The day had started badly. Phone didn’t Charge and therefore alarm didn’t go off. Rushing to get ready, shredded bottle of milk getting it out of the fridge. Skipped coffee, trod on the cat, shouted at loved ones, etc. Not a good start to a day.
From this chaos of my own making I walk into the first video meeting of my day, a team meeting with my directs. My bad mood is obvious and the team edge around issues. This frustrates me more. By the end of the meeting I have spread my bad mood faster than a virus. What an inspirational leader, where have I gone wrong?
It doesn’t have to be like this. I know how to change my state, though I am sometimes too wrapped up in myself to realise how my state effects that of others. As a leader though it is my responsibility to serve others and that means taking time to change my state and be ready to enable the team.
Back in 2003 I first learnt that my memory is an incredible powerful tool that I can use to change state. I studied NLP from Richard Bandler, and then in more detail with Paul Jacobs and Dee Shipman of New Oceans. Through my life I have experienced times when I was relaxed, excited, focused, and engaged. I just need to remember those time to bring back that state.
Like all skills this takes bit of practice. The trick is to focus on the small details; the noises in the background, the temperature or wind on my skin, the feel of an objects or person, the smells or tastes, and then what I saw. The more vividly I can experience the sensation from my memory the more the feelings of that time will flow back and through that my state will change. So step into that memory and relive it so that the disasters of the morning will drift away and I will become more able to serve my team.
In NLP we learn to anchor some of these useful memories or states so we can more quickly access them. Linking them to a shortcut menu in our heads to quickly reclaim the state.
Knowing all this I am still far from perfect and events sometimes do snowball. I am human, forgive me, and encourage me to do better.
