Key Ideas, Goals, Context

• The communication between the emotional and rational portions of your brain is the physical source of emotional intelligence.

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• What you think, say, and do can increase your EQ.

• IQ: cognitive intelligence, your ability to learn; a set of ability that doesn’t change overtime (except in cases of traumatic injury)

• EQ: emotional intelligence, your skills of being aware of your emotions and those of others along with managing your emotions and your relationships; a skill that you can learn.

• personality: your temperament or style; a preference that is stable over a lifetime.

• characteristics to define emotionally intelligent people

  • They listen and learn from criticism
  • They maintain a positive (solution mode) attitude to difficult situations
  • They manage anxiety, fear, anger and all emotions appropriately in all situations.
  • They recognize how their behaviors affect others
  • They are empathetic
  • They have discipline and are self-motivated
  • They listen even if they disagree
  • They look for ways to improve when things don’t go according to plan and embrace change.
  • they have a robust emotional vocabulary
  • they’re curious about people.
  • they know their strengths and weeknesses
  • they’re a good judge of character
  • they let go of mistakes
  • they’re assertive
  • EI is about figuring out how to apply, adapt, and deliver based on the needs of the person we’re with and what stage of the process they’re in

• what does low EQ look like?

  • they get stressed easily
  • they make assumptions quickly and defend them vehemently.
  • they often feel misunderstood
  • they don’t know their triggers
  • they don’t get angry
  • they blame other people for how they make them feel
  • they’re easily offended

EI Rewiring Process

• Own it, Face it, Feel it, Ask it, Drive it
• sometimes, our subconscious mind causes us to try and validate our emotional responses consciously. For example, if you’re not feeling great, you might look for ways that the day is bad or getting worse.
• the power of pause: pausing after someone’s answered a question or said something (for dramatic effect) to encourage them to draw upon their subconscious mind and bring deeper thoughts/feelings to the conversation.
• Identify our own beliefs and values
• “Our minds are what created fear, and our mind is the only thing that can smash through it.”
• Ask yourself: ‘Do I want to change this? Why do I want to change this? What stands to happen if I don’t change this?’
• accepting that something is going to happen and that the only thing we can control is how we choose to respond is where EI comes in.

Empathy

• Sympathy is feeling sorry for someone, whereas empathy is recognizing the emotional response someone is having and how it feels to have that emotional response
  • Putting yourself in their shoes is dangerous because that typically comes with judgement
  • We don’t need to know what has happened, just recognize what emotion and the severity of that emotion

Steps to Empathy

• Recognize which emotion the person is feeling
• Recall the last time you felt that emotion
  • What was the best and worst thing someone could have said or done to you in that moment
  • First thing we want is to be heard
• Respond
  • Help the other person gain control of their emotions and feel a connection
  • Empathetic System Architecture

Emotional intelligence: the four skills

• A Different perspective on Emotional Intelligence from Daniel Goleman
  • Self-awareness
  • self-regulation
  • internal motivation
  • Empathy
  • Social Skills
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Self Awareness Strategies

• the ability to stay aware of your emotions in the moment and understand your tendencies across situations.

crush cognitive biases

• Let’s explore some of the most common types of cognitive biases that entrench themselves in our lives. Awareness is the best way to beat these biases, so pay careful attention to how they influence you. Don’t allow them to hinder your emotional intelligence.

• Confirmation bias. Confirmation bias is the tendency to seek out information that supports our pre-existing beliefs. In other words, we form an opinion first and then seek out evidence to back it up, rather than basing our opinions on facts. Social media apps have been accused of using this bias to keep us engaged by loading our feeds with what we already believe, rather than challenging us with new information.

• Fundamental attribution error. This is the tendency to attribute situational behavior to a person’s fixed personality. For example, people often attribute another person’s poor work performance to laziness when there are so many other possible explanations. It could be that the individual in question is receiving projects they aren’t passionate about, their rocky home life is carrying over to their work life, or they’re burned out. When you’re the one being lazy, you don’t assume it’s a character flaw. You attribute this to the situation you’re in. That’s how the fundamental attribution error works.

• The decoy effect. This occurs when someone believes they have two options, but you present a third option to make the second one feel

more palatable. For example, you visit a car lot to consider two cars, one listed for $30,000 and one for $40,000. At first, the $40,000 car seems expensive, so the salesman shows you a $65,000 car. Suddenly, the $40,000 car seems reasonable by comparison. This salesman is preying on your decoy bias the decoy being the $65,000 car that he knows you won’t buy.

• The ideometer effect. This refers to the fact that our thoughts can make us feel real emotions. This is why actors envision terrible scenarios, such as the death of a loved one, in order to make themselves cry on cue. It’s also why activities such as cataloging what you’re grateful for can have such a profound, positive impact on your well-being.

• The halo effect. The halo effect occurs when someone creates a strong first impression and that impression sticks. This is extremely noticeable in grading. For example, often a teacher grades a student’s first paper, and if it’s good, the teacher is prone to continue giving the student high marks for future papers even if their performance doesn’t warrant it. The same thing happens at work and in personal relationships.

• The horn effect. This effect is the exact opposite of the halo effect. When you perform poorly at first, you can easily get pegged as a low performer, even if you work hard enough to disprove that notion.

• Conservatism bias. This bias leads people to believe that pre-existing information takes precedence over new information. Don’t be quick to reject something just because it’s radical or different. Great ideas usually are.

• Affect heuristic. Affect heuristic is the human tendency to base our decisions on our emotions. For example, consider a study conducted at Shukutoku University, Japan. Participants judged a disease that killed 1,286 people out of every 10,000 as being more dangerous than one that was 24.14% fatal (despite this representing twice as many deaths). People reacted emotionally to the image of 1,286 people dying, whereas the percentage didn’t arouse the same mental imagery and emotions.

• The ostrich effect. The ostrich effect is aptly named after the mistaken belief that ostriches, when scared, literally bury their heads in the ground. This effect describes our tendency to hide from impending problems. We may not physically bury our heads in the ground, but we might as well. For example, if your company is experiencing layoffs or you’re having relationship issues, it’s common to attempt to push all these problems away, rather than face them head on. This never works.

• Reactance. Reactance is our tendency to react to rules and regulations by exercising our freedom. A prevalent example of this is children with over-bearing parents. Tell a teenager to do what you say because you told them so, and they’re very likely to start breaking your rules. Similarly, employees who feel mistreated or “Big Brothered” by their employers are more likely to take longer breaks, use extra sick days, or even steal from their company.

• Planning fallacy. Planning fallacy is the tendency to think that we can do things more quickly than we actually can. For procrastinators, this leads to incomplete work, and this makes Type As overpromise and underdeliver.

• The bandwagon effect. The bandwagon effect is the tendency to do what everyone else is doing. This creates a kind of groupthink, where people run with the first idea that’s put onto the table instead of exploring a variety of options. The bandwagon effect illustrates how we like to make decisions based on what feels good (doing what everyone else is doing), even when it’s a poor alternative.

• Bias blind spot. If you begin to feel that you’ve mastered your biases, keep in mind that you’re most likely experiencing the bias blind spot. This is the tendency to see biases in other people but not in yourself.

PSYCHOLOGICAL FORCES THAT MAKE GOOD PEOPLE DO BAD THINGS

• The compensation effect. The compensation effect refers to people’s tendency to assume that they accumulate moral capital. We use good deeds to balance out bad deeds, or alternately, we give ourselves breaks from goodness, like a piece of chocolate cake after a week of salads. This makes people more inclined to do bad things under the guise of “I’m a good person” or “It’s just this one thing.” A great example of this is a study in which people were observed lying and cheating more after they made the decision to purchase products that were good for the environment.

• Cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance is the discomfort humans feel when they hold two contradictory opinions or when their behavior is inconsistent with their beliefs. It’s one of the strongest psychological forces driving human behavior. When people who feel they are good do bad things, cognitive dissonance makes them ignore this behavior because they can’t tolerate the inconsistency between their behavior and their beliefs. This only leads to more bad behavior.

• The power of names. What you name something is important, because it can skew people’s sense of reality. If companies assign unethical practices simple and humorous euphemisms (like “financial engineering” for accounting fraud), employees are less likely to take their unethical behavior seriously. Thomas Watson, the founder of IBM, was famous for saying, “Doing business is a game, the greatest game in the world if you know how to play it.” Something as simple as calling business a game can make people less likely to see that their actions have serious real-world consequences.

• Obedience to authority. It’s quite difficult for most people to ignore the wishes of those in positions of authority. People also feel that they’re less responsible for wrongdoings if they act under the direction of someone else. Both reasons explain why employees are likely to act out the unethical wishes of their supervisors and feel far less guilt than if they had decided to do it themselves.

• The Pygmalion effect. The Pygmalion effect refers to people’s tendency to act the way that other people treat them. For example, if employees are treated like they’re upright members of a team, they’re more likely to act accordingly. Alternately, if they’re treated with

!!! suspicion, they’re more likely to act in a way that justifies that perception.

• The pressure to conform. The pressure to conform is powerful. When a group engages in unethical behavior, individuals are far more likely to participate in or condone that behavior rather than risk standing out.

• Conspicuous consumption. When companies splash money around, they contribute to unethical behavior. Flashy displays of wealth lead to increased selfishness. Employees either aim hard for these carrots or develop jealousy of their high-rolling colleagues who achieve them. This leads to people who are more likely to put their own needs ahead of doing the right thing.

• The blinding effect of power. People in power typically see themselves as inherently different from their employees. This can lead them to set ethical boundaries for their employees that are more stringent than the ones they set for themselves. What happens next is the stuff of newspaper headlines.

Increase Your Mental Strength

• Fight when you already feel defeated. A reporter once asked Muhammad Ali how many sit-ups he did every day. He responded, “I don’t count [all] my sit-ups. I only start counting when it starts hurting, when I feel pain, cause that’s when it really matters.” The same applies to success. You always have two choices when things get tough: You can overcome an obstacle and grow in the process or let it beat you. Humans are creatures of habit. If you quit when things get tough, it gets that much easier to quit the next time. However, if you force yourself to push through a challenge, the strength begins to grow in you.

• Delay gratification. There was a famous Stanford experiment in which an administrator left a child in a room with a marshmallow for 15 minutes. Before leaving, the experimenter told the child that she was welcome to eat it, but if she waited without eating it until he returned, she would get a second marshmallow. The children who were able to wait until the experimenter returned experienced better outcomes in life, including higher SAT scores, greater career success, and even lower body mass indexes. The point is that delaying

gratification and being patient are essential to success, and they can’t be achieved without mental strength. People with mental strength know that results materialize only when you wait and forego instant gratification.

• Make mistakes, look like an idiot, and try again-without flinching. In a study conducted at the College of William and Mary, researchers interviewed more than 800 entrepreneurs and found that the most successful among them tended to have two critical things in common: They were terrible at imagining failure, and they tended not to care what other people think of them. In other words, the most successful entrepreneurs put no time or energy into stressing about their failures, as they see failure as a small and necessary step in the process of reaching their goals.

• Keep your emotions in check. Negative emotions challenge your mental strength every step of the way. While it’s impossible not to feel your emotions, it’s completely in your power to manage them effectively and keep yourself in control of them. When you let your emotions overtake your ability to think clearly, it’s easy to lose your resolve. A bad mood can make you lash out or stray from your chosen direction, just as easily as a good mood can make you overconfident and impulsive.

Make the calls you’re afraid to make. Sometimes, we have to do things we don’t want to do because we know they’re for the best in the long run: fire someone, approach a stranger, or scrap a project and start over. It’s easy to let the looming challenge paralyze you, but the most successful people know that in these moments, the best thing they can do is get started right away. Every moment spent dreading the task subtracts time and energy from actually getting it done. People who learn to habitually make tough calls stand out like flamingos in a flock of seagulls.

• Lead when no one else follows. It’s easy to set a direction and to believe in yourself when you have support, but the true test of strength is how well you maintain your resolve when nobody else believes in what you’re doing. People with mental strength believe in themselves, no matter what, and they stay the course until they win people over to their ways of thinking.

• Meet deadlines that are unreasonable and deliver results that exceed expectations. People with mental strength find a way to say yes and still honor their existing commitments. They know that the best way to stand out from everyone else is to outwork them when the time is right. For this reason, they tend to overdeliver, even when they overpromise. If they overcommit themselves, they adjust their future schedule to maintain balance, but they don’t let their overcommitment keep them from getting the job done now.

• Focus on the details, even when it makes your mind numb. Nothing tests your mental strength like mind-numbing details, especially when you’re tired. The more people with mental strength are challenged, the more they dig in and welcome that challenge. Numbers and details are no exception.

• Be kind to people who are rude to you. When people treat you poorly, it’s tempting to stoop to their level and return the favor. People with mental strength don’t allow others to walk all over them, but that doesn’t mean they’re rude to them, either. Instead, they treat rude and cruel people with the same kindness they extend to everyone else, because they don’t allow another person’s negativity to bring them down.

• Be accountable for your actions, no matter what. People are far more likely to remember how you dealt with a problem than they are to recall how you created it in the first place. By holding yourself accountable, even when making excuses is an option, you show that you care about results more than your image or ego.

THINGS MENTALLY STRONG PEOPLE DON’T DO

• Don’t stay in your comfort zone. Self-awareness is the foundation of EQ, and increasing your self-awareness isn’t comfortable. You can’t increase your EQ without pushing yourself to discover what you need to work on and what you should be doing differently. This is hard because when you take a really good look at yourself, you aren’t going to like everything you see. It’s more comfortable to keep the blinders on, but they make certain that you’ll never have a high EQ or the mental strength you need to succeed.

• Don’t give in to fear. They say that bravery is being scared to death to do something and doing it anyway. Many times, that’s true. The fear doesn’t have to come from something as extreme as rushing into a burning building. It can be a fear of speaking in front of groups or going out on a limb to ask someone out on a date. If you use fear as an excuse not to do something, you’ve already lost. It’s not that emotionally intelligent people aren’t afraid they simply pick themselves up and fight on, regardless of the fear.

• Don’t stop believing in yourself. Emotionally intelligent people persevere. They don’t give up in the face of failure, and they don’t give up because they’re tired or uncomfortable. They’re focused on their goals, not on momentary feelings, and that keeps them going, even when things are hard. They don’t take failing to mean that they’re a failure. Likewise, they don’t let the opinions of others keep them from chasing their dreams. When someone says, “You’ll never be able to do that,” they regard it as one person’s opinion, which is all it is. Don’t beg for attention. People who are always begging for attention are needy. They rely on the attention of other people to form their self-identity. Mentally strong people couldn’t care less about attention. They do what they want to do and what needs to be done regardless of whether anyone is stroking their ego.

• Don’t sweep problems under the rug. Emotionally intelligent people are accountable for their actions. When they make a mistake, they own it. People who aren’t emotionally intelligent, however, find problems and mistakes threatening, so they try to hide them. Problems tend to get bigger when they’re ignored. The more you don’t do anything about a problem, the more it starts to feel as though you can’t do anything about it. Then you’re right back to feeling like a victim.

• Don’t wait for an apology to forgive. Mentally strong people know that life goes a lot smoother once you let go of grudges and forgive even those who never said they were sorry. Grudges let negative events from your past ruin today’s happiness. Hate and anger are emotional parasites that destroy your joy in life.

• Don’t close your mind. When people close their minds to new information or opinions, it’s typically because they find them threatening. They think admitting that someone else is right means that they’re wrong, and that’s very uncomfortable for people who aren’t emotionally intelligent. Emotionally intelligent people aren’t threatened by new things; they’re open to new information and new ideas, even if it means admitting that they are wrong.

• Don’t limit the joy of others. Jealousy and resentment suck the life right out of you; they’re massive energy-stealers. Emotionally intelligent people don’t waste time or energy sizing people up and worrying about whether they measure up. They understand that others’ happiness and success don’t take away from their own, so jealousy and envy aren’t an issue for them. Instead of wasting your energy on jealousy, funnel it into appreciation. Emotionally intelligent people see success as being in unlimited supply, so they can celebrate others’ successes. When you celebrate the success of other people, you both benefit.

• Don’t fight change. Change is an inevitable part of life, and those who fight it do so because they’re struggling to remain in control. The problem with this approach is that fighting change actually limits your control over the situation by putting up a barrier between you and the actions you need to take to improve your situation. The idea is to prepare for change. This is not a guessing game where you test your accuracy in anticipating what comes next; rather, it means thinking through the consequences of potential changes so that you are not caught off guard if they surface. The first step is to admit that even the most stable and trusted facets of your life are not completely under your control. When you allow yourself to anticipate change (and understand your options if changes occur), you prevent yourself from getting bogged down by strong emotions like shock, surprise, fear, and disappointment when changes actually happen. Although you are still likely to experience these negative emotions, your acceptance that change is an inevitable part of life enables you to focus and think rationally, which is critical to making the most out of an unlikely, unwanted, or otherwise unforeseen situation.

THE TOXIC THOUGHTS MENTALLY STRONG PEOPLE QUARANTINE

• Mentally strong people are wary of these toxic thoughts, and they quash them as soon as they surface. Be mindful of your tendencies to succumb to the following thoughts so that they don’t erode your mental strength.

• My destiny is predetermined. Far too many people succumb to the highly irrational idea that they are destined to succeed or fail. Make no mistake about it: Your destiny is in your own hands, and blaming multiple successes or failures on forces beyond your control is nothing more than an excuse. Sometimes life will deal you difficult cards to play, and other times you’ll be holding aces. Your willingness to give your all in playing any hand you’re holding determines your ultimate success or failure in life.

• I “always” or “never” do that. There isn’t anything in life that you always or never do. You may do something a lot or not do something enough, but framing your behavior in terms of “always” or “never” is a form of self-pity. It makes you believe that you have no control over yourself and will never change. Don’t succumb to it.

• My past equals my future. Repeated failures can erode your self-confidence and make it hard to believe you’ll achieve a better outcome in the future. Most of the time, these failures result from taking risks and trying to achieve something that isn’t easy. Just remember that success lies in your ability to rise in the face of failure. 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.

• My emotions equal my reality. Emotionally intelligent people know how to look objectively at their feelings to separate fact from fiction. If you fail to do this, your emotions will continue to skew your sense of reality, making you vulnerable to the negative self-talk that can hold you back from achieving your full potential.

• I succeed when others approve of me. Regardless of what people think of you at any particular moment, one thing is certain you’re never as good or bad as they say you are. It’s impossible to turn off your reactions to what others think of you, but you can take people’s opinions with a grain of salt. That way, no matter what people think about you, your self-worth comes only from within.

Practice Mindfulness

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• Mindfulness is a simple yet effective form of meditation that enables you to gain control of unruly thoughts and behaviors. People who practice mindfulness are more focused, even when they are not meditating. Mindfulness is an excellent technique for reducing stress because it allows you to stop feeling out of control, to stop jumping from one thought to the next, and to stop ruminating on negative thoughts. Overall, it’s a great way to make it through your busy day calmly and productively. Mindfulness is an increasingly popular notion in the workplace, with companies such as Apple, Yahoo, Starbucks, and Google using it to their benefit. Google, for example, offers employees a 19-hour course on the subject, which is so popular that thousands of Googlers take it each year.

• Ellen Langer, a Harvard University psychologist who studies mindfulness, described it this way: “Mindfulness is the process of actively noticing new things. When you do that, it puts you in the present. It makes you more sensitive to context and perspective. It’s the essence of engagement. And it’s energy-begetting, not energy-consuming. The mistake most people make is to assume it’s stressful and exhausting all this thinking. But what’s stressful is all the mindless negative evaluations we make and the worry that we’ll find problems and not be able to solve them.”

• Mindfulness improves your ability to focus. Mindfulness improves your ability to focus on one thing at a time. This focus carries over into everything you do. Mindfulness teaches you to avoid distractions and to bring a heightened level of concentration to your work. While you may have fallen prey to multitasking in the past, mindfulness will help you kick this nasty, productivity-killing habit. A focused mind is a productive mind.

• Mindfulness boosts your creativity. Creativity hinges on your mental state. Mindfulness helps you get into a creative frame of mind by defeating the negative thoughts that stifle creative thinking and self-expression. The fact that mindfulness focuses on “the now” helps you think freely and creatively.

HOW TO PRACTICE MINDFULNESS

Practicing mindfulness increases the density of your brain matter where it counts. It’s perhaps the only technique that can change your brain in this way, which produces a ripple of other positive effects. Thankfully, you can reap the benefits of mindfulness in as little as a few minutes a day.

• Focus on your breathing. Sit in a comfortable chair with your feet flat on the floor, and spend a few minutes doing nothing but breathing slowly in and out. Focus all your attention on your breath. Feel the air travel into your mouth, down your windpipe, and into your lungs. Then, feel your body shift as it pushes the air out of your lungs. When thoughts surface that distract you from your breathing, don’t worry. Just let them pass, and shift your attention back to your breathing. After some practice, you should be able to spend several minutes doing nothing but immersing yourself in the act of breathing at the expense of all other thoughts.

• Go for a walk. You can also meditate just by going for a walk. All you have to do is focus on each step. Feel your legs move, and your feet hit the ground. Focus solely on the act of walking and the sensations of your surroundings (the cool breeze, the hot sun, or the dog barking in the distance). When you feel other thoughts creeping into your mind, focus even harder on the sensation of walking. Focusing on something that’s second nature is refreshing because it alters your frame of mind as you turn off the never-ending stream of thoughts that normally dominates your attention. You can do the same thing when you brush your teeth, comb your hair, or eat a meal.

• Feel your body. You don’t even have to stop doing what you’re doing to practice mindfulness. All you have to do is focus all your attention on what you’re doing without thinking about why you’re doing it, what you should do next, or what you should be doing. Whether it’s the gentle stroke of your fingers on the keyboard or your posture in your chair, you can direct your attention from your thoughts to your bodily sensations at the spur of the moment.

• Try a body scan. If you’re having trouble feeling your body, try lying on your back on the floor with your legs extended, arms out, and palms facing toward the ceiling. As you lay there, focus your attention on each part of your body, moving slowly from head to toe. As you focus on each part of your body, feel the weight of it against the floor. Feel the varying temperature and sensations that are unique to each part of your body. This process of focusing solely on your body will quiet your mind and keep you fully immersed in the moment.

• Repeat one positive thing about yourself, over and over. One of the main goals of mindfulness is to stop the stream of thoughts that cycle through your mind over and over again each day. Funnily enough, a great way to do this is to choose a short, positive message about yourself and repeat it over and over with each breath to keep your mind on track. A great phrase of choice is “I am capable.” The simplicity keeps you grounded in the exercise and keeps other thoughts from taking over. The right phrase also builds a little confidence, which never hurts.

• Interrupt the stress cycle. Any moment when you feel stressed, overwhelmed, or stuck on something is the perfect moment to

practice mindfulness. Just stop what you’re doing, let your thoughts go for a moment, and practice your favorite mindfulness technique (breathing, walking, or focusing on body sensations). Even a few minutes of this can make a huge difference in quieting your mind and reducing stress. You’ll be surprised at how reasonable things look once you’ve taken a few moments to clear your head.

• Lean into Your Discomfort

  • ignoring feelings doesn’t make them go away. They will resurface. Face them when they come and try to work through them.

• Physically Feel Your Emotions

  • pay attention to how an emotion physically affects you (increased heart rate, dry mouth, tightening in stomach, neck, back; fast, shallow breathing).
  • for practice, close your eyes and remember a high-emotion incident. Notice what physical symptoms you get simply thinking about it.

• Know What/Who Pushes Your Hot Buttons

  • Pay attention to the situations or people that trigger your emotions. Think about why you might find those situations or people irksome.

• Watch Yourself like a Hawk

  • Think about how your emotional reaction may make things worse.
  • Try to see things from the other’s perspective.
  • Formulate a calmer way to express your emotions and effectively convey your points.

• Observe The Ripple Effect

  • pay attention to how your emotions affect others.
  • ask others their view of how your emotions affect them.

• Don’t Be Fooled by a Bad Mood

  • When you’re stuck in a down mood, it’s not a good time to make important decisions. Briefly reflect on recent events that may have brought on the mood.

• Quit Treating Your Feelings as Good or Bad

  • pay attention when you feel an emotion begin to build.
  • try to understand the emotions and avoid labelling them good or bad.

• Check Yourself

  • Notice your mood and how it influences your demeanour

• Spot Your Emotions in Books, Movies, And Music

  • finding your emotions in the expressions of artists allows you to learn about yourself and discover feelings that are often hard to communicate.

• Get to Know Yourself Under Stress

  • People vary in how they react to stress. Which physical symptoms are common for you?
    • An upset stomach
    • A pounding headache
    • Canker sores
    • Back spasms
  • When you recognize that you are under stress, take some time to recharge your emotional battery.

Keep an Emotional Journal

• By keeping a journal of your emotions and what events triggered them, you can become more aware of patterns.

Ask Yourself Why You Do What You Do

• What is your earliest memory of reacting like this? Are the people or circumstances similar in some way?

Visit Your Values

• Remind yourself of your values and how well you are currently living up to them.
  • What are your core values and things that you have said or done recently that violate them.

Seek Feedback

• Often, there is a big difference between how you see yourself and how others see you. When you ask for feedback, seek specific examples and look for similarities in what people tell you.

Self Management Strategies

• the ability to use your awareness of your emotions to stay flexible and direct your behavior positively

beat stress and stay calm

• Appreciate what you have.

  • Research conducted at the University of California, Davis, showed that people who worked daily to cultivate an attitude of gratitude experienced improved mood, energy, and physical well-being. It’s likely that lower levels of cortisol played a major role in this improvement. The Davis study participants had one simple task: Pause during the day to contemplate what they were grateful for. Lowering your cortisol is that easy.
  • 3 habits in the first 5 mins of the day (one of them is to write down what you’re grateful for)

• Stay positive.

  • When things are going poorly, and your mind is flooded with negative thoughts, this can be a challenge. In these moments, think about your day, and identify one positive thing that happened, no matter how small. If you can’t think of something from the current day, reflect on the previous day or even the previous week. Or perhaps you’re looking forward to an exciting event that you can focus on. The point here is that you must have something positive that you’re ready to shift your attention to when your thoughts turn negative. Research from University College London found that negative thinkers have a significantly greater chance of developing dementia over just a four-year period.

• Avoid asking, “What if?”

  • “What if?” statements throw fuel on the fire of stress and worry. Things can go in a million different directions, and the more time you spend worrying about the possibilities, the less time you’ll spend focusing on taking action that will calm you down and keep your stress under control. Calm people know that asking “What if?” will only take them to a place they don’t want or need to go. If you do find yourself having trouble letting go of a particular “What if?,” take a moment to consider your plan of action should it come to fruition and move on.

• Disconnect.

  • Given the importance of keeping stress intermittent, it’s easy to see how taking regular time off the grid can help keep your stress under control. When you make yourself available to your work 24/7, you expose yourself to a constant barrage of stressors. Forcing yourself offline and even-gulp!-turning off your phone gives your body a break from a constant source of stress. Studies have shown that something as simple as an email break can lower stress levels.
  • putting a mental recharge into your weekly schedule. If you’re worried about the negative repercussions of taking this step, first try doing it at times when you’re unlikely to be contacted-maybe Sunday morning. As you grow more comfortable with these breaks, and as your coworkers begin to accept that you spend time offline, gradually expand the amount of time you spend away from technology.

• Limit your caffeine intake. Drinking caffeine triggers the release of adrenaline. Adrenaline is the source of the “fight-or-flight” response, a survival mechanism that forces you to stand up and fight or run for the hills when faced with a threat. The fight-or-flight mechanism sidesteps rational thinking in favor of a faster response. This is great when a bear is chasing you, but not so great when you’re responding to a curt email. When caffeine puts your brain and body into this hyper-aroused state of stress, your emotions outrun your behavior. The stress that caffeine creates is far from intermittent, as its long half-life ensures that it takes its sweet time working its way out of your body.

• Sleep. I’ve beaten this one to death over the years and can’t say enough about the importance of sleep for increasing your emotional intelligence and managing your stress levels. When you sleep, your brain literally recharges, 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. Stressful projects often make you feel as if you have no time to sleep, but taking the time to get a decent night’s sleep is often the one thing keeping you from getting things under control. Many of us don’t know what appropriate sleep hygiene is or why we have such lousy sleep. The chapter on cleaning up your sleep hygiene will help

you make your sleep top notch. Reframe your perspective. Stress and worry are fueled by our own skewed perceptions of events. It’s easy to think that unrealistic deadlines, unforgiving bosses, and out-of-control traffic are the reasons you’re so stressed all the time. You can’t control your circumstances, but you can control how you respond to them. So, before you spend too much time dwelling on something, take a minute to put the situation into perspective.. If you’re thinking in broad, sweeping statements such as “Everything is going wrong” or “Nothing will work out,” then you need to reframe the situation. A great way to correct this unproductive thought pattern is to list specific things that are actually going wrong or not working out. Most likely, you will come up with only a few things (not everything), and the scope of these stressors will look much more limited than they initially appeared.

• Breathe.

  • Practicing being in the moment with your breathing will train your brain to focus on the task at hand and get the stress monkey off your back. When you’re feeling stressed, take a couple of minutes to focus on your breathing. Close the door, put away all other distractions, and just sit in your chair and breathe. Your goal is to spend the entire time focused on your breathing, which will prevent your mind from wandering. Think about how it feels to breathe in and out. This sounds simple, but it’s hard to do it for more than a minute or two. It’s all right if you get sidetracked by another thought. This will happen at the beginning, and you just need to bring your focus back to your breathing. If you struggle to stay focused on your breathing, try counting each breath in and out until you get to 20, and then start again from 1. Don’t worry if you lose count. You can always just start over.
  • Shallow breaths deprive your brain of oxygen. This leads to poor concentration, forgetfulness, mood swings, anxiety and lack of energy. Breathe slowly and deeply.

• Say no.

  • Research conducted at the University of California, Berkeley, showed that the more difficulty that you have saying no, the more likely you will experience stress, burnout, and even depression. Saying no is indeed a major challenge for many people. “No” is a powerful word that you should not be afraid to wield. When it’s time to say no, avoid phrases such as “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.

• Neutralize toxic people.

  • Dealing with difficult people is frustrating, exhausting, and highly stressful. You can control your interactions with toxic people by keeping your feelings in check. When you need to confront a toxic person, approach the situation rationally. Identify your emotions, and don’t allow anger or frustration to add to the chaos. In addition, consider the difficult person’s viewpoint and perspective so that you can find solutions and common ground. When things completely derail, take the toxic person with a grain of salt to avoid letting them bring you down. This is easier said than done, which is why there’s a separate chapter on techniques and habits for neutralizing toxic people.

• Don’t hold grudges.

  • The negative emotions that come with holding onto a grudge are actually a stress response. Just thinking about the event sends your body into fight-or-flight mode. When the threat is imminent, this reaction is essential to your survival, but when the threat is ancient history, holding onto that stress wreaks havoc on your body and can have devastating health consequences over time. In fact, researchers at Emory University have shown that holding onto stress contributes to high blood pressure and heart disease. Holding onto a grudge means you’re holding onto stress, and emotionally intelligent people know to avoid this at all costs. Letting go of a grudge not only makes you feel better now but can also improve your health.

• Practice mindfulness.

  • Mindfulness is a simple, research-supported form of meditation that helps you gain control of unruly thoughts and behaviors. People who practice mindfulness regularly are more focused, even when they are not meditating. It is an excellent technique to help reduce stress, because it helps you reduce the feeling of not being in control. Essentially, mindfulness helps you stop jumping from one thought to the next, which keeps you from ruminating on negative thoughts. Overall, it’s a great way to make it through your busy day calmly and productively. There’s a separate chapter on how to practice this technique.

STRUCTURING YOUR FREE TIME ALLEVIATES STRESS

• A Stanford study found that productivity per hour declines sharply when a workweek exceeds 50 hours, and productivity drops off so much after 55 hours that there’s no point in working any more. That’s right. People who work as much as 70 hours (or more) per week actually get the same amount done as people who work 55 hours.

• Rule 1: Minimize chores. Chores tend to monopolize your free time. When this happens, you lose the opportunity to relax and reflect. What’s worse, doing a lot of chores feels like work, and if you spend all weekend doing them, you just put in a seven-day workweek. To keep this from happening, you need to schedule your chores like you would anything else during the week. If you don’t complete them during the allotted time, you move on and finish them the following weekend.

• Rule 2: Exercise. No time to exercise during the week? You have 48 hours every weekend to make it happen. Getting your body moving for as little as 10 minutes releases GABA, a soothing neurotransmitter that reduces stress. Exercise is also a great way to come up with new ideas. Innovators and other successful people know that being outdoors often sparks creativity. I know that a lot of my best ideas come to me while I’m surfing. While you’re out in the ocean, the combination of invigorating activity and beautiful scenery creates the perfect environment to be creative. Whether you’re running, cycling, or gardening, exercise leads to endorphin-fueled introspection. The key is to find a physical activity that does this for you and then to make it an important part of your weekly routine.

• Rule 3: Pursue a passion. You might be surprised what happens when you pursue something you’re passionate about during your time off. Indulging your passions is a great way to escape stress and open your mind to new ways of thinking. Things like playing music, reading, writing, painting, or even playing catch with your kids can help stimulate different modes of thought that can reap huge dividends over the coming week.

• Rule 4: Spend quality time with your family. Spending quality time with your family is essential if you want to recharge and relax. Weekdays are so hectic that the entire week can fly by with little quality family time. Don’t let this bleed into your weekends. Take your kids to the park, take your spouse to their favorite restaurant, and go visit your parents. You’ll be glad you did.

• Rule 5: Schedule micro-adventures. Buy tickets to a concert or play, or make reservations for that cool new hotel that just opened downtown. Instead of running on a treadmill, plan a hike. Try something you haven’t done before, or perhaps something you haven’t done in a long time. Studies have shown that anticipating something good is a significant part of what makes the activity pleasurable. Knowing that you have something interesting planned for Saturday will not only be fun come Saturday but will also significantly improve your mood throughout the week.

• Rule 6: Designate mornings as me time. Your mind achieves peak performance two to four hours after you wake up, so get up early to do something physical and invigorating, and then save the mental tasks for later in the morning when your mind is at its peak.

• Rule 7: Prepare for the upcoming week. The weekend is a great time to spend a few moments planning your upcoming week. As little as 30 minutes of planning can yield significant gains in productivity and reduced stress. The week feels a lot more manageable when you go into it with a plan, because all you have to focus on is execution. Weekly reflection is a powerful tool for improvement. Use the weekend to contemplate the larger forces that are shaping your industry, your organization, and your job. Without the distractions of Monday to Friday busy work, you should be able to see things in a whole new light. Use this insight to alter your approach to the coming week, which improves the efficiency and efficacy of your work.

make smart decisions

• Turn small decisions into routines. Decision-making works like a muscle: As you use it over the course of the day, it gets too exhausted to function effectively. One of the best strategies successful people use to work around their decision fatigue is to eliminate smaller decisions by turning them into routines. Doing so frees up mental resources for more complex decisions. Steve Jobs famously wore a black turtleneck to work every day. Mark Zuckerberg still wears a hoodie. Both men have stated that these iconic images are the simple result of daily routines intended to cut down on decision fatigue. They were both aware of our finite daily ability to make good decisions, as is Barack Obama, who said, “You’ll see I wear only gray or blue suits. I’m trying to pare down decisions. I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing, because I have too many other decisions to make.”

