Humor is a great stress reliever with  many positive health benefits and importantly in this current climate it causes us to step back and get a new perspective.

Allow me to share with you what a fun week I have had with the intention of inspiring you to have a little laugh…

On Tuesday night I performed 8 minutes of stand-up comedy; this had been on my bucket list for years as  I  had heard that stand-up is a real test of  skill. The aim of stand-up is to get six laughs a minute which is a hell of an achievement with a group of strangers. I didn’t get 6 laughs a minute but I did get the crowd to laugh as you can see and hear on this YouTube Video.

The unexpected bonus I had from doing stand-up comedy is that I am now seeing funny things in many more places; at work, in the street, in my relationships, everywhere! And the benefit of this is that I feel better at work and my relationships have improved noticeably.

Today we took our staff to lunch as one team member is leaving and another is having a birthday. We had a delicious lunch and with huge servings of laughter; we laughed at so many things and I think that we significantly improved the morale of the team.

One of our associates laughs for up to 5 minutes every morning as part of his preparation for the day – he says it raises his engergy better than a double shot latte. So as you read this just take stock of how much you have laughed this week? Do you need to hire some funny videos or go to a stand up comedy club yourself?

Here’s wishing you fun, lightness and laughter in the days ahead.

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Should

What is more interesting however are the ‘unsaid shoulds’.  When we get angry or upset it is most probably because somebody else has not complied with our ‘shoulds‘ or ‘shouldn’ts‘.

For example; if somebody pushes in front of you in a queue, do you feel angry? You do? Well that is because you (and me for that matter) believe that they shouldn’t push in.

Customer service is all about anticipating the expectation of should and shouldn’t. Last weekend I was taking my wife and children to see Barney (the pink dinosaur who dances!) at the Singapore Expo. Well firstly the car park was a nightmare, not enough spaces and people parking illegally and blocking traffic.  I could feel my stress levels rising as I knew I should get the kids to the show on time and that the expo SHOULD have provided enough parking.

I chose to drop my family at the entrance and go and find another car park, so after jogging back to the venue I was just in time for the show to start. My wife asked me to find two seat boosters for the kids and so I hurriedly set off in search of these only to be told by expo staff that they had run out of boosters and that I SHOULD have been there earlier!
Now I am not proud of my response to this situation because I raised my voice and told the girl that I had paid for the most expensive seats to see the damn dinosaur and I damn well think they SHOULD provide enough boosters!  In defense of the Singapore Expo or the organisers of Barney and Friends we were recompensed with two buckets of popcorn but it is another example of reacting to a ‘should’.

I have just stayed at an excellent hotel (The Grand Millennium Bangkok, Thailand) where my every need was anticipated. On check-in I was asked, “Should I need a wake up call and should I need a car to take me to the airport.” This hotel continued to impress me and I was reminded of how wonderful life is when the world meets or exceeds your mental maps.

The reason I was in Bangkok was to conduct a 3-day leadership program for senior managers and during that training I emphasised using the phrase, “what’s important to you about that?” This question uncovers a person’s values including their – ‘shoulds’. Knowing your own and other people’s mental map results in effective communication reduced conflict and increased influence.

So shouldn’t you get better at your shoulds?

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Quick pop quiz: In the last 48 hours have you experienced significant levels of frustration, fatigue, muscle tension, irritability, anger, cynicism, negativity or a feeling of being out of control?

All of these are signs of STRESS.

Success in today’s fast-paced and ever-changing environment requires the ability to effectively manage our own stress in the face of an increasing number of stressors.

A stressor is something that causes you to experience a stress response. The stressor is the cause and the stress response is the effect. The stressor that triggers your stress response can be anything from a ringing phone to the driver in front of you changing lanes without indicating. The stressor may not even be something ‘out there’; it can just be a thought inside your own head.

The stess response occurs whenever we cue our mind-body system in one of two ways. Either we send a message to our brain of “Danger!” Or we send a message of “Enough! Overload!”

Either of these two messages cues the brain to send the body into the Fight/Flight response otherwise known as General Arousal Syndrome (GAS). GAS causes blood to be withdrawn from the brain and stomach and sent to your larger muscle groups; it causes adrenalin to be released into your blood making the heart and lungs beat faster, pupil dilation and sweating. In addition; fats, cholesterol and sugar in your blood stream increase, your stomach secretes more acid, your immune system slows down and your thinking shifts to a more black-and-white, survival mode.

