your energy. He takes you out of your head and into your heart. He loves the lightness of fun, in-the-moment play, so he simply ignores me (or just gives me a quizzical look) when I take myself too seriously and he will walk away from any negativity. He’s a flawless mirror, reflecting back exactly what I’m giving out. He can follow my energy up and down, between states and give it back to me in his actions. It’s a salutory lesson about what people pick up unconsciously.

I’m reflecting on why I try to batter my way through life’s roadblocks rather than finding a peaceful alternative route. Harry has taught me about lightness of being through being willing to dance if he thinks it’s fun.

What roadblocks are in your way?  What can you change to get past them?

In Southern California, Carolyn Resnick trains horses at liberty (without head collar or leading rein), with deep respect. I love the dance they create here:

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Y is for Yes!

May 27, 2010 in Bullying, Recover Your Balance, Redundancy by annlewis | No comments

Recovering your balance is about saying ‘yes’. ‘Yes’ to doing something about the negative situation you’re in. ‘Yes’ to taking charge of your future. Yes to resisting being diminished by the behaviour of other people. ‘Yes’ to moving on.

If you are obsessively going over and over negative events, you may still be drawing a strange comfort from such activity, but in the long term, it won’t help you. If you’re being bullied or suffering problems at work that are affecting your wellbeing, it’s important to accept that what is going on is toxic for you, and decide to do something to change it, because you can make that choice.

Choosing to stay stuck puts the control of your emotions and your life somewhere outside you in the external environment – so you’re not in charge of your own destiny. It will also continue to allow negative emotions to affect your physical well-being and your performance.

Things can really move quite fast when you make a commitment to change your circumstances. Allowing the possibility of creating a better situation completely lifts your spirits, and reduces the pressure of negative emotions on your body, mind and spirit. The mind-shift you experience can feel like a sudden ray of sunlight on a wet day. This ‘sunlight moment’ may be triggered by a specific event which wakes you up to the possibility of a different future, or it may come gradually. Ideally it will be something that begins to restore your sense of proportion.

Recover Your Balance offers a seven-step process for getting back to your fully functioning self. It’s designed to help you say ‘yes’ getting grounded again, to calming the emotional rollercoaster, and to ridding yourself of some of the negative effects on your health of being off balance.

What will be your sunlight moment? Please do leave a comment.

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R is for Resilience

May 20, 2010 in Bullying, Recover Your Balance by annlewis | No comments

Resilence is about how effectively you bounce back from adversity.  When you’re under stress and not coping well, your resilience is compromised and you find it hard to respond flexibly or to recover effectively. Imagine you want to keep a bundle of letters together.  Chances are you’ll search for an elastic band to hold them. But that band lurking at the back of the kitchen drawer may well snap rather than stretching. Does that feel like you in the midst of your toxic workplace?

Losing your resilience seriously limits your choices. When you are in the middle of painful experiences, deep-seated emotions are stirred, and it is often difficult to see what is really going on. At this level, your relationship to power (your own and that of others over you) can become distorted as you draw your energy inwards, or are panicked into pushing against the situation. I can remember being suspicious of everyone and trusting nobody.

You may have feelings of guilt and worthlessness, or a fear that you may not recover and that you may not be employable again. One of my coaching clients had made a major mistake at work fifteen years earlier and was still allowing his feelings about this to limit his career choices. He believed he could not trust himself. It was only when I asked him what he had achieved in the interim, what he had learned, and whether such a mistake had ever happened again that he realised that his pessimism was out of proportion, and that he had more options than he had allowed himself to consider.

That client had become rigid, and his career development depended on recovering some flexibility. Recovering your balance is also about building your resilience so that you are less likely to be thrown by negative events in the future.

So where do you start?  Here’s one option. I call this exercise ‘extreme self-care’.

Sit in your favourite place, and be sure you won’t be disturbed. Close your eyes and take a few gentle breaths. Scan your body, notice any tensions and release them.  Open your eyes.

Now take your favourite notebook and pen, and ask yourself these questions:

  • How am I feeling, physically and emotionally?
  • How am I responding to day-to-day events?
  • How clear is my thinking?
  • How linked do I feel to my sense of purpose (my spiritual energy)?

Don’t aim to change anything, just observe and make a note.  The aim is to understand what’s going on for you.