• Make big decisions in the morning. Another great way to beat decision fatigue is to save small decisions for after work (when decision fatigue is greatest) and tackle complex decisions in the morning, when your mind is fresh. When you’re facing a stream of important decisions, a great trick is to wake up early and work on your most complicated tasks before you get hit with a bunch of distracting minor decisions (phones ringing, emails coming in). A similar strategy is to do some of the smaller things the night before to get a head start on the next day. For instance, lay out your outfit at night, so you don’t even have to think about it when you wake up.

• Pay close attention to your emotions. There’s an old saying: “Don’t make permanent decisions based on temporary emotions.” Emotionally intelligent people recognize and understand their emotions (including their intensity and their impact on behavior) so that they are able to look at decisions as objectively and rationally as possible. Unfortunately, most people aren’t good at recognizing their emotions. Strong decision makers, however, know that a bad mood can make them lash out or stray from their moral compass just as easily as a good mood can make them overconfident and impulsive.

• Evaluate your options objectively. When really wrapped up in a decision, emotionally intelligent people weigh their options against a pre-determined set of criteria because they know that this makes decision-making easier and more effective. Here are some helpful criteria to consider: How does this decision benefit me? How does it hurt me? How does this benefit? How does it hurt? Does the decision reflect my values? Would I regret making this decision? Would I regret not making this decision?

• Sleep on it. Sleeping on your decision ensures that you have clarity of thought when you approach it the next day. It also allows time

for your emotions to run their course. When you act too quickly, you tend to react, but when you give more focus and time to your decision, you expose important facets of it that you didn’t see before.

• Don’t sleep on it for too long. Emotionally intelligent people know the importance of gathering as much information as they can, but at the same time, they make certain not to fall prey to analysis paralysis. Instead of waiting for the moons to align, emotionally intelligent people know that they need to have a timetable for making their decision. Once they set that date, they are motivated to do their homework and some soul searching to meet the deadline.

• Use exercise to recharge. This isn’t the first time I’ve touted the benefits of exercise for emotional intelligence, and it won’t be the last. The stress of a major decision naturally produces cortisol, the chemical that triggers the fight-or-flight response. Cortisol clouds your ability to think clearly and rationally. When you find yourself stressing about a decision, try exercising. As little as 30 minutes is all it takes to get a good endorphin-fueled buzz and return to mental clarity. Exercise also helps you get past that fight-or-flight state by putting the cortisol to practical use. Researchers have shown that long-term exercise improves the overall functioning of the brain regions responsible for decision-making.

• Seek outside counsel. When approaching a decision, we naturally tend to pick an alternative and then gather information to support that decision, instead of gathering information and then choosing a side (this is called confirmation bias). A great way to beat confirmation bias is to seek outside opinions and advice from people who bring different perspectives to your situation. Their perspectives help you weigh your options more objectively and spot your subjective or irrational tendencies.

• Reflect on previous decisions. Mark Twain described the complicated nature of decision-making as follows: “Good decisions come from experience, but experience comes from making bad decisions.” This isn’t to say that the only way to become a great decision maker is to make a ton of mistakes. It just means that it’s important to keep past decisions front of mind. Emotionally intelligent people are aware enough of their past decisions and use them to their benefit when something similar comes up.

TRUSTING YOUR INTUITION

• Slow down enough to hear your inner voice. Before you can pay attention to your intuition, you first have to be able to hear it amid the cacophony of your busy life. You have to slow down and listen, which often requires solitude. Taking some time away from the everyday, even something as brief as going for a walk, is a great way to turn up the volume of your intuition.

• Follow your inner voice. One of the primary reasons that some people are more intuitive than others is that they actually listen to their gut feeling instead of dismissing or doubting it. That doesn’t mean that they ignore their analytical mind and their critical thinking skills. There’s a difference between using reason as a system of checks and balances and using it to talk yourself out of what your intuition knows to be true.

• Practice empathic accuracy. I’d probably lose you if I said that highly intuitive people read minds, so I’ll use the scientific term: empathic accuracy. It’s not magic; it’s an intuitive awareness of what other people are thinking and feeling, using cues such as body language and tone of voice. It’s an extremely powerful form of empathy that helps foster deep connections with other people.

• Practice mindfulness. “Mindfulness” sounds even more New-Agey than trusting your intuition, but it’s really just a fancy term for focusing on being in the moment. Mindfulness is a great technique for filtering out all of the distractions in your environment and your brain. When you do that, you can hear your intuition loud and clear.

• Nurture your creativity. Did you have a paint-by-number kit when you were a kid? Talk about turning art into a science all you have to do is put the right color in the right little space. You may end up with a pretty painting, but the only intuition involved is guessing what colors you’re supposed to use in those really tiny spaces. No paint-by-numbers kit in the world can make a skilled artist create something as novel and monumental as the Sistine Chapel or the Mona Lisa. The missing ingredient is intuition. Just as intuition is the secret ingredient in creativity, being intentionally creative strengthens your use of intuition.

• Listen to your body. Have you ever made a decision and immediately felt sick-maybe even kind of clammy? That affective experience is your body’s way of informing you that the decision your analytic mind came to is at odds with your instinct.

• Analyze your dreams. If you accept the science that demonstrates the power of intuition, it’s not much of a leap to accept that your dreams are often manifestations of intuition. Sure, sometimes dreams are nonsense, but they often try to tell us something. Intuitive people don’t just think, “Wow, that was a weird dream!” They ask themselves, “Where did that come from, and what can I take away from it?”

DEALING WITH UNCERTAINTY

• Quiet your limbic system. Your limbic system responds to uncertainty with a knee-jerk fear reaction, and fear inhibits good decision- making. People who are good at dealing with uncertainty are wary of this fear and spot it as soon as it surfaces. This way, they can contain it before it gets out of control. Once they are aware of the fear, they label all the irrational thoughts that try to intensify it as irrational fears not reality-and the fear subsides. Then they can focus more accurately and rationally on the information they have. Throughout the process, they remind themselves that a primitive part of their brain is trying to take over and that the logical part needs to be the one in charge. In other words, they tell their limbic system to settle down and be quiet unless a hungry tiger shows up.

• Don’t seek perfection. Emotionally intelligent people don’t set perfection as their target because they know there’s no such thing as a perfect decision in an uncertain situation.

• Know what you know-and what you don’t. When uncertainty makes a decision difficult, it’s easy to feel as if everything is uncertain,

but that’s hardly ever the case. People who excel at managing uncertainty start by taking stock of what they know and what they don’t know and assigning a factor of importance to each. They gather all the facts they have, and they take their best shot at compiling a list of things they don’t know, for example, what a country’s currency is going to do or what strategy a competitor will employ. They actually try to identify as many of these things as possible, because this takes away their power. Then they can make the best decision possible with the facts they have.

• Embrace that which you can’t control. We all like to be in control. After all, people who feel like they’re at the mercy of their surroundings never get anywhere in life. But this desire for control can backfire when you see everything that you can’t control or don’t know as a personal failure. People who excel at managing uncertainty aren’t afraid to acknowledge what’s causing it. In other words, they live in the real world. They don’t paint any situation as better or worse than it actually is, and they analyze the facts for what they are. They know that the only thing they really control is the process through which they reach their decisions. That’s the only rational way to handle the unknown, and the best way to keep your head on level ground. Don’t be afraid to step up and say, “Here’s what we don’t know, but we’re going forward based on what we do know. We may make mistakes, but that’s a lot better than standing still.”

• Focus on what matters. Some decisions can make or break you. Most just aren’t that important. The people who are the best at making decisions in the face of uncertainty don’t waste their time getting stuck on decisions where the biggest risk is looking foolish. When it comes down to it, almost every decision contains at least a small factor of uncertainty-it’s an inevitable part of life. Learning to properly balance the many decisions on your plate, however, allows you to focus your energy on the things that matter and to make more informed choices. It also removes the unnecessary pressure and distraction caused by a flurry of small worries.

• Know when to trust your gut. Our ancestors relied on their intuition-their gut instinct for survival. Since most of us don’t face life-or- death decisions every day, we have to learn how to use this instinct to our benefit. I explained the importance of trusting your intuition earlier in this chapter, but the importance of your intuition in making good decisions is magnified the more you’re facing uncertainty. People who successfully deal with uncertainty recognize and embrace the power of their gut instincts, and they rely on some tried-and- true strategies to do so successfully:

  • They recognize their own filters. They’re able to identify when they’re overly influenced by their assumptions and emotions or by another person’s opinion, for example. Their ability to filter out the feelings that aren’t coming from their intuition helps them focus on what is.
  • They give their intuition some space. Gut instincts can’t be forced. Our intuition works best when we’re not pressuring it to come up with a solution. Albert Einstein said he got his best ideas while sailing, and when Steve Jobs was faced with a tough problem, he’d head out for a walk.
  • They build a track record. People who deal well with uncertainty take the time to practice their intuition. They start by listening to their gut on small things and seeing how it goes so that they’ll know whether they can trust it when something big comes around. Have contingency plans. Staying on top of uncertainty is as much about planning for failure as it is about hoping for the best. Experts at handling uncertainty aren’t afraid to admit that they could be wrong, and that frees them up to make detailed, rational, and transparent contingency plans before taking action. Emotionally intelligent people know they aren’t always going to make the right decision. They know how to absorb and understand mistakes so that they can make better decisions in the future. And they never let mistakes get them down for too long.

break the bad habits that are holding you back

• Once a habit becomes automatic, it’s a lot harder to break- and that’s why you’re probably failing if you’re not giving yourself 66 days to wean yourself off it. Sixty-six days might seem like a long time, but there are specific stages that make the process feel much shorter. Let’s look at them.

• Days 1-10: Look Inward

  • It’s usually pretty obvious which bad habits are causing the most problems in your life-the ones that keep coming up in performance appraisals or sparking arguments with your spouse. Once you’ve identified a habit to change, the real challenge lies in understanding your triggers. That can be harder than it sounds, especially if the habit has become so ingrained that you do it subconsciously. If you give it enough thought, you’ll get to the bottom of it. Maybe you keep getting tickets for speeding, and you realize that you drive too fast when you leave work in a bad mood, or maybe you snack when you’re stressed. Looking inward to explore the source of the habit you’re trying to break makes breaking that habit possible. The first 10 days of trying to break the habit will provide substantial insight into its source, should you look.

• Days 11-40: Spread the Word

  • Accountability is crucial for breaking bad habits. In this stage, you create a very vocal accountability network by telling everybody you can about the habit you’re trying to break. The more vocal you are about it, the more likely people are to call you out when you slip up. Let them know that you really want them to say something. Just remember that you might have to keep reminding them—it’s just as easy for them to forget and backslide as it is for you. Accountability feeds your efforts to avoid bad habits. Sure, you avoid them some on your own, but your efforts are turbocharged when you don’t want the negative attention that comes with engaging in your bad habits. Before long, you’ve had enough practice avoiding them, and sometimes you don’t even have to think about it.

• Days 41-66: Mind Your Relapse Triggers

  • As you head for the home stretch, be ready to make some mistakes-it happens to everybody. Just be on the lookout for common threads running through those mistakes. If you tend to relapse in a certain situation, you’d be smart to avoid that trigger completely until you feel that your bad habit is really extinguished. In addition, keep an eye out for new or rare triggers that haven’t popped up yet. Keeping new triggers from surprising you when it feels like you’ve kicked a habit is typically the difference between success and failure this late in the process.

• Day 67: Reward Yourself

  • Sure, you could say that breaking the habit is its own reward, but why pass up an opportunity to celebrate? Just don’t celebrate by indulging in the habit that you worked so hard to break! Rewarding yourself is critical because it reinforces the new habit loop you’ve created to replace and extinguish the bad habit. You’ve replaced your old negative responses to your triggers with positive new ones. Without a clear and apparent reward, your mind might lose the urge to follow through in the future. You should also use this opportunity to reflect on and select the next habit you’re going to break.

THE BAD HABITS YOU MUST BREAK

• The self-control required to develop good habits (and stop bad ones) also serves as the foundation for a strong work ethic and high productivity. Some bad habits cause more trouble than others. The following bad habits are the worst offenders. Shedding them will increase your productivity and allow you to enjoy the positive mood that comes with increased self-control.

• Impulsively surfing the Internet. It takes you 15 consecutive minutes of focus before you can fully engage in a task. Once you do, you fall into a euphoric state of increased productivity called flow. Research has shown that people in a flow state are five times more productive than they would otherwise be. When you click out of your work because you get an itch to check the news, Facebook, a sport’s score, or what have you, this pulls you out of flow. This means you have to go through another 15 minutes of continuous focus to reenter the flow state. Click in and out of your work enough times, and you can go through an entire day without experiencing high productivity.

• Eating too much sugar. Glucose functions as the “gas pedal” for energy in the brain. You need glucose to concentrate on challenging tasks. With too little glucose, you feel tired, unfocused, and slow; too much glucose leaves you jittery and unable to concentrate. The tricky thing is that you can get your glucose any way you want, and you’ll feel the same at least initially. The difference lies in how long your productivity lasts. Donuts, soda, and other forms of refined sugar lead to an energy boost that lasts only 20 minutes, while oatmeal, brown rice, and other foods containing complex carbohydrates release their energy slowly, enabling you to sustain your focus.

• Using multiple notifications. Multiple notifications are a productivity nightmare. Studies have shown that hopping on your phone and email every time they ping causes your productivity to plummet. Getting notified every time a message drops onto your phone or an email arrives in your inbox might feel productive, but it isn’t. Instead of working at the whim of your notifications, pool all your emails/ texts and check them at designated times (e.g., respond to your emails every hour). This is a proven, productive way to work. In addition to checking email on a schedule, productive people take advantage of features that prioritize messages by sender. They set alerts for their most important vendors and their best customers, and they save the rest until they reach a stopping point in their work. Some people even set up an autoresponder that lets senders know when they’ll be checking their email again.

• Putting off tough tasks. We have a limited amount of mental energy, and as we exhaust this energy, our decision-making and productivity decline rapidly. This is called decision fatigue. When you put off tough tasks until late in the day because they’re intimidating, you save them for when you’re at your worst. To beat decision fatigue, you should tackle complex tasks in the morning when your mind is fresh.

• Letting toxic people live in your head rent free. There will always be toxic people who have a way of getting under your skin and staying there. Each time you find yourself thinking about a coworker or person who makes your blood boil, practice being grateful for someone else in your life instead. There are plenty of people out there who deserve your attention, and the last thing you want to do is think about the people who don’t matter when there are people who do.

• Hitting the snooze button. When you sleep, your brain moves through an elaborate series of cycles, the last of which prepares you to be alert at your wake-up time. This is why you sometimes wake up right before your alarm clock goes off your brain knows it’s time to wake up, and it’s ready to do so. When you hit the snooze button and fall back asleep, you lose this alertness and wake up later, tired and groggy. Worst of all, this grogginess can take hours to wear off. So, no matter how tired you think you are when your alarm clock goes off, force yourself out of bed if you want to have a productive morning.

THE REAL HARM IN MULTITASKING

• The researchers showed that people who are regularly bombarded with several streams of electronic information cannot pay attention, recall information, or switch from one job to another as well as those who complete one task at a time.

• They found that heavy multitaskers-those who multitask a lot and feel that it boosts their performance were actually worse at multitasking than those who like to do a single thing at a time. The frequent multitaskers performed worse because they had more trouble organizing their thoughts and filtering out irrelevant information, and they were slower at switching from one task to another. Ouch.

• Multitasking reduces your efficiency and performance because your brain can focus on only one thing at a time. When you try to do two things at once, your brain lacks the capacity to perform both tasks successfully. Researchers have also shown that in addition to slowing you down, multitasking temporarily lowers your IQ. A study at the University of London found that participants who multitasked during cognitive tasks experienced IQ score declines that were similar to what they’d expect if they had stayed up all night.

• If you’re prone to multitasking, this is a bad habit you’ll want to break-it clearly slows you down and decreases the quality of your work. Even if it doesn’t cause brain damage, allowing yourself to multitask will fuel any existing difficulties you have with concentration, organization, and attention to detail. Multitasking in meetings and other social settings indicates low self- and social awareness, two emotional intelligence skills that are critical to success at work. If multitasking does damage your anterior cingulate cortex (a key brain region for EQ), as current research suggests, it will lower your EQ in the process. So, every time you multitask, you aren’t just harming your performance in the moment; you may very well be damaging an area of your brain that’s critical to your future success at work.

Build Powerful New Success Habits

• You should be very careful in choosing your pursuits, because your habits make you. Cultivating the right habits will take you where you want to go in life. The emotional intelligence habits that follow are a great start. They will help you lead a more meaningful and fulfilling life in which you cultivate the best within yourself.

• Be biased toward action. If only we knew about all the great ideas that never came to fruition because people lacked the confidence to put them into action. Emotionally intelligent people confidently act on their ideas because they know that a failed idea is not a reflection of their ability; instead, they see it as a wonderful learning opportunity. This makes them eager to get going.

• Seek composure. People who are composed constantly monitor their emotions. They understand their emotions well, and they use this knowledge in the moment to react with self-control to challenging situations. When things go downhill, they are persistently calm and frustratingly content (frustrating to those who aren’t, at least). They know that no matter how good or bad things get, everything changes with time. All they can do is adapt and adjust to stay happy and in control.

• Appreciate the here and now. Gratitude is fundamental to peace and happiness—not wealth, glamour, adventure, or fast cars, but simple appreciation for what you have. Just because you can’t afford champagne and caviar doesn’t mean that you never enjoy a meal. Hot dogs and beer on the back deck with your friends can taste just as good. So don’t fool yourself into thinking that to be happy you need

something that you don’t have. The truth is that if you don’t appreciate what you have now, you won’t be able to appreciate the “good life” if you ever get it.

• Realize that things aren’t always as you perceive them to be. This goes along with appreciating the here and now. That person you envy because they seem to have the perfect life might be dealing with all kinds of problems behind closed doors. That “perfection” could be a total mirage. Your employer’s decision to move the office might seem like a huge hassle when you first hear about it, but it could end up being one of the best things that ever happens to you. You’re not omniscient and you’re not a fortune-teller, so be open to the possibility that life might have some surprises in store, because what you see is not always what you get.

• Stick to realistic goals. How many people start January by proclaiming, “I’m going to lose 30 pounds by March!“? Big, scary, crazy goals can be incredibly inspiring until you fall short, and then, instead of inspiration, you’re left with disappointment and guilt. Don’t stop setting goals that push and challenge you, but try to stick within the bounds of reality. Small habits make big gains with time.

• Expose yourself to a variety of people. There’s no easier way to learn to think differently than spending time with someone whose strengths are your weaknesses or whose ideas are radically different from your own. This exposure sparks new ideas and makes you well rounded. This is why we see so many great companies with cofounders who are very different. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak at Apple were prime examples. Neither could have succeeded without the other.

• Turn tedious tasks into games. Every job entails some degree of tedium. For most people, tedium leads to sloppy, rushed work. Emotionally intelligent people find ways to make the tedious interesting. By turning tedious work into a game, they challenge themselves and produce high-quality work, making things interesting in the process.

• Start a collection of things that truly resonate with you. Have you ever come across a quote or a meme that so perfectly summed up your feelings that you wanted to keep it forever? When you come across things that resonate with you (whether it’s something that expresses who you are or who you want to be), have a central place to keep those gems. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a spiral notebook, a bulletin board, or a folder on Evernote. Have a place to collect the things that matter so that you can revisit them regularly.

• Get out and do something that reminds you who you are. We all joke about having “me” time, but what is that, really? It’s making time for the activities that we feel most authentically ourselves doing. These are the times when all the masks are off, and we can just be. Whether it’s going for a run or dancing around with your ’80s favorites blaring at top volume, make time for those moments. They’re incredibly rejuvenating.

THE PARADOXICAL HABITS OF WILDLY SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE

• They’re convergent and divergent thinkers. Convergent thinking is what’s measured by IQ tests: rational thinking that typically results in a single right answer. Divergent thinking, on the other hand, is less precise. It’s about generating ideas and asking questions that have no solid right or wrong answers. Both are important. No matter how high your IQ, you’re not going to be successful if you can’t think outside the proverbial box. On the other hand, you need rational thinking skills to correctly judge whether your ideas have merit. That’s why this particular paradox is so important.

• They’re polite yet completely unafraid to rock the boat. Successful people are what I like to call “graciously disruptive.” They’re never satisfied with the status quo. They’re the ones who constantly ask, “What if?” and “Why not?” They’re not afraid to challenge conventional wisdom, but they don’t disrupt things for the sake of being disruptive. They do it to make things better. Still, they’re polite and considerate, and they don’t draw attention to other people’s mistakes just to humiliate them. However, that doesn’t mean they sit back and let people wander in the wrong direction. They won’t hesitate to speak up when it’s time to change course.

• They’re naïve and smart. No one would argue that intelligence isn’t an important part of success, but many successful people also have a childlike lack of awareness (or maybe it’s a lack of respect for) of the type of constraints that other people blindly accept. They’re not limited by what other people tell them is possible. This naiveté allows them to tackle problems from previously undiscovered angles.

• They’re both energetic and calm. Successful people seem to have limitless energy when it comes to doing the things they’re passionate about, but they aren’t frantic. They can keep that energy under control. They work hard and focus on the task at hand with devoted concentration, but they’re so smooth that they make it look easy and fun. Some people are so energetic that they’re hyperactive, unfocused, and constantly bouncing from one thing to another. Successful people know how to harness their energy so that it works in the service of progress and doesn’t undermine it.

• They’re deeply passionate yet rational and objective about their work. Successful people are passionate about their work, but they don’t let it skew their thinking. They have the ability to step back and look at their work with a critical eye and accept their mistakes. If it’s a disaster, they’ll admit it because they realize that it’s better to try something different than to put out something subpar with their name on it. This sense of detachment also allows them to accept feedback from others without taking it personally.

• They’re ambiverts. Successful people are comfortable acting in ways that amplify their introversion and extraversion, depending on what the situation calls for. They can sit in the back of a conference room and silently listen to what’s going on, or they can go up on stage, grab a microphone, and engage a huge crowd-and they look just as comfortable doing one as they do the other.

• They’re both humble and proud. Taking pride in your work is absolutely essential for success, but successful people know they wouldn’t be where they are without the people who came before them and those they’ve worked with along the way. They know that they didn’t achieve their success all on their own, and because they’re okay with that, they don’t have anything to prove. That’s why so many incredibly successful people end up coming across as grounded and humble when you meet them in person.

• They dream big but remain grounded. Successful people reach for the seemingly impossible, but they do so in a way that is actionable and realistic. While you may not know exactly how you’re going to achieve your dream, you need to make progress, no matter how small the steps. For example, Elon Musk’s goal at SpaceX is to “Occupy Mars.” This is a big dream, but Musk keeps it realistic by engaging in regular steps that, someday, may get them there. SpaceX’s ability to reuse rocket boosters is radically reducing the cost of space travel. It’s a far cry from colonizing Mars, but it’s an essential step in a very ambitious process.

THE UNUSUAL HABITS OF THE WORLD’S MOST CREATIVE PEOPLE

• Wake Up Early

  • Not all creative minds are morning people. Franz Kafka routinely stayed up all night writing, and William Styron (author of Sophie’s Choice, among other best-sellers) woke up at noon every day and considered his “morning” routine to be staying in bed for another hour to think. However, early risers make up the clear majority of creative thinkers. The list of creative early risers ranges from Benjamin Franklin to Howard Schultz to Ernest Hemingway, although they didn’t wake up early for the same reasons. Ben Franklin woke up early to plan his day, while Schultz used the time to send motivational emails to his employees. For many creative people, waking up early is a way to avoid distractions. Ernest Hemingway woke up at 5 a.m. every day to write. He said, “There is no one to disturb you and it is cool and cold and you come to your work and warm as you write.” The trick to making getting up early stick is to do it every day and avoid naps. Eventually, you’ll start going to bed earlier to make up for the lost sleep. This can make for a couple of groggy days at first, but you’ll adjust quickly. Before you know it, you’ll join the ranks of creative early risers.

• Keep Your Day Job

  • Creativity flourishes when you’re creating for yourself and no one else. Creativity becomes more difficult when your livelihood depends on what you create (and when you begin to think too much about what your audience will think of your product). Perhaps this is why so many successful and creative people held on to their day jobs. Many of them, like Stephen King, who was a schoolteacher, produced their breakout (and, in King’s case, what many consider his very best) work while they still held a 9 to 5. Day jobs provide more than the much-needed financial security to create freely. They also add structure to your day that can make your creative time a wonderful release. The list of successful, creative minds who kept their day jobs is long. Some notable individuals include Jacob Arabo, who started designing his own jewelry while working in a jewelry shop; William Faulkner, who worked in a power plant while writing As I Lay Dying; and composer Philip Glass, who worked as a plumber.

• Exercise Frequently

  • There’s plenty of evidence pointing to the benefits of exercise for creativity. Feeling good physically gets you in the right mood to focus and be productive. Exercise also forces you to have disconnected time (it’s tough to text or email while working out hard), and this allows you to reflect on whatever it is you’re working on. In a Stanford study, 90% of people were more creative after exercising. It’s no surprise that so many creative and successful people build exercise into their daily routines. Kurt Vonnegut took walks into the nearby town, swam laps, and did push-ups and sit-ups, Richard Branson runs every morning, and composers Beethoven and Tchaikovsky walked every day.

• Stick to a Strict Schedule

It’s a common misconception that in order to be creative, you should live life on a whim with no structure and no sense of needing to do anything. The habits of highly successful and creative people suggest otherwise. In fact, most creative minds scheduled their days rigorously. Psychologist William James described the impact of a schedule on creativity, saying that only by having a schedule can we “free our minds to advance to really interesting fields of action.”

• Learn to Work Anywhere, Anytime

Many people work in only one place, believing it’s practically impossible for them to get anything done anywhere else. Staying in one place is actually a crutch; studies show that changing environments is beneficial to productivity and creativity. E.B. White, author of Charlotte’s Web, said it well: “A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper.” The same is true for any type of creative work. If you keep waiting until you’re in the perfect place at the ideal time, the time will never come. Steve Jobs started Apple in his mom’s garage, and J.K. Rowling wrote the first ideas for Harry Potter on a napkin on a train. When you have a creative idea, don’t wait. Put it into action as soon as you can. Recording that spark of creativity may very well be the foundation of something great.

• Learn that Creative Blocks Are Just Procrastination

As long as your heart is still beating, you have the ability to come up with new ideas and execute them. They may not always be great ones, but the greatest enemy of creativity is inactivity. Author Jodi Picoult summarized creative blocks perfectly: “I don’t believe in writer’s block. Think about it—when you were blocked in college and had to write a paper, didn’t it always manage to fix itself the night before the paper was due? Writer’s block is having too much time on your hands. If you have a limited amount of time to write, you just sit down and do it. You might not write well every day, but you can always edit a bad page. You can’t edit a blank page.” Picoult’s comment describes all creative activity-the only way to stay creative is to keep moving forward.

Clean up Your Sleep Hygiene

• Avoid working or watching television in bed

• Avoid caffeine after noon.

• SIDE EFFECTS FROM MISSING SLEEP

  • Irritability
  • Cognitive impairment
  • Memory lapses or loss
  • Impaired moral judgement
  • Decreased creativity - Increased stress
  • Symptoms similar to ADHD
  • Impaired immune system
  • Risk of diabetes Type 2
  • Decreased testosterone
  • Increased heart rate variability
  • Risk of heart disease and stroke
  • Increased reaction time
  • Decreased accuracy
  • Tremors
  • Aches

  Other:

  • Growth suppression - Risk of obesity
  • Decreased temperature

• It all starts with caffeine. The first tip for cleaning up your sleep hygiene is perhaps the most straightforward method. It’s also the most important. For most people, this tip has the potential to have a bigger impact than any other action. The catch? You have to cut down on caffeine, and as any caffeine drinker can attest, this is easier said than done. You can sleep longer and vastly improve the quality of the sleep you get by reducing your caffeine intake and adjusting the timing of your consumption.

• As discussed in the chapter on beating stress, drinking too much caffeine can also alter your emotional intelligence because caffeine triggers the release of adrenaline, the source of the “fight or flight” response.

• SIDE EFFECTS OF CAFFEINE

• Central

  • Irritability
  • Anxiety

  -Restlessness

  • Confusion
  • Delirium
  • Headache
  • Insomnia
  • Sleep deprivation

• Muscular

  • Trembling
  • Twitching
  • Overextension

• Respiratory

  • Rapid breathing

• Urinary

  • Frequent urination

• Visual

  • Seeing flashes

• Ears

  • Ringing

• Systemic

  • Dehydration

• Skin

  • Increased sensitivity to touch or pain

• Heart

  • Rapid heartbeat
  • Irregular rhythm

• Gastric

  • Abdominal pain
  • Nausea

• Stay away from sleeping pills. Sleeping pills are anything you take that sedates you so that you can sleep. Whether it’s alcohol, Nyquil, Benadryl, Valium, Ambien, or what have you, these substances greatly disrupt your brain’s natural sleep process. As you sleep and your brain removes harmful toxins, it cycles through an elaborate series of stages. Sedation interferes with these stages, which has dire consequences for the quality of your sleep. Therefore, many of the habits in this chapter eliminate factors that disrupt your sleep quality. If reducing your use of sleeping pills is difficult, try some of the other habits (such as cutting down on caffeine and reducing blue light in the evening) that will make it easier for you to fall asleep naturally and reduce your dependence on sedatives.

• Avoid blue light at night. This is a big one-most people don’t even realize it impacts their sleep. Short-wavelength blue light plays an important role in your mood, energy level, and sleep quality. In the morning, sunlight contains high concentrations of this “blue” light. When your eyes are exposed to it directly (not through a window or while wearing sunglasses), blue light halts production of the sleep- inducing hormone melatonin and makes you feel more alert. This is great, and exposure to morning sunlight can improve your mood and energy levels. If the sun isn’t an option for you, try a blue-light therapy lamp.

• Turn off devices with screens 2 hours before bedtime or block blue waves with special glasses or a blue-wave blocker app.

• Eliminate interruptions. Unfortunately for those with small children, the quality of your sleep suffers when it’s interrupted. The key is to eliminate all interruptions that are under your control. If you have loud neighbors, wear earplugs to bed. If your mother likes to call at all hours of the night, silence your phone’s ringer before you go to bed. If you have to wake up early one morning, make sure your alarm clock is back on its regular time when you go to bed. Don’t drink too much water in the evening to avoid a bathroom trip in the middle of the night. If you think hard enough, there are lots of little things you can do to eliminate unnecessary sleep interruptions. You just have to prepare for them.

• Learn how much sleep you really need. The amount of sleep you need is something that you can’t control, and scientists are beginning to discover the genes that dictate it. The problem is that most people sleep much less than they really need and are underperforming because they think they’re getting enough. Some discover this the hard way. Ariana Huffington was one of those frantic types who under slept and overworked until she collapsed unexpectedly from exhaustion one afternoon. She credited her success and well-being since then to the changes she made in her sleep habits. “I began getting 30 minutes more sleep a night, until gradually I got to 7 to 8 hours. The result has been transformational,” Huffington said, adding that “all the science now demonstrates unequivocally that when we get enough sleep, everything is better: our health; our mental capacity and clarity; our joy at life; and our ability to live life without reacting to every bad thing that happens.”

• Learn to meditate. Many people who learn to meditate report that it improves the quality of their sleep and that they can get the rest they need even if they aren’t able to significantly increase the number of hours they sleep. At the Stanford Medical Center, insomniacs participated in a six-week mindfulness meditation and cognitive-behavioral therapy course. At the end of the study, participants’ average time to fall asleep was cut in half (from 40 to 20 minutes), and 60% of the subjects no longer qualified as insomniacs. The subjects retained these gains upon follow-up a full year later. A similar study at the University of Massachusetts Medical School found that 91% of participants either reduced the amount of medication they needed to sleep or stopped taking medication entirely after a mindfulness and sleep therapy course. Give mindfulness a try. At the minimum, you’ll fall asleep faster, as it will teach you how to relax and quiet your mind once you hit the pillow. The chapter on mindfulness will show you how.

• Stop working. When you work in the evening, it puts you in a stimulated, alert state when you should be winding down and relaxing in preparation for sleep. Recent surveys showed that roughly 60% of people monitor their smartphones for work emails until they go to sleep. Staying off blue light-emitting devices (discussed above) after a certain time each evening is also a great way to avoid working so you can relax and prepare for sleep, but any type of work before bed should be avoided if you want quality sleep.

• Wake up at the same time every day. Consistency is key to a good night’s sleep, especially when it comes to waking up. Waking up at the same time every day improves your mood and sleep quality by regulating your circadian rhythm. When you have a consistent wake-up time, your brain acclimates to it and moves through the sleep cycle in preparation for you to feel rested and alert at your wake-up time. Roughly an hour before you wake, hormone levels increase gradually (along with your body temperature and blood pressure), causing you to become more alert. This is why you’ll often find yourself waking up right before your alarm goes off.

  • When you don’t wake up at the same time every day, your brain doesn’t know when to complete the sleep process and when it should prepare you to be awake. Long ago, sunlight ensured a consistent wake-up time. These days, an alarm is the only way most people can pull this off. Doing this successfully requires resisting the temptation to sleep in, because you know you’ll actually feel better by keeping your wake-up time intact. If you don’t, you’ll often end up feeling groggy and tired, because your brain hasn’t prepared your body to be awake. This isn’t a big deal on your day off, but it makes you less productive on Monday, because it throws your cycle off and makes it hard to get going again on your regular schedule.

• When all else fails, take naps. One of the biggest peaks in melatonin production occurs during the 1:00 to 3:00 p.m. timeframe, which explains why most people feel sleepy in the afternoon. Companies like Google and Zappos are capitalizing on this need by giving employees the opportunity to take short afternoon naps. If you aren’t getting enough sleep at night, you’re likely going to feel an

overwhelming desire to sleep in the afternoon. When this happens, you’re better off taking a short nap (even as short as 15 minutes) than resorting to caffeine to keep you awake. A short nap will give you the rest you need to get through the rest of the afternoon, and you’ll sleep much better in the evening than if you drink caffeine or take a long afternoon nap.

• Sleep naked. What if I told you that in just 10 seconds a day you could sleep better and lose weight? All you have to do is take off your clothes. None of the other nine strategies for improving your sleep is as simple and some are less effective as stripping down before you go to sleep. As only 8% of people sleep naked, most people can discover the benefits of sleeping in the buff. This may sound far-fetched, but hear me out before you throw those cozy flannel pajamas on. Researchers at the University of Amsterdam found that lowering your skin temperature increases the depth of your sleep and reduces the number of times you wake up at night. Stripping down to your birthday suit is a great way to lower your skin temperature without changing the temperature of the room. A study conducted by the U.S. National Institutes of Health found that keeping yourself cool while you sleep speeds the body’s metabolism because your body creates more brown fat to keep you warm. Brown fat produces heat by burning calories (300 times more heat than any organ in the body), and this boosts your metabolism all day to help you lose weight. In addition to the metabolic effects of sleeping in the buff, removing your clothes improves your blood circulation, which is good for your heart and muscles. The quality sleep you’ll enjoy also increases the release of growth hormone and melatonin, both of which have anti-aging benefits.

Control Your Anger

PUTTING AWAY THE FUNNEL

• The question we all need to ask ourselves is not, “Do I funnel my emotions into anger?” Rather, it’s, “When, where, and how do I funnel my emotions into anger?” Turning off the anger funnel is really a matter of educating yourself on the sources of your anger. Only by breaking down and understanding the real emotions you funnel into anger can you understand yourself well enough to catch yourself the next time you’re about to get angry.