In today’s business world we cannot succeed by physically fighting or flight, we therefore need to manage our thinking and behaviours to rise above the stressors.

The first step in stress management is awareness; awareness of the stressors in your work and home life and your usual stress response. Only through awareness and Self Leadership can we gain control and direct our energies towards successful actions. A strong word of caution, denial can be lethal both financially and physically, so take a moment now and think about what pushes your stress buttons?

Stressors include:

• Not enough time
• Not enough clients/business
• Being kept on hold
• Paperwork/bureaucracy
• People not being trustworthy
• Delays
• Interruptions
• Incompetence

Are any of these, stressors buttons for you? Anything  else?

What about internal stressors such as the following thoughts?

• “I’m not good enough”
• “I don’t know enough”
• “I don’t have the right connections”
• “I’m not smart enough”
• “I need to be perfect”

Do you have any of these thoughts or others like them?

When your buttons are pushed, either from and external or internal stressor, what is your response?

• Breathe holding
• Muscle tension, leading to headaches
• Anger, Frustration
• Shouting
• Depression

You have a choice to interrupt the stressor to stress response and break the cause-effect chain. You can manage your mind-body and emotions because it is this ability that determines the difference between success and mediocrity in any endeavor including business and sport.

Consider Tiger Woods as he steadies himself to take a long put at championship point, with thousands of people watching intently. Watching to see him win or lose. Could you handle the pressure? Well probably not, not without the practice and training that Tiger has had. You can however practice and train yourself to handle the pressure in your chosen endeavour.

Sporting greats such as Tiger Woods have a strategy for handling stress; let me share with you a strategy to propel you to success in your business.

Step 1. Know why you are doing what you are doing. We can withstand any what if we have a big enough why. Your ‘whys’ are you values, what’s important to you.

Examples of values are: Making a difference, independence, profit, caring for family, being in control, balance, health, happiness. So what’s important to you?

Step 2. Keep a note in your diary of when you become stressed and what caused it; this will increase your awareness of how you run your mind-body-emotional states.

Step 3. Interrupt the stressor to stress response. There are many stress interrupt patterns and the best is still breathing. When we start to go into a stressful state we tend to breath hold and tense our muscles, by consciously taking a deep breathe and slowly breathing out fully, you break the cycle. Practicing relaxation techniques is also useful to achieve this.

Step 4. Take the sting out of the stressor – burst its bubble.

When you identify a stressor, ask yourself this question “in terms of what I value, is it useful to get stressed about this?”

Comparing the stressor against your values shrinks it down to size. With the stressor now at a manageable proportion you can ask yourself, “What is a more useful behaviour for me to engage in?” For example if your stressor was not enough new clients, rather than engage in stressful worrying, a more useful behaviour would be to engage in marketing activities to secure new clients.

Step 5. See each stressful situation as an opportunity to increase your skills. Successful people have the ‘frame of mind’ that with every challenge is a chance to improve, they don’t beat themselves up, they focus on what learning’s they can take out of a situation.

By using this strategy you will take control of you mind-body state and so start to take control of your results. You may not be aware that all communication is dependent upon the state you are in. Have you ever tried to say, “I love you” when you are angry? The words are changed by the emotional state. We are all very sensitive to non-verbal signals and your emotional state is broadcasting to everyone you are communicating with. So if you are frustrated, angry or stressed this will be transmitted along with whatever you say. Since the quality of our communication has a direct correlation to our results it is important to manage your state of mind for success.

Between 1991 and 1992 Richard Branson was under attack. His Virgin record company was making money but his vision for Virgin Airways was being blocked by underhanded tactics from British Airways and a lack of support from his own bankers. When Branson blew the whistle on BA, the smear campaign saw the British papers with headlines calling him a liar. Branson could have cut his losses and consolidated his business to the profitable record company. His wife, friends and advisors all suggested that course of action but Branson is an optimist and refused to let the stress get to him. Dr Martin Seligman has discovered that the pessimist is at the mercy of reality, whereas the optimist has a massive defense against reality that maintains good cheer in the face of a relentlessly indifferent universe. It is my observation that the optimist by refusing to accept reality creates their own and therefore determines their results. Branson beat BA and went on to become a billionaire.

