I am honored to welcome my good friend and colleague Doris Kovic as a guest blogger today.  Doris is an extraordinary leadership coach and President of Leading Insight, a management consulting company, based in San Clemente, California.  She works with clients to increase the effectiveness of their people, in order to realize greater productivity and increased revenues. 

While Doris’ post was originally directed at a corporate audience, her message applies to people in all walks of life.  Enjoy!

Managing Your Emotions to Get Results

Letting your emotions get the better of you will derail your decision making and the ability  of the people around you to be their best. I would like to be able to say that its easy to manage your emotions.  But it is not!  Research confirms that over time, our responses to feelings become hard wired in and that every time we react a certain way we are reinforcing those connections in our brain.  That is the bad news.   The good news is that our brains are “plastic” and through reflection and practice we can rewire the connections and build new and better habits.  Old dogs can learn new tricks!

For more information on Doris’ work, visit her website at www.leadinginsight.com

Where I am, on vacation in New England, the weather has been less than optimal.  That’s code for it’s been raining alot!  As a result, people are a bit down, disappointed that their best laid summer plans have been washed out.  It seems that all any one can talk about is the weather (yawn, ho hum), as if talking about it is going to make the sun come out.  And ‘talk’ is actually being kind…I feel like I’m living in Complaintville.  If the clouds and rain aren’t enough, all this negative talk is a real downer.  You’d think that the whole world had stopped and all that is going on is bad weather.  Why do we have such a narrow view?  Why do we find comfort (pleasure?) in sharing our common misery?  And why must we let the weather dictate our sense of satisfaction and well being?  I say we mustn’t and  I’m on a campaign to turn things around…I’ve begun a list of the great things I’ve been able to do on rainy days during my vacation this summer.  I’d welcome your additions.  Just thinking about the many options cheers me up!

Here are a few of the things I’ve been able to do that I wouldn’t have done if the weather had been better:

1. Went to the local art museum without feeling like I’m missing a day on the water!
2. Finished the book I started last month.
3. Go running without struggling with the heat
4. Take naps to catch up on the sleep I’ve been missing
5. Spend intimate time with my kids playing games and doing puzzles
6. Clean the cluttered closets that have been bugging me for years.
7. Write real pen and paper letters to friends
8. Clean out my inbox
9. Write some blog entries
10. Write 5 things I’m grateful for at the end of every day.

Here are some ideas I’ve had for others:

1. Think of things you did on rainy days as a kid and ‘re-enact’ them for your kids
2. Rent movies you’ve always wanted to see or better yet, rent some of your old faves and watch them again
3. Have a tea party
4. Organize your closets or your kitchen
5. Embark on that hobby you’ve always wanted to explore
6. Interview your relatives and learn more about your family history

What do you do on a rainy day while on vacation?  Do you suffer and complain or do you make the best of it and create your own good time?

Like many things in life, we can’t control the weather but we have complete control over how we deal with it!

Enjoy!

I had a number of people write and say the thing they most wanted to change is their habits around finances.  That’s a hot topic now, more than ever before.  And, the truth is, changing our habits around money is the same whether we have a little or a lot and it’s the same process as changing any habit.  In fact, I know many people who have very little money and are very comfortable and relaxed about it and I know others who have a great deal of money and worry they are one-step away from being a bag lady or man.  In many cases, it’s not about the money.  It’s about our beliefs about money, the meaning we bestow on money and how we have historically handled our financial affairs that matter. 

Here are some tips for creating more positive habits around your finances:

1.  Get clear about what you want.  Do you want to be debt free?  Do you want to spend without guilt?  Do you want to save for a particular item, event or time in the future?  If so, how much and by when? 

Many of my clients say they want to be better about money.  That isn’t a clear enough goal to work toward.  What is the specific thing you want to do more of or less of or what is the specific outcome you want to reach?  And, by when do you want to reach your goal.  Remember to be realistic.  Money issues seldom go away over night.

2.  Identify what you are doing now that is preventing you from reaching your goal.  Come on, come clean.  What are your current beliefs and behaviors that are causing you to be dissatisfied with your current financial situation or relationship to your finances?

3.  Identify the specific behaviors and beliefs you want to start doing and make your new habits.  You may not know the answer to this question yet.  That’s Ok.  If you don’t know the answer to any question, the first step is to learn.  So, you might want to read books or articles on improving your financial situation.  You can find them in magazines, on the internet or your local library. Or you may want to talk with an expert.  If you don’t have a financial planner or an accountant, ask a friend you trust who he/she uses.  You don’t have to hire the person, at least not right away.  You just need to spend some time talking with him/her to learn what is required to be financially responsible.  Then determine which of the things you are already doing well and what you need to do or do differently.