• Emotions are often funneled into anger in an instant. It’s unrealistic to assume that you’ll stop yourself every time you’re about to pour your emotions into the funnel. Instead, you can turn off your anger as soon as it’s aroused by asking yourself three simple questions. To help illustrate, I’ve put my own answers to these questions from an incident in which I was abruptly cut off by another car on the freeway.

• Question 1: Why am I angry?

  • The answer to this question usually involves finger-pointing. That’s OK, as it’s part of the process. Usually, something or someone around you helped you begin moving toward anger. In my case, my answer was, “I’m angry because that car almost ran me off the road.”

• Question 2: How did this incident really make me feel?

  • You might also call this question, “What was the feeling that I funneled into anger?” As long as you’re willing to feel vulnerable, the answer to this question should come pretty easily. In my case, the answer was obvious: fear. Getting cut off like that made me feel intense fear. The fear was so intense that a fuming, smoke-out-my-ears anger came out the other side of the funnel. I knew it was time to ask myself these three questions, as opposed to giving in to the thought of teaching the guy a lesson. My anger was like a big red balloon that was going to pop, but as soon as I realized this anger was a substitute for fear, it sent all of the air rushing out of the balloon. I went from shocked that I couldn’t get the car in front of me out of my mind to shocked that anger that intense could simply evaporate.

• Question 3: Why was this feeling so intolerable?

  • By the time you get to question 3, your anger will have largely subsided. In my case, the whole thing felt silly by this point. I felt silly for being so angry and silly for being so vulnerable to fear. So, I asked myself, why was I afraid? I’ve been driving for decades here in Southern California, where getting cut off is a regular occurrence. So, why did this time get me going? The answer is that when this happened I was a new father. My drive to remain safe and be there for my son magnified my fear. What was really intolerable was the thought of not being there for him. Learning why the feeling is so intolerable improves your self-awareness, so that you’re less likely to use that funnel the next time someone inevitably cuts you off.

PERFECTIONISM FEEDS ANGER

• You get defensive when receiving feedback. Perfectionists care deeply about what other people think of them, and this can make feedback hard to take. Even well-presented, useful feedback feels like a needle to the eye. You likely catch yourself acting defensively before you realize that you’re taking issue with the feedback. It’s a knee-jerk reaction. As a perfectionist, you naturally have an intense desire to succeed. Take comfort in the fact that feedback (even brutal feedback) ultimately helps you improve. Take it in stride, and feedback will actually help you get closer to perfection.

• However, you’re critical of others. Considering their inability to receive criticism, perfectionists can certainly dish it out. Perfectionists can’t help but measure themselves against other people, so taking someone down a notch, especially if that person is a threat, feels good. However, this isn’t always the reason. Perfectionists are also critical of others because they compare them to the same unobtainable standard to which they compare themselves.

• You recognize that your perfectionism is a problem, but you think that’s what it takes to be successful. Sometimes, you really need to push yourself hard to be successful. When your perfectionism gets out of control, using hard work as a justification for the unnecessary pain and suffering you endure is easy. Make no mistake about it-perfectionism creates unnecessary struggle and strife. When you get your perfectionism under control, you can work less and get more done.

• You procrastinate all the time. Perfectionism and fear of failure go hand in hand. This combination leads to procrastination, because even mundane tasks are intimidating when they must be completed perfectly. Most writers spend countless hours brainstorming characters and plot, and they even write page after page that they know they’ll never include in their book. They do this because they know that ideas need time to develop. We tend to freeze up when it’s time to get started because we know that our ideas aren’t perfect and that what we produce might not be any good. However, how can you ever produce something great if you don’t get started and give your ideas time to evolve? Author Jodi Picoult summarized the importance of avoiding perfectionism perfectly: “You can edit a bad page, but you can’t edit a blank page.”

• You have a guilty conscience. Perfectionists have a steady stream of guilty thoughts running through their minds because they’re always feeling like they’re coming up short. This guilt elevates stress and frustration and can easily spiral into depression and anxiety.

• You take mistakes personally. Perfectionists take things so seriously that they tend to overestimate the impact of their mistakes. Minor events can cause them to experience bitter disappointment. This issue is significant because it makes you less resilient, and the ability to bounce back from failure is critical to success. Perfectionists must learn that failure is not a confirmation that they aren’t good enough.

• You take pleasure in other people’s failures. This little-known secret of perfectionists is not as evil as it sounds. Misery loves company, and perfectionists can’t help but find satisfaction in knowing that other people experience the same frustrations they do. These moments of relief are short-lived, and they make perfectionists feel bad for being so competitive.

• You’re afraid to take risks. With the fear of failure comes the fear of taking risks. Perfectionists’ hard work, research, and attention to detail produce novel ideas. Unfortunately, their great ideas are often placed on the back burner because of their fear of risk. The only way to get comfortable with taking risks is to take them. Starting the process is never easy, but by actively leaning into the very things that make you uncomfortable, you build up your confidence and realize that it’s never as bad as you build it up in your mind to be.

• You live in fear of rejection. Perfectionists need the approval of others to feel successful. This mentality leads to a crippling fear of rejection. Perfectionists dread certain things, such as asking for a raise or pursuing their passions in lieu of something that will win approval from others. Living in fear of rejection feels terrible, stifles creativity, and slows down your progression as a person. Whenever you find yourself overly concerned with what other people think of you, remember this famous take on authenticity (commonly misattributed to Dr. Seuss): “Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.”

• Only Get Mad on Purpose

  • Don’t let your anger control you. Be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for hte right purpose, and in the right way.
  • Express your anger when you know it will show the gravity of a situation and serve to improve relationship

Increase Your Productivity

• They don’t let their desks get cluttered. You may think you know exactly where, and in which stack of paper, you can find a particular document. But you’re kidding yourself if you don’t think you’d be more productive with a clean and organized desk. Just the act of organizing the stuff on your desk helps you organize it in your mind. In addition, research conducted at Princeton University revealed that the more your brain is bombarded by the competing stimuli on a cluttered desk, the less you’re able to focus. This wasn’t subjective evidence. The researchers were able to see the difference on MRIS of the subjects’ brain activity.

• They fight the tyranny of the urgent. The tyranny of the urgent refers to the tendency of little things that have to be done right now to get in the way of what really matters. This creates a huge problem, as urgent actions often have little impact. If you succumb to the tyranny of the urgent,

  • you can find yourself going days, or even weeks, without touching the important stuff. Productive people are good at spotting when putting out fires is getting in the way of their performance, and they’re willing to ignore or delegate the things that get in the way of real forward momentum.

• They never touch things twice. Productive people never put anything in a holding pattern because touching things twice is a huge time-waster. Don’t save an email or a phone call to deal with later. As soon a something gets your attention, you should act on it, delegate it, or delete it.

• They eat frogs. “Eating a frog” is the best antidote for procrastination; ultra-productive people start each morning with this tasty “treat.” In other words, they do the least appetizing, most dreaded item on their to-do list before they do anything else. After that, they’re freed up to tackle the stuff that excites and inspires them.

• They have a high level of self-awareness. Highly productive and organized people have a clear sense of who they are. They know their weaknesses, and they put organizational structures in place to overcome them. If they tend to let meetings run too long, they set a timer. If they have trouble keeping meetings productive, they make an agenda. If they forget to check their voicemail in the morning, they set a reminder. The details don’t matter. What’s important is that they think carefully and use specific aids and routines that work with their organizational weaknesses.

• They work from a single to-do list. Are you old enough to remember the days when people used to buy those expensive leather-bound planners and fill them up with a to-do list color-coded by priority? They might seem a bit old school now, but no one can deny that it was effective. Why were those planners effective? They reminded us how important it is to keep a single to-do list. When you consolidate everything into one list, you always know where to look, and you can stop wasting time trying to remember which list has the information you need.

• They make time for lunch. We’ve all been there you’re head-down busy, and by the time you look up, it’s way past lunchtime. You end up either going without or grabbing a donut or a bag of chips from the snack machine. Both are really bad ideas. The donut will give you an energy boost for about 20 minutes, but after that, your energy will drop like a rock. Skipping meals affects not only your concentration, productivity, and problem-solving skills but also your waistline and not in the way you might expect. Researchers at Ohio State University showed that the weight you lose by skipping meals is muscle weight that you regain later as fat.

• They stick to the schedule during meetings. Meetings are the biggest time-waster there is. Ultra-productive people know that a meeting will drag on forever they let it, so they inform everyone at the onset that they’ll stick to the schedule. This sets a limit that motivates everyone to be more focused and efficient.

• They tidy up at the end of each day. The best remedy for clutter is to set aside about 10 minutes at the end of each day to organize your desk. Although we know that it’s best to touch things only once, we’ve all stopped halfway through a task because the phone rang somebody stopped by to chat. You really can’t prevent such things, but you can end the day by resolving all the things you left half-finished.

• They plan their days the night before. Productive people go to bed each night secure in the knowledge of what they’ll accomplish the following day. They get their priorities straight the night before, so that once the day starts, they’re less likely to get distracted by the “tyranny of the urgent.”

• They make full use of technology. There’s a lot in other chapters about how modern technology extends the workday, making it so that we’re always on the clock. Although that’s true, technology can also make you more productive and help you focus. Whether it’s setting up an email filter to keep your inbox spam-free, or using apps that help you organize information you’re going to need again, technology isn’t always bad. Used properly, it can save a lot of time. Ultra-productive people put technology to work for them. Beyond setting up filters in their email accounts so that messages are sorted and prioritized as they come in, they set up contingencies on their smartphones that alert them when something important happens. This way, when your stock hits a certain price, or you have an email from your best customer, you’ll know. There’s no need to waste time constantly checking your phone for status updates.

HAVE A GREAT MORNING ROUTINE

• Start with exercise. Starbuck’s Howard Schultz, Richard Branson, Tim Cook, and Disney’s Bob Iger all wake up well before 6:00a.m. to get their bodies moving. Although their ungodly wake- up hours and exercise routines may seem difficult, research supports this extra effort. People who exercise regularly feel more competent, they have more energy, and it gives them a more positive outlook, all of which are critical for getting things done. Exercising first thing in the morning ensures that you’ll have the time for it, and it improves your self-control and energy levels over the course of the entire day.

• But drink some lemon water first. Drinking lemon water as soon as you wake up spikes your energy levels physically and mentally. Lemon water gives you steady, natural energy that lasts the length of the day by improving nutrient absorption in your stomach. You need to drink it first thing in the morning (on an empty stomach) to ensure full absorption. You should also wait 15- 30 minutes after drinking it before eating (perfect time to squeeze in some exercise). Lemons are packed with nutrients; they’re chock full of potassium, vitamin C, and antioxidants. If you’re under 150 pounds, drink the juice of half a lemon (a full lemon if you’re over 150 pounds). Don’t drink the juice without water because it’s hard on your teeth.

• Practice mindfulness. Mindfulness has become increasingly popular in the business world, largely due to the huge dividends it pays in productivity and overall well-being. Researchers have shown that mindfulness fights off stress by reversing the fight-or-flight response, improves your ability to focus, boosts creativity, and increases your emotional intelligence. Mindfulness meditation in the morning, no matter how brief, is a great way to start your day. It helps you relax and focus, and you can use it to set your intentions for the day. The chapter on mindfulness will show you how.

• No Internet until breakfast. When you dive straight into emails, texts, and Facebook, you lose focus, and your morning succumbs to the wants and needs of other people. It’s much healthier to take those precious first moments of the day to do something relaxing that sets a calm, positive tone for your day. Jumping right into electronics has the opposite effect-it’s a frantic way to start your day. Exercising, meditating, or even watching the birds out the window are all great ways to start the day. Of course, you can also work on something productive, just no browsing the web or checking apps.

• Eat a healthy breakfast. Eating anything at all for breakfast puts you ahead of a lot of people. People who eat breakfast are less likely to be obese, they have more stable blood sugar levels, and they tend to be less hungry over the course of the day. And these are the statistics just for people who eat breakfast. When you eat a healthy breakfast, the doors to a productive day swing wide open. A healthy breakfast gives you energy, improves your short-term memory, and helps you concentrate more intensely and for longer periods.

• Set goals for the day. Benjamin Franklin was obsessive about planning his days. Each morning, he woke up at 4:00 a.m. and meticulously pieced together a schedule. There’s a clear message to take from Franklin’s habit: Prudent goal setting pays dividends. When you plan out your day as carefully as possible, your chances of accomplishing your goals skyrocket. I like to set my daily goals after my mindfulness practice because the added calm and clarity help me set effective, specific goals.

• Make certain your goals are realistic. There’s no point in setting goals if they aren’t realistic. Take the time to ensure that your schedule for the day is doable by assigning times to your to-do list. A good rule of thumb is to make your day as top heavy as possible. Think about the things that have the ability to advance your career, no matter how daunting the tasks, and schedule them first. When you complete difficult tasks first, you carry positive energy and a feeling of accomplishment into the rest of your day. Vague goals such as “I want to finish writing my article” are counterproductive, because they fail to include the “how” of things. This can be re-phrased in a more functional way: “I am going to finish my article by writing each of the three sections, spending no more than an hour on each section.” Now you have more than simply something you want to achieve you have a way to achieve it.

• No checking email until you’ve eaten three frogs. In the previous section, “eating frogs” was introduced as an antidote to procrastination and low productivity. Frogs are tastiest first thing in the morning, and eating them before checking email ensures you are off to a productive start before you get sidetracked putting out fires. Email is a major distraction that enables procrastination and wastes precious mental energy. Spend your morning on something that requires a high level of concentration that you don’t want to do, and you’ll get it done in short order.

Develop a Growth Mindset

• Don’t stay helpless. We all have moments when we feel helpless. The test is how we react to that feeling. We can either learn from it and move forward or let it drag us down. There are countless successful people who would have never made it if they had succumbed to feelings of helplessness: Walt Disney was fired from the Kansas City Star because he “lacked imagination and had no good ideas.” Oprah Winfrey was fired from her job as a TV anchor in Baltimore for being “too emotionally invested in her stories.” Henry Ford started two failed car companies before succeeding with Ford, and Steven Spielberg was rejected by USC’s Cinematic Arts School multiple times. Imagine what would have happened if any of these people had a fixed mindset. They would have given up hope. People with a growth mindset don’t feel helpless because they know that in order to be successful, you need to be willing to fail hard and then bounce right back.

• Take action. It’s not that people with a growth mindset are able to overcome their fears because they are braver than the rest of us; it’s just that they know fear and anxiety are paralyzing emotions, and that the best way to overcome this paralysis is to take action. People with a growth mindset are empowered, and empowered people know that there’s no such thing as a truly perfect moment to move forward. So why wait for one? Taking action turns your worry and concern about failure into positive, focused energy.

• Then go the extra mile (or two). Empowered people give it their all, even on their worst days. They’re always pushing themselves to go the extra mile. One of Bruce Lee’s pupils ran three miles every day with him. One day, they were about to hit the three-mile mark when Bruce said, “Let’s do two more.” His pupil was tired and said, “I’ll die if I run two more.” Bruce’s response? “Then do it.” His pupil became so angry that he finished the full five miles. Exhausted and furious, he confronted Bruce about his comment, and Bruce explained it this way: “Quit and you might as well be dead. If you al-ways put limits on what you can do physical or anything else it’ll spread over into the rest of your life. It’ll spread into your work, into your morality, and into your entire being. There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there; you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you. A man must constantly exceed his level.” If you aren’t getting a little bit better each day, then you’re most likely getting a little worse. What kind of life is that?

• Be passionate. Growth-minded people pursue their passions relentlessly. There will always be someone who’s more naturally talented than you, but what you lack in talent, you can make up for in passion. Growth-minded people’s passion drives their unrelenting pursuit of excellence. To find your truest passions, Warren Buffet recommends using what he calls the 5/25 technique: Write down the 25 things that you care about the most. Then cross out the bottom 20. The remaining five are your true passions. Everything else is merely a distraction.

Be flexible. Everyone encounters unanticipated adversity. People with an empowered, growth-oriented mindset embrace adversity as a means for improvement instead of something that holds them back. When an unexpected situation challenges an empowered person, they adjust until they get results.

• Don’t complain when things don’t go your way. Complaining is an obvious sign of a fixed mindset. A growth mindset looks for opportunities in everything, so there’s no room for complaints. Plain and simple.

• Expect and prepare for change. People change, and businesses go through ebbs and flows. Even the growth-minded in Judge’s study couldn’t control that. They found themselves out of work. Their companies have fallen on tough times. The difference is that they believe they are fully capable of dealing with changes and making something positive happen. In other words, they are mentally prepared for change and you can be, too. If you don’t anticipate change naturally, you need to set aside some time regularly to create a list of important changes that you think could possibly happen. The purpose of this task is not to predict every change you’ll face. Instead, it will open your mind to change and sharpen your ability to spot and respond to impending changes. Even if the events on your list never happen, the practice of anticipating and preparing for change will give you a greater sense of command over your future.

• Rewrite your script. This one is the hardest, because it requires you to change the mode of thinking that you’re accustomed to. Over time, we all develop mental scripts that run through our heads and influence how we feel about our circumstances and what we do in response. These scripts go so far as to tell us what to say and how to act in different situations. To develop a growth mindset, you need to rewrite your script. To do this, recall a tough time you went through recently. What was it you believed about your circumstances that prevented you from making the most of your situation or responding more effectively? Write this script down, and label it your hardluck script. As hindsight is 20/20, go ahead and write a more effective and empowered mental script that you wish you had followed next to it. This is the empowered script you will use to replace your hard-luck script.

File them away so that you can pull them out and study them whenever you’re feeling stressed or very anxious. When you pull your scripts out, compare your present thinking to your hard-luck and empowered scripts. This will keep you honest and enable you to adjust your thinking so that you’re operating from an empowered script. These periodic reminders will eventually rewrite your script completely, enabling you to operate from an empowered script at all times.

GROWTH-MINDED EXPECTATIONS

• The most important person you can believe in is yourself. Your beliefs and expectations shape your reality. They can change your life, emotionally and physically, and they are critical to maintaining a growth mindset and increasing your emotional intelligence. You need to be extra careful about (and aware of) the expectations you harbor, because the wrong ones make life unnecessarily difficult. Be especially wary of the following expectations they give people trouble and work against a growth mindset.

• Life should be fair. We’ve all had the old mantra life isn’t fair beaten into our brains since we were young. We’ve been told a million times (and likely told other people) that life isn’t fair, but despite what we know about the intricacies of injustice, it doesn’t quite sink in in practice. A surprising number of us subconsciously expect life to be fair, and we believe that any unfairness that we experience will somehow be balanced, even if we don’t do anything about it. If you’re stuck in that mindset, it’s time to get over it. It’s a mindset of despair, anxiety, and passive inaction. Although it’s true that we sometimes have a limited ability to stop negative events from occurring, we are always free to choose our response. When something “unfair” happens, don’t rely on outside forces to get you back on your feet. Sometimes there isn’t any consolation prize, and the sooner you stop expecting there to be, the sooner you can take actions that will actually make a difference. You’ll surprise yourself with how much control you can wield in response to seemingly uncontrollable circumstances.

• Opportunities will fall into my lap. One of the most important things a person can do is stick their neck out and seek opportunities. Just because you deserve a raise, a promotion, or a company car doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. You have to make it happen. You have to put in the hard work and then go and get what’s yours. If you limit yourself to what’s given to you, you’re at the mercy of other people. When you take action, think, “What steps do I need to take?” “What obstacles are in my way, and what do I need to do to remove them?” and “What mistakes am I making that take me away from my goals rather than toward them?”

• Everyone should like me. People have hangups, and that means all sorts of decent, kind, respectable people are not liked by (some) others for no good reason at all. When you think that everyone should like you, you end up feeling hurt when you shouldn’t. You can’t win them all. When you assume that people are going to like you, you take shortcuts; you start making requests and demands before you’ve laid the groundwork to really understand what the other person is thinking and feeling. Instead of expecting that people will like you, focus on earning their trust and respect.

• People should agree with me. This one can be tough. Sure, you know what you’re talking about, and for that reason, people should take you seriously, but expecting people to agree with you out of courtesy or because your ideas are so incredibly sound is another story. Something that’s obvious to you might not be to someone with different experiences and a different agenda, so don’t be offended when people disagree with you, and don’t assume there’s only one right answer (yours). Instead, focus on how you can find solutions that give everyone what they need.

• People know what I’m trying to say. People can’t read your mind, and what you’re trying to say is rarely what other people hear. You can’t expect people to understand you just because you’re talking-you have to be clear. Whether you’re asking someone to do something without providing the context or explaining a complex concept behind a big project, it’s easy to leave out relevant information because you don’t think it’s necessary. Communication isn’t anything if it isn’t clear, and your communication won’t be clear until you take the time to understand the other person’s perspective.

• I’m going to fail. If you expect to fail, you have a higher chance of creating the very outcome you’re worried about. If you fail, accept that sometimes you’ll fail, and sometimes you’ll succeed, but if you pursue an endeavor, believe with all your being that you’re going to succeed in that endeavor. Otherwise, you’ll limit the chances of that happening.

• I can change them. There’s only one person in this world you can truly change-yourself-and even that takes a tremendous amount of effort. People change only when they want to and have the ability to change themselves. Still, it’s tempting to try to change someone who doesn’t want to change, as if your sheer will and desire for them to improve will change them (as it has you). You might even actively choose people with problems, thinking that you can “fix” them. Let go of this faulty expectation.

LEARNING FROM MISTAKES

• People with a growth mindset land on their feet because they acknowledge their mistakes and use them to get better. People with a fixed mindset are bound to repeat their mistakes because they try their best to ignore them. Growth-minded people are by no means immune to making mistakes; they simply have the tools in place to learn from their errors. In other words, they recognize the roots of their mix-ups quickly and never make the same mistake twice. Some mistakes are so tempting that we all make them at one point or another. Here are 11 mistakes that almost all of us make, but growth-minded people only make once.

• Mistake 1 - Believing in someone or something that’s too good to be true.

  • Some people are so charismatic and confident that it can be tempting to follow anything they say. They speak endlessly of how successful their businesses are, how well liked they are, who they know, and how many opportunities they can offer you. Although, of course, it’s true that some people really are successful and really want to help you, growth-minded people only need to be tricked once before they start to think twice about something or someone who sounds too good to be true. The results of naivety and a lack of due diligence can be catastrophic. Growth-minded people ask serious questions before getting involved because they realize that no one, themselves included, is as good as they look.

• Mistake 2-Failing to delay gratification.

  • We live in a world where books instantly appear on our e-readers, news travels far and wide, and just about anything can show up at our doorsteps in as fast as a day. Growth-minded people know that real gratification doesn’t come quickly, and hard work comes long before the reward. They also know how to use this as motivation during every step of the arduous process that amounts to success, because they’ve felt the pain and disappointment that come with selling themselves short.

• Mistake 3 - Losing sight of the big picture.

  • It’s so easy to become head-down busy, working so hard on what’s right in front of you that you lose sight of the big picture. However, growth-minded people learn how to keep this tendency in check by weighing their daily priorities against a carefully calculated goal. It’s not that they don’t care about small-scale work. They just have the discipline and perspective to adjust their course as necessary. Life is all about the big picture, and when you lose sight of it, everything suffers.

• Mistake 4-Surrounding yourself with toxic people.

  • Growth-minded people believe in a simple notion: You are who you associate with. Think about it. Some of the most successful companies in recent history have been founded by brilliant pairs. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak of Apple lived in the same neighborhood, Bill Gates and Paul Allen of Microsoft met in prep school, and Sergey Brin and Larry Page of Google met at Stanford. Just as great people help you reach your full potential, toxic people drag you down with them. Toxic people create stress and strife that should be avoided at all costs. If you’re unhappy with where you are in your life, take a look around. More often than not, the people you’ve surrounded yourself with are the root of your problems. If you need help with toxic people, there’s a whole chapter for you.

• Mistake 5 - Not doing your homework.

  • Everybody’s taken a shortcut at some point, whether it was copying a friend’s biology assignment or strolling into an important meeting unprepared. Growth-minded people realize that, while they may occasionally get lucky, that approach will hold them back from achieving their full potential. They don’t take chances, and they understand that there’s no substitute for hard work and due diligence. They know that if they don’t do their homework, they’ll never learn anything and that’s a surefire way to bring your growth to a screeching halt.

• Mistake 6 - Trying to be someone or something you’re not.

  • It’s tempting to try to please people by being who they want you to be, but no one likes a fake, and trying to be someone you’re not never ends well. Growth-minded people figure that out the first time they get called out for being a phony. Other people never seem to realize that everyone else can see right through their act. They don’t recognize the relationships they’ve damaged, the jobs they’ve lost, or the opportunities they’ve missed as a result of trying to be someone they’re not. Growth-minded people, however, make that connection right away and realize that happiness and success demand authenticity.

• Mistake 7 - Trying to please everyone.

  • Almost everyone makes this mistake at some point, but growth-minded people quickly realize that it’s simply impossible to please everybody, and trying to please everyone pleases no one. They know that, in order to be effective, you have to develop the courage to call the shots and to make the choices that you feel are right (not the choices that everyone will like).

• Mistake 8 - Playing the victim.

  • News reports and our social media feeds are filled with stories of people who seem to get ahead by playing the victim. Growth-minded people may try it once, but they quickly realize that it’s a form of manipulation, and that any benefits disappear as soon as people see that it’s a game. But there’s a more subtle aspect of this strategy that only truly growth-minded people grasp: To play the victim, you have to give up your power, and you can’t put a price on that.

• Mistake 9 - Giving in to fear.

  • Fear is nothing more than a lingering emotion fueled by your imagination. Danger is real. It’s the uncomfortable rush of adrenaline you get when you almost step in front of a bus. Fear is a choice. Growth-minded people know this better than anyone, so they flip fear on its head. They are addicted to the euphoric feeling they get from conquering their fears. Don’t ever hold back in life just because you feel scared. People often say, “What’s the worst thing that can happen to you? Will it kill you?” Yet death isn’t the worst thing that can happen to you. The worst thing that can happen to you is you allow yourself to die inside while you’re still alive.

• Mistake 10 - Letting your age define you.

  • Age really is just a number. Growth-minded people don’t let their age define who they are and what they are capable of. Just think of the latter years of Betty White’s career or any young, thriving entrepreneur. I remember a professor in graduate school who told our class that we were all too young and inexperienced to do consulting work. He said we had to go work for a company for several years before we could hope to succeed as independent consultants. I was the youngest in the class, and I sat there doing work for my consulting clients while he droned on (he found out and almost failed me, although my grades were great). Without fail, people feel compelled to tell you what you should and shouldn’t do because of your age. Don’t listen to them. Growth-minded people certainly don’t. They follow their hearts and allow their passion-not the body they’re living in to be their guide.

• Mistake 11 - Focusing on things you can’t control.

  • Follow the news for any length of time, and you’ll see it’s just one endless cycle of war, violent attacks, fragile economies, failing companies, and environmental disasters. It’s easy to think the world is heading downhill fast. And who knows? Maybe it is. But growth- minded people don’t worry about that because they don’t get caught up in things they can’t control. Instead, they focus their energy on directing the two things that are completely within their control their attention and their effort. They focus their attention on all the things they’re grateful for, and they look for the good that’s happening in the world. They focus their effort on doing what they can every single day to improve their own lives and the world around them because these small steps are all it takes to make the world a better place.

Fixed Mindset vs Growth Mindset

• I’m either good at something or I’m not -> I can improve my skills with effort and practice
• when people give me feedback, it feels like criticism -> I appreciate it; it helps me learn and grow
• I’m just not good at math -> Math is challenging for me, but I know I can improve
• I’m too shy to speak in front of the class -> With practice, I can become more confident and improve my public speaking skills
• I’m already a really good writer. I don’t need to get any better -> There’s always room for improvement
• naturally smart people don’t need to try hard to succeed -> No one is born smart. We can all improve with time, effort and persistence
• Other people’s successes make me feel bad about myself -> Other people’s successes encourage and inspire me. They show me what is possible
• Successful people are lucky/talented and have never experienced failure -> Failure is part of success. Most successful people have failed many times, but they succeeded because they didn’t quit
• I wish I was as good at baseball as you. It’s not fair -> Your skills as a baseball player inspire me. Do you have any tips to help me improve
• It’s embarrassing when I make a mistake -> everyone makes mistakes, and mistakes are opportunities to learn
• If I don’t try new or hard things, then I won’t fail -> I have to try new and difficult things in order to grow, even if I fail at first
• When I fail, I get frustrated and give up -> When I fail or get frustrated, I try again using the lessons I’ve learned.
• Failure means it is time to give up -> I only truly fail when I stop trying
• I can’t do that -> I can’t do that yet. I’m going to keep going, try new strategies, and/or ask for help until I understand it
• If I don’t improve right away, I get frustrated. I start to criticize myself -> I know improvement takes time, and I celebrate the small steps. Even a little progress makes a difference

Increase Your Happiness

• Aristotle was right when he said, “Happiness depends upon ourselves.” Happiness is synthetic-you either create it, or you don’t. Even when you accomplish something great, that high won’t last. It won’t make you happy on its own; you have to work to make and keep yourself happy. Supremely happy people have honed habits that maintain their happiness day in, day out. These habits require emotional intelligence. Indeed, happy people are highly intentional. If you want to follow in their footsteps, learn to incorporate the following habits into your repertoire.

• Make an effort to be happy. No one wakes up feeling happy every day, and supremely happy people are no exception. They just work at it harder than everyone else. They know how easy it is to get sucked into a routine where you don’t monitor your emotions or actively try to be happy and positive. Happy people constantly evaluate their moods and make decisions with their happiness in mind. Sometimes

that includes forcing themselves to do something they aren’t in the mood for, such as exercise or socializing.

• Don’t obsess over things you can’t control. It’s good to know how inflation might affect your wallet or that your company could merge with its largest competitor, but there’s a big difference between understanding these larger forces and worrying about them. Happy people are ready and informed, but they don’t allow themselves to fret over things that are beyond their control.

• Believe the best is yet to come. Don’t just tell yourself that the best is yet to come-believe it. Having a positive, optimistic outlook on the future doesn’t just make you happier; it also improves your performance by increasing your sense of self-efficacy. The mind tends to magnify past pleasure to such a great degree that the present pales in comparison. This phenomenon can cause you to lose faith in the power of the future to outdo what you’ve already experienced. Don’t be fooled. Believe in the great things the future has in store.

• Surround yourself with the right people. Happiness is contagious. Happiness spreads through people. Surrounding yourself with happy people builds confidence and stimulates creativity, and it’s flat-out fun. Hanging around negative people has the opposite effect. They want people to join in their misery so that they can feel better about themselves. Think of it this way: If a person were smoking, would you sit there all afternoon inhaling their secondhand smoke? You’d distance yourself, and you should do the same with negative people because their unhappiness is lethal to everyone around them. Proof in point, the famous Terman study from Stanford followed subjects for eight decades and found that being around unhappy people is linked to poorer health and a shorter life span.

• Slow down to appreciate life’s little pleasures. By nature, we fall into routines. In some ways, this is a good thing. It saves precious brain- power and creates comfort. However, sometimes you get so caught up in your routine that you fail to appreciate the little things in life. Happy people know how important it is to savor the taste of their meal, revel in the amazing conversation they just had, or even just step outside to take a deep breath of fresh air.

• Stay positive. Bad things happen to everyone, including happy people. Instead of complaining about how things could have been or should have been, happy people reflect on everything they’re grateful for. Then they find the best solution available to the problem, tackle it, and move on. Nothing fuels unhappiness quite like pessimism. The problem with a pessimistic attitude, apart from the damage it does to your mood, is that it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy: If you expect bad things, you’re more likely to experience negative events. Pessimistic thoughts are hard to shake off until you recognize how illogical they are. Force yourself to look at the facts, and you’ll see that things are not nearly as bad as they seem.

• Learn to love yourself. Most of us have no problem marveling at our friends’ good qualities, but it can be hard to appreciate our own. Learn to accept who you are, and appreciate your strengths. Studies have shown that practicing self-compassion increases the number of healthy choices you make, improves your mental health, and decreases your tendency to procrastinate.

• Express gratitude. The real neural antidepressant is gratitude. Gratitude boosts levels of serotonin and dopamine the brain’s happy chemicals and the same chemicals targeted by antidepressant medications. The striking thing about gratitude is that it can work even when things aren’t going well for you. That’s because you don’t actually have to feel spontaneous gratitude in order to produce chemical changes in your brain; you just have to force yourself to think about something in your life that you appreciate. This train of thought activates your brain to make you feel happier. Put a reminder on your calendar each day so that you’ll be sure to take a brief moment to pause and appreciate.

• Label negative feelings to dilute their power. There is an amazing amount of power in simply labeling, or consciously identifying, your negative emotions. In one study, participants underwent fMRI scans of their brains while they labeled negative emotions. When they named these emotions, their brains’ prefrontal cortex took over, and their amygdala (where emotions are generated) calmed down. This effect doesn’t just work with your own emotions; labeling the emotions of other people calms them down too, which is why FBI hostage negotiators frequently rely on this technique. So, the next time you’re feeling down, take a moment to contemplate and label what you are feeling. You’ll be surprised at the positive impact this has on your frame of mind.

• Making decisions feels good. Similar to naming emotions, making decisions engages your prefrontal cortex, which calms your amygdala and the rest of your limbic system. The key is to make a “good enough” decision. Trying to make the perfect decision causes stress. We’ve always known that, but now there’s scientific research that explains why. Making a “good enough” decision activates the dorsolateral prefrontal areas of the brain, calming emotions down and helping you feel more in control. Trying to make a perfect decision, on the other hand, ramps up your ventromedial frontal activity which basically means your emotions are overly involved in your decision-making process.

• Do things in person. Happy people let technology do their talking only when absolutely necessary. The human brain is wired for in- person interaction, so happy people jump at the chance to drive across town to see a friend or meet face-to-face because it makes them feel good.

• Spend money on other people. Research shows that spending money on other people makes you much happier than spending it on yourself. This is especially true of small things that demonstrate effort, such as going out of your way to buy your friend a book that you know they’ll like.

• Get in touch with your feelings. Attempting to repress your emotions doesn’t just feel bad; it’s bad for you. Learning to be open about your feelings decreases your stress levels and improves your mood. One study even suggested that there was a relationship between how long you live and your ability to express your emotions. It was found that people who lived to be at least 100 were significantly more emotionally expressive than the average person.

• Get high-quality sleep. This won’t be the last time you see this habit mentioned in this book. There’s good reason for that. Happy people make sleep a priority, because it makes them feel great, and they know how lousy they feel when they’re sleep deprived. Simply put, if you want to be happy, you need to sleep and sleep well. That means you need to clean up your sleep hygiene. If you haven’t read it yet, be sure to read the chapter on sleep hygiene. Cleaning up yours will make you much happier.

• Heed your moral compass. Crossing moral boundaries in the name of success or pleasing other people is a surefire path to unhappiness. Violating your personal standards creates feelings of regret, dissatisfaction, and demotivation. Know when to stand your ground and express dissent when someone wants you to do something that you know you shouldn’t. When you’re feeling confused, take some time to review your values and write them down. This will help you locate your moral compass.

• Lend a hand. Taking the time to help other people not only makes them happy but also makes you happy. Helping other people gives you a surge of oxytocin, serotonin, and dopamine, all of which create good feelings. In a Harvard study, employees who helped others were 10 times more likely to be focused at work, and they were the most likely to be happy during times of high stress. As long as you make certain you aren’t overcommitting yourself, helping others will have a positive influence on your happiness.

