I had my first piano lesson this week. My teacher is perfect for me. I’ve plonked around on our piano at home for a long time, and since I’ve sung in a choir, I’ve used it frequently to pick out my part in new songs. But I’ve never been able to play with both hands, and increasingly, I’ve wanted to learn.

A couple of weeks ago, I tried, again, to play a simple piece that I’ve toyed with, on and off, for several years.  Frustratingly, I still couldn’t do the left hand and the right hand together. ‘I’m definitely going to find a teacher’ I said to my husband.  But not just any teacher. One who can start from where I am, take me back to where I need to start and go from there.

The very next morning (really) I logged into TweetDeck. There among my new followers was a piano teacher who lives five miles from me on the Isle of Wight. I checked out her website (she uses our lovely piano tuner), ‘chatted’ with her on Twitter and email and my first lesson was soon in the diary. On the day, she quickly established what I know, understood what I wanted and set me to work doing things from scratch and properly.  I’m now playing my first little two-handed piece.

Knowing what you want

When the level of negative events in life overtakes the positive in our minds, it can be a bit difficult to see how to move on. That’s why Recover Your Balance starts from what you want to be different. I’ve seen so many people, in the midst of huge stress, redundancy, derailed careers or workplace bullying, who don’t know where to start.  My first question is “what exactly do you want to be different?” Answering that question moves you towards the possibility of change.

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.

Helping the Universe

I’m currently reading Mike Dooley’s new book, Leveraging the Universe. Mike has been much misrepresented after he appeared on the best selling video, The Secret. He doesn’t advocate sitting at home dreaming and waiting for miracles.  He’s very clear that you need to know what you want, visualise it in as much detail as you can, and then ACT. By act, he means start from where you are and take baby steps towards what you want.  When you act, he says, the Universe helps.

Now you will have your own beliefs about how change happens. I hold up my piano teacher as one example among many of what can happen when you’re clear and prepared to act. You judge.

Making a start

If these sorts of creative activity don’t appeal, find a way that does work for you. This might be writing a list of bullet points on a sheet of paper, creating goals, making a plan or drawing a Mind Map™[3]. Do whatever seems right for you personally.

Time to take that first baby step.

Take responsibility

Although you may not be able directly to change what’s happening, you can take charge of your response to it.  If you sink into a victim mentality, you end up blaming others and looking for someone to rescue you.

When you take charge, you recover your power to influence and manage your own life, and you’re in a better position to move on effectively, on your own terms.

Tune in to your health

Signs that things are getting out of hand include chronic tiredness, being susceptible to every virus doing the rounds, anxiety, depression and general lack of energy. Take notice of any health issues that have started recently, or that are made worse by your work situation. Visit your GP if you need to.

Learn to centre your energy

Notice your body. Take some deep breaths, right down into your abdomen.

Now stand or sit in balance, feet shoulder width apart, shoulders balanced and neck straight.  Scan your body and notice any points of tension.  Consciously relax them.

Take another breath. Remind yourself of what matters to you and aim to keep it more in focus. Do this as often as you can, and especially when you feel stressed.[i]

Get clear about what you want to be different

Answer these three questions:

If your working life was as good as you’d like, what would be different? What one thing would make the most difference?  How can you bring that into your working life?

Make a plan

Now you know what you want to be different, create a plan for bringing about the change you want. Do you need to talk to HR? Have a conversation with your boss? Negotiate a more manageable workload? Look for a new job?

Take your top two or three actions, set yourself a time to do them, and go for it.

Get help

As you decide to move on from what’s distressing you, it will help to find someone to cheer you along.  A coach, a mentor, a good friend or colleague who can see the bigger picture, all will be valuable.

Getting specific help with your transition back to the working life you want will help prevent your dumping the same stories on your family day after day, preventing the damage that can result from taking problems home.

Find a mantra or saying that will keep you on track.

For example: ‘I am worthy of as much respect as everyone else. I respect myself’. Or (from a client) ‘It’s only a thought and I can change it’. Make it something that really chimes for you.

That’s a bit strong…

I don’t think so. In Recover Your Balance – how to bounce back from bad times at work, I examine the damaging effects of chronic or repeated fear and distress.  One frequent consequence is a constant feeling of anxiety. There is a huge amount of research about the chain reactions which anxiety and fear set up in the body.

Anxiety triggers the release of adrenaline, which in turn triggers the release of cortisol, used by the body for healing when you’ve injured yourself. That’s fine if you’re dealing with a one-off incident (e.g. getting out of the path of a moving truck). However, the continuous release of cortisol increases stress in the body and, long term, that’s bad news.

