After many years of observing how powerful the use of simple Emotional Intelligence (EI) techniques are in helping people reduce their stress, I find myself constantly amused at the epidemic of stress-reduction techniques presented by a multitude of publications. While some of these can be helpful, none hold a candle to those offered by enhancing EI.
Even before the economic downturn, we were all putting in more hours while we watched our projects pile up and budget and staff cut. Just imagine yourself in this stressful work environment and now you're in the middle of another bad-news meeting feeling stressed. Your mind wanders to some of the stress reduction suggestions and tips you've read lately and you think you could put those suggestions to use. You contemplate which of those suggestions and tips will help in this moment. Should you...
take a nap (as long as your head doesn't nod, maybe you'll get away with it)
count to ten (OK, but then what?)
take deep breaths (might help, but where do you go from there?)
practice yoga (hard to do in the meeting)
etc.
Right - OK if you don't care about your job you can try some of these in your meeting.
To some degree or another all of these suggestions might help reduce your stress. However, many of these tips are more appropriate outside of work. The problem is that many people experience most of their stress at work. So we live all day on excess adrenaline and cortisol (the stress hormone) as we experience one stressful situation after another. Then we go home and try to reduce our stress by practicing some of these stress-reduction suggestions. Or worse, we wait until the weekend or a vacation.
If we look beyond those things that trigger stress (last minute demands, unappreciative co-workers, work overload, staff cuts, team members not pulling their weight, etc.) and examine the real cause of stress we can target solutions that will work.
What is Stress?
We've all experienced times when we've felt engaged and challenged with our work. And we've experienced the opposite of those feelings -- times when we've felt overwhelmed. These two situations illustrate the difference between good stress (eustress) and bad stress. When we are engaged, challenged, and feeling positive, we are experiencing eustress (good stress). In this situation we feel capable of meeting our work demands. However, when we are not able to cope with those demands, we experience negative emotions that cause bad stress. Based on this information, we can draw the conclusion that the difference between bad and good stress is the difference between negative emotions (frustration, fear, anxiety, etc.) and positive emotions (appreciation, happy, curious, etc.)
The significance of this difference is key. Emotions, whether positive or negative, impact important work issues such as decision-making, accuracy, relationships, mental clarity, etc. Negative emotions have a negative impact whereas positive emotions have a positive effect.
The Solution
So we need a technique or way to transform negative emotions, in-the-moment of stress to positive, productive emotions. It's easy to see that while some of the suggested tips or ideas mentioned earlier might help us to some degree, none has the capability to help us transform our feelings in-the-moment while at work. And we want something that can do more than just "stuff" our emotions.
Emotional Intelligence offers a way to meet this challenge. Developing skill in the foundational competencies of emotional self-awareness and emotional self-management helps people direct their emotional energy in the right direction -- positive emotions. Developing an awareness of your emotions begins by noticing those things (people, situations, events) that trigger negative emotions. When you continually dwell on negative emotions, reliving and recalling the situation, you end up in a downward spiral and ultimately elevate your stress level. Once you are aware of those things that trigger negative emotions, you can transform those feelings by recalling and re-experiencing positive emotions.
It's easy and deceptively simple to recall fun, positive experiences. You can do it no matter where you are - at work or at home. And you'll discover that you can transform the anxiety and stress in a few seconds.
Tailoring the art and science of Emotional Intelligence to your needs, Byron Stock focuses on results, helping individuals and organizations develop byronstock.com Emotional Intelligence skills, leadership competencies and core values. Visit ByronStock.com ByronStock.com/ to learn about his practical, user-friendly techniques to enhance Emotional Intelligence skills.
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