• Know the power of touch. As you learned in the likeability chapter, humans are social animals, to the point that our brains react to social exclusion in the same way that they react to physical pain-with activity in the anterior cingulate and insula. Similarly, our brains are hardwired to interpret touch as social acceptance. Touch is one of the primary stimuli for releasing oxytocin, which calms the amygdala and, in turn, calms emotions. Studies even show that holding hands with a loved one actually reduces your brain’s response to pain. You might think that’s bad news for people who are socially isolated, but studies show that a massage increases serotonin by as much as 30%. So, there are always options. Touch reduces your stress hormones, decreases your perception of pain, improves your sleep, and reduces your fatigue. Most importantly, it’s good for your mood.

THE HABITS OF UNHAPPY PEOPLE

• So much of our happiness is determined by our habits (in thought and deed) that we have to monitor them closely to make certain

that they don’t drag us down into the abyss. Unhappiness can catch you by surprise. Negative habits break Kolb’s feedback loop, which is terrible for your mood. There are numerous bad habits that tend to make us unhappy. Eradicating these bad habits can move your happiness set point in short order. The list of bad habits that follows will help you do just that.

• Immunity to awe. Amazing things happen around you every day if you only know where to look. Technology has exposed us to so much and has made the world so much smaller. Yet there’s a downside that isn’t talked about much: Exposure raises the bar for what it takes to be awestruck. And that’s a shame, because few things are as uplifting as experiencing true awe. True awe is humbling. It reminds us that we’re not the center of the universe. Awe is also inspiring and full of wonder, underscoring the richness of life and our ability to contribute to it and be captivated by it. It’s hard to be happy when you just shrug your shoulders every time you see something new.

• Isolating yourself. Isolating yourself from social contact is a pretty common response to feeling unhappy, but a large body of research says it’s the worst thing you can do. This is a huge mistake, as socializing, even when you don’t enjoy it, is great for your mood. We all have those days when we just want to pull the covers over our heads and refuse to talk to anybody, but the moment this becomes a tendency it destroys your mood. Recognize that when unhappiness is making you antisocial, you need to force yourself to get out there and mingle. You’ll notice the difference right away.

• Waiting for the future. Telling yourself, “I’ll be happy when…” is one of the easiest unhappy habits to fall into. How you end the statement doesn’t really matter (it might be a promotion, more pay, or a new relationship) because it puts too much emphasis on circumstances, and improved circumstances don’t lead to happiness. Don’t spend your time waiting for something that’s proven to have no effect on your mood. Instead, focus on being happy right now, in the present moment, because there’s no guarantee for the future. Blaming. We need to feel in control of our lives in order to be happy, which is why blaming is so incompatible with happiness. When you blame other people or circumstances for the bad things that happen to you, you’ve decided that you have no control over your life, which is terrible for your mood.

• Controlling. It’s hard to be happy without feeling in control of your life, but you can take this too far in the other direction by making yourself unhappy by trying to control too much. This is especially true for trying to control people. The only person you can control in your life is you. When you feel that nagging desire to dictate other people’s behavior, it will inevitably blow up in your face and make you unhappy. Even if you can control someone in the short term, it usually requires pressure in the form of force or fear, and treating people this way won’t leave you feeling good about yourself.

• Criticizing. Judging other people and speaking poorly of them is a lot like overindulging in a decadent dessert; it feels good while you’re doing it, but afterward, you feel guilty and sick. Sociopaths find real pleasure in being mean. For the rest of us, criticizing other people (even privately or to ourselves) is just a bad habit that’s intended to make us feel better about ourselves. Unfortunately, it doesn’t. It just creates a spiral of negativity.

• Complaining. Complaining is troubling, as is the attitude that precedes it. Complaining is self-reinforcing behavior. By constantly talking and therefore thinking about how bad things are, you reaffirm your negative beliefs. Although talking about what bothers you can help you feel better, there’s a fine line between complaining being therapeutic and it fueling unhappiness. Beyond making you unhappy, complaining drives other people away.

• Leaving the present. The past and the future are products of your mind. No amount of guilt can change the past, and no amount of anxiety can change the future. Happy people know this, so they focus on living in the present moment. It’s hard to be happy if you’re constantly somewhere else, unable to fully embrace the reality of the very moment. To live in the moment, you must do two things:

  • 1. Accept your past. If you don’t make peace with your past, it will never leave you, and it will create your future. Happy people know that the only good reason to look at the past is to see how far you’ve come.
  • 2. Accept the uncertainty of the future, and don’t worry about it. Worry has no place in the here and now. As Mark Twain once said, “Worrying is like paying a debt you don’t owe.”

• Blowing things out of proportion. Bad things happen to everybody. The difference is that happy people see them for what they are (a temporary bummer), whereas unhappy people see anything negative as further evidence that life is out to get them. A happy person is upset if they have a fender bender on the way to work, but they keep things in perspective: “What a hassle, but at least it wasn’t more serious.” An unhappy person, on the other hand, uses it as proof that the day, the week, the month, maybe even their whole life, is doomed.

• Comparing your life to the lives people portray on social media. The Happiness Research Institute conducted the Facebook Experiment to find out how our social media habits affect our happiness. Half of the study’s participants kept using Facebook as they normally would, while the other half stayed off Facebook for a week. The results were striking. At the end of the week, the participants who stayed off Facebook reported a significantly higher degree of satisfaction with their lives and lower levels of sadness and loneliness. The researchers also concluded that people on Facebook were 55% more likely to feel stressed. The thing to remember about social media in general is that it rarely represents reality. Social media provides an airbrushed, color-enhanced look at the lives people want to portray. I’m not suggesting that you give up social media; just use it sparingly and with a grain of salt. Jealousy and envy are incompatible with happiness, so if you’re constantly comparing yourself with others, it’s time to stop.

• Numbing yourself with technology. You deserve the opportunity to binge-watch a TV show now and then or switch on your Kindle and get lost in a book. The real question is how much time you spend plugged in (to video games, the TV, the tablet, the computer, the phone, etc.) and whether it makes you feel good or simply makes you numb. When your escape becomes a constant source of distraction, it is a sure sign that you’ve fallen into the trap of too much of a good thing.

• Seeing yourself as a victim. Unhappy people tend to operate from the default position that life is both hard and out of their control. In other words, “Life is out to get me, and there’s nothing I can do about it.” The problem with that philosophy is that it fosters a feeling of helplessness, and people who feel helpless aren’t likely to take action to make things better. While you’re entitled to feel down every once in a while, it’s important to recognize when you’re letting this affect your outlook on life. You’re not the only person to whom bad things happen, and you have control over your future as long as you’re willing to take action.

• Neglecting to set goals. Because unhappy people are pessimistic and feel a lack of control over their lives, they tend to sit back and wait for life to happen to them. Having goals gives you hope and the ability to look forward to a better future, and working toward those goals makes you feel good about yourself and your abilities. It’s important to set goals that are challenging, specific (and measurable), and driven by your personal values. Without goals, instead of learning and improving yourself, you just plod along, wondering why things never change.

• Holding your feelings in. One of the great misconceptions concerning emotional intelligence is that it is about repressing our feelings and holding them in. Although it’s true that there are feelings that people with high EQ do not allow to erupt on impulse, that does not mean those feelings are not expressed. Emotional intelligence means honoring your feelings and allowing yourself to experience the catharsis that comes from embracing them for what they are. Only then can you express them in a manner that helps rather than hinders your happiness.

SPEND YOUR MONEY ON EXPERIENCES, NOT THINGS

• A 20-year study conducted by Dr. Thomas Gilovich, a psychology professor at Cornell University, reached a powerful and straightforward conclusion: Don’t spend your money on things. The trouble with things is that the happiness they provide fades quickly. There are three critical reasons for this:

  • 1. We get used to new possessions. What once seemed novel and exciting quickly becomes the norm.
  • 2. We keep raising the bar. New purchases lead to new expectations. As soon as we get used to a new possession, we look for an even better one.
  • 3. The Joneses are always lurking nearby. Possessions, by their nature, foster comparisons. We buy a new car and are thrilled with it until a friend buys a better one and there’s always someone with a better one.

• Gilovich and other researchers have found that experiences as fleeting as they may be deliver longer-lasting happiness than things. Here’s why:

• Experiences become a part of your identity. You are not your possessions, but you are the accumulation of everything you’ve seen, the things you’ve done, and the places you’ve been. Buying an Apple Watch isn’t going to change who you are; taking a break from work to hike the Appalachian Trail from start to finish most certainly will. “Our experiences are a bigger part of ourselves than our material goods,” said Gilovich. “You can really like your material stuff. You can even think that part of your identity is connected to those things, but nonetheless, they remain separate from you. In contrast, your experiences really are part of you. We are the sum total of our experiences.”

• Comparisons matter little. We don’t compare experiences in the same way that we compare things. In a Harvard study, when people were asked if they’d rather have a high salary that was lower than that of their peers or a low salary that was higher than that of their peers, many weren’t sure. However, when they were asked the same question about the length of a vacation, most people chose a longer vacation, although it was shorter than that of their peers. It’s hard to quantify the relative value of any two experiences, which makes them that much more enjoyable.

• Anticipation matters. Gilovich also studied anticipation and found that anticipation of an experience causes excitement and enjoyment, while anticipation of obtaining a possession causes impatience. Experiences are enjoyable from the very first moments of planning, all the way through to the memories you cherish forever.

• Experiences are fleeting (which is a good thing). Have you ever bought something that wasn’t nearly as cool as you thought it would be? Once you buy it, it’s right there in your face, reminding you of your disappointment. And even if a purchase does meet your expectations, buyer’s remorse can set in: “Sure, it’s cool, but it probably wasn’t worth the money.” We don’t do that with experiences. The fact that they last for only a short time is part of what makes us value them so much, and that value tends to increase as time passes.

Gilovich and his colleagues aren’t the only ones who believe that experiences make us happier than things do. Dr. Elizabeth Dunn at the University of British Columbia has also studied the topic, and she attributes the temporary happiness achieved by buying things to what she calls “puddles of pleasure.” In other words, that kind of happiness evaporates quickly and leaves us wanting more. Things may last longer than experiences, but the memories that linger are what matter most.

Increase Your Confidence

• Take an honest look at yourself. Johnny Unitas said, “There is a difference between conceit and confidence. Conceit is bragging about yourself. Confidence means you believe you can get the job done.” In other words, confidence is earned through hard work, and confident people are self-aware. When your confidence exceeds your abilities, you’ve crossed the line into arrogance. You need to know the difference. True confidence is firmly planted in reality. To grow your confidence, it’s important to honestly and accurately assess your abilities. If there are weaknesses in your skill set, make plans to strengthen these skills and find ways to minimize their negative impact. Ignoring your weaknesses or pretending they’re strengths won’t make them go away. Likewise, having a clear understanding of your strengths enables you to shake off some of the more groundless feedback and criticism you can get and that builds confidence.

• Listen more than you speak. Confident people listen more than they speak because they don’t feel as though they have anything to prove. Confident people know that by actively listening and paying attention to others, they are much more likely to learn and grow. Instead of seeing interactions as opportunities to prove themselves to others, confident people focus on the interaction itself, because they know that this is a far more enjoyable and productive approach to people.

• Speak with certainty. You rarely hear the truly confident utter phrases such as “Um,” “I’m not sure,” and “I think.” Confident people speak assertively because they know that it’s difficult to get people to listen to you if you can’t deliver your ideas with conviction. However, there’s a big difference between being assertive and being aggressive. Aggressiveness isn’t confidence; it’s bullying. When you’re insecure, it’s easy to slip into aggressiveness without intending to. Practice asserting yourself without getting aggressive (and trampling over someone else in the process). You won’t be able to achieve this until you learn how to keep your insecurities at bay. This will increase your confidence.

• Seek out small victories. Confident people like to challenge themselves and compete, even when their efforts yield only small victories. Small victories build new androgen receptors in the areas of your brain responsible for reward and motivation. The increase in androgen receptors increases the influence of testosterone, which further increases your confidence and eagerness to tackle future challenges. When you have a series of small victories, the boost in your confidence can last for months.

Get your happiness from within. Happiness is a critical element of confidence, because to be confident in what you do, you have to be happy with who you are. People who brim with confidence derive their sense of pleasure and satisfaction from their own accomplishments instead of what other people think of their accomplishments.

• Exercise. A study conducted at the Eastern Ontario Research Institute found that people who exercised twice a week for 10 weeks felt more competent socially, academically, and athletically. They also rated their body image and self-esteem higher. Best of all, rather than the physical changes in their bodies being responsible for the uptick in confidence, the immediate endorphin-fueled positivity from exercise made all the difference.

• Don’t be afraid to be wrong. Confident people aren’t afraid to be proven wrong. They like putting their opinions out there to see if they hold up because they learn a lot from the times they are wrong, and other people learn from them when they’re right. If you’re self- assured, you know what you’re capable of and don’t treat being wrong as a personal slight.

• Celebrate other people’s successes. Insecure people constantly doubt their relevance, and because of this, they try to steal the spotlight and criticize others in order to prove their worth. Confident people, in contrast, aren’t worried about their relevance because they draw their self-worth from within. Instead of insecurely focusing inward, confident people focus outward, which allows them to see all the wonderful things that other people bring to the table. Praising people for their contributions is a natural result.

• Get right with the boss. A troubled relationship with a boss can destroy even the most talented person’s confidence. It’s hard to be confident when your boss is constantly criticizing you or undermining your contributions. If this applies to you, try to identify where the relationship went wrong and decide whether there’s anything you can do to get things back on track. If the relationship is truly unsalvageable, it may be time to move on to something else. In the next section, the chapter “Survive a Bad Boss” will help you navigate this process.

• Dress for success. Like it or not, how we dress has a huge effect on how people see us. Things like the color, cut, and style of the clothes we wear and even our accessories-communicate loudly. But the way we dress also affects how we see ourselves. Studies have shown that people speak differently when they’re dressed up than when they’re dressed casually. To boost your confidence, dress well. Choose clothing that reflects who you are and the image you want to project, even if that means spending more time shopping and more time getting ready in the morning.

WHAT CONFIDENT PEOPLE WON’T DO

• Don’t make excuses. If there’s one trait confident people have in spades, it’s self-efficacy-the belief that they can make things happen. It’s about having an internal locus of control rather than an external one. That’s why you don’t hear confident people blaming traffic for making them late or an unfair boss for their failure to get a promotion. Confident people don’t make excuses because they believe they’re in control of their own lives.

• Don’t quit. Confident people don’t give up the first time something goes wrong. They see problems and failures as obstacles to overcome rather than impenetrable barriers to success. That doesn’t mean, however, that they keep trying the same thing over and over. One of the first things confident people do when something goes wrong is to figure out why it went wrong and how they can prevent it from happening again.

• Don’t wait for permission to act. Confident people don’t need somebody to tell them what to do or when to do it. They don’t waste time asking themselves questions like “Can I?” or “Should I?” If they ask themselves anything, it’s “Why wouldn’t I?” Whether it’s running a PTA meeting when the chairperson doesn’t show up or going the extra mile to solve a customer’s problem at work, it doesn’t even occur to them to wait for somebody else to take care of it. They see what needs to be done, and they do it. Fear doesn’t hold them back, because they know that if they never try, they will never succeed.

• Don’t seek the spotlight. Confident people know that being yourself is much more effective than trying to prove that you’re someone important. When the spotlight shines on them, it doesn’t inflate their ego. They are masters of attention diffusion. When they’re receiving attention for an accomplishment, they show gratitude for everyone who helped them along the way. They don’t crave approval or praise because they draw their self-worth from within.

• Don’t need constant praise. Have you ever been around somebody who constantly needs to hear how great they are? Confident people don’t. It goes back to that internal locus of control. They don’t think that their success is dependent on other people’s approval, and they understand that no matter how well they perform, there will always be somebody out there offering nothing but criticism. Confident people also know that the kind of confidence that’s dependent on praise from other people isn’t really confidence at all; it’s narcissism.

• Don’t put things off. Why do people procrastinate? Sometimes, it’s simply because they’re lazy. A lot of times, though, it’s because they’re afraid that is, afraid of change, failure, or maybe even success. Confident people don’t put things off. Because they believe in themselves and expect that their actions will lead them closer to their goals, they don’t sit around waiting for the right time or the perfect circumstances. They know that today is the only time that matters.

• Don’t sit in judgment. Confident people don’t waste time sizing people up and worrying about whether they measure up to everyone they meet. They don’t pass judgment on others because they know that everyone has something to offer, and they don’t need to take other people down a notch to feel good about themselves. Comparing yourself to other people is limiting, and confident people have few limitations.

• Don’t avoid conflict. Confident people don’t see conflict as something to be avoided at all costs; they see it as something to manage effectively. They don’t go along to get along, even when that means having uncomfortable conversations or making unpleasant decisions. They know that conflict is part of life, and that they can’t avoid it without cheating themselves out of the good stuff, too. In the next section, the chapter “Mastering Conflict” will help you manage conflict effectively.

• Don’t get too comfortable. Confident people understand that getting too comfortable is the mortal enemy of achieving their goals. That’s because they know that comfort leads to complacency, and complacency leads to stagnation. When they start feeling comfortable, they take that as a big red flag and start pushing their boundaries again so that they can continue to grow. They understand that a little discomfort is a good thing.

Maintain a Positive Attitude

• Step 1. Separate Fact from Fiction.

  • The first step in learning to focus on the positive requires knowing how to stop negative self-talk. 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’ll be more rational and clear-headed in evaluating their veracity. Evaluate these statements to see if they’re factual. You can bet the statements aren’t true any time you see words like never, always, worst, ever, etc.
  • Do you really always lose your keys? Of course not. Perhaps you forget them frequently, but most days, you remember them. Are you never going to find a solution to your problem? If you really are that stuck, maybe you’ve been resisting asking for help. Or if it really is an intractable problem, then why are you wasting your time beating your head against the wall? If your statements still look like facts once they’re on paper, take them to a friend you can trust, and see if they agree 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 facts will help you escape the cycle of negativity and move toward a positive new outlook.

• Step 2. Identify a Positive.

  • Once you snap yourself out of self-defeating, negative thoughts, it’s time to help your brain learn what you want it to focus on the positive. This will come naturally after some practice, but first you have to consciously select something positive to think about. If you search hard enough, you can always find something positive to focus on. Step 1 stripped the power from negative thoughts by separating fact from fiction. Step 2 replaces the negative with a positive. Once you’ve identified a positive thought, draw your attention to that thought each time you find yourself dwelling on the negative. If that’s difficult, you can repeat the process of writing down your negative thoughts to discredit their validity, and then allow yourself to freely enjoy positive thoughts.

• Step 3. Cultivate an Attitude of Gratitude

  • As we learned in the chapter on stress, taking time to contemplate what you’re grateful for isn’t merely the “right” thing to do; it reduces the stress hormone cortisol by 23%. Pausing to appreciate what you’re grateful for improves your mood, improves your energy levels, and results in substantially less anxiety due to lower cortisol levels. You just need to take time every day to focus on gratitude. If you don’t do this naturally, put an alert on your phone’s calendar. When it goes off, pause briefly to think of something you are grateful for or feel good about. You’ll be shocked by how much this simple act alters the positivity of your mindset. Any time you experience negative or pessimistic thoughts, use this as a cue to shift gears and think about something positive. You cultivate an attitude of gratitude by taking time out every day to focus on the positive. You simply need to ensure that your day is peppered with positive thoughts. In time, a positive attitude will become a way of life.

STOP COMPLAINING

• Because we human beings are inherently social, our brains naturally and unconsciously mimic the moods of those around us, particularly the people we spend a great deal of time with. This process is called neuronal mirroring, and it’s the basis for our ability to feel empathy. The flip side, however, is that it makes complaining transmissible you don’t have to do it yourself to suffer the ill effects. You should be cautious about spending time with people who complain about everything. They suck you in and make it hard to maintain a positive attitude.

• THE SOLUTION TO COMPLAINING

  • When you feel the need to complain, you can do two things. One is to cultivate an attitude of gratitude, as discussed at the beginning of this chapter. Let the impulse to complain be your cue that it’s time to shift your attention to something you’re grateful for. Heck, you may want to complain so frequently that you won’t even need to set up a gratitude calendar reminder. The second thing you can do and only when you have something that’s truly worth complaining about is to engage in solution-oriented complaining. Think of it as complaining with a purpose. Solution-oriented complaining should do the following:
  • Have a clear purpose. Before complaining, know what outcome you’re looking for. If you can’t identify a purpose, there’s a good chance you just want to complain for its own sake, and that’s the kind of complaining you should nip in the bud.
  • Start with something positive. It may seem counterintuitive to start a complaint with a compliment, but starting with a positive helps keep the other person from getting defensive. For example, before launching into a complaint about poor customer service, you could say something like, “I’ve been a customer for a very long time and have always been thrilled with your service…” If the complaint is about your own life or circumstances, it’s even more critical that you identify something positive about the situation.
  • Be specific. When you’re complaining, it’s not a good time to dredge up every minor annoyance from the past 20 years or every little aspect of what you’re disappointed in. Be concise and focus on the heart of the matter. This way, you don’t expand your complaint unnecessarily.
  • End on a positive. If you end your complaint with “I’m never shopping here again,” the person who’s listening is not motivated to act on your complaint. If you end your complaint with “I’m never going to try for another promotion,” the person who’s losing future motivation is you. In either case, you’re just venting, or complaining with no purpose other than to complain. Instead, restate your purpose, as well as your hope that the desired result can be achieved, for example, “I’d like to work this out because I like shopping here,” or “This one hurts, but once I’m ready, I’m going to rework my resume and give it another go.”

Learn Your Lesson

• Regardless of the magnitude of the decision, our brains make it hard for us to keep the perspective we need to make good decisions. Over time, these decisions add up, and when they’re poor, they can lead to regret. Bronnie Ware spent her career as a palliative care nurse, working exclusively with people who were three to 12 months from death. She made a habit of asking them about their greatest regrets, and she heard the same five regrets repeatedly. Examining these regrets now can help ensure that you make good, emotionally intelligent decisions and don’t fall victim to them in your final days.

• Regret 1: They wish they hadn’t worked so hard.

  • Working hard is a great way to impact the world, to learn, to grow, to feel accomplished, and sometimes even to find happiness, but it becomes a problem when you work hard at the expense of the people closest to you. Ironically, we often work hard to make money for the people we care about, without realizing that they value our company more than money. The key is to find a balance between doing what you love and being with the people you love. Otherwise, you’ll look back one day and wish you’d focused more on the latter.

• Regret 2: They wish they had stayed in touch with their friends.

  • When you get caught up in your weekly routine, it’s easy to lose sight of how important people are to you, especially those you have to make time for. Relationships with old friends are among the first things to fall off the table when we’re busy. This is unfortunate because spending time with friends is a major stress buster. Close friends bring you energy, fresh perspectives, and a sense of belonging in a way that no one else can.

• Regret 3: They wish they had expressed their feelings.

  • We’re taught as children that emotions are dangerous and that they must be bottled up and controlled. This usually works at first, but boxing up your feelings causes them to grow until they erupt. The best thing you can do is put your feelings directly on the table. Although it’s painful to initiate, it forces you to be honest and transparent. For example, if you feel as though you don’t make enough money at work, schedule a meeting with your boss and propose why you think you’re worth more. They will either agree with you and give you a raise or disagree and tell you what you need to do to become more valuable. However, if you do nothing and let your feelings fester, this will hinder your performance and prevent you from reaching your goal.

• Regret 4: They wish they hadn’t made decisions based on what other people think.

  • When you make decisions based on other people’s opinions, two things tend to happen:
    • You make poor career choices: There are too many people out there who studied for a degree they regret or even spent their lives pursuing a career they regret. Whether you’re seeking parental approval or pursuing pay and prestige over passion, making a poor career choice is a decision that will live with you forever.
    • You fail to uphold your morals: When you get too caught up in what your boss thinks of you, how much money you think your spouse needs to be happy, or how bad you will look if you fail, you are at high risk of violating your own morals. Your intense desires to make yourself look good and to please other people compromise your ability to stay true to yourself and, ultimately, to feel good.

• Regret 5: They wish they had let themselves be happy.

  • When your life is about to end, all the difficulties you’ve faced suddenly become trivial compared to the good times. This is because you realize that, more often than not, suffering is a choice. Unfortunately, most people realize this far too late. Although we all inevitably experience pain, how we react to our pain is completely under our control, as is our ability to experience joy. Learning to laugh, smile, and be happy (especially when stressed) is a challenge at times, but it’s one that’s worth every ounce of effort.

PHRASES EMOTIONALLY INTELLIGENT PEOPLE NEVER UTTER AT WORK

• “This is the way it’s always been done.”

  • Technology-fueled change is happening so fast that even a six-month-old process can be outdated. Saying “this is the way it’s always been done” not only makes you sound lazy and resistant to change, but it could also make your boss wonder why you haven’t tried to improve things on your own. If you really are doing things the way they’ve always been done, there’s almost certainly a better way.

• “He’s lazy/incompetent/a jerk.”

  • There is no upside to making a disparaging remark about a colleague. If your remark is accurate, everybody already knows it, so there’s no need to point it out. If your remark is inaccurate, you’re the one who ends up looking like a jerk. There will always be rude or incompetent people in any workplace, and chances are that everyone knows who they are. If you don’t have the power to help them improve or fire them, then you have nothing to gain by broadcasting their ineptitude. Announcing your colleague’s incompetence comes across as an insecure attempt to make you look better. Your callousness will inevitably come back to haunt you in the form of your coworkers’ negative opinions of you.

• “It’s not fair.”

  • Everyone knows that life isn’t fair. Saying “it’s not fair” suggests that you think life is supposed to be fair, which makes you look immature and naïve. If you don’t want to make yourself look bad, you should stick to the facts, stay constructive, and leave your interpretation out of it. For instance, instead of saying the phrase above, you could say, “I noticed that you assigned Ann that big project I was hoping for. Would you mind telling me what went into that decision? I’d like to know why you thought I wasn’t a good fit, so that I can work on improving those skills.”

• “No problem.”

  • When someone asks you to do something or thanks you for doing something, and you tell them “no problem,” you’re implying that their request should have been a problem. This makes people feel as though they’ve imposed upon you. What you want to do instead is show people that you’re happy to help. Say something like, “It was my pleasure” or “I’ll be happy to take care of that.” It’s a subtle difference in language, but it has a huge impact on people.

• “I think…/This may be a silly idea…/I’m going to ask a stupid question.”

  • These overly passive phrases instantly erode your credibility. Even if you follow these phrases with a great idea, they suggest that you lack confidence, which makes the people you’re speaking to lose confidence in you. Don’t be your own worst critic. If you’re not confident in what you’re saying, no one else will be, either. And if you really don’t know something, say, “I don’t have that information right now, but I’ll find out and get right back to you.”

• “I’ll try.”

  • Just like the word “think,” “try” sounds tentative and suggests that you lack confidence in your ability to execute the task. Take full ownership of your capabilities. If you’re asked to do something, either commit to doing it or offer an alternative, but don’t say that you’ll try, because it sounds like you won’t try all that hard.

• “That’s not in my job description.”

  • This often sarcastic phrase makes you sound as though you’re only willing to do the bare minimum required to keep getting a paycheck, which is a bad thing if you like job security. If your boss asks you to do something that you feel is inappropriate for your position (as opposed to morally or ethically inappropriate), the best move is to complete the task eagerly. Later, schedule a conversation with your boss to discuss your role in the company and whether your job description needs an update. This ensures that you avoid looking petty. It also enables you and your boss to develop a long-term understanding of what you should and shouldn’t be doing.

• “It’s not my fault.”

  • It’s never a good idea to cast blame. Be accountable. If you had any role-no matter how small-in whatever went wrong, own it. If not, offer an objective, dispassionate explanation of what happened. Stick to the facts, and let your boss and colleagues draw their own conclusions about who’s to blame. The moment you start pointing fingers is the moment people start seeing you as someone who lacks accountability for their actions. This makes people nervous. Some will avoid working with you altogether, and others will strike first and blame you when something goes wrong.

• “This will only take a minute.”

  • Saying that something only takes a minute undermines your skills and gives the impression that you rush through tasks. Unless you’re literally going to complete the task in 60 seconds, feel free to say that it won’t take long, but don’t make it sound as though the task can be completed any sooner than it can actually be finished.

• “I can’t.”

  • “I can’t” is “it’s not my fault’s” twisted sister. People don’t like to hear “I can’t” because they think it means “I won’t.” Saying “I can’t” suggests that you’re not willing to do what it takes to get the job done. If you really can’t do something because you truly lack the necessary skills, you should offer an alternative solution. Instead of saying what you “can’t” do, say what you “can” do. For example, instead of saying, “I can’t stay late tonight,” say, “I can come in early tomorrow morning. Will that work?” Instead of “I can’t run those numbers,” say, “I don’t yet know how to run that type of analysis. Is there someone who can show me so that I can do it on my own next time?”

THINGS EMOTIONALLY INTELLIGENT PEOPLE NEVER REVEAL ABOUT THEMSELVES AT WORK

• Emotionally intelligent people are adept at reading others, and this ability shows them what they should and shouldn’t reveal about themselves at work. They know better than to reveal any of the following, because these things will send your career careening in the wrong direction.

• Your political beliefs. People’s political beliefs are too closely tied to their identities to be discussed without incident at work. Disagreeing with someone else’s views can quickly alter their otherwise strong perception of you. Confronting someone’s core values is one of the most insulting things you can do. Granted, different people treat politics differently, but asserting your values can alienate some people as quickly as it intrigues others. Even bringing up a hot-button world event without asserting a strong opinion can lead to conflict. People build their lives around their ideals and beliefs, and giving them your two cents is risky. Be willing to listen to others without inputting anything on your end. Political opinions are so deeply ingrained in people that challenging their views is more likely to get you judged than to change their minds.

• How much money you make. Your parents may love to hear all about how much you’re pulling in each month, but in the workplace, this only breeds negativity. It’s impossible to allocate salaries with perfect fairness, and revealing yours gives your coworkers a direct measure of comparison. As soon as everyone knows how much you make, everything you do at work is considered against your income. It’s tempting to swap salary figures with a buddy out of curiosity, but the moment you do, you’ll never see each other the same way again.

• That you hate your job. The last thing anyone wants to hear at work is someone complaining about how much they hate their job. Doing so labels you as a negative person who is not a team player. This brings down the morale of the group. Bosses are quick to catch on to naysayers who drag down morale, and they know that there are always enthusiastic replacements waiting just around the corner.

• What you do in the bedroom. Whether your sex life is out of this world or lacking entirely, this information has no place at work. Such comments will get a chuckle from some people, but they make most uncomfortable, and even offended. Crossing this line will instantly give you a bad reputation.

• What you think someone else does in the bedroom. A good 111% of the people you work with do not want to know that you bet they’re tigers in the sack. There’s no more surefire way to creep someone out than to let them know that thoughts of their love life have entered your brain. Anything from speculating on a colleague’s sexual orientation to making a relatively indirect comment like, “Oh, to be a newlywed again,” plants a permanent seed in the brains of all who hear it that casts you in a negative light. Keep your thoughts to yourself.

• How wild you used to be. Your past can say a lot about you. Just because it’s been many years since you did something outlandish or stupid doesn’t mean people will believe you’ve developed impeccable judgment since then. Some behavior that might qualify as just another day in the typical fraternity (binge drinking, petty theft, and so on) shows everyone you work with that when push comes to shove, you have poor judgment and don’t know where to draw the line. Many presidents have been elected despite their past indiscretions, but unless you have a team of handlers and PR types protecting and spinning your image, you should keep your unsavory past to yourself.

• That you’re job hunting. When I was a kid, I told my baseball coach that I would be quitting the team in two weeks. For the next two weeks, I found myself riding the bench. It got even worse after those two weeks when I decided to stay, as I became “the kid who doesn’t

even want to be here.” I was crushed, but it was my own fault. I told him my decision before it was certain. The same thing happens when you tell people that you’re job hunting. Once you reveal that you’re planning to leave, you suddenly become a waste of everyone’s time. There’s also the chance that your hunt will be unsuccessful, so it’s best to wait until you’ve found a job before you tell anyone. Otherwise, you’ll end up riding the bench.

LEARN TO ENJOY BEING ALONE

• You recuperate and recharge. All of us—even the most extroverted among us-need time to recuperate and recharge. There’s nothing like spending time alone to make this happen. The peace, quiet, and mental solitude you experience when you’re by yourself are essential to recovering from the stresses of daily living.

• You can do what you want. As fun as it is to spend time with other people, it inevitably leads to compromise. You’re constantly modifying your ideas to accommodate other people’s interests. Being alone frees you up to do exactly what you want when you want. You can throw on whatever you feel like wearing, eat what you feel like eating, and work on projects that are meaningful to you.

• It boosts your self-esteem. Enjoying your own company is a huge confidence booster. If you’re bored and restless when you’re by yourself, it’s easy to start thinking that you’re boring or that you need other people around to enjoy yourself. Learning to enjoy time alone boosts your self-esteem by confirming that you’re enough.

• You learn to trust yourself. Freedom is more than doing what you want; it’s the ability to trust your gut and to think clearly, without any pressure or outside influence. Being alone helps you form a clear understanding of who you are, what you know, and what’s right for you. It teaches you to trust yourself. When you’re around others, even when you don’t realize it, you monitor people’s reactions to gauge the appropriateness of your own feelings and actions. When you’re alone, it’s all on you. You develop your own ideas and opinions without having them watered down by what anyone else thinks. Once you learn to enjoy being alone, you’ll discover what you’re truly capable of without the constraints of other people’s thinking.

• It increases your emotional intelligence. Self-awareness is the foundation of emotional intelligence, and you can’t increase your EQ without it. Because self-awareness requires understanding your emotions and how you react to various people and situations, this necessitates careful self-reflection, which happens best when you’re alone.

• You appreciate other people more. Absence really does make the heart grow fonder. Time alone lets you see people in a whole new light, and it helps you develop a renewed sense of gratitude for who they are and what they do.

• You get more done. It’s said that “more hands make light work,” and although that might be true when it comes to raking leaves, it’s a completely different story with cognitive tasks. Even the effectiveness of brainstorming is more myth than reality. Researchers at Texas A&M found that group brainstorming hinders productivity due to “cognitive fixation.” Cognitive fixation is the tendency for people working in groups to get stuck on other people’s ideas, reducing their ability to come up with anything new, and the bigger the group, the more fixated everyone becomes. Spending time alone not only eliminates distractions but also ensures that you don’t have trouble with “too many cooks.”

Get Motivated

• When it comes to success, our eyes often lead us astray. It’s hard not to feel like the most successful people are those with the biggest houses, the most expensive cars, and the most influential friends. Regardless of what you achieve, there’s always someone with more, and this can make you feel like you’re losing. The problem isn’t your lack of toys; it’s believing that toys indicate true success. Real success is about who you are and how far you’ve come. If you ever worry that you’re not as successful as you should be, you may be evaluating yourself against the wrong criteria. Sometimes, you just need a reminder of what you’ve really accomplished in life. The following habits will help you do just that, and they’ll increase your emotional intelligence in the process.

• You keep things in perspective. Sometimes bad things happen. It’s part of life. For most of us, however, our very worst day would seem like a vacation to somebody who has real problems-like not having enough to eat or trying to survive a civil war. Locking your keys in the car or even getting passed over for a promotion aren’t that bad once you learn to develop perspective. If you’ve mastered the ability to keep your problems in perspective, mark it down as a huge success.

