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Imagine this scenario. You’re about to present the company’s latest goals and how they connect to the greater vision, but you have just spent most of the morning trapped—not physically, but in a negative thought loop. Perhaps it’s a less-than-flattering user review or an uncomfortable exchange at a recent networking event. The point is that you just’re overthinking and impairing your ability to effectively lead your team – for more reasons than you’ll be able to imagine.
The most blatant thing is that rumination is distracting. It distracts you from the present and prevents you from doing work that requires deep concentration, corresponding to preparing for an essential speech. Negative thought loops worsen your mood and tests has shown that they delay bouts of depression. You cannot perform at your best if you do not feel your best. But more importantly, individuals who tend to ruminate don’t just experience momentary sadness – quite the opposite internalizing negative feedback into your sense of self. This negative thought loop doesn’t just change your mood; it changes the way you see yourself as a leader.
I write usually about my experiences as a CEO and founder Lots of shape. I share challenges and vulnerabilities. I’m not trying to present myself as flawless. The problem with rumination, as opposed to being vulnerable, is that it is often inaccurate. For example, you have one awkward interaction and you go into a spiral of believing that you just are socially inept. The truth is more nuanced.
Self-reflection is essential. Self-awareness is an essential quality of a leader. But the thoughts – which of them? WHAT defines as obsessive considering involving excessive, repetitive thoughts or topics that interfere with other forms of mental activity – it does not serve you as an individual or your organization as its leader. Entrepreneurs often obsess over their business down to the smallest detail perfectionists they think more often. If you are stuck in negative considering patterns, here are some strategies to help break the cycle.
Try a different spin
The one time we released a product update, user reception was surprisingly lukewarm. The team found the new edition to be a huge improvement. Judging by the numbers, our users disagreed. I used to be embarrassed. I became obsessed with what this ordeal said about me as a leader. I began the company with the vision of making life easier for our users. But if I could not foresee how to do it – the tools and services to realize that vision – then what was I doing?
At some point I remembered something I had read recently: You are not your thoughts. These ideas lived in my head, but that did not mean they were reality.
When you end up in a similarly destructive thought pattern, first discover and observe these thoughts objectively. How Harvard Business Review notes, “Instead of allowing negative ideas to feel like dictators in your life, gain some perspective by observing them from a distance and reminding yourself that they are just thoughts.”
Scientists from the Davis Center for Mind and Brain at the University of California suggested that reframing a negative experience could also be one way to stop rumination and its mood-worsening effects. In my case, I could change the narrative from “I can’t anticipate user needs” to “This update failed, let’s go back to the drawing board and figure out why.”
Like the news team, analyze different actions you can take in the same situation. Latest research using resting-state fMRI, a functional magnetic resonance imaging method that records brain activity in the resting state, they concluded that rumination could also be verbal or linguistic. This signifies that changing the narrative—literally presenting a different way of phrasing your thoughts—can make it easier to break out of negative loops and positively impact your mood.
Find (productive) time to worry
I wrote about being the so-called meta-schedule (hat tip to Cal Newport). Everything I do is blocked in my e-calendar, even planning time. When Greg Siegle, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine who studies rumination, said New York Times that setting aside “time for worry and reflection” could ease the constant considering, I immediately agreed to it.
But according to the technique from sleep expert Lisa Strauss, I take the practice of limiting time for worry a step further. If intrusive thoughts distract me from work or keep me up at night, I take a pen and notebook and draw 4 columns. In the first column I write down what stresses me out. In the second one I write: Is there anything I can do about these stressors in the next two weeks? If the answer is no, I remind myself that every time the thought arises, there is nothing I can do – at least not now. If so, the third column describes what I can do. In the fourth column, I give myself a deadline.
Why do I find this method effective?
Because just telling yourself not to think about something is not effective. (Don’t think about the pink elephant.) Giving yourself a task and turning obsessive thoughts into actionable steps. As Strauss said Washington Post Office“[W]I don’t have to do these things anywhere near perfectly for them to be helpful.” Even if there are no solutions, taking a step back from my thoughts and taking the time to draw a graph is calming.
They say, “The mind is a great servant but a terrible master.” The above strategies help me regain control. I can return to work with a lighter mind, with more bandwidth to focus and more attention to devote to my co-workers.