Experiment: Listen to yourself and those around you and every time you hear yourself or someone else blame someone or something else, make a tik mark on a piece of paper or in your cell phone notes. At the end of the day, count the tik marks. What do you notice? We as humans seem to love to blame others for pretty much everything, including our own feelings! “You made me feel this way!”
In coaching a client recently, we discussed the sad reality (not really…. sad, just meaning we have work to do..) that we own how we feel. It is as Eleanor Roosevelt said: “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” A leader’s work includes having the courage to reflect on their own “triggers” or reactive behaviors and examine the root cause. In the moment, this might look like breathing and visualizing a relaxing, grounded image, giving yourself a hug of compassion, and then refocusing on your desired outcome. For our client, her trigger was her life experience that “people will let me down and I can only count on myself.” Her recognizing this allowed her to have compassion for herself, while setting boundaries with an employee. She still had work to do but she didn’t have to carry anger and resentment into the rest of her day and her home life. We’d love to hear your thoughts for yourself and others around this challenge.
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