• You’re no longer the center of the universe. We all know “successful” people who act like they’re the center of the universe. It’s their world, and the rest of us just live in it, right? That’s not success. True success requires the ability to feel empathy-to realize that other people’s feelings and dreams are just as important as ours, and that we cannot succeed without them.

• You stay positive. Hope and optimism are essential components of a happy life. If you dwell on things that go wrong, you become bitter and resentful. When that happens, you fail-no matter what you may have achieved. Real success means always seeing the bright side and believing that you have the power to make even the worst situations better.

• You realize that life isn’t a zero-sum game. It’s not a seesaw, either. Just because somebody else achieves a big success doesn’t mean you suffer a loss in equal proportion. You just didn’t win that particular time. One sure sign of success is the ability to celebrate others’ achievements with sincere enthusiasm.

• You ask for help when you need it. Refusing to ask for help, no matter how much you’re struggling, is a sign of emotional immaturity. Asking for help means that you no longer feel like you have something to prove by being perfect. It shows you aren’t afraid of people discovering your weaknesses, and you understand that no one succeeds alone.

• You know that failure isn’t forever. You’ve learned that the only people who never fail are those who don’t try. When you fail, you don’t automatically assume that you’re a failure. Instead, you embrace each failure as an opportunity to learn something and then you move

on.

• You can tell the difference between drama and excitement. Remember the days when stable relationships were boring, and you quickly got tired of anyone who treated you as they should? If that kind of “drama” is a thing of the past, congratulations. If you prefer stability and depth to drama, you’re succeeding.

• You no longer care what other people think. You worry about what other people think only when you still feel like you have something to prove. Conversely, you know you’ve “made it” when you don’t worry about that anymore when you’re true to yourself and your principles, and satisfied with your life. You know you’ve made it when you understand that other people’s opinions are just that- opinions. They have no effect on reality. They don’t change who or what you are.

• You accept what you can’t change and change what you can. There’s a difference between pessimism and practicality. If there’s a hurricane headed your way, there’s nothing you can do to stop it. But once you accept that the hurricane is coming, you can start working to mitigate its effects. If your company downsizes and you get laid off, every moment you spend in denial just delays whatever is waiting over the horizon. You’re able to move on only when you start exploring your options and making plans to change what you can. Taking responsibility for changing the things you don’t like about your life is one of the biggest indicators of success.

LEAVING YOUR COMFORT ZONE

• Accomplish an “impossible” goal. Few things compare to the exhilaration of accomplishing something that you didn’t think you were capable of. These achievements fall so far outside your comfort zone that they seem impossible. Maybe it’s running a marathon or giving a keynote speech at a convention. These accomplishments are worth every bit of suffering you endure to achieve them, because once you finally do them, you feel invincible and carry that triumph with you forever.

• Volunteer. It would be great if everyone volunteered for purely altruistic reasons, but we all have demands on our time and have to set priorities. The problem is that after a long workday, volunteering can get pushed down somewhere below watching Netflix. Volunteering is a powerful experience that feels good and expands your network at the same time. Have you ever met anyone who made volunteering a priority and wasn’t changed for the better by the experience? Neither have I.

• Practice public speaking. You’ve likely heard that the majority of people fear public speaking more than death. In fact, 74% of Americans have glossophobia (the fancy word for a fear of public speaking). So, yes, it’s a challenge. It’s also worth it. Whether you’re addressing five people around a table or an audience of 5,000, becoming a better public speaker can be a huge boon to your career.

• Talk to someone you don’t know. Unless you’re an extreme extrovert, or a politician, talking to new people probably makes you at least somewhat uncomfortable. Do it anyway. Social interaction is good for your mood (even when you don’t like it), expands your network, exposes you to new ideas, and boosts your self-confidence.

• Get up early. Unless you’re a morning person, getting up earlier than usual can take you way out of your comfort zone. However, if you get up well before you have to start getting ready for work, it’s worth it. It gives you an opportunity to collect your thoughts and mentally prepare yourself for the day ahead, rather than just dashing from one activity to another. It also gives you the opportunity to eat a good breakfast and exercise, both of which have well-known health benefits.

• Bite your tongue. Sure, it can feel so good to unload on somebody and let them know what you really think, but that good feeling is temporary. What happens the next day, the next week, or the next year? It’s human nature to want to prove that you’re right, but it’s rarely effective. The vast majority of the time, that means you should be biting your tongue.

TAKE YOUR BRAIN OFF AUTOPILOT

• The best things in life don’t come easily, and failing to observe yourself carefully is a sure path to mediocrity and low emotional intelligence. I believe that Socrates said it best: “The unexamined life isn’t worth living.” Many of life’s essential truths need repeating. We need reminders that help us stay focused on them. Keep these truths handy, and they’re sure to give you a much-needed boost.

• Great success is often preceded by failure. You will never experience true success until you learn to embrace failure. Your mistakes pave the way for you to succeed by revealing when you’re on the wrong path. The biggest breakthroughs typically come when you’re feeling the most frustrated and the most stuck. This frustration forces you to think differently, to look outside the box and see the solution that you’ve been missing. Success takes patience and the ability to maintain a good attitude even while suffering for what you believe in.

• The first step is always the hardest. When you want to achieve something important, that first step will inevitably be daunting, even frightening. When you dare to make that first move, anxiety and fear dissipate in the name of action. People who dive headfirst into taking that brutal first step aren’t any stronger than the rest of us. They’ve simply learned that it yields great results. They know that the pain of getting started is inevitable and that procrastination only prolongs their suffering.

• Being busy does not equal being productive. Look at everyone around you. They all seem so busy-running from meeting to meeting and firing off emails. Yet how many of them are really producing, really succeeding at a high level? Success doesn’t come from movement and activity. It comes from focus-from ensuring that your time is used efficiently and productively. You get the same number of hours in the day as everyone else. Use yours wisely. After all, you’re the product of your output, not your effort. Make certain that your efforts are dedicated to tasks that get results.

• You will always have less control than you want. There are too many extenuating circumstances in life to control every outcome. However, you can control how you react to things that are out of your control. Your reaction is what transforms a mistake into a learning experience and ensures that a victory doesn’t send your ego through the roof. You can’t win every battle, but with the right attitude, you can win the war.

• You’re living the life you’ve created. You are not a victim of circumstances. No one can force you to make decisions and take actions that run contrary to your values and aspirations. The circumstances you’re living in today are your own you created them. Likewise, your future is entirely up to you. If you’re feeling stuck, it’s probably because you’re afraid to take the risks necessary to achieve your goals and live your dreams. When it’s time to take action, remember that it’s always better to be at the bottom of the ladder you want to climb than at the top of one you don’t.

• Good things take time. Success, above all, requires time and effort. Author Malcolm Gladwell suggested that mastery of anything requires 10,000 hours of tireless focus. Many successful people would agree. Consider Harry Bernstein, who dedicated his entire life to writing before he finally landed a best-seller at the age of 96. When you finally succeed, you realize that the journey was the best part of it.

• Fear is the #1 source of regret. When it’s all said and done, you’ll lament the chances that you didn’t take far more than you will your failures. Don’t be afraid to take risks.

• Your biggest problems are mental. Almost all our problems occur because we time travel: We go to the past and regret things we’ve done, or we go to the future and feel anxious about events that haven’t even happened. It’s all too easy to slip into the past or jet into the future. When you do, you lose sight of the one thing that you can actually control the present.

• Life is short. None of us is guaranteed tomorrow. Yet when someone dies unexpectedly, it causes us to take stock of our own life: what’s really important, how we spend our time, and how we treat other people. Loss is a raw, visceral reminder of the frailty of life. It shouldn’t be. Remind yourself every morning when you wake up that each day is a gift, and you’re bound to make the most of the blessing you’ve been given. The moment you start acting like life is a blessing is the moment it will start acting like one. After all, a great day begins with a great mindset.

ASK YOURSELF THE RIGHT QUESTIONS

• If you aren’t achieving all that you’d hoped for, it’s often the result of not asking yourself the right questions. Some questions are hard to confront because you’re afraid you won’t get the answer you want; others because you really don’t want to know the answer. When Eric Schmidt was CEO of Google, he famously said, “We run this company on questions, not answers.” Life runs on questions, not answers. You should be asking yourself regularly if you’re headed in the right direction. Let’s take a closer look at some of the tough questions you should ask yourself frequently.

• How do people see me differently than I see myself?

  • Have you ever heard a recording of your voice and thought, “Is that what I really sound like?” Because of the way the sound of the voice travels through the human skull, we never hear ourselves the same way that everybody else hears us. The same is often true of the way we behave. We interpret our behavior in terms of how we think we come across, whereas everyone else sees the real thing.
  • A great way to gain this perspective is a 360° assessment. It gathers feedback from everyone you work with closely that is constructive, anonymous, and accurate. If you forego the 360° assessment and solicit feedback in person, make certain you ask for feedback that is specific, avoiding broad questions and generalizations. For example, you’re more likely to get an honest and accurate answer to, “How well did I handle myself in the meeting when everyone disagreed with me?” than to, “Am I a good boss?” Be careful to show that you’re receptive to the feedback. If you flip out or get defensive every time somebody speaks their mind, they’re going to stop doing it.

• What/whom did I make better today?

  • That’s another way of saying, “Leave things better than you found them.” Ending each day by asking yourself what or whom you made better is a great way to keep yourself grounded and focused on what really matters. Even when the answers are no one and nothing, asking yourself this question will keep you grounded and focused to do better the following day.

• What haven’t I taken the time to learn about?

  • It’s a big world out there, and it’s getting bigger all the time. Scientists have theorized that it once took 1,500 years for the accumulated knowledge in the world to double. Now, it takes only a year or two. Don’t get left behind.

• If I achieved all of my goals, how would I feel? What can I do to feel that way as I work to achieve them?

  • The ability to delay gratification in pursuit of your goals is one of the most fundamental prerequisites for success, but delaying gratification doesn’t have to mean being miserable until you cross that finish line. You can achieve more and have more fun doing it— if you let yourself feel some of that pride and pleasure along the way.

• What do I want my life to be like in five years?

  • Lewis Carroll once said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there.” The corollary is that once you have your destination in mind, you can plan your route. Five years is the perfect timeframe: It’s not so far in the future that you can’t imagine yourself there, but it’s not so close that you can’t do anything about it.

• In what areas of my life am I settling?

  • When you settle, you accept less than you’re capable of. Sometimes, we settle in dead-end jobs. Other times, we settle for unhealthy or unfulfilling relationships. If you don’t ask yourself where and why you’re settling, it’s hard to stop.

• What would I do if I wasn’t scared?

  • From a survival perspective, fear has its purpose. It’s what keeps us from sticking our hand in the washing machine or any of the million other things that could get us hurt or killed. However, fear tends to get carried away. Instead of keeping you safe, it keeps you from improving your life and living your dreams. Asking yourself what you’re afraid of often makes it a lot less scary.

• Am I being true to my values?

  • Do you ever get that nagging feeling that something is a little off in your life? This often happens when little habits creep up on you that violate your values. If spending quality time with your family is one of your primary values, but you keep staying late at work, there’s a conflict. If you want that nagging little voice to go away, you have to do something about it.

• Who has qualities that I aspire to develop?

  • When people have qualities that you admire, reflecting on these qualities and thinking about ways in which you can incorporate them into your repertoire is a great exercise. This also motivates you to spend more time around these individuals so that you can watch and learn.

• What’s stopping me from doing the things that I should be doing?

  • It’s easy to shrug your shoulders and say, “I don’t know what to do,” but that’s just an excuse. Most of the time, we know exactly what we should be doing. We just aren’t willing to move the obstacles out of the way.

• Will you be my mentor?

  • It’s an intimidating question to ask, but few people will turn you down. Everyone likes being looked up to, and it feels good to share our knowledge with others.

Be Utterly Authentic

• Don’t hide your quirks. Authentic people often have unusual preferences that don’t fit the norm. They’re open and unabashed about who they are, which gives everyone a good look at these interesting tendencies. Billionaire Warren Buffett, for example, has never been suited to the high-rolling lifestyle. Instead, he still lives in the same modest house he bought in 1958 for $31,500. It might seem quirky or even strange for such an incredibly wealthy man to live so frugally, but Buffett doesn’t sacrifice his preferences to what’s expected of him.

• Express your true feelings and opinions even when they’re not popular. Authentic people don’t live a go-along-to-get-along lifestyle. They’re simply not capable of acting in a way that’s contrary to what their principles dictate, even if there are repercussions. They prefer not to lie to other people, and they especially can’t lie to themselves. This means that they’re willing to live with the repercussions of staying true to themselves.

• Give others room to breathe. Authentic people don’t expect others to play a role, either. They don’t make people feel as though they have to fit into a certain mold or project a certain image to be a part of their lives. Their commitment to being authentic gives other people the freedom to live authentically, too.

• Check your ego at the door. An egomaniac is never authentic. Ego-maniacs are always posturing and worrying about how they’re perceived. It’s exhausting, and it’s also dishonest. Take Oprah Winfrey an interesting and authentic person. In a speech to the Stanford University graduating class of 2008, she said, “The trick is to learn to check your ego at the door and start checking your gut instead. Every right decision I’ve made every right decision I’ve ever made has come from my gut. And every wrong decision I’ve ever made was a result of me not listening to the greater voice of myself.” Oprah’s advice is so important: Listen to your values, goals, and ambitions, rather than worrying about what will make you look good.

• Avoid the bandwagon. Nothing is more boring than following the bandwagon, and authentic people are intent on forging their own paths. There’s often nothing wrong with what everyone else is doing. It’s just that authentic people are innovators who break with conformity to pursue new, exciting, and interesting ideas.

• Don’t worry about what others think of you. It’s never fun accepting that someone doesn’t like you, but a lot of times, that discomfort comes from trying to figure out what you did wrong or how you can fix it. Authentic people don’t have that anxiety because they would never try to change themselves to influence someone else’s opinion. They accept that other people have the right to be authentic about their own feelings, even if those feelings are negative toward them. Nothing is more unauthentic than hiding your true self because you’re afraid that other people might not like it. Instead, authentic people are true to themselves wherever they are, whoever they’re with, and whatever they’re doing.

• Don’t take anyone’s advice without evaluating it carefully. It’s not that authentic people aren’t willing to take advice; they are. But they don’t put that advice into action just because other people have. First, they’ll run it through the wringer from a critical perspective so that they can be sure it makes sense for them.

• Try new things. Authentic people do what interests them. They know what they want, and they’re brave enough to take the steps to get there. This often means trying new things-things at which they’re often terrible at first.

• Never stop learning. To authentic people, the world has infinite possibilities. This curiosity leads to constant learning, fueled by an ever-burning desire to discover the unknown. For example, despite Albert Einstein’s intelligence and accomplishments, he retained a sense of wonder throughout his life that made him continue to ask questions about the world. Like Einstein, authentic people are in a constant state of wonder.

PASSION DRIVES AUTHENTICITY

• Passionate people are obsessed. Put simply, passionate people are obsessed with their muse, and I don’t mean that in an unhealthy sort of way. I’m talking about a positive, healthy obsession, the kind that inspired the quote, “Do what you love, and you’ll never work a day in your life.” No matter what else is going on, their thoughts keep returning to their passion. Not because they feel burdened and pressured by it, but because they’re just so dang excited about it. They’re obsessed with their muse because it inspires them and makes them happy.

• They don’t waste time. You won’t find passionate people wasting time. They don’t have time to be bothered with things that don’t matter or things that just kill time. They devote every minute available to their passion, and it’s not a sacrifice, because there’s nothing else they’d rather be doing.

• They’re optimistic. Passionate people are always focused on what can be, rather than what is. They’re always chasing their next goal with the unwavering belief that they’ll achieve it. You know how t feels when you’re looking forward to a really special event? Passionate people feel like that every day.

• They’re early risers. Passionate people are far too eager to dive into their days to sleep in. It’s not that they don’t like to sleep; they’d just much rather be pursuing their passion. When the rooster crows, their minds are flooded with ideas and excitement for the day ahead.

• They’re willing to take big risks. How much you want something is reflected i how much you’re willing to risk. Nobody is going to lay it all on the line for something they’re only mildly interested in. Passionate people, on the other hand, are willing to risk it all.

• They have only one speed-full tilt. Passionate people don’t do anything halfheartedly. If they’re going, they’re going full tilt until they cross the finish line or crash. If they’re relaxed and still, they’re relaxed and still. There’s no in-between.

They talk about their passions all the time. Again, we’re talking about people whose passions are inseparable from who they are, and you couldn’t form much of a relationship with them if they couldn’t be real about who they are, right? It’s not that they don’t understand that you don’t share their obsession; they just can’t help themselves. If they acted differently, they’d be playing a role rather than being authentic.

• They’re highly excitable. You know those people who probably wouldn’t get excited if an alien spaceship landed in their front yard? Yeah, that’s not how passionate people operate. It’s not that they’re never calm, or even bored. It’s just that it takes less to get them excited, so they get excited more frequently and stay excited longer. One theory is that they devote their energy to just one or two things, so they make more progress, and that momentum fuels their excitement.

Make Your Goals Public

• share your goals with someone and ask this person to hold you accountable

Count to 10

• When you feel yourself becoming frustrated or angry, count to 10 with a slow breath between each number. The focus on counting will engage your rational brain

Sleep On It

• Time help bring clarity and perspective

Talk to a Skilled Self-Manager

• Find a person who is skilled self-manager and who is willing to give you some tips

Smile and Laugh More

• Your brain responds to the nerves and muscles in your face to determine your emotional state. Read or watch something that you find funny.
  • Tip: Hold a pencil between your teeth to activate the muscles used in smiling.

Set Aside Time for Problem Solving

• Decisions made in a rush are selfdom effective

Take Control of Your Self-Talk

• There is a strong relationship between what you think and how you feel, both physically and emotionally. Learn to control your self-talk.
• Replace the following: “I always”, “I never”, “I’m an idiot”, “It’s all my fault”, “it’s all their fault” with “Just this time”, “Sometimes”, “I made a mistake”, “We each are responsible for our actions”

Visualize yourself Succeeding

• Visualize effectively managing your emotions and behavior

Focus Your Attention on Your Freedoms

• Take accountability for what is within your area of responsibility rather than focusing on what you can’t control.

Stay Synchronized

• When your emotions get the best of you, force your attention away from your emotions and on to the task at hand

Speak to Someone not Emotionally invested

• Find a trusted person to act as a sounding board. This should be someone who is not affected by the situation. The person should be a good listener rather than someone who tries to solve your problem for you.

Learn from Everyone You Encounter

• When you are caught off-guard and on the defensive, use it as an opportunity to learn something. Learn from either the other person’s feedback or their behavior

Put a Mental Recharge into Your Schedule

• Schedule time for physical activity. It releases chemicals in your brain to improve your mood, keep you alert, and help you be more effective in planning, organizing, and making decisions.

Accept that Change is Just around the Corner.

• At least every 2 weeks, think about important things that might happen. Make a list of activities that you will take if the change occurs. Make a list of things you could do now to prepare for the possible change.

Social Awareness Strategies

• accurately pick up on emotions in other people and understand what is really going on with them

Greet People by Name

• “a person’s name is the most important word in any language to them. Use it often and respect it”

Make Timing Everything

• Avoid asking a person for something when you can tell they are angry or under a lot of stress

Develop a Back-pocket Question

• Have a question to ask in case a conversation lags. Avoid questions about sensitive topics.

Plan Ahead for Social Gatherings

• On an index card, list who will be at the event along with any talking points you want to use. Also list anything you agreed to bring so you don’t forget.

Clear Away the Clutter in Your Head

• When a person is speaking, focus on listening to that person, instead of letting your mind wander to other things.
• Make a point to try to learn something from listening to the person.

Go on a 15-minute Tour

• Walk around, noticing people’s workspaces and how people move around the area.
• Try to pick up on people’s feelings and how others affect your feelings.

Watch EQ at the Movies.

• Watch some movies with the objective of watching the character interactions and conflicts
• Notice how the characters handle the conflict.
• Challenge yourself to pick up on clues that conflict may be building.

Step into Their Shoes

• Ask yourself, “If I were this person, how would I [feel, react, respond]?”
• Think about how the person has reacted in similar situations.

See the Whole Picture

• Seeking feedback gives you a chance to see how others may view your behavior.
  • What you intend as helpful responses and behaviors may appear unhelpful to other people. For example, others may interpret your attempt at courteous listening as lack of interest in the topic.

Catch the Mood of the room

• When you enter a room, scan it for energy level.
• How would you describe the mood [enthusiastic, bored, somber, playful, cautious, angry]?
• Notice how people arrange themselves, alone or in groups.
• Which people are animated and which are subdued?

know when you’re being lied to

• Thankfully, Dr. Brink’s research points to objective, well-documented physiological and behavioral changes or “tells”— that we can use to accurately assess other people’s truthfulness. Keep an eye out for the following signs, and you can use your emotional intelligence to ensure you won’t be taken advantage of by a liar.

• They repeat themselves and provide too much detail. Liars hate silence, so they often try to fill it up by talking more than they need to. They provide far more information than needed or asked for. Sometimes, the longer you stay quiet, the more details liars throw in to support their story as they try to convince you and themselves of their deception. Liars also repeat phrases over and over again as they struggle to buy time to gather their thoughts.

• They cover their mouths. People often cover their mouths when lying. A hand on the mouth or even a touch of the lips shows you that they may be lying, because this unconscious body language represents a closing off of communication. When lying, people also instinctively cover vulnerable body parts, such as the head, neck, or abdomen, because lying makes them feel exposed, vulnerable, and open to attack.

• They prepare for an escape. In an unconscious attempt to find an escape route, people who are lying often angle their bodies toward the door if they’re sitting, and they may even move closer to the door if they’re standing. They may also change their posture from relaxed to erect or guarded as their bodies perk up in unconscious preparation for an escape.

• They fidget. Fidgeting is a clear sign of nervous energy. Even practiced liars worry that you won’t believe them, so they release that nervous energy by playing with their hair, tapping their feet or fingers, pulling on their ears, and more. Shuffling the feet is a common expression of nervous energy associated with lying. Their feet start moving because the liar feels vulnerable, and their body wants to flee.

• Their breathing changes. People reflexively start breathing more heavily when they lie, as lying causes changes in their heart rate and blood flow. Sometimes, liars even have trouble speaking, as the mucous membranes in their mouth dry out as part of their body’s response to lying.

• Their words and body language don’t match. It’s easy to lie with words, but our bodies know (and show) the truth. A clear sign that someone is lying to you is when their words are saying one thing, and their body language is saying something entirely different. For example, someone is telling you a sad story about the personal struggles that made them miss work, yet they’re smiling while they’re talking, and their hand gestures and body posture are animated and excited.

• They change their typical eye movement patterns. They say that the eyes are the “windows to the soul.” That’s especially true when someone is lying. But there’s a catch: It’s not where the person is looking that matters, but the change in direction. Some people, for instance, look up and to the right when they’re remembering information, but down when they’re lying. For other people, it’s the opposite. A change in eye movement can be a very strong indicator of lying, but you have to know the person’s typical pattern first. That makes this tactic more suitable to use with people you know well, or at least interact with regularly. However, one eye movement “tell” is pretty universal: People who are lying often look toward the door, their unconscious escape route.

• They get aggressive. Liars often get aggressive in a conversation for no apparent reason. Sometimes, they become hostile and point aggressively in your direction. Other times, liars maintain excessive eye contact without blinking, in an abrasive attempt to appear truthful. If someone’s aggression is making you uncomfortable, and they seem to be lying, they probably are.

• Before rushing to conclusions about someone you think might be lying, be certain to consider what constitutes normal behavior for them. The indicators I’ve mentioned have meaning only in the context of a person’s typical behavior. If your friend has ADHD and fidgets constantly, you can’t take their fidgeting as a sign of lying. Some people, such as psychopaths, don’t demonstrate these behaviors because they don’t feel nervous or guilty about lying. A British study showed that the incidence of psychopathy among CEOs is four times that of the general population, so it’s not as unlikely as you might think.

WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU CATCH A LIAR

• First, make certain you understand the rules. Before you decide what course of action to take, consider the recent history of similar situations. If you’re going to call someone out, you need to know what you’re getting yourself and the liar into. Know the severity of the consequences for lying (if in a setting such as the workplace), and make certain you follow the proper protocol for addressing it, or calling the liar out could backfire on you.

• Option 1: Do nothing. Nobody likes being lied to, and the natural reaction is to call the liar out, but that’s not always the smartest thing to do. Before you do anything, ask yourself, “What’s at stake besides my ego?” Carefully weigh the pros and cons before you act. Consider who, if anyone, should know about the lie and the implications for them. Sometimes, the animosity you avoid by staying silent is worth more than the satisfaction you receive from speaking out. This is especially true with smaller lies. At other times, the lie is serious enough that people have to know.

• Option 2: Deflect with humor. Some lies are too big to ignore completely but too small to make a big deal out of. When this happens, you can always make a joke about it. Playful comments that acknowledge the lie usually do the trick: “Hey, I think I just saw your nose grow a little bit” or “I need to get my prescription checked. When I looked at the scorecard, it said you shot 112.” This strategy gives the liar a chance to admit their slip-up without fear of reprisal. The key to making this tactic work is to give the impression that the other person was kidding around or intentionally exaggerating and never expected to be believed.

• Option 3: Play dumb. Another way to let someone save face and this is particularly appropriate for group settings-is to play dumb. Pretend you suddenly suffered a memory lapse or are confused about the facts. Ask lots of follow-up questions. The more details you request, the more likely the truth will come out. Drawing it out gives the liar a chance to admit that they “misspoke” and correct themselves without being called a liar.

• Option 4: Call them on it. In situations where doing nothing isn’t a good option, you can always call the liar out. You just need to think carefully about the best way to do this. Impulsively bashing them is never a smart move. You may choose to have a private conversation with the liar or with others affected by the lie. In either case, it’s important to have evidence that backs up your claim, or you may be called a liar. Make certain you are honest and direct with the person who lied. Don’t go to others with the lie when you know it’s better handled privately between you and the liar.

  • Many times, calling out a lie is the right thing to do, both ethically and practically. Sometimes, not reporting a lie can cost you your job. However, you need to think about a few things before you take that step. First, question your motives. Are you thinking about telling someone about the lie out of concern that they or someone else could be harmed, or are you just mad? If it’s the latter, you run the risk of making yourself look petty. If it’s the former, stick to the facts. Don’t offer any hypotheses about why the person may be lying, because that’s just supposition on your part. Stick to what the person said, what the truth is, and any proof you’ve collected.

• Not optional: Protect yourself. Whether you decide to call out a lie or to let it go, once you know you’re dealing with a liar, take steps to protect yourself, especially at work. One way to do this is to have a witness attest to what the liar said. Failing this, interact with the liar via email or text, both of which create a written record. However, if you’re dealing with a particularly savvy liar, they’re not going to commit to anything in writing. In that case, document the conversation yourself: who, what, when, where, etc. Cap it off by sending your lying colleague an email summarizing the conversation. That’s not as good as having proof in the other person’s words, but at least you’ll be able to make the argument that your colleague had the opportunity to correct you.

Read Body Language Like a Pro

• Positive body language changes your attitude. Cuddy found that consciously adjusting your body language to make it more positive creates a feedback loop that improves your attitude. When you choose to alter your body language, you choose to improve your attitude.

• It increases testosterone. When you think of testosterone, it’s easy to focus on sports and competition, but testosterone is much more important than its effect in athletics. Whether you’re a man or a woman, testosterone improves your confidence and causes other people to see you as more trustworthy and positive. Researchers have shown that positive body language actually increases your testosterone levels.

• It decreases cortisol. Cortisol is a stress hormone that impedes performance and creates negative long-term health effects. Decreasing cortisol levels minimizes stress and enables you to think more clearly, particularly in difficult and challenging situations. Researchers have found that positive body language decreases cortisol levels by 25%.

• It creates a powerful combination. Although a decrease in cortisol or an increase in testosterone is great on its own, the two together are a powerful combination that is typically seen among people in positions of power. This combination creates the confidence and clarity of mind that are ideal for dealing with tight deadlines, tough decisions, and massive volumes of work. People who are naturally high in testosterone and low in cortisol are known to thrive under pressure. Of course, you can use positive body language to make this happen for you.

• It makes you more likeable. In a Tufts University study, participants watched soundless clips of physicians interacting with their patients. Just by observing the physicians’ body language, the study participants were able to guess which physicians ended up being sued by their patients. Body language is a huge factor in how you’re perceived and can be more important than your tone of voice or even what you say. Using positive body language will make people like you and trust you more.

• It conveys competence. In a study conducted at Princeton, researchers found that a one-second clip of candidates for senator or governor was enough for people to accurately predict which candidate was elected. This may not increase your faith in the voting process, but it shows that the perception of competence has a strong foundation in body language.

It’s a powerful tool in negotiation (even virtually). There’s no question that body language plays a huge role in your ability to persuade others to your way of thinking. Researchers studying the phenomenon in virtual communication have found that body language in video conferencing plays an important role in negotiation outcomes.

BODY LANGUAGE CUES INCREASE YOUR EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

• Crossed arms and legs signal resistance to your ideas. Crossed arms and legs are physical barriers that suggest the other person is not open to what you’re saying. Even if they’re smiling and engaged in a pleasant conversation, their body language tells the story. Gerard I. Nierenberg and Henry H. Calero videotaped more than 2,000 negotiations for a book they wrote on reading body language. Not one ended in an agreement when one of the parties had their legs crossed while negotiating. Psychologically, crossed legs or arms signal that a person is mentally, emotionally, and physically blocked off from what’s in front of them. It’s not intentional, which is why it’s so revealing.

• Real smiles crinkle the eyes. When it comes to smiling, the mouth can lie, but the eyes can’t. Genuine smiles reach the eyes, crinkling the skin to create crow’s feet around them. People often smile to hide what they’re really thinking and feeling, so the next time you want to know if someone’s smile is genuine, look for crinkles at the corners of their eyes. If they aren’t there, that smile is hiding something.

• Copying your body language is a good thing. Have you ever been in a meeting with someone and noticed that every time you cross or uncross your legs, they do the same? Or perhaps they lean their head the same way as yours when you’re talking? That’s actually a good sign. Mirroring body language is something we do unconsciously when we feel a bond with the other person. It’s a sign that the conversation is going well and that the other party is receptive to your message. This knowledge can be especially useful when you’re negotiating something because it shows you what the other person is really thinking.

• Posture tells the story. Have you ever seen a person walk into a room, and immediately, you knew they were in charge? That effect is largely about body language, and often includes an erect posture, gestures made with the palms facing down, and open and expansive gestures in general. The brain is hardwired to equate power with the amount of space that people take up. Standing up straight with your shoulders back is a power position; it appears to maximize the amount of space you fill. Slouching, on the other hand, is the result of collapsing your form; you appear to take up less space and project less power. Slouching can also be seen as a sign of disrespect. It communicates that you’re bored and have no desire to be where you are. You would usually never tell someone, “I don’t understand why I have to listen to you,” but if you slouch, you don’t have to. Your body says it for you, loud and clear. Maintaining good posture commands respect and promotes engagement, whether you’re a leader or not.

• Eyes that lie. Most of us probably grew up hearing, “Look me in the eye when you talk to me!” Our parents were operating under the assumption that it’s tough to hold someone’s gaze when you’re lying to them, and they were right to an extent. However, it’s such common knowledge that people often deliberately hold eye contact in an attempt to cover up that they’re lying. The problem is that most overcompensate and hold eye contact to the point that it feels uncomfortable. On average, Americans hold eye contact for seven to 10 seconds, longer when we’re listening than when we’re talking. If you’re talking with someone whose stare is making you squirm (especially if they’re very still and unblinking), something is up, and they might be lying to you. See the chapter, Know When You’re Being Lied To, for more tips on detecting when someone is lying to you.

• Raised eyebrows signal discomfort. Three main emotions make your eyebrows go up: surprise, worry, and fear. Try raising your eyebrows when you’re having a relaxed, casual conversation with a friend. It’s hard to do, isn’t it? If somebody talking to you raises their eyebrows, and the topic isn’t one that would logically cause surprise, worry, or fear, something else is going on.

• Exaggerated nodding signals anxiety about approval. When you’re telling someone something, and they nod excessively, this means that they are worried about what you think of them or that they think you doubt their ability to follow your instructions.

• A clenched jaw signals stress. A clenched jaw, a tightened neck, or a furrowed brow are all signs of stress. Regardless of what the person is saying, these are signs of considerable discomfort. The conversation might be delving into something they’re anxious about, or their mind might be elsewhere, and they’re focusing on the thing that’s stressing them out. The key is to watch for that mismatch between what the person says and what their tense body language is telling you.

• The bottom line with these body language cues is that even if you can’t read a person’s thoughts, you can learn a lot from their body language, and that’s especially true when their words and body language don’t match.

BODY LANGUAGE BLUNDERS

• How you treat waiters and receptionists. How you treat support staff is so indicative of your makeup that it has become a common interview tactic. By gauging how you interact with support staff on your way in and out of the building, interviewers get a sense of how you treat people in general. Most people act the part when they’re speaking to the hiring manager or other “important” people, but some pull a Jekyll and Hyde act the moment they walk out the door, treating others with disdain or indifference. Business lunches and dates are other places this comes to light. No matter how nice you are to the people you have lunch with, it’s all for naught if those people witness you behaving badly toward others.

• How often you check your phone. There’s nothing more frustrating than someone pulling out their phone mid-conversation. Doing so conveys a lack of respect, attention, listening skills, and willpower. Unless it’s an emergency, it’s wise to keep your phone holstered. A study from Elon University confirmed that pulling out your phone during a conversation lowers the quality and quantity of face-to-face interactions.

• How long you take to ask questions. Have you ever had a conversation with someone during which they talked about themselves the entire time? The amount of time someone allows to pass before they take an interest in you is a strong personality indicator. People who talk only about themselves tend to be loud, self-absorbed “takers.” People who only ask questions and share little about themselves are usually quiet, humble “givers.” Those who strike a nice balance of give-and-take are reciprocators and good conversationalists.

• Repetitive, nervous habits. Touching your nails or face or picking at your skin typically indicates that you’re nervous, overwhelmed, and not in control. Research from the University of Michigan suggested that these nervous habits indicate perfectionism, and that perfectionists are more likely to engage in these habits when they’re frustrated or bored.

• Watching the clock while talking to someone is a clear sign of disrespect, impatience, and an inflated ego. It sends the message that you have better things to do than talk to the person you’re with, and that you’re anxious to leave them.

• Scowling or having a generally unhappy expression sends the message that you’re upset by those around you, even if they have nothing to do with your mood. Scowls turn people away, as they feel judged. Smiling, however, suggests that you’re open, trustworthy, confident, and friendly. MRI studies have shown that the human brain responds favorably to a person who’s smiling, and this leaves a lasting positive impression.

• Turning away from others, or not leaning into your conversation, shows that you’re unengaged, uninterested, uncomfortable, and perhaps even distrustful of the person speaking. Try leaning in toward the person speaking and tilting your head slightly as you listen to them. This shows the person speaking that they have your complete focus and attention.

• Exaggerated gestures can imply that you’re stretching the truth. Aim for small, controlled gestures to indicate confidence and open gestures -like spreading your arms apart or showing the palms of your hands to communicate that you have nothing to hide.