Now ask yourself:

  • What most gives me joy, and how can I bring that into my day and into my new life?
  • What one change can I make right now that will positively improve my energy?
  • What will I do to take care of myself today?

For more on recovering from a toxic workplace, see my guest blog, with my thanks to ebosswatch.com.

It’s becoming traditional to find you a video.  Here’s what I’ve found today.  Enjoy!

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E is for emotion

May 12, 2010 in Bullying, Recover Your Balance, Redundancy by annlewis | 1 comment

How does it feel to be off balance?  People who contributed to Recover Your Balance told very graphic stories about their emotional response to what was happening to them.

For Rob, a former specialist Nurse Practitioner whose boss’s lack of support led to a demoralising loss of purpose as his job was thrown into doubt “Work became unbearable. First it was difficult to get up in the mornings and then Sunday evenings became a part of the weekend I dreaded, and Friday evenings the focus for the week. Everything about my job started to get me down and I found even the most minor problem or criticism impossible to cope with.”

Laura, a former NHS trust CEO told me: “I felt under siege, very emotional and extremely angry! It has taken several years to work through all of that and to regain my self confidence and equilibrium.”

Of her bullying boss, former HR director Lou said, “Then it came to one weekend… I knew I had to face him. I had to face the way he was treating me… I knew I was going to have to have a head-to-head. And every time I thought about it, I kept crying. I was very emotionally unstable, basically, I was crying at everything, and I felt awful.”

When you are in the middle of painful experiences deep-seated emotions are stirred, and it is often difficult to see what is really going on. At this level, your relationship to power (your own and that of others over you) can become distorted as you draw your energy inwards, or are panicked into pushing against the situation. I can remember being suspicious of everyone and trusting nobody. You may have feelings of guilt and worthlessness, or a fear that you may not recover and that you may not be employable again.

The secret of recovering your balance lies in taking back control and responsibility.  Here are a few thoughts to get you started:

  • When your situation arises from others’ actions, for example when you are bullied or criticised without inviting it, the other person is projecting their own world view onto you. It is their ‘stuff’, not yours.
  • The negative emotions associated with being off balance can trigger associations with events much earlier in your life (such as being bullied or suppressed as a child). Understanding the links can help you respond with greater awareness – this is a different scenario and you are not powerless.
  • Your first step to recovering your balance is to make a commitment to moving on. Making that commitment can begin to lift your spirits.
  • By taking responsibility both for your response and for your future, you can avoid becoming a victim and keep and nurture your personal power rather than giving it to others. Your recovery is about fully owning that power, and retrieving your authentic Presence.

Here’s a lovely, thought provoking video about balance. Watch, hear, feel and respond from your heart:

For Rob “Work became unbearable. First it was difficult to get up in the mornings and then Sunday evenings became a part of the weekend I dreaded, and Friday evenings the focus for the week. Everything about my job started to get me down and I found even the most minor problem or criticism impossible to cope with.”

Laura told me: “I felt under siege, very emotional and extremely angry! It has taken several years to work through all of that and to regain my self confidence and equilibrium.”

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V is for Values

May 5, 2010 in Bullying, Recover Your Balance, Redundancy by annlewis | 4 comments

Your values underpin your life. They tell you a great deal about who you are and what you need in order to feel fulfilled.

According to Lou whose story is included in Recover Your Balance, “What’s … important is actually thinking through what are my values? Where do I see myself going? What is going to be important to me for the next stage of my life? …Try and really think through what it is you want from life, not what you need. What is it that you want to happen? Because everybody needs food and a certain amount of money, but what is it that you want out of life? That allows the flexibility for it to happen in whatever way you can achieve.”

Exercise for Identifying Your Values

Think about these questions and answer them as fully as you can:

  • What words best describe your values: for example, ‘integrity’, ‘family’, ‘health’, ‘honesty’, ‘happiness’ and so on?
  • Make a list of as many as you can think of that matter to you. If you find it hard to get started, try typing ‘personal values’ into an internet search engine and you’ll find lots of helpful sites.
  • When you have your list, choose the ten most important values.
  • Now reduce this list to five and write a paragraph for each one describing why they are important.
  • Now choose the two values you will never compromise and describe why.

How are your values compromised by your current situation?

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