4.  Create a vivid mental image of what it will look like and feel like when you are successfully managing your financial affairs.  I don’t mean that you are dripping in wealth, I mean that you are practicing the habits required of fiscal responsibility.  Picture how you handle money, the choices you make and how you feel about them.  Create a vision board to remind you of your intention.

5.  Each time you have a decision to make about money, ask yourself, “Does this action support my goal?” or “How will I feel tomorrow if I make this choice today?”  Make your spending and saving decisions consciously.

6.  Remember that changing your financial habits takes time and discipline.  Be patient with yourself and acknowledge yourself each time you make a choice that supports your desired outcome.

I had one today.  I’ve been very busy recently, working at the detail level of my business, managing my family through the hectic pace of spring sports and school year’s end.  I was feeling very transactional: efficient and productive but not very creative or inspired.  I’ve been reactive and a more than a little stressed.  The pace at which I was moving caused me to feel disconnected from people and from the things that inspire me and allow me to support and inspire others.  The harder I tried to get inspired, the more disconnected and uninspired I felt.  I tried reading or writing but I came up dry.  And today, while on a long awaited vacation on the coast of Maine, I had an epiphany.  The fastest route to creative, constructive, inspiration is to stop trying.  I needed to unplug (or almost anyway, I’m still connected to my laptop but not tethered to it), unwind, stop trying to resolve the problem.  I need to listen to the quiet, get present to the beauty in nature, and allow thoughts to emerge.  During the usual, busy, multitasking day to day lives most of us lead, it is impossible for us to allow our thoughts to fully percolate, to play themselves out in all of their glory.  We are too rushed, too often interrupted, too impatient to get on to the next thing.  Allowing this time off the treadmill of life is critical to creative thinking.  Without it, we are inclined to do the same thing we’ve always done, perhaps with a bit of a unique twist but not significantly differently enough to allow for real change.  No, this sort of ‘allowing’ is  not something one can do.  It is a way we must be.   We must be quiet, be patient, be with ourselves.

Vacation time is great for such breakthrough opportunities but even if you don’t have the luxury of extended time off, you can create opportunities for yourself to have mental space.  Commit to being fully disconnected for a block of time… no internet, no email, no blackberry, no TV.  I find my best creative thinking and problem solving comes when I am physically active, engaged in something that doesn’t require thinking, for example walking, running, dare I say it…cleaning.  Others find meditation or other mindful practice to be the key.  At these times, thought gems just seem to emerge out of the space.   The common denominator is to stop trying and allow.  Stop working at it and relax.  Slow down enough so that when the right thoughts emerge, you notice and grab on to them.  Find ways to slow down, get off the grid and just be with best self.

When we’re working on a project or problem, we often ignore the rest of us.  For example, when we are working toward an important deadline at work, we often neglect our personal life;  when we are focused on our family, we often let our own health take a back seat.  It can be challenging to keep all the parts of us well at the same time.   Not doing so can have a pretty high cost:  our relationships suffer, our work performance declines, we feel stressed, we lose sleep, we are susceptible to disease, our mood suffers and on and on.    In the end, those costs negatively impact the thing we were originally focused on as well:  it’s hard to complete a task when we fall physically ill, hard to think clearly when we are exhausted, hard to get support from others when we are short tempered and moody. 

So how do we consistently pay attention to all of the parts of us at once?

1.  Create a clear vision for all aspects of your life:  personal, spiritual, financial, health, job/career, family, home, emotional, service, etc.

2.  Make a vision board for your life or for each aspect.  Keep that image in a place where you see it often.  Make it a compelling, pictoral creation that reminds and inspires. 

3.  Set specific, measurable goals for each area, the attainment of which will move you toward your vision.

4.  Schedule time each week to ‘work’ on each aspect of your life that is important.  NO EXCEPTIONS!  NO EXCUSES!  

5.  Create an evidence board.  Make note of the progress you make in each life area, no matter how small.  Focus on what you have accomplished vs. what you still have left to do.

6.  Don’t compartmentalize.   All of your parts are integrated.  You can’t be your best self unless you take care of all of you.

7. Pay attention to signals from your body, from your mind and from others that let you know you are losing sight of some aspect of yourself.  Respond to those messages promptly by revisiting your vision and goals and getting back on track with your plan.

8.  Put yourself first.  It is the only way you can be fully there for everyone else when they need you!