• Your handshake. It’s common for people to associate a weak handshake with a lack of confidence and an overall lackadaisical attitude. A study at the University of Alabama showed that although it isn’t safe to draw assumptions about someone’s competence based on their handshake, you can accurately identify personality traits. Specifically, the study found that a firm handshake is equated with being less shy, less neurotic, and more extroverted. However, a handshake that is too strong could be perceived as an aggressive attempt at domination, which is just as bad. Adapt your handshake to each person and situation, but make sure it’s always firm.

• Showing up late. Being late leads people to think that you lack respect and tend to procrastinate, and that you’re lazy and disinterested. Contrary to these perceptions, a San Diego State University study by Jeff Conte revealed that being late is typically seen in people who multitask or are high in relaxed Type B personality traits. Conte’s study found that Type B individuals are often late because they experience time more slowly than the rest of us. The bottom line is not to read too much into people showing up late. It’s better to ask why they’re late than to make assumptions.

• Too much or too little eye contact. As I mentioned previously, avoiding eye contact makes it look like you have something to hide, and that arouses suspicion. A lack of eye contact can also indicate a lack of confidence and interest, which you never want to communicate. Sustained eye contact, however, communicates confidence, leadership, strength, and intelligence. Eye contact that’s too intense may be perceived as aggressive, or an attempt to dominate. The way we break contact sends a message, too. Glancing down communicates submission, while looking to the side projects confidence. The key to eye contact is balance. Although it’s important to maintain eye contact, doing so 100% of the time is perceived as combative and creepy. At the same time, if you maintain eye contact for only a small portion of the conversation, you’ll come across as disinterested, shy, or embarrassed. Studies show that maintaining eye contact for roughly 60% of a conversation strikes the right balance and makes you come across as interested, friendly, and trustworthy.

• Inconsistency between your words and your facial expression causes people to sense that something isn’t right, and they begin to suspect that you’re trying to deceive them, even if they don’t know exactly why or how. For example, a nervous smile while rejecting an offer during a negotiation won’t help you get what you want. It will just make the other person feel uneasy about dealing with you, because they’ll assume that you’re up to something.

• Handwriting. There are all manner of false stereotypes attempting to relate your handwriting to your behavior. For example, people believe that how hard you press down on the paper relates to how uptight you are, the slant of your writing indicates introversion or extroversion, and the neatness or sloppiness of your writing reveals organizational tendencies. When it comes to handwriting and understanding people, the research is inconclusive, at best. Because people mistakenly read so much into handwriting, if you have an important letter to write, stick to the keyboard to keep things neutral.

• Does their smile appear sincere?

• Do they appear relaxed or tense and fidgety?

• Go People Watching: Find a public place to watch how people interact with one another. Notice body language.

• Understand the Rules of Culture

  • When interacting with those of a different culture, observe their body language and manner of speaking.
  • If you aren’t sure what behavior would be acceptable, ask questions.

• Test for Accuracy

  • To confirm your interpretation of body language, use a reflective question. Example:
    • “It looks like you are feeling down about something. Did something happen?”

• Don’t Take Notes at All Meetings

  • In a meeting where people interact, avoid taking extensive notes. Instead, focus on watching people’s body language.

Relationship Management Strategies

• ability to use your awareness of your own and others’ emotions to manage interactions successfully.

neutralize toxic people

• emotional manipulators are easy enough to spot if you know what to look for.

  • They undermine your faith in your grasp of reality. Emotional manipulators are incredibly skilled liars and gaslighters. They insist that an incident didn’t happen when it did, and they insist they did or said something when they didn’t. The trouble is, they’re so good at it that you end up questioning your own sanity. Insisting that whatever caused the problem is a figment of your imagination is an extremely powerful way of getting out of a jam. Their utter confidence in the lie makes you question your own perception of events. They are an emotional black hole. Whatever emotional manipulators are feeling, they’re geniuses at sucking everyone around them into those emotions. If they’re in a bad mood, everyone around them knows it. But that’s not the worst part: They’re so skillful that not only is everyone aware of their mood, but they also feel it. This creates a tendency for people to feel responsible for the manipulator’s moods and obligated to fix them.

  • They are experts at doling out guilt. Emotional manipulators are masters at leveraging your guilt to their advantage. If you bring up something that’s bothering you, they make you feel guilty for mentioning it. If you don’t mention it, they make you feel guilty for keeping it to yourself and stewing about it. When you’re dealing with emotional manipulators, whatever you do is wrong, and no matter what problems the two of you are having, they’re your fault.

  • They claim the role of the victim. When it comes to emotional manipulators, nothing is ever their fault. No matter what they do (or fail to do) it’s someone else’s fault. Someone else made them do it and usually, it’s you. If you get mad or upset, it’s your fault for having unreasonable expectations. If they get mad, it’s your fault for upsetting them. Emotional manipulators don’t take accountability for anything.

  • Their actions don’t match their words. Emotional manipulators tell you what you want to hear, but their actions are another story. They pledge their support, but when it’s time to follow through, they act as though your requests are completely unreasonable. They tell you how lucky they are to know you, and then act as though you’re a burden. This is just another way of undermining your belief in your own sanity. They make you question reality as you see it and mold your perception according to what is convenient to them.

  • They are too much, too soon. Whether it’s a personal relationship or a business relationship, emotional manipulators always seem to skip a few steps. They share too much too soon and expect the same from you. They appear vulnerable and sensitive, but it’s a ruse. The charade is intended to make you feel “special” for being let into their inner circle, but it’s also intended to make you feel not just sorry for them but also responsible for their feelings.

  • They eagerly agree to help-and maybe even volunteer-and then act like martyrs. An initial eagerness to help swiftly morphs into sighs, groans, and suggestions that whatever they agreed to do is a huge burden. If you shine a spotlight on that reluctance, they’ll turn it around on you, assuring you that, of course, they want to help and that you’re just being paranoid. The goal? To make you feel guilty, indebted, and maybe even crazy.

  • They always one-up you. No matter what problems you may have, emotional manipulators have it worse. They undermine the legitimacy of your complaints by reminding you that their problems are more serious. The message? You have no reason to complain, so shut the heck up.

  They know all your buttons and don’t hesitate to push them. Emotional manipulators know your weak spots, and they’re quick to use that knowledge against you. If you’re insecure about your weight, they comment on what you eat or the way your clothes fit. If you’re worried about an upcoming presentation, they point out how intimidating and judgmental the attendees are. Their awareness of your emotions is off the charts, but they use it to manipulate you, not to make you feel better.

THE NINE TOXIC TYPES

• The Gossip

  • Eleanor Roosevelt famously said, “Great minds discuss ideas, average ones discuss events, and small minds discuss people.” Gossipers derive pleasure from other people’s misfortunes. It might be fun at first to discuss somebody else’s personal or professional misfortune, but over time, it gets tiring, makes you feel gross, and hurts other people. There are too many positives out there and too much to learn from interesting people to waste your time talking about the misfortunes of others.

• The Victim

  • Victims are tough to identify because you initially empathize with their problems. However, as time passes, you begin to realize that their “time of need” is all the time. Victims actively push away any personal responsibility by making every speed bump they encounter into an uncrossable mountain. They don’t see tough times as opportunities to learn and grow from; instead, they see them as an out. There’s an old saying: “Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional.” It perfectly captures the toxicity of the victim, who chooses to suffer every time.

• The Arrogant

  • Arrogant people are a waste of your time because they see everything you do as a personal challenge. Arrogance is false confidence, and it always masks major insecurities. Arrogant people tend to be lower performers, be more disagreeable, and have more cognitive problems than the average person. Arrogant people can be completely self-absorbed, and they bring you down through the impassionate distance they maintain from other people. You can usually tell when you’re hanging around self-absorbed people because you start to feel completely alone. This happens because as far as they’re concerned, there’s no point in having a real connection with anyone else. You’re merely a tool used to build their self-esteem.

• The Envious

  • To envious people, the grass is always greener somewhere else. Even when something great happens to envious people, they don’t derive any satisfaction from it. That’s because they measure their fortune against the world’s when they should be deriving their satisfaction from within. And let’s face it, there’s always someone out there who’s doing better if you look hard enough. Spending too much time around envious people is dangerous because they teach you to trivialize your own accomplishments.

• The Manipulator

  • Manipulators suck time and energy out of your life under the façade of friendship. They can be tricky to deal with because they treat you like a friend. They know what you like, what makes you happy, and what you think is funny. However, they use this information as part of a hidden agenda. Manipulators always want something from you, and if you look back on your relationships with them, it’s all take, take, take, with little or no giving. They’ll do anything to win you over, just so they can work you over.

• The Dementor

  • In J. K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” series, Dementors are evil creatures that suck people’s souls out of their bodies, leaving them shells of humans. Whenever a Dementor enters the room, it goes dark, people get cold, and they begin to recall their worst memories. Rowling said that she based them on highly negative people—the kind of people who have the ability to walk into a room and instantly suck the life out of it. Dementors suck the life out of the room by imposing their negativity and pessimism on everyone they encounter. Their viewpoints are always “the glass is half empty,” and they can inject fear and concern into even the most benign situations. A Notre Dame University study found that students assigned to roommates who thought negatively were far more likely to develop negative thinking and even depression themselves.

• The Temperamental

  • Some people have absolutely no control over their emotions. They lash out at you and project their feelings onto you, all the while thinking that you’re the one causing their malaise. Temperamental people are tough to dump from your life because their lack of control over their emotions makes you feel bad for them. When push comes to shove, though, temperamental people will use you as their emotional toilet and should be avoided.

• The Twisted

  • There are certain toxic people who have bad intentions, deriving deep satisfaction from the pain and misery of others. They are out to hurt you, to make you feel bad, or to get something from you. Otherwise, they have no interest in you. The only good thing about this type is that you can spot their intentions quickly, which makes it that much faster to get them out of your life.

• The Judgmental

  • Judgmental people are quick to tell you exactly what is and isn’t cool. They have a way of taking the thing you’re most passionate about and making you feel terrible about it. Instead of appreciating and learning from people who are different from them, judgmental people look down on others. Judgmental people stifle your desire to be passionate and expressive, so you’re best off cutting them out and being yourself.

HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM TOXIC PEOPLE

• Set limits (especially with complainers). Complainers and negative people are bad news because they swallow in their problems and fail to focus on solutions. They want others to join their pity party so that they can feel better about themselves. People often feel pressure to listen to complainers because they don’t want to be seen as callous or rude, but there’s a fine line between lending a sympathetic ear and getting sucked into their negative emotional spiral. You can avoid this only by setting limits and distancing yourself when necessary. One way to set a limit is to ask complainers how they intend to fix the problem. They will either quiet down or redirect the conversation in a productive direction.

• Don’t die in the fight. People with high EQ know how important it is to live to fight another day, especially when your foe is a toxic individual. In conflict, unchecked emotion makes you dig your heels in and fight the kind of battle that can leave you severely damaged. When you read and respond to your emotions, you’re able to choose your battles wisely and stand your ground only when the time is right.

• Stay aware of your emotions. Maintaining emotional distance requires awareness. You can’t stop someone from pushing your buttons if you don’t recognize when it’s happening. Sometimes, you’ll find yourself in situations in which you’ll need to regroup and choose the best way forward. This is fine, and you shouldn’t be afraid to buy yourself some time to do so. Think of it this way-if a mentally unstable person approaches you on the street and tells you he’s John F. Kennedy, you’re unlikely to set him straight. When you find yourself with a coworker who is engaged in similarly derailed thinking, sometimes it’s best to just smile and nod. If you’re going to have to straighten them out, it’s better to give yourself some time to plan the best way to go about it.

• Rise above. Toxic people drive you crazy because their behavior is so irrational. Make no mistake about it; their behavior truly goes against reason. So, why do you allow yourself to respond to them emotionally and get sucked into the mix? The more irrational and off- base someone is, the easier it should be for you to remove yourself from their traps. Quit trying to beat them at their own game. You don’t need to respond to the emotional chaos-only the facts.

• Establish boundaries. People feel like because they work or live with someone, they have no way to control the chaos. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Once you find someone’s behavior more predictable and easier to understand, you are equipped to think rationally about when and where you have to put up with them and when you don’t. For example, even if you work closely with someone on a project team, you don’t need to have the same level of one-on- one interaction with them you have with your other team members. You can establish a boundary, but you’ll have to do it consciously and proactively. If you let things happen naturally, you’re bound to find yourself constantly embroiled in difficult conversations. If you set boundaries and decide when and where you’ll engage a difficult person, you can control much of the chaos. The only trick is to stick to your guns and keep boundaries in place when the person tries to encroach upon them which they will.

• Don’t focus on problems-only solutions. Where you focus your attention determines your emotional state. When you fixate on the problems you’re facing, you create and prolong negative emotions and stress. When you focus on actions to better yourself and your circumstances, you create a sense of personal efficacy that produces positive emotions and reduces stress. When it comes to toxic people, fixating on how crazy and difficult they are gives them power over you. Quit thinking about how troubling your difficult person is, and focus instead on how you’re going to handle them. This makes you more effective by putting you in control, and it will reduce the amount of stress you experience when interacting with them.

• Don’t forget. Emotionally intelligent people are quick to forgive, but that doesn’t mean that they forget. Forgiveness requires letting go of what’s happened so that you can move on. It doesn’t mean you’ll give a wrongdoer another chance. Emotionally intelligent people are unwilling to be bogged down unnecessarily by others’ mistakes, so they let them go quickly and are assertive in protecting themselves from future harm.

• Use your support system. It’s tempting but ineffective to try to tackle everything by yourself. To deal with toxic people, you need to recognize the weaknesses in your approach to them. This means tapping into your support system to gain perspective on a challenging person. Everyone has someone who is on their team, rooting for them, and ready to help them get the best from a difficult situation.

Identify these individuals in your life and seek their insight and assistance when you need it. Something as simple as explaining the situation can lead to a new perspective. Most of the time, other people can see a solution that you can’t because they are not as emotionally invested in the situation as you are.

Master Conflict

• The secret to effectively handling conflict is assertiveness-that delicate place where you get your needs met without bullying the other person into submission. Assertive people operate in the small space that lies between passivity and aggression (that is, they never

lean too far in either direction). It’s easy to think that nice people are too passive. Although that’s often true, unchecked passivity can boil over into aggression. So, there are plenty of very nice people out there who have exhibited both extremes of the assertiveness spectrum. To be assertive, you need to learn to engage in healthy conflict. Healthy conflict directly and constructively addresses the issue at hand without ignoring or trivializing the needs of either party. The following habits will help you handle conflict assertively.

• Consider the repercussions of silence. Sometimes, it’s hard to muster the motivation to speak up when the likelihood is high that things will turn ugly. The fastest way to motivate yourself to act is to fully consider the costs of not speaking up-they’re typically far greater than standing up for yourself. The trick is that you need to shift your attention from the headache that will come with getting involved to the things you stand to gain from your assertiveness.

• Ask good questions until you get to the heart of the matter. Failing to understand the motive behind someone’s behavior throws fuel on the fire of conflict, because it makes everything they do appear foolish and shortsighted. Instead of pointing out flaws, you should seek to understand where the other person is coming from. Try asking good questions, such as, “Why did you choose to do it that way?” “What do you mean by that?” “Can you help me understand this better?” Even when you don’t see eye to eye, using questions to get at the underlying motive builds trust and understanding, both of which are conflict killers.

• When you challenge, offer solutions. People don’t like it when they feel as if you’re attempting to take apart their idea right off the bat. When you challenge someone’s idea but also offer a solution, you demonstrate that you want to work together to come up with a solution. This reinforces the value of their idea, even if it’s full of holes. For example, you might say, “One potential problem that I see with your idea is However, I think we can overcome this problem if we can just figure out a way to___.” In this example, you aren’t even providing the solution. You’re just acknowledging that you’re willing to work together to find one.

• Say “and” instead of “but.” The simple act of replacing the word “but” with “and” makes conflict much more constructive and collaborative. Say, for example, that your teammate John wants to use the majority of your budget on a marketing campaign, but you’re worried that won’t leave enough money for a critical new hire. Instead of saying, “I see that you want to use the money for marketing, but I think we need to make a new hire,” say, “I see that you want to use the money for marketing, and I think we need to make a new hire.” The difference is subtle, but the first sentence minimizes the value of his idea. The second sentence states the problem as you see it, without devaluing his idea, which then opens things up for discussion. Saying “and” makes the other party feel like you’re working with them, rather than against them.

• Use hypotheticals. When you assert yourself, you don’t want it to look like you’re poking holes in their idea (even when you are). Hypotheticals are the perfect way to pull this off. Telling someone, for example, “Your new product idea won’t work because you overlooked how the sales team operates” comes across much more aggressively than suggesting the hypothetical, “How do you think our sales team will go about selling this new product?” When you see a flaw and present a hypothetical, you’re engaging with the original idea and giving the other party a chance to explain how it might work. This shows that you’re willing to hear the other person out.

THE FIVE MISTAKES THAT DERAIL ASSERTIVENESS

• Mistake 1: Being Brutally Honest

  • You’ve suffered in silence long enough. Your colleague continues to park so close to your car that you have to enter through the passenger door. You’ve asked them to stop. After half a dozen more violations, you decide to do something about it. Clearly, they need to know what you think of their intentional disrespect. So you let them have it. You go right up to them and tell them what an inconsiderate jerk they are.
  • How to beat this? Honesty without brutality. From a young age, we’re taught that we have to choose between telling the truth and keeping a friend that the only options are brutality or harmony. With emotional intelligence, you can speak the truth without burning a bridge. Have you ever noticed how some conversations-even ones about very risky subjects go very well? And others, even those about trivial things, can degenerate into combat? The antidote to conflict is not diluting your message. It’s creating safety. Many people think the content of the conversation is what makes people defensive, so they assume it’s best to just go for it and be brutally honest. It isn’t. People don’t get defensive because of the content-they get defensive because of the intent they perceive behind it. It isn’t the truth that hurts—it’s the malice used to deliver the truth. When you remove your emotions from your message, you can be honest without being brutal. In this case telling your colleague that you’ve asked them before not to park so close to your car, that they continue to do so, that it’s a major inconvenience for you, and that you’d like them to stop is bound to get their attention and doesn’t require an ounce of malice.

• Mistake 2: Robotically Sharing Your Feelings

  • Some well-intentioned “communication” professionals suggest that when it’s time to speak up, the diplomatic way to do so is to start by sharing your feelings. For example, you tell your parking-impaired colleague, “I feel rage and disgust.” Somehow, that’s supposed to help. It doesn’t. People don’t work this way. Robotically sharing your feelings only alienates, annoys, and confuses them.
  • How to beat this? Start with the facts. Our brains often serve us poorly during difficult conversations. To maximize cognitive efficiency, our minds store feelings and conclusions, but not the facts that created them. That’s why, when you give your colleague negative feedback and they ask for an example, you often hem and haw. You truly can’t remember. So you repeat your feelings or conclusions, but offer few helpful facts. Gathering the facts beforehand is the homework required to master conflict. Before opening your mouth, think through the basic information that helped you think or feel the way you do and prepare to share it first.

• Mistake 3: Defending Your Position

  • When someone takes an opposing view on a topic you care deeply about, the natural human response is “defense.” Our brains are hardwired to assess for threats, but when we let feelings of being threatened hijack our behavior, things never end well. In conflict, getting defensive is a surefire path to failure.
  • How to beat this? Get curious. A great way to inoculate yourself against defensiveness is to develop a healthy doubt about your own certainty. Then, enter the conversation with intense curiosity about the other person’s world. Give yourself the detective’s task of discovering why a reasonable, rational, and decent person would think the way they do. As former Secretary of State Dean Rusk said, “The best way to persuade others is with your ears, by listening.” When others feel deeply understood, they become far more open to hearing you.

• Mistake 4: Blaming Others for Your Situation

  • Your boss tells you they’ll go to bat for you for a promotion. You hear later that in the HR review they advocated for your colleague instead. You feel betrayed and angry. Certainly, your boss is the one responsible for your pain-right? The truth is, they’re not the only one.
  • How to beat this? Challenge your perspective. When we feel threatened, we amplify our negative emotions by blaming others for our problems. Remember the anger funnel? You won’t master conflict until you recognize the role you’ve played in creating your circumstances. Your boss may have passed you over, but they did so for a reason. Half your pain is the result of their betrayal; the other half is due to your disappointment over not performing well enough to win the promotion.

• Mistake 5: Talking Yourself Out of Speaking Up

  • It’s easy for conflict to fill you with dread. Under the influence of such stress, your negative self-talk takes over, and you obsess over all the bad things that might happen if you speak up. You conjure up images of conflict, retribution, isolation, and pain until you retreat into silence.
  • How to beat this? Quantify the risks of not speaking up. The fastest way to motivate yourself to step up to difficult conversations is to simply articulate the costs of not speaking up. People who consistently speak up aren’t necessarily more courageous; they’re simply more accurate. First, they scrupulously review what’s likely to happen if they fail to speak up. Second, they ponder what might happen if they speak up and things go well. Finally (the order is important), they consider what may happen if the conversation goes poorly. Once they have an accurate understanding of the possibilities, saying something is their typical choice. The reward usually outweighs the risk.

BLUNDERS THAT LEAD TO VIRTUAL CONFLICT

• Typing a message that comes across just like you do in person is a fine art. During a conversation, you adjust your tone, facial expression, gestures, and posture to fit the mood of what you’re conveying. You do this because people tend to be much more responsive to how you say things than to what you actually say.

• Text strips a conversation bare. It’s efficient, but it turns otherwise easy interactions into messy misinterpretations. Without facial expressions and body posture to guide your message, people look at each word you type as an indicator of tone and mood. Most of the mistakes people make in their electronic messages are completely avoidable. The following bad habits lead to subtle mistakes and hidden blunders.

• The Way-Too-Brief

  • All too often, the cause of a virtual conflict is an imbalance between the effort in the initial message and the effort in the response to that message. When someone types up a detailed paragraph outlining important issues, they expect you to respond carefully. Sending back “Got it” or “Noted” just doesn’t do the trick. Without knowledge of your intent and tone, brief responses come across as apathetic and even sarcastic to the receiver. This is unfortunate because this is rarely the sender’s intent. The best way to avoid being misinterpreted in a brief response is to share your intent. Even responding with “I’m a little busy but should be able to read it later this week” comes across much better than “Got it,” which a lot of people will interpret as indifference.

• The Compulsive CC and Reply All

  • CCing people all the time is one of the most annoying things you can do when communicating electronically. I’d say it’s the most annoying, but this honor is bestowed on the excessive “Reply All.” If someone sends an email to you and a bunch of other people, do you really think every recipient needs to get another email from you saying “thanks”? They don’t, and when you do this, it sends people climbing up a wall. The trick for knowing when to CC someone is to treat your message as if it’s an in-person meeting. The question then becomes, “Would it be necessary or helpful to have this person come to the meeting?” If the answer is no, then don’t waste their time with a message. As for Reply All, just don’t do it. Even if someone else in the thread Replies All, you’re still annoying everyone to death when you join the fray. If you have something to say, it’s better to send it directly (and privately) to the original sender and let them decide if the group should know about it, too.

• The “URGENT” Subject Line

  • Subject lines that say “URGENT” or “ASAP” show complete disregard for the recipient. If your message is that urgent, pick up the phone and give the person a call. Even in the rare instance when a message is actually urgent, labeling it as such in the subject line is unnecessary and sets a strong, negative tone. The key to avoiding “URGENT” subject lines is twofold. First, if the issue is best dealt with in any form other than an electronic message, then that’s how you should be dealing with it. Second, if this is not the case, then the issue lies in your ability to create a strong subject line. After all, people check their messages frequently, so as long as your subject line catches their eye, it will get the job done. Instead of labeling the message urgent, ask yourself why the message is urgent. The answer to this question is your new subject line. If a client needs an answer today, then simply make your subject line “Client needs response today.” This maintains the sense of urgency without setting a rude, desperate tone.

• The Debbie Downer

  • Sending messages that consistently tell people what they’re doing wrong and what they shouldn’t be doing really takes a toll. Even if you’re trying to offer constructive criticism, you need to avoid negativity in your messages at all costs. Because people can’t hear your tone directly, they read into the connotations of words and create a tone in their heads as they go along. Negatives become especially negative in electronic form. Whenever you find yourself using negative words like “don’t,” “can’t,” “won’t,” or “couldn’t,” turn them into positives. Making this change transforms the entire tone of the message. For example, instead of saying, “You can’t complete reports like this in the future,” say, “Next time you complete a report, please…” When you must deliver negative feedback, don’t do it electronically. Just hop on the telephone or walk down the hall.

• The Robot

  • It’s easy to think of electronic communication as a way to get something done quickly, but when you do this to the extreme, you come across as inhuman. You wouldn’t walk into someone’s office and hand them a report to complete without acknowledging them somehow. Jumping straight into the nitty-gritty might seem like the most effective thing to do, but it leaves a lasting negative impression. Fixing this one is simple. Just take an extra second to greet the person you’re writing to. You don’t have to ask your recipient about their weekend. Just a simple acknowledgment of the individual as a human being is all it takes. This keeps the tone much more respectful than if you simply sent assignments.

HABITS THAT QUIET VIRTUAL CONFLICT

• Habit 1: Follow Honest Abe’s First Rule of Netiquette

  • I know what you’re thinking: How could someone who died more than a century before the Internet existed teach us about message etiquette? Well, in Lincoln’s younger years, he had a bad habit of applying his legendary wit when writing insulting letters to, and about, his political rivals. But after one particularly scathing letter led a rival to challenge Lincoln to a duel, he learned a valuable lesson-words impact the receiver in ways that the sender can’t completely fathom.
  • By the time he died, Lincoln had amassed stacks of flaming letters that verbally shredded his rivals and subordinates for their bone- headed mistakes. However, Lincoln never sent them. He vented his frustration on paper and then stuffed the sheet away in a drawer. The following day, the full intensity of his emotions having subsided, Lincoln wrote and sent a much more congenial and conciliatory letter. We can all benefit from learning to do the same with electronic communication. Your emotions are a valid representation of how you feel (no matter how intense), but that doesn’t mean that acting on them in the moment serves you well. Go ahead and vent-tap out your anger and frustration on the keyboard. Save the draft and come back to it later when you’ve cooled down. By then, you’ll be rational enough to edit the message and pare down the parts that burn, or even better-rewrite the kind of message that you want to be remembered by.

• Habit 2: Know the Limits of Virtual Humor

  • Some people show their displeasure with words typed in ALL CAPS and a barrage of exclamation points. Others, however, express dissatisfaction more subtly with sarcasm and satire. The latter is no less of a breakdown in the core emotional intelligence skill of self- management, and it can be even more dangerous because it’s harder to detect when you’re doing it. The sender can always convince themselves that the spite was just a little joke.
  • Although a little good-natured ribbing can sometimes help lighten face-to-face interaction, it’s almost never a good idea to have a laugh at someone else’s expense when communicating electronically. In-person interactions equip you with an arsenal of facial expressions and voice inflections to help you convey the right tone. Digitally, you don’t have the same luxury. Your message can too easily be misinterpreted without your body language to help explain it, and you won’t be there to soften the blow when your joke doesn’t go over as intended. In the virtual world, it’s best to err on the side of friendliness and professionalism. For those times when you absolutely cannot resist using humor, just make sure you’re the butt of the joke.

• Habit 3: Remember that People Virtually Are Still People

  • While entranced by the warm glow of a phone or computer screen, it’s sometimes difficult to remember that a living, breathing human being will end up reading your message. Psychologist John Suler of Rider University found that when people are communicating virtually, they experience a “disinhibition effect.” Without the real-time feedback between sender and receiver that takes place in face- to-face and telecommunication, we simply don’t worry as much about offending people virtually. We don’t have to experience the discomfort of watching someone else become confused, despondent, or angry because of something that we said. When these natural consequences are delayed, we tend to spill onto the screen whatever happens to be on our minds.
  • To avert such messages, you have to apply your social awareness skills. When you cannot physically see the other person’s body language or hear the tone of their voice, picture the recipient in your mind and imagine what they might feel when reading your message as it’s been written. The next time you receive a curt or outright rude message, put the brakes on before firing back a retort. Taking the time to imagine the sender and consider where they’re coming from is often enough to extinguish the flames before they get out of control. Could the sender have misinterpreted a previous message that you sent to them? Could they just be having a bad day? Are they under a lot of pressure? Even when the other party is in the wrong, spending a moment on the other side of the screen will give you the perspective you need to avoid escalating the situation.

• Habit 4: Let the Emojis Flow

  • Emojis have a mixed reputation in the business world. Some people and even organizations believe that smiley faces, winks, and other caricatures of digital emotion are unprofessional and undignified, and have no place outside a school hallway. When used properly, however, emojis can effectively enhance the desired tone of a message, as shown by a Dutch research team. The team led by Daantje Derks at the Open University of the Netherlands concluded that “to a large extent, emojis serve the same functions as actual nonverbal behavior.” Considering that nonverbal behavior accounts for between 70% and 90% of a message when communicating face-to-face, it’s time to ditch the stigma attached to emojis in a business setting. For those leery of dropping a winky face into your next work message, I’m not suggesting that you smile, wink, and heart eyes your way through every message you write. Just don’t be afraid to use emojis when you want to be certain that the recipient understands the tone of your message.

• Habit 5: Recognize When Online Chats Need to Become Offline Discussions

  • Managing online relationships will always be a somewhat difficult task for people built to communicate in person. However, they become substantially more difficult anytime emotions run strong. Significant, lengthy, and heated exchanges are almost always better taken offline and finished in person, or at least on the phone or a video chat. With so much communication via messaging and email these days, it can be hard to pull the trigger and initiate a face-to-face conversation when you sense that an interaction is becoming too heated or simply too difficult to do well online. Online technologies have become enormously useful for increasing the speed and efficiency of communication, but they have a long way to go before they become the primary source for creating and maintaining quality human relationships.

Avoid Integrity Traps

• Kiel’s data is clear: Companies perform better under the guidance of high-integrity leadership. Every leader has the responsibility to hone their integrity. This requires a great deal of emotional intelligence. Many times, there are integrity traps that tend to catch well- meaning leaders off guard. These traps are often driven by lapses in emotional intelligence. By studying these traps, you can sharpen the saw and keep your integrity high.

• Fostering a cult of personality. It’s easy for leaders to get caught up in their own worlds, as there are many systems in place that make it all about them. These leaders identify so strongly with their leadership roles that instead of remembering that the only reason they’re there is to serve others, they start thinking, “It’s my world, and we’ll do things my way.” Being a good leader requires remembering that you’re there for a reason, and that the reason certainly isn’t to get your way. High-integrity leaders not only welcome questioning and criticism but insist on it.

• Dodging accountability. Politicians are notorious for refusing to be accountable for their mistakes, and business leaders do it, too. Even if only a few people (instead of millions) see a leader’s misstep, dodging accountability can be incredibly damaging. A person who refuses to say “the buck stops here” really isn’t a leader at all. Being a leader requires being confident enough in your own decisions and those of your team to own them when they fail. The very best leaders take the blame but share the credit. A boss who is too proud to admit a mistake or who singles out individuals in front of the group creates a culture that is riddled with fear and anxiety. It’s impossible to bring your best to your work when you’re walking on eggshells. Instead of pointing fingers when something goes wrong, good managers work collaboratively with their team and focus on solutions. They pull people aside to discuss slip-ups instead of publicly shaming them, and they’re willing to accept responsibility for mistakes made under their leadership.

• Frequent threats of firing. Some managers use threats of termination to keep you in line and to scare you into performing better. This is a lazy and shortsighted way of motivating people, and it lacks integrity. People who feel disposable are quick to find another job where they’ll be valued and receive the respect they deserve.

Holding people back. As an employee, you want to bring value to your job, and you do so with a unique set of skills and experience. So, how is it that you can do your job so well that you become irreplaceable? This happens when managers sacrifice your upward mobility for their best interests. If you’re looking for your next career opportunity, and your boss is unwilling to let you move up the ladder, your enthusiasm is bound to wane. Taking away opportunities for advancement is a serious morale killer.

• Management may have a beginning, but it certainly has no end. When blessed with a talented employee, a manager should keep finding areas in which the employee can improve to expand their skill set and further their career. The most talented employees want feedback (more so than the less talented ones), and it’s a manager’s job to keep it coming. Otherwise, people become bored and complacent.

• Lacking self-awareness. Many leaders think they have sufficient emotional intelligence. Often, they are proficient in some emotional intelligence skills, but when it comes to understanding themselves, they are woefully blind. It’s not that they’re hypocrites; they just don’t see what everyone else sees. They might play favorites, be tough to work with, or receive criticism badly. They think that because they don’t have angry outbursts, their emotional intelligence isn’t an issue, but everyone else knows that it is.

• Forgetting that communication is a two-way street. Many leaders also think that they’re great communicators, not realizing that they’re communicating in only one direction. Some pride themselves on being approachable and easily accessible, yet they don’t really hear the ideas that people share with them. Some leaders don’t set goals or provide context for the things they ask people to do, while others never offer feedback, leaving people wondering if they’re more likely to get promoted or fired.

• Not firing poor performers. Sometimes, whether it’s because they feel sorry for an employee or simply because they want to avoid conflict, leaders dodge making the really tough decisions. Although there’s certainly nothing wrong with being compassionate, real leaders know when it’s just not a good fit, and they understand that they owe it to the company and to the rest of the team to let someone go.

• Hiring and promoting the wrong people. Good, hardworking employees want to work with like-minded professionals. When managers don’t do the hard work of hiring good people, it’s a major demotivator for those stuck working alongside them. Doing so is lazy, and it’s a dereliction of duty that shows a lack of integrity. Promoting the wrong people (because they’re the manager’s favorites) is even worse. When you work your tail off only to get passed over for a promotion that’s given to someone who glad-handed their way to the top, it’s a massive insult. No wonder it makes good people leave.

• Succumbing to the tyranny of the urgent. The chapter on productivity introduced you to the tyranny of the urgent. This is what happens when leaders spend their days putting out small fires. They take care of what’s dancing around in front of their faces and lose focus on what’s truly important their people. Your integrity as a leader hinges on your ability to avoid distractions that prevent you from putting your people first.

• Micromanaging. You see this mistake most often in people who have recently worked their way up through the ranks. They still haven’t made the mental shift from doer to leader. Without something tangible to point to at the end of the day, they feel unproductive, not realizing that productivity means something different for a leader. As a result, they micromanage to the point of madness and fall off schedule. An important part of a leader’s integrity rests on giving people the freedom to do their jobs.

• Going back on their commitments. Making promises to people places you on the fine line that lies between making them very happy and watching them walk out the door. When you uphold a commitment, you grow in the eyes of your employees because you prove yourself to be trustworthy and honorable (two very important qualities in a boss). But when you disregard your commitment, you come across as slimy, uncaring, and disrespectful. After all, if the boss doesn’t honor their commitments, why should everyone else?

Make Yourself Even More Likeable

• Ask a lot of questions. Likeable people ask lots of questions. The biggest mistake most people make when it comes to listening is that they’re so focused on what they’re going to say next or how what the other person is saying is going to affect them that they fail to hear what’s being said. The words come through loud and clear, but the meaning is lost. A simple way to avoid this is to ask a lot of questions. People like to know you’re listening, and something as simple as a clarification question shows that you are not only listening but also care about what they’re saying. You’ll be surprised how much respect and appreciation you gain just by asking questions.