Although stress is not necessarily a primary cause of illness, research[1] shows that it does exacerbate our existing tendency towards such chronic health problems as cardiovascular disease, digestive problems, bone problems such as osteoporosis, and late-onset diabetes.

Yes, but bullying?

Defining bullying isn’t always easy. One person’s bully may be another’s strong manager. I find the Workplace Bullying Institute’s definition helpful here. It describes bullying as “repeated…behaviours that are threatening, intimidating or humiliating.” (See “the Bully at Work” by Gary and Ruth Namie.)

Being uplifted by others’ experience

My Twitter friend and colleague Marion Chapsal is having her own big challenges at the moment.  Marion has a deep humanity that enables her to reach for what is healing and affirming about life, even at its toughest.

Her blog post, Silly Things that Help During Crises speaks for itself. I’d like to share it with you, because if you are feeling challenged by your working life, I think you’ll find something to inspire you.

What do you appreciate in your life?

Now you’ve read Marion’s post, think about your own special things. Here’s a little exercise from Recover Your Balance.:

When we’re off balance, it shows, even though we may be unaware of how we’re coming across. I’ve experienced clients saying they responded calmly to a situation, while their colleagues report observing a very strong negative reaction from them.  It really does help to become self-aware.

So I went to Brighton last week. No this isn’t a holiday story. I spent a hugely enjoyable and informative day in the company of three other coaches on a workshop with Mark Walsh of Integration Training, whose guest post and video about centring you may remember. This particular workshop was based on the work of Paul Linden of Being in Movement, and was rooted in Dr. Linden’s work with trauma survivors among others.

Grounded techniques and practices

We came back to centring several times during the day. Mark strives to provide a wholly somatic (body-based), subtly nuanced explanation of stress and its antidotes. Of centring, he says: “People all over the world  have all found it found useful – it simply improves whatever they do – and is regularly assessed as the best “quick win” on leadership, time management and stress management courses. I am aware that to say something improves ANY activity is a big claim so I invite you to test it for yourselves with any measurables you can muster.”

‘Don’t believe me, try it’ was akin to a mantra throughout the day.

The Body and Leadership

Now Mark is writing a new book, ‘The Body and Leadership‘, and is serialising it on his blog. The latest chapter expands on the concept of centring.  Mark says, “I first came across centring in the martial arts – in the pressure of confrontation being uncentred – off-balance and tense physically, mentally and emotionally – is a recipe for disaster. Since then I have taught centring everywhere from war-zones, to classrooms to boardrooms with people of many occupations on five continents.”

The parallels between his description of three responses to stress and that of Patsy Rodenburg in her book ‘Presence’ (‘The Second Circle’ in the US) are striking. There’s a brief description in an earlier post, together with a video of Rodenburg talking about her work with actors.

Mark and I have different views about the value of the concept of energy as a way of understanding human responses to stress, but I have no doubt that his somatic approach is rigorous, highly researched and deeply experienced.  I shall be back for more.

Their  circumstances were very different, but one thing stood out especially for me:  all of them said “Get help”.  Two of them had, and one hadn’t.  The lady who had struggled on alone through some particularly horrendous bullying is still carrying the scars several years later.  Getting help really can support you to get through the experience and take control of your life again far more quickly than going it alone.  I know – it took me three years.

Get some help

If you’re struggling through difficult times at work, I’d very much recommend that you find a supporter. Choose someone neutral – a mentor, a coach or someone else uninvolved, whom you trust. By using a supporter, you will have someone who can help you get events into perspective at a time when it is easy to over-react to everything that happens.

Karen, a client and contributor to Recover Your Balance remembers: “I was bullied (I realized later), but was told I was a bully. In the middle of it I felt literally sick (great weight loss programme as I could barely eat!). I have always opposed bullying and felt completely knocked off balance – I had always tried to put people at the centre of my actions. The very strong feelings lasted until I got my coach on board and then I began to be able to see what was happening. The feelings were still strong as I was hit with wave after wave of false accusations about my work quality, etc. It wasn’t until I left the situation that I was able to regain my balance.”

One of my coaching clients had made a major mistake at work many years earlier and had kept his feelings to himself. He was still allowing his error to limit his career choices, believing 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.

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. 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. Like Karen, I often felt sick. You may have feelings of guilt and worthlessness, or a fear that you may not recover and that you may not be employable again.

When you are stressed it is likely that you will go home and dump your negative feelings on the same person every night. As you walk through the door, they may be thinking with a sinking feeling, ‘what’s coming now?’ By choosing to work with a supporter outside your home environment you will prevent that toxic energy polluting your home and your relationship. Your bonds with friends and family will suffer less strain than they would if you were making them your only source of support.

