Staying Productive and In Control
When it comes to
self-control, it is so easy to focus on your failures that your successes tend
to pale in comparison. And why shouldn’t they? Self-control is an effort that’s
intended to help achieve a goal. Failing to control yourself is just that—a
failure. If you’re trying to avoid digging into that bag of chips after dinner
because you want to lose a few pounds and you succeed Monday and Tuesday nights
only to succumb to temptation on Wednesday by eating four servings’ worth of
the empty calories, your failure outweighs your success. You’ve taken two steps
forward and four steps back.
A Study carried on half a million people and resulted that the upper
echelons of top performance are filled with people who are high in emotional
intelligence (90% of top performers, to be exact). The hallmark of emotional
intelligence is SELF-CONTROL—a skill that unleashes massive productivity by
keeping you focused and on track.
Unfortunately,
self-control is a difficult skill to rely on. Self-control is so fleeting for
most people that when Martin Seligman and his colleagues at the University of
Pennsylvania surveyed two million people and asked them to rank order their
strengths in 24 different skills, self-control ended up in the very bottom
slot. And when your self-control leaves something to be desired, so does your
productivity.
Self-control is something
we could all use a little help with, Things that emotionally intelligent people
do to keep themselves productive and in control. They consciously apply these
twelve behaviors because they know they work. Some are obvious, others
counter-intuitive, but all will help you minimize those pesky failures to boost
your productivity.
Perfection is not the
Goal
Emotionally intelligent
people won’t set perfection as their target because they know it doesn’t exist.
Human beings, by our very nature, are fallible. When perfection is your goal,
you’re always left with a nagging sense of failure that makes you want to give
up or reduce your effort. You end up spending your time lamenting what you
failed to accomplish and what you should have done differently instead of
moving forward excited about what you've achieved and what you will accomplish
in the future.
Solution Focused
Where you focus your
attention determines your emotional state. When you fixate on the problems that
you’re facing, you create and prolong negative emotions which hinder
self-control. When you focus on the actions you'll take to better yourself and
your circumstances, you create a sense of personal efficacy that produces
positive emotions and improves performance. Emotionally intelligent people
won’t dwell on problems because they know they’re most effective when they
focus on solutions.
Be Positive
Positive thoughts help
you exercise self-control by focusing your brain’s attention onto the rewards
you will receive for your effort. You have to give your wandering brain a
little help by consciously selecting something positive to think about. Any
positive thought will do to refocus your attention. When things are going well,
and your mood is good, self-control is relatively easy. When things are going
poorly, and your mind is flooded with negative thoughts, self-control is a
challenge. In these moments, think about your day and identify one positive
thing that happened, or will happen, no matter how small. If you can't think of
something from the current day, reflect on the past and look to the future. The
point here is that you must have something positive that you're ready to shift
your attention to when your thoughts turn negative, so that you don't lose
focus.
They Avoid Asking “What
If?”
“What if?” statements
throw fuel on the fire of stress and worry, which are detrimental to self-control
Things can go in a million different directions, and the more time you spend
worrying about the possibilities, the less time you’ll spend taking action and
staying productive (staying productive also happens to calm you down and keep
you focused). Productive people know that asking “what if? will only take them
to a place they don’t want—or need—to go. Of course, scenario planning is a
necessary and effective strategic planning technique. The key distinction here
is to recognize the difference between worry and strategic thinking.
They Forgive Themselves
A vicious cycle of
failing to control oneself followed by feeling intense self-hatred and disgust
is common in attempts at self-control. These emotions typically lead to
over-indulging in the offending behavior. When you slip up, it is critical that
you forgive yourself and move on. Don’t ignore how the mistake makes you feel;
just don’t wallow in it. Instead, shift your attention to what you’re going to
do to improve yourself in the future.
Failure can erode your
self-confidence and make it hard to believe you’ll achieve a better outcome in
the future. Most of the time, failure results from taking risks and trying to
achieve something that isn’t easy. Emotionally intelligent people know that
success lies in their ability to rise in the face of failure, and they can’t do
this when they’re living in the past. Anything worth achieving is going to
require you to take some risks, and you can’t allow failure to stop you from
believing in your ability to succeed. When you live in the past, that is
exactly what happens, and your past becomes your present, preventing you from
moving forward.