• Put away your phone. Nothing turns someone off to you like a mid-conversation text message or even a quick glance at your phone. When you commit to a conversation, focus all your energy on the conversation and nothing else. You’ll find that conversations are more enjoyable and effective when you immerse yourself completely in them. While you’re having more fun, the people you’re interacting with will like you all the more, and that’s a winning proposition.

• Greet people by name. Your name is an essential part of your identity, and it feels terrific when people use it. Likeable people make certain they use others’ names every time they see them. However, you shouldn’t use someone’s name only when you greet them. Research shows that people feel validated when the person they’re speaking with refers to them by name during a conversation. If you’re great with faces but struggle with names, have some fun with it, and make a game out of remembering people’s names. Most people who struggle with names tend to forget the name of the person they’re introduced to right after they hear it. When this happens, don’t hesitate to ask their name a second time. People won’t be offended because they appreciate you making the effort to learn their names.

• Smile. People naturally (and unconsciously) mirror the body language of the person they’re talking to. If you want people to like you, smile at them during the conversation, and they will unconsciously return the favor and feel good about you as a result. Smiling doesn’t just make you look happy; it makes you feel happier, too. Multiple studies have shown that smiling (even when the subjects are instructed to do so) stimulates the release of mood-enhancing endorphins and serotonin. Smiling also lowers your blood pressure and can even boost your immune system.

• Don’t seek attention. People dislike those who are desperate for attention. You don’t need to develop a big, extroverted personality to be likeable. Simply being friendly and considerate is all you need to win people over. When you speak in a friendly, confident, and concise manner, you’ll notice that people are much more attentive and persuadable than if you try to show them that you’re important. People catch on to your attitude quickly and are more attracted to the right attitude than what or how many people you know. When you’re being given attention, such as when you’re being recognized for an accomplishment, shift the focus to all the people who worked hard to help you get there. This may sound clichéd, but if it’s genuine, the fact that you pay attention to others and appreciate their help shows that you’re appreciative and humble-two adjectives that are closely tied to likeability.

• Know who to touch and when to touch them. When you touch someone during a conversation, you release oxytocin in their brain, a neurotransmitter that makes their brain associate you with trust and a slew of other positive feelings. A simple touch on the shoulder, a hug, or a friendly handshake is all it takes to release oxytocin. Of course, you have to touch the right person in the right way to release oxytocin, as unwanted or inappropriate touching has the opposite effect. Just remember, relationships are built not just from words but also from general feelings about each other. Touching someone appropriately is a great way to show you care.

• Follow the platinum rule. We all know the golden rule, and it’s pretty easy to follow. The platinum rule is harder to follow because it requires us to treat people the way they want to be treated. Not only does doing so make the other person more comfortable (and therefore more likely to open up and connect with you), but it also proves that you’ve been listening and have really heard what they’ve been telling you. That shows valuable extra effort on your part. The trick is that when you’re engaged in conversation, you have to focus more on the other person than you do on yourself. Otherwise, you’ll never be able to understand what makes them tick and, therefore, how they want to be treated.

• Balance passion and fun. People gravitate toward those who are passionate because their zest for life is appealing. That said, it’s easy for passionate people to come across as too serious or uninterested because they tend to get absorbed in their passions. Likeable people balance their passion with an ability to have fun. They are serious but friendly. They minimize small talk and gossip and focus on having meaningful interactions with others. They remember what you said to them yesterday or last week, which shows you’re just as important to them as anything else they are passionate about.

UNLIKEABLE HABITS

• Humble bragging. We all know people who like to brag about themselves behind the mask of self-deprecation. For example, the woman who makes fun of herself for being a nerd when she really wants to draw attention to the fact that she’s smart or the guy who makes fun of himself for having a strict diet when he really wants you to know how healthy and fit he is. Although many people think that self- deprecation masks their bragging, everyone sees right through it. This makes the bragging all the more frustrating because it isn’t just bragging; it’s also an attempt to deceive.

• Name-dropping. It’s great to know important and interesting people, but using every conversation as an opportunity to name-drop is pretentious and silly. Just like humble bragging, people see right through it. Instead of making you look interesting, it makes people think that you’re insecure and overly concerned with having them like you. It also cheapens what you have to offer. When you connect everything you know with who you know (instead of what you know or what you think), conversations lose their color.

• Gossiping. People make themselves look terrible when they get carried away with gossiping. Wallowing in talk of other people’s misdeeds or misfortunes may end up hurting their feelings if the gossip ever finds its way to them, and gossiping is guaranteed to make you look negative and spiteful every time.

• Emotional hijackings. At TalentSmartEQ, I spent much of my career designing and validating 360 feedback assessments. These tests give coworkers the opportunity to provide anonymous feedback on an employee’s behavior in the workplace. We’ve come across far too many instances of people throwing things, screaming, making people cry, and other telltale signs of emotional hijacking. An emotional hijacking demonstrates low emotional intelligence. As soon as you show that level of instability, people question whether you’re trustworthy and capable of keeping it together when it counts. Exploding at anyone, regardless of how much they might “deserve it,” turns a huge amount of negative attention your way. You’ll be labeled unstable, unapproachable, and intimidating. Controlling your emotions keeps you in the driver’s seat. When you’re able to control your emotions around someone who wrongs you, they end up looking bad instead of you. This increases your likeability.

• Having a closed mind. If you want to be likeable, you must be open-minded, which makes you approachable and interesting to others. No one wants to have a conversation with someone who has already formed an opinion and is unwilling to listen. To eliminate preconceived notions and judgment, you need to see the world through other people’s eyes. This doesn’t require that you believe what they believe or condone their behavior; it simply means that you quit passing judgment long enough to truly understand what makes them tick.

• Sharing too much too early. While getting to know people requires a healthy amount of sharing, sharing too much about yourself right off the bat comes across wrong. Be careful to avoid sharing personal problems and confessions too quickly. Likeable people let the other person guide them as to when it’s the right time for them to open up. Oversharing comes across as self-obsessed and insensitive to the balance of the conversation. Think of it this way: If you’re getting into the nitty gritty of your life without learning about the other person first, you’re sending the message that you see them as nothing more than a sounding board for your problems.

• Sharing too much on social media. Studies have shown that people who overshare on social media do so because they crave acceptance, but Pew Research Center research has revealed that this oversharing works against them by making people dislike them. Sharing on social media can be an important mode of expression, but it needs to be done thoughtfully and with some self-control. Letting everyone know what you ate for breakfast, lunch, and dinner will do more harm than good when it comes to likeability.

FORMING STRONG CONNECTIONS

• Leave a strong first impression. Research shows that most people decide whether they like you within the first seven seconds of meeting you. They then spend the rest of the conversation internally justifying their initial reaction. This may sound terrifying, but by knowing this, you can take advantage of it to connect with anyone. First impressions are tied intimately to positive body language. Becoming aware of your gestures, expressions, and tone of voice (and making certain they’re positive) will draw people to you like ants to a picnic. Using an enthusiastic tone, uncrossing your arms, maintaining eye contact, and leaning toward the person who’s speaking are all forms of positive body language that people with high emotional intelligence use to draw others in. Positive body language can make all the difference in a conversation. It’s true that how you say something can be more important than what you say.

• Be the first to venture beyond the superficial. Our first conversation or two with a new acquaintance tends to be pretty superficial. We portray a careful picture of ourselves, and we stick to nice, safe topics. We talk about the weather and people we know in common and share the most basic details from our lives. But if you really want to connect with somebody, try upping the ante and revealing the real you. You don’t need to get too personal, but it’s important to let the other person know what you’re passionate about. Most of the time, if you open up, the other person will follow your lead and do the same. You’ll find that your conversations have real depth because you’re willing to reveal some of what lies beneath the surface.

• Ask good questions. Sometimes asking a lot of questions isn’t enough, and the conversation feels like it’s going nowhere. If the other person seems hesitant to open up, encourage them to do so by asking substantial questions. “What do you do?” doesn’t further the conversation nearly as much as, “Why did you choose your profession?” Search for questions that will help you understand what makes the other person tick without getting too personal. Some questions will lead nowhere, and others will open doors that get the conversation going. When you land on a question that really gets the other person talking, ask thoughtful follow-up questions that further this line of thought.

• Learn from others. During the course of his research, Lieberman concluded that our educational system would be much more effective if we tapped into the social side of learning, rather than trying to quash it. For example, the best way to help an eighth grader struggling with math is to have him get help from another student. Apply that same principle to your life, and be willing to learn from the person you’re trying to connect with. Not only does that make them feel more bonded to you, it also makes them feel important. It also shows that you’re willing to be vulnerable and aren’t too proud to admit that you have much to learn. This makes you far more interesting than someone who appears to have everything figured out.

• Don’t make them regret removing the mask. If your new acquaintance does you the honor of opening up, don’t make them regret it. Sarcasm, criticism, or jokes that might make the other person feel judged for what they’ve shared are major faux pas. Instead, empathize with their approach to life, which you can do even if you don’t agree with their beliefs, and then reciprocate by revealing more about yourself. This process of reciprocation is quick to create new depth in relationships.

• Look for the good in them. Our culture can often predispose us to cynicism. We seem to focus on finding reasons not to like people, instead of reasons to like them. Shut that cynical voice off, and concentrate on looking for the good in a new acquaintance. For one thing, that keeps you from writing someone off too soon, but more importantly, when you expect the best from people, they’re likely to deliver it.

• Don’t make it a contest. We’ve all seen the stereotypical sitcom scene where two guys in a bar spend the night trying to one-up each other. The same thing happens when you meet someone new. Their accomplishments and life experiences sneak up on you and make you feel the urge to make yourself look just as good (if not better). Doing so may stroke your ego, but it doesn’t help you connect with them. It keeps you focused on yourself when you should be trying to learn about others and find common ground.

• Turn off your inner voice. One giant thing that keeps us from connecting with other people is that we don’t really listen. Instead, we’re thinking while the other person is talking. To be clear, we hear what the other person is saying (the words come through loud and clear), but our relentless inner voice ensures the meaning is lost. You must turn off this inner voice if you want to connect deeply with people. So what if you forget what you were going to say or if the conversation moves in a different direction before you have a chance to make your point? If your real goal is to connect with someone, you have to shut off your own soundtrack long enough to focus on what they’re telling you.

HAVE A FEW TRICKS UP YOUR SLEEVE

• Open hands and palms create trust. An employee policy at LEGOLAND says whenever someone asks where something is, the employee “presents” (open-palm gesture) their directions instead of “pointing” them. This is because the open-palmed gesture conveys trust, making people more likely to agree with what you’re saying and to find you friendly and likeable. Pointing, on the flip side, is generally seen as aggressive and rude.

• When a group of people laughs, each member of the group can’t help but make eye contact with the person they feel closest to. This trick can make you an astute observer of relationships of all types. It can tell you who is bonding and learning to trust one another, just as easily as it can tell you if you might have a shot at landing a date with a certain someone. Of course, you’ll learn a lot about how you feel about other people just by paying attention to whom you unconsciously make eye contact with.

• Silence gets answers. When you ask someone a question and they’re slow to respond, don’t feel pressure to move the conversation forward. Remaining silent plays to your advantage. Moments of silence make people feel as though they should speak, especially when the ball is in their court. This is a great tool to use in negotiations and other difficult conversations. Just make certain you resist the urge to move the conversation forward until you get your answer.

• Nodding during a conversation or when asking a question makes the other person more likely to agree with what you’re saying. The next time you need to win someone over to your way of thinking, try nodding as you speak. People unconsciously mirror the body language of those around them to better understand what other people are feeling. When you nod as you speak, you convey that what you’re saying is true and desirable and people are more inclined to agree with you.

• People remember unfinished things better. The natural tendency to remember unfinished things is called the Zeigarnik effect. Ever notice how some television commercials get cut off early? The company paying for the commercial cuts it off so that it sticks in your head longer than other commercials. The best way to forget unfinished things (commercials or songs) is to finish them in your head. If a song gets stuck in your head, try singing the last lines to yourself. You’ll be amazed at how quickly it goes away.

• When someone does a favor for you, it actually makes them like you more. When you convince someone to do you a favor, they unconsciously justify why they are willing to do so. Typical justifications include things such as “She’s my friend,” “I like her,” and “She seems like the kind of person who would return the favor.” These justifications serve you perfectly. Not only did you just get help with something, but the other party also likes you more than they did before.

• People’s feet reveal their interest. When talking to someone, pay attention to their feet. If their feet are aimed at you, they’re interested and listening to what you’re saying. If their feet point away from you, they’re most likely disinterested and mentally checked out.

• When you meet someone new, working their name into the conversation ensures you’ll remember it. The goal is to repeat their name three times in the first five minutes. It works extremely well, but the trick is to do it naturally. When you rattle off their name unnecessarily, it sounds foolish and awkward. Try to use phrases like “Hello,_” “Nice to meet you,” and “Where are you from,__?”

• Showing excitement makes other people like you. This goes back to the idea that we mirror the behavior of those around us. If you show excitement when you see someone, they naturally mirror that excitement back at you. It’s easy to make a strong first impression and get people to like you when you show enthusiasm for the encounter.

Master Communication

• This tendency to overestimate how well we communicate (and how well we’re understood) is so prevalent that psychologists have a name for it: closeness- communication bias. “The understanding, ‘What I know is different from what you know’ is essential for effective communication,” said study lead Kenneth Savitsky, “but that insight can be elusive. Some [people] may indeed be on the same wavelength, but maybe not as much as they think. You get rushed and preoccupied, and you stop taking the perspective of the other person.” You can’t reach your full potential until you’re a great communicator. Great communicators inspire people. They create a connection that is real, emotional, and personal. Great communicators forge this connection through an understanding of people and an ability to speak directly to their needs in a manner that they’re ready to hear. The following habits will help you use your emotional intelligence to overcome communication bias and connect with people in a real and meaningful way. Apply these habits and watch your communication skills reach new heights.

• Talk so people will listen. Great communicators read their audience (groups and individuals) carefully to ensure they aren’t wasting their breath on a message that people aren’t ready to hear. Talking so people will listen means you adjust your message on the fly to stay with your audience (what they’re ready to hear and how they’re ready to hear it). Droning on to ensure you’ve said what you wanted to say does not have the same effect on people as engaging them in a meaningful dialogue in which there is an exchange of ideas. Resist the urge to drive your point home at all costs. When your talking leads to people asking good questions, you know you’re on the right track.

• Listen so people will talk. One of the most disastrous temptations is to treat communication as a one-way street. When you communicate, you must give people ample opportunity to speak their minds. If you find that you’re often having the last word in conversations, then this is likely something you should work on. Listening isn’t just about hearing words; it’s also about listening to the tone, speed, and volume of the voice. What is being said? Anything not being said? What hidden messages exist below the surface? When someone is talking to you, stop everything else and listen fully until the other person has finished speaking. When you’re on a phone call, don’t type an email. When you’re meeting with someone, close the door and sit near the person so you can focus and listen. Simple behaviors like these will help you stay in the present moment, pick up on the cues the other person sends, and make it clear that you will really hear what they’re saying.

• Connect emotionally. Maya Angelou said it best: “People will forget what you said and did, but they will never forget how you made them feel.” Your communication is impotent if people don’t connect with it on an emotional level. This is hard for many people to pull off because they feel they need to project a certain persona. Let that go. To connect with people emotionally, you should be transparent. Be human. Show them what drives you, what you care about, what makes you get out of bed in the morning. Express these feelings openly, and you’ll forge an emotional connection with everyone you encounter.

• Read body language. Many people are pleasers, which makes it hard for them to say what’s really on their minds. This is magnified when dealing with authority figures. No matter how good a relationship you have with your subordinates, you’re kidding yourself if you think they’re as open with you as they are with their peers. So, you must become adept at understanding unspoken messages. The greatest wealth of information lies in people’s body language. The body communicates nonstop and is an abundant source of information, so purposefully watch body language during meetings and casual conversations. Once you tune into body language, the messages will become loud and clear. Pay as much attention to what isn’t said as what said, and you’ll uncover facts and opinions that people are unwilling to express directly. Be certain to read the chapter on body language because it shows you specifically what to look for.

• Prepare your intent. A little preparation goes a long way toward saying what you wanted to say and having a conversation achieve its intended impact. Don’t prepare a speech; develop an understanding of what the focus of a conversation needs to be (in order for people to hear the message) and how you’ll accomplish this. Your communication will be more persuasive and on point when you prepare your intent ahead of time. Align your intention with Your Impact

• Speak to each person in the room. In business, you often have to speak to groups of people. Whether it’s a small team meeting or a company-wide gathering, you should develop a level of intimacy in your approach that makes each individual in the room feel as if you’re speaking directly to them. The trick is to eliminate the distraction of the crowd so that you can deliver your message as if you were talking to one person. You want to be emotionally genuine and exude the same feelings, energy, and attention you would one-on-one (as opposed to the anxiety that comes with being in front of people). The ability to pull this off is the hallmark of great group communication.

• Skip the jargon. At first, euphemisms surfaced in the workplace to help people deal with touchy subjects that were difficult to talk about. Before long, they morphed into corporate buzzwords that expanded and took over our vocabulary until our everyday conversations started sounding like they’re taking place on another planet: “Listen, Ray, I don’t have the bandwidth for it with everything that’s on my plate, but ping me anyway because at the end of the day it’s on my radar, and I don’t want to be thrown under the bus because I didn’t circle back around on this no-brainer.” I understand the temptation. These phrases are spicy, and they make you feel clever (“low-hanging fruit” is a particular crutch of mine), but they also annoy the heck out of people. If you think you can use these phrases without consequences, you’re kidding yourself. Most people overuse jargon and alienate others with their “business speak.” Use jargon sparingly if you want to connect with people. Otherwise, you’ll come across as insincere.

• Enhance Your Natural Communication Style

  • Analyze how those who know you well view you. “Upsides of My Style” Vs “Downsides of My Style”
  • How can you use the upsides of your style to improve your communication?
  • How can you eliminate or minimize the downsides of your style?

• Avoid Giving Mixed Signals

  • Pay attention to your emotions and how your body language and vocal expression are coming across to people.

• Offer a Fix It Statement During a Broken Conversation

  • Look at both sides to figure out where the interaction went off track.
  • Say something neutral to help you take a pause. It can be as simple as “This is hard”

• Ask, Ask, Tell

  • Use open communication to ask someone how to do/achieve something, if they still don’t do it keep emotion out of it, remaining calm and factual and tell them what they need to do. Set clear expectations, including consequences
  • maybe ask the reason why they don’t want to do it?

MASTER COMMUNICATORS ARE FABULOUS LISTENERS

• Put away distractions. It’s impossible to listen well and monitor your phone at the same time. Even if you’re able to do both things at once, you’ll turn the other person off to your conversation, and they won’t feel heard. When you commit to a conversation, focus all your energy on it. You’ll find that conversations are more enjoyable and effective when you immerse yourself in them.

• Practice reflective listening. Psychologist Carl Rogers used the term “reflective listening” to describe the listening strategy of paraphrasing the meaning of what’s being said in order to make certain you’ve interpreted the speaker’s words correctly. By doing this, you give the speaker the opportunity to clarify what they meant to say. When you practice reflective listening, don’t simply repeat the speaker’s words to them. Use your own words to show that you’ve absorbed the information.

• Ask probing questions. People need to know that you’re really listening, and the way you do that is by asking good questions. In addition to verifying what you’ve heard, you should ask questions that seek more information. Examples of probing questions are “What happened next?” and “Why did he say that?” The key is to make certain that your questions really do add to your understanding of the speaker’s words, rather than deflecting the conversation to a different topic.

• Focus. When you’re supposed to be listening, it’s easy to get lost in your thoughts and fail to hear what’s being said. Although that’s not entirely true, because you hear the words but miss out on the meaning behind them. Focusing may seem like a simple suggestion, but it’s not as easy as it sounds. Your thoughts can be incredibly distracting. To focus, listening has to become your number one priority during a conversation.

• Use body language that shows you’re engaged in the conversation. First, don’t do anything that makes you look bored or distracted. No checking the clock, looking over your shoulder, or watching people walk down the hallway. Lean toward the speaker to show them that they have your whole attention. Use an enthusiastic tone when speaking, uncross your arms, and maintain eye contact. All of these forms of positive body language can make all the difference in a conversation because they show the speaker that you’re fully engaged.

• Reserve judgment. Good listeners are patient and open to new ideas. If you form strong opinions and judge what the speaker is saying, they’ll pick up on this in your body language. Forming your opinions later isn’t a problem. Forming them right there while the other person is still speaking is an issue because shows that you’re closed off to what they’re trying to communicate. Having an open mind is crucial in the workplace, where approachability means access to new ideas and help. Listening without judgment doesn’t mean that you condone someone’s ideas or behavior; it simply means that you quit passing judgment long enough to truly understand what they’re saying.

• Keep your mouth shut. If you’re not checking for understanding or asking a probing question, you shouldn’t be talking. Not only does thinking about what you’re going to say next take your attention away from the speaker, but hijacking the conversation shows that you think you have something more important to say. This means that you shouldn’t jump in with solutions to the speaker’s problems. It’s human nature to want to help people, especially when it’s someone you care about, but what a lot of us don’t realize is that when we jump in with advice or a solution, we’re shutting the other person down. It’s essentially a more socially acceptable way of saying, “Okay, I’ve got it. You can stop now!” The effect is the same.

• Practice active listening. The bulk of the good listening habits suggested here promote active listening. Active listening is a simple technique that ensures people feel heard, an essential component of good communication. To practice active listening:

  • Spend more time listening than you do talking.
  • Do not answer questions with questions.
  • Avoid finishing other people’s sentences.
  • Focus more on the other person than you do on yourself.
  • Focus on what people are saying right now, not on what their interests are.
  • Reframe what the other person has said to make certain you understood them (“So, you’re telling me that this budget needs further consideration, right?“) ■Think about what you’re going to say after someone has finished speaking-not while they’re speaking.
  • Ask plenty of questions.
  • Never interrupt.
  • Don’t take notes.
  • Listen to the tone, speed, and volume of the voice and how those fluctuate. Are those sending the message beyond what the words say? You won’t know unless you focus fully on the person.
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Accelerate Your Climb Up the Corporate Ladder

• The trick to advancing your career and getting paid more is to add value by making certain your contributions are worth more than you’re paid. You want to go above and beyond so that you’re seen as someone highly valuable someone the organization can’t live without. You should aim to exceed your boss’s expectations so much that they feel like they’re the smartest person in the world for hiring you. This isn’t as hard as it sounds. In fact, you can blow your boss’s mind and make it clear that you’re ready for a raise in seven easy steps.

• Step 1: Beyond developing the skills you need for your job, learn about your company’s industry, competitors, latest developments, and challenges.

  • Professional development is important, but why stop there? If you really want to blow your boss’s mind, soak up everything you can about your company and your industry. For example, if you’re an IT developer, instead of simply learning the current best practices in coding, learn how those practices are being applied throughout your industry. Transferring your knowledge to the real-world context of your organization is a great way to add value. In addition to knowing how to do your job, it shows that you know why you’re doing it and why it matters.

• Step 2: Instead of always having the answer, pre-empt the question.

  • It’s a good feeling when you can answer your boss’s questions on the spot without shuffling through piles of paper or telling them you’ll have to get back to them. But if you really want to blow their mind, pre-empt the question. Anticipate what they want to stay on top of, and send them regular updates. You’ll save them time and energy, and they’ll appreciate it as much as your enthusiasm.

• Step 3: Instead of owning up to mistakes once they’re discovered, bring them to light yourself.

  • Accountability is a lost art. Too many people try to cover up their mistakes, fearing the repercussions of admitting fault. Show your boss that you’re not afraid to own up to your mistakes, and they’ll be amazed. When you make a mistake, give your boss a simple heads- up and have a solution ready. Even better, tell them the steps you’ve taken to mitigate the problem. Everyone makes mistakes. You’ll stand out by showing your boss that you’re accountable, creative, and proactive when you inevitably make them.

• Step 4: Instead of asking for training, do it on your own.

  • Typical career advice is to ask your boss to send you to classes and workshops to improve your skills. But we’re not talking about what’s typical; we’re talking about blowing your boss’s mind. Pursue training yourself on your own time. It doesn’t have to be expensive; there are plenty of online courses available free or close to free. While everybody else is asking the boss to send them to training, you can tell your boss what you’ve already done, and your initiative will be rewarded. You’ll save the company money, get ahead, and expand your skillset at the same time.

• Step 5: Instead of doing what you’re told, be proactive.

  • Anybody (well, almost anybody) can do what they’re told. To blow your boss’s mind, you have to be proactive. If you see a problem, fix it. If you see something that needs doing, do it. Put together a how-to guide for new hires, document your processes, and figure out where you can streamline them, or do whatever else you can think of to make a difference. Bosses appreciate vision more than anything. They love it when you see what could be useful to the company over the long term and don’t forget to tell your boss about it. It’s only “kissing up” if you do it manipulatively or with the intention of making your coworkers look bad. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with owning your accomplishments.

• Step 6: Build relationships with other departments.

  • It’s practically guaranteed that, at some point, your department will need help or input from another area. An excellent way to blow your boss’s mind is to build relationships throughout the company. Person-to-person interactions are almost always more effective than department-to-department exchanges. You can make your boss’s day by saying, “Why don’t I take care of that for you? I know someone who can get that done for us right away.”

• Step 7: Be the calm one in a crisis.

  • Few things get your boss’s attention like your ability to weather a storm. Whether it’s conflict between people, everyone freaking out over a rule change, or what have you, make certain that you’re the one who remains calm, composed, and in control of your emotions. Your composure and ability to think clearly during a crisis demonstrate leadership potential, and leaders get promoted.

A BIAS TOWARD PROMOTION

• When it comes to getting promoted, you want to present yourself in a way that feeds into the biases that bosses have about what makes someone promotable. You’re already doing the hard work, so why not frame your effort in such a way that it increases your chances of obtaining the position you want? Although this probably sounds a bit manipulative, there are several straightforward things you can do to showcase your work and make certain that you’re promotable. This is social awareness in action. The following five actions will appeal to your boss’s inherent biases about promotability without you being disingenuous.

• Stretch your boundaries. To get promoted, you have to go above and beyond. Taking on additional responsibilities without being asked is not only a great way to demonstrate your work ethic, energy, and skills, but it also lets your boss know that you’re ready (and able) to expand your scope. When you take on more than the norm, your boss can’t help but think that you’re capable of a bigger role. This includes showing that you’re willing to take risks by making innovative suggestions.

• Don’t be too irreplaceable. Most people fail at this. Of course, performing at your highest level, regardless of your position, is always the best idea. The key here is not to be seen as the only person capable of performing the necessary duties in the position that you want to move on from. If you do, your boss will conclude that promoting you isn’t worth the trouble (and risk) of finding someone to replace you. The best way to find a balance between doing your best and showing that you’re ready for more is by developing other people. As tempting as it is to hoard knowledge, don’t. Instead, make certain that others know how to do important aspects of your job. Teaching is also a critical leadership skill. Thus, in addition to alleviating concerns about finding your replacement, you’ll demonstrate that you can handle the responsibility that comes with a more advanced position.

• Demonstrate emotional intelligence (EQ). You might be able to get away with being a temperamental genius in entry-level positions, but you’ll never move past that without emotional intelligence. If you’re the type who’s prone to temper tantrums when things don’t go your way, losing your cool when people cross you, yelling and storming out of rooms, or going silent during conflict, you’re signaling to your boss that you don’t want a promotion. No boss wants to be known as the one who promoted a short-fused person. Once you’re promoted, your behavior is a reflection of the judgment of the person who promoted you. Show your boss that you have enough self-awareness to acknowledge your weaknesses and work on improving them. This will prove that you’re capable.

• Make certain you speak the company’s language. As you move up in any company, your choice of language becomes increasingly important. It’s no longer enough to simply be an expert at what you do; you have to demonstrate that you understand how the work you do serves the business. That means learning the vocabulary of the executive team and your boss. Whether that’s KPIs, EBITDA, profit margin, market share, failure rate, or what have you, know what the terms mean and why they’re important so that you can use them correctly when speaking with upper management. Speaking the right language will not only show that you’re interested in more than your current role, but it will also demonstrate your intelligence and fit within the company.

• Don’t be afraid to ask for it. Not everybody wants to be promoted; some people are perfectly happy doing the same job for years. If you don’t tell your boss otherwise, they may assume that you’re one of them. When the time comes to show up in your boss’s office and say, “I’m interested in a promotion,” it’s important that you have something specific in mind if not a specific job title, then at least a clear idea of what the responsibilities might include and how this ties in with your career goals. And if the job requires skills you don’t have, outline your plan for acquiring them.

  • You may not get the promotion you’re aiming for. If that happens, ask for feedback, but stay away from sour grapes questions like, “Why did you pick him and not me?” In fact, don’t talk at all about the person who got the promotion. Instead, ask which of the critical skills you lack and what you need to do to be ready for the next opportunity. Don’t argue; just listen and ask thoughtful follow-up questions. However, make certain you follow through on the suggestions you’re given. If your boss suggests things you can do to become more promotable, and you don’t follow through, don’t expect to be considered the next time around.

ABOVE ALL ELSE, BE EXCEPTIONAL

• Take initiative. Initiative is a habit that will take you far in life. In theory, initiative is easy (the desire to take action is always there), but in the real world, other things get in the way. There’s a big difference between knowing what to do and being too scared or lazy to actually do it. That requires initiative. You have to take risks and push yourself out of your comfort zone until taking initiative is second nature.

• Never satisfied. Exceptional employees have unparalleled convictions that things can always be better and they’re right. No one stops growing, and there is no such thing as “good enough” when it comes to personal improvement. No matter how well things are going, exceptional employees are driven to improve without forgetting to give themselves a healthy pat on the back.

• Be judiciously courageous. Exceptional employees are willing to speak up when others are not, whether it’s to ask a difficult (or “embarrassingly” simple) question or to challenge an executive decision. However, that’s balanced with common sense and timing. They think before they speak and wisely choose the best time and place to do so.

• Focus. Student pilots are often told, “When things start going wrong, don’t forget to fly the plane.” Plane crashes have resulted from pilots concentrating so hard on identifying the problem that they flew the plane into the ground. Eastern Airlines Flight 401 is just one example: The flight crew was so concerned about the landing gear being down that they didn’t realize they were losing altitude until it was too late, despite alarms going off in the cockpit. Exceptional employees understand the principle of “just fly the plane.” They don’t get distracted by cranky customers, interoffice squabbles, or a switch to a different brand of coffee. They can differentiate between real problems and background noise; therefore, they stay focused on what matters.

• Tolerate conflict with grace. Although exceptional employees don’t seek conflict, they don’t run away from it either. They’re able to maintain their composure while presenting their positions calmly and logically. They’re able to withstand personal attacks in pursuit of the greater goal and never use that tactic themselves.

• Stay in control of your ego. Exceptional employees have egos. It’s part of what drives them, but they never give their egos more weight than is deserved. They’re willing to admit when they’re wrong and willing to do things someone else’s way, whether it’s because the other way is better or it’s important to maintain team harmony.

• Delay gratification. One thing an exceptional employee never says is, “That’s not in my job description.” Exceptional employees work outside the boundaries of job descriptions. They’re neither intimidated nor entitled. Instead of expecting recognition or compensation to come first, they forge ahead in their work, confident that they’ll be rewarded for a job well done.

• Recognize when things are broken and fix them. Whether it’s a sticky desk drawer or an inefficient, wasteful process affecting the cash flow of the entire department, exceptional employees don’t walk past problems. “Oh, it’s been that way forever,” simply isn’t in their vocabulary. They see problems as issues to be fixed immediately; it’s that simple.

• Be accountable. If you’re a manager trying to decipher a bungled report, “It’s not my fault” is the most irritating phrase in the English language. Exceptional employees are accountable. They own their work, their decisions, and all of their results-good or bad. They bring their mistakes to management’s attention rather than hoping no one will find out. They understand that managers aren’t out to assign blame; they’re out to get things done.

• Be marketable. “Marketable” can mean many things. Inside the organization, it means “likeable.” Exceptional employees are well liked by their coworkers. They have integrity and leadership skills (even if they’re not in an official leadership position) that people respond to. Externally, this means they can be trusted to represent the brand well. Managers know they can send these employees out to meet with clients and prospects without worrying about what they’ll say or do.

HOW TO WIN AT OFFICE POLITICS

• First, learn the lay of the land. Whether you just started a new job or just realized that avoiding office politics is detrimental to your career, you have to begin by figuring out what’s going on. Your office is full of allies and rivals, and if you watch and listen closely, you can get a pretty good sense of who’s aligned with whom:

Who has lunch together?

• Who gets invited to important meetings, and who doesn’t?

• Who always seems to be the first to know about coming changes, and who always seems to be last to know?

• What are the hot buttons that get tempers boiling around here?

• The answers to these questions define your political landscape. This doesn’t mean that you should choose a side (that would be counterproductive), but it’s smart to understand the rules, the players, and their strategies before you jump into the fray. Otherwise, you could find yourself unintentionally caught up in a long, simmering rivalry.

• Next, build broad alliances. One of the smartest things you can do is build alliances throughout the company so that you’ll have a foot in as many of the political camps as possible. If you accomplish this and show people across the board that they can rely on you, you’ll stand a good chance of coming out ahead, no matter which political camp is currently “winning.” You also won’t be left out in the cold if a group of allies leaves the company.

• Throughout the process, keep your eyes on your goal. Remind yourself, as many times as it takes, that you’re not engaging in office politics for fun or being one of “them.” You’re doing it for two reasons: career success and job fulfillment. When you get caught up emotionally, you run the risk of making decisions you’ll regret down the road. Gossiping, backstabbing, manipulating, and the rest are not needed to win at office politics. Keeping your eyes on the goal lets you develop and maintain a strategic approach to dealing with your workplace’s unique political atmosphere.

• Keep things win-win. Part of what gives office politics such a bad reputation is the perception that there’s always a winner and a loser, and that you win only if your opponent limps off the battlefield, bloody and bruised. But done correctly, this isn’t a zero-sum game. Navigating office politics works best when you follow the golden rule of negotiating: End with everybody feeling like they won. Instead of trying to defeat an opponent, spend that time and energy thinking about how you can both get what you want. This is how you play the game smart.

• Never pit rivals against each other. One situation that everybody dreads is getting caught between two warring parties. In a situation like that, it’s easy to tell each of them what they want to hear, even if that’s just nodding in agreement when they bad-mouth each other. Fake allegiances are always exposed in the long run, and then neither of the people you were trying to impress will trust you again. Instead, steer your conversations back to the facts: What decisions need to be made? What are the next steps? What can I do to help improve this situation?

Stick to your principles without fail. Before taking any action that’s fueled by office politics, ask yourself why you’re doing it. If you’re motivated by fear, revenge, or jealousy, don’t do it. If it conflicts with your values and beliefs about fair behavior, it’s better not to get involved.

• Deciding to stay out of office politics altogether isn’t an effective strategy. As long as it’s going on around you, you’re going to be affected by it. It’s a lot better to be a competent, conscious player than to be a bystander or a pawn in the game. The key is to understand the players and the rules, and then to play the game in a way that aligns with your personal values and principles. Don’t be fooled into compromising “just this once,” because once is all it takes to lose control.

COMMON MISTAKES THAT WILL KILL YOUR CAREER

• Study the list that follows so that you know which mistakes to avoid. If you stay aware of them, you can catch and control these mistakes before they creep up on you and kill your career. If you do make a mistake, remember you can’t make the same mistake twice. The second time is not a mistake. It’s a choice.