Moving on

Part of getting your balance back is about achieving some closure with the difficulties you’ve suffered. One of our callers found some relief only when they discovered that all the people who had bullied them were dead. Another found a way through by being clear about their values, and how they were being compromised by staying in a situation that felt wrong.

I was particularly cheered by the caller who didn’t want to waste any more negative energy on the people who had hurt her. She said ‘I can support ten people while I am pouring negativity onto my former employer.’

Choosing to put your energy into positive and affirming things is a sign that you’re back in charge.  And you’ll do it quicker when you realise you’re not alone and get some help.

This week I’ve been treated to two extremes.  But that’s not where I’m going to start.

Customer love

My gold standard for a great service ethos is my good friend Heather Barrie of Harries Food.  Commuters from lovely Arundel in Sussex, England will know Harries, because Heather runs the coffee stall on the station each morning.  And she just loves her customers.

The stories are many, and the verdict seems unanimous – she’s brilliant. She will bend over backwards to give harrassed travellers a good send-off. Her biggest concern as she grows?  Finding staff who will love her customers as much as she does.

‘Sorry we’re too busy to answer the phone…’

At the opposite end of the service scale this weekend was Interflora. My Mum is in a care home 5 hours’ from me.  I ordered flowers for Mothers’ Day to be delivered to my Dad’s house on Saturday so that I could take them to her before driving home on Sunday. Normally I call the florist directly, but I no longer know one florist from another in my birth town, so I took what I thought was the easy way out and ordered online. Wrong decision.

At 05.48 on Saturday, I received an email telling me the flowers were on their way as requested. At 10.58, another email informed me that they would not now be delivering them until Sunday.  No explanation, just a refund of the carriage and the offer of a discount on the next order. They had let me down at an important moment.

I naively tried calling the number in the email.  Maybe I could get the flowers re-routed to the care home? Nope. A recorded message informed me that they could not make any changes to Mothers’ Day orders (even though they just did!) and they were too busy to answer my call. I replied to the email indicating that the new arrangement was unacceptable and why.  I received an automated acknowledgment.

There was nothing for it. I went into town and bought a new bouquet for Mum so that I had flowers to take to her.  She hardly knew, but that’s not the point. She had flowers. From me.  In person.

On Sunday, I drove home.  The Interflora flowers were finally delivered just as I arrived back in Southampton.

On Monday, I received an email from Interflora.  It informed me that the flowers had been delivered on 3rd April at 12.42, and that a signature had been obtained.  No acknowledgement of my complaint.  I replied immediately pointing this out.  I am still waiting for a response.  Interflora?  Hello?

‘We promise we’ll keep you updated…’

Now for the other extreme. If you read my last post, you’ll know that I dropped my mp3 player down the loo in the middle of the night. It took a long time to dry out.  So long that my other half revised his opinion about its survival chances and I ordered a new one.

The new player was promptly shipped from China. Four days in, it was flagged up by the courier, FedEx, as being stranded in Chinese Customs, labeled a possible ‘hazardous item’.

Oh what a different experience. I called the number on the tracking email.  The woman who answered knew her business, and quickly established that this could take a while.  ‘We’ll call you when we know what’s happening’, she promised.  And they did. Twice.  Once to say they still weren’t sure when it would be free, and then to say it was on its way, what its route would be, and when it was likely to arrive.

Both callers gave their names, both were confident and both sounded as though they enjoyed what they were doing. They were brilliant.  I know it’s at Stansted now, and I am pretty sure it will turn up tomorrow.

And my point is…?

A few years back, I worked with another of my favourite clients, FrontLine Telephone Answering Services.  They wanted both to establish a great service for their customers and an inclusive and supportive workplace for their staff.  You can get the case study describing how they did it here.  My point is this:  it takes a huge amount of focused, intentional work to create great customer service, and it takes authentic, confident staff buy-in to keep the show on the road. And if you put in the work, the business stands a good chance of growing.

I’ve been in organisations that understood this, and I’ve been in ones that didn’t.  I don’t know how things are at Interflora, or at FedEx, but I do know that when you have miserable customer service, it is often delivered by miserable staff. And vice-versa.

So FedEx – well done and thank you.  And no, Interflora, I will not be taking you up on your offer of a discount on my next order, because I shall never, ever give you an order again. Why?  Because Mothers’ Day is not always a jolly time, you let me down, and I don’t believe you care.

Down the pan

I ask because I dropped my mp3 player last night.  I’ll leave where I dropped it to your imagination. Suffice it to say that it’s drying out slowly, and my electronic engineer husband thinks there’s a good chance it will work when it’s stopped being damp.

In the microseconds after I had retrieved it (I didn’t know I could move that fast when I was half asleep) I caught myself berating me for my stupidity.  But not for my behaviour, you understand.  Before I had chance to draw breath, the gremlin on my shoulder was in full flow, telling me how stupid I was, how completely ridiculous for expecting the earphone plug to take its weight.  And I was right off balance.