They Don’t Say Yes Unless
They Really Want To
Research conducted at the
University of California in San Francisco shows that the more difficulty that
you have saying no, the more likely you are to experience stress, burnout, and
even depression, all of which erode self-control. Saying no is indeed a major
self-control challenge for many people. “No” is a powerful word that you should
not be afraid to wield. When it’s time to say no, emotionally intelligent
people avoid phrases like “I don’t think I can” or “I’m not certain.” Saying no
to a new commitment honors your existing commitments and gives you the
opportunity to successfully fulfill them. Just remind yourself that saying no
is an act of self-control now that will increase your future self-control by
preventing the negative effects of over commitment.
They Eat
File this one in the
counter-intuitive category, especially if you’re having trouble controlling
your eating. Your brain burns heavily into your stores of glucose when
attempting to exert self-control. If your blood sugar is low, you are far more
likely to succumb to destructive impulses. Sugary foods spike your sugar levels
quickly and leave you drained and vulnerable to impulsive behavior shortly
thereafter. Eating something that provides a slow burn for your body, such as
whole grain rice or meat, will give you a longer window of self-control. So, if
you’re having trouble keeping yourself out of the company candy bin when you’re
hungry, make sure you eat something else if you want to have a fighting chance.
They Sleep
I’ve beaten this one to
death over the years and can’t say enough about the importance of sleep to
increasing your emotional intelligence and maintaining your focus and
self-control. When you sleep, your brain literally recharges, shuffling through
the day’s memories and storing or discarding them (which causes dreams), so
that you wake up alert and clear-headed. Your self-control, attention, and
memory are all reduced when you don’t get enough—or the right kind—of sleep.
Sleep deprivation raises stress hormone levels on its own, even without a
stressor present, which are a major productivity killer. Being busy often makes
you feel as if you must sacrifice sleep to stay productive, but sleep
deprivation diminishes your productivity so much throughout the day that you're
better off sleeping.
When you're tired, your
brain's ability to absorb glucose is greatly diminished. This makes it
difficult to control the impulses that derail your focus. What’s more, without
enough sleep you are more likely to crave sugary snacks to compensate for low
glucose levels. So, if you’re trying to exert self-control over your eating,
getting a good night’s sleep—every night—is one of the best moves you can make.
They Exercise
Getting your body moving
for as little as 10 minutes releases GABA, a neurotransmitter that makes your
brain feel soothed and keeps you in control of your impulses. If you’re having
trouble resisting the impulse to walk over to the office next door to let somebody
have it, just keep on walking. You should have the impulse under control by the
time you get back.
They Meditate
Meditation actually
trains your brain to become a self-control machine. Even simple techniques like
mindfulness, which involves taking as little as five minutes a day to focus on
nothing more than your breathing and your senses, improves your self-awareness
and your brain’s ability to resist destructive impulses. Buddhist monks appear
calm and in control for a reason. Give it a try.
They Ride the Wave
Desire and distraction
have the tendency to ebb and flow like the tide. When the impulse you need to
control is strong, waiting out this wave of desire is usually enough to keep
yourself in control. When you feel as if you must give in, the rule of thumb
here is to wait at least 10 minutes before succumbing to temptation. You’ll
often find that the great wave of desire is now little more than a ripple that
you have the power to step right over.
They Squash Negative
Self-Talk
A big final step in
exercising self-control involves stopping negative self-talk in its tracks. The
more you ruminate on negative thoughts, the more power you give them. Most of
our negative thoughts are just that—thoughts, not facts. When you find yourself
believing the negative and pessimistic things your inner voice says, it's time
to stop and write them down. Literally stop what you're doing and write down
what you're thinking. Once you've taken a moment to slow down the negative
momentum of your thoughts, you will be more rational and clear-headed in
evaluating their veracity.
You can bet that your
statements aren’t true any time you use words like “never,” “worst,” “ever,”
etc. If your statements still look like facts once they’re on paper, take them
to a friend or colleague you trust and see if he or she agrees with you. Then
the truth will surely come out. When it feels like something always or never
happens, this is just your brain’s natural threat tendency inflating the
perceived frequency or severity of an event. Identifying and labeling your
thoughts as thoughts by separating them from the facts will help you escape the
cycle of negativity and move toward a positive new outlook.
Putting These Strategies
to Work
The important thing to
remember is you have to give these strategies the opportunity to work. This
means recognizing the moments where you are struggling with self-control and,
rather than giving in to impulse, taking a look at these strategies and giving them
a go before you give in.
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