Will you back yourself and take charge of your success? Will you use your stressors as the fuel to improve your skills and move to the front of your field? Will you practice the skills daily and move from Stress to Success?

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It is a bit like if you were in a boat and have set your course, but the boat springs a leak and you spend your whole time bailing water and have no time to steer.

William Bridges created a model of change and transition that is highly relevant in today’s financial readjustment. When the collapse of Lehman Brothers started the domino effect of the global crisis, many of us would have experienced first shock, then denial, anger and fear. If you lost money or a job you might then experience grief, frustration, confusion, stress and loss of control.

As an executive coach and leadership consultant I have often witnessed this spiraling down into paralysis that Bridges calls the ‘neutral zone’. Symptoms of the neutral zone include ambiguity, anxiety and the absence of motivation. The cure for this paralysis is a new vision of what is possible.

Einstein said that, “A problem cannot be solved with the same level of thinking that created the problem.” When in the neutral zone, we are in a dark place and our ability to think optimistically and see possibilities is severely limited. What is required is a little magic, the magic of imagination. All of human achievement started with imagination, from running a mile in under 4 minutes, to imagining what it would be like on the top of Mount Everest to imagining walking on the surface of the moon.

A vision will inspire, motivate and engender creativity and it starts with using imagination to travel to the future when things will be better. The Executive who asks him/herself, “What is possible?” “What will we be doing when things are better?” To do achieve this we must take time to stop bailing the water in the boat and look to the shore. Most executives find this extremely difficult as they leave themselves little or no time to stop, step back and think strategically.

With a new vision of where you are going, you and your people will become more optimistic, think creatively and start planning actions that will move you towards success.

It was no surprise that Barack Obama beat John McCain; Dr Martin Seligman in his book ‘Learned Optimism’ talks about his analysis of US elections based on the number of positive or optimistic comments made by the candidates. Obama clearly offered a more optimistic view of the future and thus captured the popular vote.

Obama is being called a transformational leader because he:

1. Created a vision that inspired the American voters (and the world) to believe that there were new possibilities.

2. Stimulates people to think, to re-examine their ideas and find creative alternatives. Such an environment breeds imagination and innovation.

3. Treats people as individuals making people feel valued and encouraging them to contribute. He recognizes that people have unique talents, strengths and weakness and allowing for these differences without judgment.

The transformational leader must have what I like to call ‘realistic optimism’ which is a practical and pragmatic approach that is ideally suited to the current climate. Realistic optimism is the mindset that we can make the best of any circumstance; it is the acceptance that bad things do happen but with a healthy self-esteem and the confidence in our abilities we can overcome adversity, learn from the situation and be even better for the experience.

Optimism without right actions and following sound principles will not be enough. Lehman Brothers failed because of over-optimism and the senior management not being in alignment with their own company’s vision and values.

In the current climate it is tempting to focus on immediate need and make tactical rather than strategic decisions; I urge you to step back for a moment, get in touch with your personal or company vision and ask yourself, “Is this decision the right one for the long term?”

Andrew Bryant is the Director of Self Leadership International and is based in Singapore but travels extensively as an executive coach and leadership consultant.

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As a wake up call to all of us I thought I would post  13 ways to mis-manage your health and seriously reduce your happiness and life expectancy.

1. Believe you are immortal or believe that illness only happens to other ‘weaker’ people. Never have a health check or listen to advice.
2. Don’t exercise; avoid all types of physical activity especially anything that makes you lightly puff.
3. Smoke 2 packs a day.
4. Bottle up all your feelings; avoid sharing with friends, family or any strong social support group.
5. Drink alcohol excessively.
6. Drive very fast and drink alcohol excessively.
7. Get angry with everyone and everything, blame others and take no responsibility for your situation.
8. Never take a break or time to relax, holidays are for wimps!
9. Ignore your bodies warning signs like chest pains, headaches, shortness of breath and dizziness.
10. Over eat especially high fat, high sugar junk food. Aim to become morbidly obese.
11. Multitask and have a strong sense of time urgency. This will you to cultivate being angry when anyone interupts you.
12. Worry constantly especially about things that may never happen; this will prevent you doing the things you need to do and help you to maintain a depressed state.
13. Practice being really selfish: Whatever you do don’t laugh or share a kind word with another human being.

Feel free to add to the list via your comments, but most importantly exercise self leadership and,  in the words of Mr. Spock of Startreck,  “Live long and prosper.”

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