Learning and blaming

The reality is that response is a choice.  I can go on berating myself for ‘being stupid’ or I can learn.  In her book, Change Your Questions, Change Your Life, Marilee Adams PhD has a really useful model that she calls the Choice Map.  You can download it from her site. My clients find it really helpful when they’re dealing with difficult situations at work, or learning to manage a team for the first time. And the book is a great read too – the parable of a man who is about to quit his new job because he thinks he’s a failure, and the coach (who else?) who helps him find a more helpful response to his circumstances.

Adams believes that if you set off in judgement mode (‘who’s to blame?’, ‘why am I so stupid?’) you end up in a pit of negativity in which you’ve become the lead in a failure drama. And you feel terrible about yourself and everyone else.

Stop the plop

Once you catch yourself being judgemental, it takes a heartbeat to switch onto what Adams calls the ‘Learner Path’. From there you can make helpful choices. You can get off the self-blame roller-coaster and stop reacting automatically. So much more helpful.

So I’m debating whether to buy the case with the loop for attaching to clothes and bags, or the padded arm band.

Eva was badly bullied at work.  Since she ditched her job and her damaging boss a year ago, I’ve watched as she charted her recovery.  Here’s what she says about it:

“Tough Love

It’s exactly a year since I walked out of my job, taking the first step of putting an extreme case of workplace bullying behind me (recorded in my blog).

It didn’t end with my letter of resignation, of course. I was immediately embroiled in the complex legalities of constructive dismissal. Even more negative were the unemployed hours with little to do but mull over what I’d gone through.

My boss had spent so long making fun of me, his voice narrated over everything I did. I knew what he’d say in any given situation and my imagination said it for him. Prolonged workplace bullying had made me paranoid and crazy.

A year later…

…and I’ve made a full recovery.

It’s not surprising considering the work I put in. And that’s what it takes – dedicated work. I’m not going to lie to you. Here’s a few from the list:-

I tried affirmations, self-help books, St John’s Wort, Kalms tablets, tried some angel therapy, forced myself to the gym, consulted my GP, called ACAS and twice called the Samaritans.

I talked to my mum and my best friend, went for walks, tried shopping therapy, wrote a self help book, used forums, got a better job and enrolled on a playwriting course.

I went on a yoga retreat (rooming with a hippy chick who listened to nothing but Hari Krishna on her MP3). I registered with a casting agency, trying to engineer more confidence about my appearance.

Perhaps more significantly, I tried Recover Your Balance – online.

You can’t imagine the cumulative hours I put into restoring myself back to the person I was.

It takes a whole lot of work

The refusal to give up until I felt 100% better now makes me more sensitive to those who don’t try or are half hearted about it. I see them everywhere. When I say, ‘Why don’t you read this, or try that?’ the answer is invariably along the lines of ‘Why should I? He/she made me feel like this. They’re responsible’.

But it’s the equivalent of someone hurt and bleeding after a car accident saying, ‘I won’t wear a bandage if the other driver won’t put it on for me.’

If you met me in the street today, you wouldn’t have the faintest idea I’ve ever had a problem in my life. Some days, I can almost believe it. And that, my friends, takes a whole lot of work. It takes a whole lot of tough love.

So take the tough love line on yourself – and try anything.

Best wishes, BBTB x”

There’s cause both for celebration and for frustration. The internet is a ready source for the statistics of inequality, and I don’t plan to go the statistical route today, important though it is for defining what’s happening across the World. There’s a heap of information in the latest Ipsos/Mori poll on the subject.

The power of confidence

So many people who do the Recover Your Balance programme feel powerless when they start out.  Something outside of themselves has knocked them off track.  They feel bad about themselves.  They think there’s something wrong with them.  When I was bullied at work (a quarter of a century ago, at a time when my firm’s macho culture was the norm rather than the exception) I thought I would never be acceptable to an employer again.  I’m pleased to say I was wrong.  Very wrong.

I’ve mentioned Eva James before.  She was badly bullied and blogs about her journey back to sanity.  Her latest post, with a wink at Oscar Wilde, talks about forgiveness for our own sake. Here is a woman whose confidence buttons were pushed mercilessly by her previous boss. Her post shows how differently she feels from the perspective of growing confidence. And she is a fabulous writer.

We all have within us the power to bring enormous good into the World. The spanner in the works is self-doubt. Recovering balance is about aligning with our solid core of positive energy, from which creation flows freely. And it’s a life’s work.

Wishing:

So here is my wish for women on this landmark anniversary:

that every woman recovers confidence in her own core of being that enables her to be who she truly is.