• Over-promising and under-delivering. It’s tempting to promise the moon to your colleagues and your clients, especially when you’re honest and hardworking and believe you can do it. The problem is that there’s no point in creating additional pressure that can make you look bad. If you promise to do something ridiculously fast, and you miss the deadline by just a little bit, you’ll likely think that you did a good job because you still delivered quickly. But the moment you promise something to someone, they expect nothing less. You end up looking terrible when you fall short, which is a shame, because you could have done the same quality work in the same amount of time with great results if you’d just set up realistic expectations from the beginning. This is one of those situations in which perception matters more than reality. Don’t deliberately undershoot your goals. Just be realistic about the results you can deliver so that you’re certain to create expectations that you will blow out of the water.

• Having an inflatable ego. Have you worked with someone who had a string of successes and started thinking that they were the be-all and endall of superstardom? Success is great. It definitely boosts your career, and it feels really, really good. The problems start once you let success go to your head. You start thinking that success is going to last forever and that you’re entitled to it. Never, ever be content with resting on your laurels. Once you start thinking that you’re the cat’s meow, you’re setting yourself up for a very painful failure.

• Being complacent. How long has it been since you proactively learned a new skill, reached out to your networking contacts, or even polished up your resume? If you can’t remember, you might have become complacent, and complacency is a real career killer. It’s what happens when you’re just along for the ride and assume that nothing will ever change. We’ve seen enough disruption-technological and otherwise over the last few years to realize that change is inevitable. If you’re always too busy to learn something new or to expand your network, you’ve got your priorities mixed up. However, if you make continuous growth and development a priority, you’ll be ready for whatever comes your way.

• Fearing change. Fear of change is complacency’s evil twin. It actively works to keep things the same. Things are changing too fast these days to latch on so tightly to the status quo, and the costs of doing so can be huge. Change is a constant part of our lives, both personally and professionally. It doesn’t matter whether you think things should change or whether you prefer the old ways-change just is. You don’t have to learn to love it, but you should learn to stop resisting it and start adapting.

• Being negative. Sometimes, when you’re feeling negative and down, your mood can leak out and affect other people, even if you don’t intend it to. You were hired to make your boss’s and your team’s jobs easier, not harder. People who spread negativity through their department and complain about their work or other people complicate things for everyone else. If people always have to tiptoe around you to avoid dislodging that massive chip on your shoulder, they’re unlikely to be willing to do it for very long.

• Having low emotional intelligence (EQ). Everyone knows that you can get fired for being unable or unwilling to play nicely with others, but what trips up a lot of people is having a poorly developed poker face. If everyone can tell when you’re bored or irritated or that you think something a colleague says is stupid, this will catch up with you. Emotional outbursts, belittling others, shutting coworkers down when they speak, having low self-awareness, and just generally being difficult are other ways that a lack of emotional intelligence will do great harm to your career.

• Sucking up to your boss. Some people suck up to their boss and call it “managing up,” but that isn’t the case at all. Sucking up has nothing to do with a real relationship built on respect; it’s sneaky and underhanded. Suck-ups try to get ahead by stroking the boss’s ego instead of earning their favor. That doesn’t go over well with colleagues who are trying to make it on merit. Yes, you want to bolster your relationship with your boss, but not by undermining your colleagues. That’s the key distinction here. For a boss- employee relationship to work, it has to be based on authenticity. There’s no substitute for merit.

• Backstabbing. The name says it all. Stabbing your colleagues in the back, intentionally or otherwise, is a huge source of strife in the workplace. One of the most frequent forms of backstabbing is going over someone’s head to solve a problem. People typically do this in an attempt to avoid conflict, but they end up creating even more conflict as soon as the victim feels the blade. Any time you make someone look bad in the eyes of their colleagues, it feels like a stab in the back, regardless of your intentions.

• Misusing company supplies or resources. Many people don’t think twice about taking a pack of printer paper home when they’ve run out or using the company’s FedEx account to mail a last-minute holiday gift. However, in the eyes of your employer, this is stealing. Abusing company resources is a serious offense, even if the monetary value of the item doesn’t add up to much. Catching you in the act can also be a good excuse if your boss is looking to fire you. It’s a lot easier to document and justify firing someone for stealing than it is to fire them because they’re just okay at their job.

• Speaking on behalf of the company. This isn’t just about sending out an unauthorized press release or venting on the company’s Twitter account, because most people know that these types of things will get them fired. I’m talking about answering a question when a reporter sticks a microphone in your face or identifying yourself as an employee of the company when sharing your personal opinions online. This creates the perception that you’re speaking as a representative of the company, even when you aren’t trying to, and that’s something that can definitely get you fired.

DON’T LET A BIG MISTAKE DERAIL YOUR CAREER

• Staying composed, focused, and effective under pressure is all about your mentality. People who successfully manage crises are able to channel their emotions into producing the behavior that they want. In other words, they turn their anxiety into energy and excitement. This can’t happen if you don’t engage your logic. Yes, making a big mistake is embarrassing. You might get yelled at by your boss, and the mistake might even show up on your next performance appraisal, but in all likelihood, it’s not going to result in you getting fired, losing your house, living out of your car, or any of the other catastrophic thoughts that fuel your anxiety and keep you from focusing.

• If you struggle with putting things into perspective, ask yourself two simple questions: What’s the worst thing that could happen as a result of this? Will this matter in five years? Your answers should stop cataclysmic thinking. You’ll probably realize that you’re panicking due to the anticipation of public embarrassment more than anything else. Once you get over that, you can build your confidence by picking up the pieces and making things better. Remind yourself: “There’s more to me than this situation. One honest mistake won’t define me.”

• Next, recognize that people are less focused on you than you think they are. It’s easy to see yourself as the center of the maelstrom. You’re embarrassed, and you’re worried about your job. The more you feel judged by others, the more intense your anxiety. But your boss, and everyone else, will spend far less time worrying about you than they will about trying to improve a difficult situation, which is what you should be focusing on. Realize that they won’t have much time to think about you until after the dust has settled, and by that time, you’ll have become part of the solution.

• Now, magnify your logic. Nothing helps you maintain the right frame of mind in a crisis like logical thinking. Once you’ve forestalled the panic, it’s time to ask yourself important factual questions: What exactly happened? What are the possible repercussions? Is there still time to avoid the repercussions? If so, how? Who needs to be involved? If it’s too late to head off the repercussions, what can be done to mitigate the damage? Don’t let your mind run off with ridiculous self-accusations.

• Finally, take action. Once you’ve figured out the facts and screwed your head on straight, it’s time to own up to the situation. Putting off the hard work of cleaning up the mess just gives your sense of dread more power. Pouring your energy into making things better is both empowering and a wonderful distraction from any anxiety that might surface. Remember, getting excited by the challenge of rising from the ashes will improve your performance dramatically. To keep things humming, don’t be so hard on yourself. Nobody’s perfect. Even the most successful people make serious mistakes. Beating yourself up might be a tempting option, but it never accomplishes anything, and it certainly doesn’t make you any calmer. Instead, focus your energy on the future and the things you can change.

Be Persuasive and Get Your Point Across

• There are eight habits you can adopt right now to increase your credibility, get people to take you more seriously, and ensure that you get treated with the respect you deserve.

• Don’t let your statements sound like questions. One of the most common things people do to undermine their credibility is ending their sentences with a higher inflection than where they started. It’s called “up-speak,” and our brains are trained to interpret that pattern as a question. So, instead of delivering information, you end up sounding like you’re asking if your own input is correct. And people notice. In a survey of 700 managers conducted by Pearson, 85% considered upspeak a sign of insecurity and emotional weakness, and 44% said they mark job candidates down by as much as a third for using upspeak. That’s one habit you should break right now to give yourself an instant credibility boost.

• Don’t just give reports-tell stories. The most successful TED talks follow a magic formula-they are 75% stories and 25% data backing up those stories. Stories provide an emotional hook that helps people remember what you said, and they give you a platform for connecting your knowledge to the real world. There’s a huge difference between memorizing mathematical formulas, for example, and being able to use them to calculate whether a particularly dangerous asteroid will hit us in our lifetime. Stories help people take you seriously because they demonstrate that you can apply what you know.

• Encourage people to talk about themselves. When you first started dating, your mom probably encouraged you to get your dates to talk about themselves. Sure, it’s good manners-and we all know that everybody likes to talk about themselves. But it turns out that there’s a scientific basis for this. Your brain rewards you for self-disclosure. In fact, talking about yourself feels so good that it causes neurological changes in the brain. So, if you want people to pay attention to what you’re saying, let them talk about themselves first. Once those “feel-good” neurotransmitters are flowing, and people start feeling connected to you, they’re much more likely to take you and your contributions seriously.

• Do your homework. One of the best ways to get people to take you seriously is to be prepared and know what you’re talking about. Americans attend 11 million meetings every day, and unproductive meetings cost the U.S. economy $37 billion every year. Why are there so many unproductive meetings? Because people are unprepared. Don’t be one of them. Whether it’s a team meeting or briefing your boss, always take the time to prepare. Know what you want to say, be able to back up your opinions with data, and be prepared to answer questions two or three levels down.

• Stay informed. The employee handbook for the tech company Valve states that the company looks for “T-shaped” employees: people who have a lot of broad knowledge layered on top of their primary area of expertise. Do whatever it takes to keep up with what’s going on in the world. It’s particularly important to stay abreast of trends in science and technology, especially as they relate to business. You don’t want to look like a deer in the headlights when somebody starts talking about how artificial intelligence is going to transform manufacturing.

• Dress for success. Fair or not, we judge people on their appearance every single day. And it happens so fast-in about a tenth of a millisecond, according to researchers at Princeton-that we don’t even realize we’re doing it. We make inferences about a person’s character and capabilities based on appearance. If your appearance is sloppy, for example, people are likely to subconsciously conclude that your work will be sloppy, too. Looking polished and well-groomed, however, creates the impression of responsibility and competence. That doesn’t mean you have to rush out and blow your budget on a designer wardrobe. However, it does mean that you should show enough respect for yourself and for your colleagues to make a substantial effort.

• Strike a power pose. If you assume an expansive pose (taking up more room by keeping your shoulders open and your arms wide), other people see you as more powerful. This is a hardwired human characteristic, as people who have been blind since birth throw their arms out in victory, although they’ve never seen someone do this. Moreover, power poses actually change our body chemistry. Researchers at Harvard found that after participants held a power pose for just two minutes, their testosterone levels rose by 20%, and their cortisol (the stress hormone) levels dropped. Power poses are a win-win: They make other people see you as more powerful, and they actually make you feel more powerful.

• Be confident, but not too confident. No one is going to have confidence in you until you have confidence in yourself. But you have to balance that confidence with a little humility. Truly confident people aren’t afraid to admit that they don’t know everything-it doesn’t make them feel threatened at all. In fact, the most confident people are eager to ask questions and learn. The best way to show your confidence is to own what you know and what you don’t.

BE PERSUASIVE

• They know their audience. Persuasive people know their audience inside and out, and they use this knowledge to speak their audience’s language. Whether it’s toning down your assertiveness when talking to someone who is shy or cranking it up for the aggressive, high- energy type, everyone is different, and catching on to these subtleties goes a long way toward getting them to hear your point of view.

• They aren’t pushy. Persuasive people establish their ideas assertively and confidently, without being aggressive or pushy. Pushy people are a huge turn-off. The in-your-face approach starts the recipient backpedaling, and before long, they’re running for the hills. Persuasive people don’t ask for much, and they don’t argue vehemently for their position because they know that subtlety is what wins people over in the long run. If you tend to come across as too aggressive, focus on being confident but calm. Don’t be impatient and overly persistent. Know that if your idea is really a good one, people will catch on if you give them time. If you don’t, they won’t catch on at all.

• They aren’t mousy, either. On the other hand, presenting your ideas as questions or as though they need approval makes them seem flawed and unconvincing. If you tend to be shy, focus on presenting your ideas as statements and interesting facts for the other party to mull over. In addition, remove qualifiers from your speech. When you’re trying to be persuasive, there’s no room for “I think” or “It’s possible that.”

• They respond rather than react. If someone criticizes a persuasive person for making a mistake, or if someone else makes a critical mistake, persuasive people don’t react immediately and emotionally. They wait. They think. Then, they deliver an appropriate response. Persuasive people know how important relationships are, and they won’t let an emotional overreaction harm theirs. They also know that emotions are contagious and that overreacting has a negative influence on everyone around them.

• They form connections. People are much more likely to accept what you have to say once they have a sense of what kind of person you are. In a negotiation study, Stanford students were asked to reach agreement in class. Without instructions, 55% of the students successfully reached agreement. However, when students were instructed to introduce themselves and describe their backgrounds before attempting to reach agreement, 90% of the students did so successfully. The key is to avoid getting too caught up in the back and forth of the negotiation. The person you are speaking with is a person, not an opponent or a target. No matter how compelling your argument, if you fail to connect on a personal level, they will doubt everything you say.

• They’re pleasers. Persuasive people know how and when to stand their ground, yet they are constantly making sacrifices that help their cause. They are always giving in, giving ground, and doing things for other people that make them happy. Persuasive people do this because they know in the long run this wins people over. They know it’s better to be successful than it is to be “right.”

• They acknowledge your point of view. An extremely powerful tactic of persuasion is to concede the point. Admit that your argument is not perfect. This shows that you are open-minded and willing to make adjustments instead of stubbornly sticking to your cause. You want your audience to know that you have their best interests at heart. Try using statements such as “I see where you’re coming from” and “That makes a lot of sense.” This shows that you’re actively listening to what they’re saying, and you won’t just force your ideas on them. Persuasive people allow others to have their own opinions, and they treat these opinions as valid. They do this because it shows respect, which makes the other person more likely to consider their point of view.

• They are proactive. Persuasive people don’t wait for things like new ideas and new technologies to find them; they seek those things out. These early adopters always want to anticipate what’s next. They’re persuasive because they see what’s coming, and they see what’s coming because they intentionally look for it. Then, they spread the word.

• They paint a picture. Researchers have shown that people are far more likely to be persuaded by something that has visuals that bring it to life. Persuasive people capitalize on this by using powerful visual imagery. When actual images aren’t available or appropriate, these people tell vivid stories that breathe life into their ideas. Good stories create images in the minds of recipients that are easy to relate to and hard to forget.

BE POWERFUL

• Powerful people have a lot in common. Their pursuit of excellence is driven by nine habits, which you can employ and watch your

power and influence expand.

• They don’t wait for a title to lead. It’s important not to confuse power with authority. The right title can give you authority, but it can’t give you power. However, you don’t need a title to be powerful. You can lead without being a boss, and you can have a powerful influence on your workplace and community without a title.

• They think for themselves. Powerful people aren’t buffeted by the latest trends or by public opinion. They form their opinions carefully based on the facts. They’re more than willing to change their minds when the facts support it, but they aren’t influenced by what other people think, only by what they know.

• They focus only on what really matters. Powerful people aren’t distracted by trivialities. They’re able to cut through the static and clutter, focus on what matters, and point it out to everyone else. They speak only when they have something important to say, and they never bore people with idle banter.

• They inspire conversation. When powerful people speak, their words spread like ripples in a pond. Influencers inspire everyone around them to explore new ideas and think differently about their work. That is the definition of power.

• They know their strengths and weaknesses. People who get seduced by power and, therefore, start abusing it are often blind to their own weaknesses. To become truly powerful, you have to see yourself as you really are and position yourself to use your strengths for the greater good. That means taking a clear-eyed look at your strengths and your weaknesses and owning them completely.

• They grow and leverage their networks. Those who grow power in the Machiavellian way don’t bother with people who aren’t useful to them. People see this coming a mile away, and it doesn’t win any friends. Truly powerful people know how to make lasting connections. Not only do they know a lot of people, but they also get to know their connections’ connections. More importantly, they add value to everyone in their network. They share advice and know-how, and they make connections between people who should get to know each other.

• They believe. Powerful people always expect the best. They believe in their own power to achieve their dreams, and they believe that others share that same power. They believe that nothing is out of reach, and that belief inspires those around them to stretch for their own goals. They firmly believe that one person can change the world.

• They ask for help when they need it. It’s easy to mistakenly assume that powerful people never ask for help from anybody. Asking for help when you don’t know the answer or can’t do it all by yourself is not a sign of weakness; it’s a sign of strength. It sends the message that you’re not so insecure that you put your ego above the mission. It takes a tremendous amount of humility to admit that you need assistance. Asking for assistance is critical because there’s nothing worse than trucking down the wrong path because you’re too embarrassed or proud to admit that you don’t know what you’re doing.

• They do it now. Way back in 1894, Orison Swett Marden made an important point: “Don’t wait for extraordinary opportunities. Seek common occasions, and make them great. Weak men wait for opportunities. Strong men make them.” If you put off growing your power until the right opportunity comes along, it’s never going to happen. Powerful people stop making excuses and just start. You know what you believe in, you know who you are, and you know what you want to become, so act like it. Yes, it will be uncomfortable at times, and yes, some people will tell you you’re doing it wrong, but the only way to be persuasive, achieve power, and use it for good is to get out there and do it.

Make Your Relationships Last

THE FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE APOCALYPSE

• Conflict is actually a normal and (ideally) productive part of two people with different needs and interests coming together. The researchers found that the amount of conflict between two people had no bearing on the success of the relationship. How conflict is handled determines a relationship’s success, and the Four Horsemen’s presence means that conflict is not being dealt with constructively or productively.

• The First Horseman: Criticism

  • Criticism is not to be confused with delivering feedback or otherwise seeking improvement or change in another person. Criticism becomes, well, criticism when it isn’t constructive (“Your driving is terrible.”). Criticism, in its most troubling form, focuses on the individual’s personality, character, or interests rather than the specific action or behavior you’d like to see changed (“You are terrible at driving. You are too timid for it.”). It’s one thing to criticize without being constructive; it’s another to go after someone for something they are unable to change.
  • If you find yourself criticizing when you planned on being constructive, it’s best if you don’t deliver your feedback and commentary unless you’ve planned ahead. You’ll need to think through what you’re going to say and stick to your script to remain constructive and avoid criticism. It’s also best if you focus your feedback on a single specific behavior, as your reactions to multiple behaviors at once can easily be perceived as criticism. Try to deliver feedback in a bite-sized, actionable strategy that the receiver can work to implement. If you find that you cannot deliver feedback without generalizing it to the other person’s personality, you’re better off saying nothing at all.

• The Second Horseman: Contempt

  • Contempt is any open sign of disrespect toward another person. Contempt often involves comments that aim to take the other person down a notch, as well as direct insults. Contempt is also seen in indirect and veiled forms, such as rolling your eyes and couching insults within “humor.” Contempt makes people feel disliked or even hated. It’s often hard for those on the receiving end of contempt to understand where it’s coming from.
  • Contempt stems from a lack of interest in another person. When you find that you don’t enjoy or admire someone (perhaps there are things about them that used to be interesting or charming, and now they’ve lost their luster), contempt can surface unexpectedly. If your disinterest is unavoidable, and the relationship isn’t going anywhere (such as a family member or coworker), then you need to focus on finding common ground. Common ground, no matter how small, is a commodity to be sought and cherished. In the immortal words of Abraham Lincoln, “I do not like that man. I must get to know him better.”

• The Third Horseman: Defensiveness

  • Denying responsibility, making excuses, meeting one complaint with another, and other forms of defensiveness are problematic in any relationship. They prevent conflict from reaching any sort of resolution. Defensiveness accelerates the anxiety and tension experienced by both parties, which makes it difficult to focus on the larger issues at hand that need to be resolved.
  • To overcome defensiveness, you first need to be aware of when you’re the one being defensive. This sounds easy but can be quite difficult, as most of us feel our defensive behavior is justified. When you catch yourself being defensive, you must be willing to stop and listen carefully to the other party’s complaint, even if you don’t see things the same way. This doesn’t mean you have to agree with them. Instead, focus on fully understanding the other person’s perspective so that you can work together to resolve the conflict. It’s critical that you work to remain calm. Once you understand why the other person is upset, it’s much easier to find common ground than if you dismiss their opinions defensively.

• The Fourth Horseman: Stonewalling

  • Stonewalling is what happens when a person shuts the discussion down by refusing to respond. Examples of stonewalling include the silent treatment, being emotionally distant or devoid of emotion, and ignoring the other person completely. Stonewalling is problematic because it aggravates the person being stonewalled and prevents the two from working on resolving the conflict together.
  • The key to overcoming stonewalling is to participate in the discussion. If you’re stonewalling because the circumstances are leaving you feeling overwhelmed, let the other person know how you feel and ask for some time to think before continuing the discussion. If you stonewall as a matter of practice, you need to realize that participating in discussions and working together to resolve conflict are the only ways to keep your relationships from crumbling.

REPAIRING A DAMAGED RELATIONSHIP

• Relationships are tough, especially when they’re damaged. If you want to know how to repair a damaged relationship, you first need to remember that the frequency of conflict has no bearing on the quality of a relationship. Conflict is a normal part of two people with different needs, interests, and motivations coming together. How conflict is handled determines the quality and ultimate success of a relationship. Researchers at the University of Washington (the same researchers who predicted the future success of a relationship with 93% accuracy) discovered that successful relationships address conflict using a single technique a technique that’s so effective at addressing conflict that it’s called a repair.

• A repair is a gesture that shows respect and concern for each other despite the disagreement. Repairs take many forms, but all are aimed at resolving the conflict together as opposed to winning the conflict on your own. A repair can be anything from suggesting a compromise to owning your half of the situation to voicing respect for the other party, or even using humor to break the tension. In the heat of an argument, a repair sends an instant signal that you think the other person is important, you respect them, and you’re willing to put the good of the relationship ahead of your self-interest. Repairs don’t just improve the outcome of the conflicts you weave them into; they inject health into relationships that have been damaged by discord.

• It’s safe to assume that we’ve all had conversations that could use repairs. Simple discussions can break into disagreements or get stuck going around in circles. In these broken conversations, past mistakes are brought to the surface, regretful comments are made, and blame is prevalent. No matter who said what, or who “started it,” it’s time to refocus and fix it. It’s time for you to step back, quickly assess the situation, and begin repairing the conversation. Repairs happen in a four-step process. If you’re new to repairs, you’ll likely be conscious of each step. Once you get some practice under your belt, the steps will blend together, and the entire process will feel smooth and seamless.

• Step 1: Take Your Emotions Out of the Driver’s Seat

  • A repair is an act of moving beyond the expression of anger, resentment, and hostility toward the other party. Your first hope for a successful repair lies in your self-awareness. You cannot improve an argument if you are being thrown over a barrel by your emotions. Disagreements bring your emotions rushing to the surface, and you cannot perform a repair unless you understand them. Do not waste time feeling guilty about your feelings. Just focus your energy on understanding them for what they are. If you find your emotions are so strong that it’s hard to think clearly, it is probably best to save the discussion for later. If you’re so emotional that you are getting tunnel vision, feeling sick, or just in a haze, the most successful repair is explaining to the other party that you feel overwhelmed and need some time to cool off and get your thoughts together before continuing. Your argument isn’t going anywhere, so don’t pressure yourself into a discussion when you can’t think clearly.

• Step 2: Take a Look at the Field from the Other Sideline

  • If you are composed enough to have some perspective on the situation, you can initiate the next step in a repair. Focus your thoughts on what things must be like standing in the other person’s shoes. Not what you think they are like; rather, imagine what the other person is thinking and feeling. What’s important to them, and how is that driving their behavior? You can’t launch a successful repair until you fully understand why the other person is doing whatever it is they’re doing. To make a repair, you have to show the other person that you care about how things look from their point of view, even if you do not agree with their perspective. This can’t happen until you actually see their perspective. To do this, you need to let go of the blame and focus on the repair. Do you want to be right, or do you want a resolution? Move beyond thinking of ways you can convince the other party of your opinions, and ask yourself what you can do to honor their feelings. Respecting another’s opinions, right or wrong, is the key to compromise.

• Step 3: Make a Repair and Evaluate Its Effectiveness

  • At this stage, all you can do is craft your repair and give it a whirl. Keep in mind that an effective repair will:
    • Show respect for the other party.
    • Show concern for the other party’s perspective.
    • Find common ground.
    • Be neutral in tone.

• The look of a successful repair is as varied as the problems it can solve. A repair that works in one situation, with one person, may just make things worse in another. Saying, “What exactly do you mean by that?” can sound like you’re minimizing the issues in the middle of one argument and be received as a sign of wanting to make things better in another. To repair successfully, arm yourself with the knowledge that many attempts will crash and burn. Even an empathetic comment like “I understand what you’re saying” can be perceived as belittling if the other party is defensive or not accustomed to you saying this. Be ready to try multiple repairs in a single argument and expect that they will not all go off without a hitch. People with the best skills in repairing disagreements are the ones who try the most often. The more you attempt repairs, the more the other party will be receptive and do the same. Your persistence will pay off because it is a demonstration of your desire to meet in the middle and understand each other.

• Step 4: Discuss Repairs Together

  • Discussing repairs together will also help your relationship. If you can talk about improving your arguments, you are both more likely to initiate repairs the next time you have one. When repair attempts are always one-sided, the relationship usually fails. Both parties need to work toward resolving challenges together. When you talk about repairs, you develop an understanding that they’re important. Even if the other party has trouble making repairs the next time the two of you argue, they will likely recognize your effort and realize it is an attempt to make things better.

TEACHING CHILDREN SELF-LEADERSHIP

• Allow them to experience risk and failure. Success in life is often driven by risk. When parents go overboard protecting their children, they don’t allow them to take risks and reap the consequences. When you aren’t allowed to fail, you don’t understand risk. A person can’t take appropriate risks until they know the bitter taste of failure that comes with risking it all and coming up short. The road to success is paved with failure. When you try to shield your children from failure to boost their self-esteem, they have trouble tolerating the failure required to succeed. Don’t rub their faces in it, either. Children need your support when they fail. They need to know you care. They need to know that you know how much failure stings. Your support allows them to embrace the intensity of the experience and to know that they’ll make it through it all right. That, right there, is solid character building.

• Don’t overpraise. Children need praise to build a healthy sense of self-esteem. Unfortunately, piling on the praise doesn’t give them extra self-esteem. Children need to believe in themselves and develop the self-confidence required to become successful, but gushing every time they put pen to paper or kick a ball (the “everyone gets a trophy” mentality) creates confusion and false confidence. Always show your children how proud you are of their passion and effort. Just don’t paint them as superstars when you know it isn’t true.

• Say no. Overindulging children is a surefire way to limit their development. To succeed, one must be able to delay gratification and work hard for things that are really important. Children need to develop this patience. They need to set goals and experience the joy that comes with working diligently toward them. Saying no to your children will disappoint them momentarily, but they’ll get over that. They’ll never get over being spoiled.

• Let children solve their own problems. There’s a certain self-sufficiency that comes with being a self-leader. When you’re the one making the calls, you should also be the one who needs to stay behind and clean up the mess these create. When parents constantly solve their children’s problems for them, they never develop the critical ability to stand on their own two feet. Children who always have someone swooping in to rescue them and clean up their mess spend their whole lives waiting for this to happen. Leaders take action. They take charge. They’re responsible and accountable. Make certain your children are, as well.

• Don’t obsess about achievement. Parents get sucked into obsessing about achievement because they believe that this will make their children into high achievers. Instead, fixating on achievement creates all sorts of problems for kids. This is especially true when it comes to self-leadership, where focusing on individual achievement gives kids the wrong idea about how things get done. Simply put, the best leaders surround themselves with great people because they know they can’t do it alone. Achievement-obsessed children are so focused on awards and outcomes that they never fully understand this. All they can see is the player who’s handed the MVP trophy and the celebrity CEO who makes the news-they assume it’s all about the individual. It’s a rude awakening once they discover how real life works.

• Walk your talk. Emotionally intelligent self-leaders are transparent and forthcoming. They aren’t perfect, but they earn people’s respect by walking their talk. Your children can develop this quality naturally, but only if it’s something they see you demonstrate. To be authentic, you must be honest in all things, not just in what you say and do but also in who you are. When you walk your talk, your words and actions will align with who you claim to be. Your children will see this and aspire to do the same.

• Show you’re human. No matter how indignant and defiant your children are at any moment, you’re still their hero and their model for the future. This can make you want to hide your past mistakes for fear that they’ll be enticed to repeat them. The opposite is true. When you don’t show any vulnerability, your children develop intense guilt about every failure because they believe that they’re the only ones to make such terrible mistakes. To develop self-leadership, children need to know that the people they look up to aren’t infallible. Leaders must be able to process their mistakes, learn from them, and move forward to be better people. Children can’t do this when they’re overcome by guilt. They need someone-a real, vulnerable person to teach them how to process mistakes and learn from them. When you show them how you’ve done this in the past, you’re doing just that.

Create True Work-Life Balance

• The following items are yours. If you don’t set boundaries around them and learn to say no to your boss, you’re giving away something that has immeasurable value.

• Your family. It’s easy to let your family suffer for your work. Many of us do this because we see our jobs as a means of maintaining our families. We have thoughts such as, “I need to make more money so that my kids can go to college debt free.” Although these thoughts are well-intentioned, they can burden your family with the biggest debt of all—a lack of quality time with you. When you’re on your deathbed, you won’t remember how much money you made for your spouse and kids. You’ll remember the memories you created with them.

• Your sanity. While we all have our own levels of sanity, you don’t owe a shred of it to your employer. A job that takes even a small portion of your sanity is taking more than it’s entitled to. Your sanity is difficult for your boss to keep track of. You have to monitor it on your own and set good limits to keep yourself healthy. Often, it’s your life outside work that keeps you sane. When you’ve already put in a good day’s (or week’s) work, and your boss wants more, the most productive thing you can do is say no, and then go and enjoy your friends and hobbies. This way, you return to work refreshed and de- stressed. You certainly can work extra hours if you want to, but it’s important to say no to your boss when you need time away from work.

• Your health. It’s difficult to know when to set boundaries around your health at work because the decline is so gradual. Allowing stress to build up, losing sleep, and sitting all day without exercising all add up. Before you know it, you’re rubbing your aching back with one hand and your zombie-like eyes with the other, and you’re looking down at your belly. The key is not to let things sneak up on you. The way you do that is by maintaining a routine. Think about what you need to do to keep yourself healthy (taking walks during lunch, not working weekends, taking your vacations as scheduled, etc.), make a plan, and stick to it, no matter what. If you don’t, you’re allowing your work to overstep its bounds.

• Your contacts. Although you do owe your employer your best effort, you certainly don’t owe them the contacts you’ve developed over the course of your career. Your contacts are a product of your hard work and effort, and although you might share them with your company, they belong to you.

• Your identity. Your work is an important part of your identity, but it’s dangerous to allow it to become your whole identity. You know you’ve allowed this to go too far when you reflect on what’s important to you, and work is all that (or most of what) comes to mind. Having an identity outside of work is about more than just having fun. It also helps you relieve stress, grow as a person, and avoid burnout.

• Your integrity. Sacrificing your integrity causes massive amounts of stress. Once you realize that your actions and beliefs no longer align, it’s time to make it clear to your employer that you’re not willing to do things their way. If that’s a problem for your boss, it might be time to part ways.

ARE YOU BURNING OUT?

• Burnout often results from a misalignment of input and output: You get burnt out when you feel like you’re putting more into your work than you’re getting out of it. Sometimes, this happens when a job isn’t rewarding, but more often than not, it’s because you aren’t taking care of yourself. Before you can treat and even prevent burnout, recognize the following warning signs so that you’ll know when it’s time to take action.

• Cognitive difficulties. Research shows that stress hammers your pre-frontal cortex, the part of your brain responsible for executive function. Executive function impacts your memory, decision-making abilities, emotional control, and focus. When you notice that you’re making silly mistakes, forgetting important things, having outbursts of emotion, or making poor decisions, you’re likely burning out.

• Difficulty with work and personal relationships. Stress bleeds over into everything you do, particularly how you interact with people. Even when you feel that you’re keeping your stress under control at work, it can rear its ugly head at home. Often, it’s your relationships that suffer. Stress makes many people more likely to snap at others, lose their cool, and become involved in silly, unnecessary conflicts. Others are more inclined to withdraw and avoid the people they care about.

• Fatigue. Burnout often leads to exhaustion because of the toll that stress takes on your mind and body. The hallmarks of burnout fatigue are waking up with no energy after a good night’s sleep, drinking large amounts of caffeine to get you through the day, or having trouble staying awake at work.

• Health problems. Burnout has a massive, negative impact on your physical and mental health. Whether you’re experiencing back pain, depression, heart disease, or obesity, or you’re just getting sick a lot, consider the role your work plays in this. You’ll know when burnout is affecting your health, and you’ll have to decide whether your approach to work is worth the consequences.

• Negativity. Burnout can turn you very negative even when you’re usually a positive person. If you find yourself focusing on the downside of situations, judging others, and feeling cynical, it’s clear that negativity has taken hold, and it’s time for you to do something about it.

• Decreased satisfaction. Burnout almost always leads to a nagging sense of dissatisfaction. Projects and people who used to get you excited no longer do so. This dip in satisfaction makes work very difficult, because no matter what you’re putting into your job, you don’t feel like you’re getting much out of it.

• Lost motivation. We begin jobs in a honeymoon phase, seeing everything through rose-colored glasses. When you’re in this phase, motivation comes naturally. When you’re burnt out, you struggle to find the motivation to get the job done. You may complete tasks, and even complete them well, but the motivation that used to drive you is gone. Instead of doing work for the sake of the work itself, your motivation stems from fear of missing deadlines, letting people down, or getting fired.

Taking your work home with you. You know that sickening feeling when you’re lying in bed thinking about all the work that you didn’t get done and hoping that you didn’t miss something important? When you can’t stop thinking about work when you’re at home, it’s a strong sign that you’re burning out.

• Performance issues. People who burn out are often high achievers, so when their performance begins to slip, others don’t always notice. It’s crucial to monitor your slippage. How were you performing a month ago? Six months ago? A year ago? If you see a dip in your performance, it’s time to determine if burnout is behind it.

• Poor self-care. Life is a constant struggle against the things that feel good momentarily but aren’t good for you. When you experience burnout, your self-control wanes, and you find yourself succumbing to temptations more easily. This is largely due to the way that stress compromises your decision-making and self-control and partially due to lower levels of confidence and motivation.

FIGHTING BURNOUT

• Disconnect. Disconnecting is the most important burnout strategy on this list. If you can’t find time to remove yourself electronically from your work, then you’ve never really left work. If taking the entire evening or weekend off from handling work emails and calls isn’t realistic, try designating specific times to check on emails and respond to voicemails. For example, on weekday evenings, you might check emails once after dinner, and on the weekend, you might check your messages on Sunday morning before everyone is up. Scheduling such specific and short blocks of time alleviates stress without completely sacrificing your availability.

• Schedule relaxation. It’s just as important to plan your relaxation time as it is to plan when you work. Even scheduling something as simple as “read for 30 minutes” benefits you greatly. Scheduling relaxing activities makes certain they happen as well as gives you something to look forward to.

• Pay attention to your body’s signals. It’s easy to think that a headache is the result of dehydration, that a stomachache is the result of something you ate, and that an aching neck is from sleeping on it wrong, but that’s not always the case. Often, aches and pains are an accumulation of stress and anxiety. Burnout manifests in your body, so learn to pay attention to your body’s signals so that you can nip burnout in the bud. Your body is always talking, but you have to listen.

• Get organized. Much of the stress we experience on a daily basis doesn’t stem from having too much work; it stems from being too disorganized to handle the work effectively. When you take the time to get organized, the load feels much more manageable.

Take regular breaks during the workday. Physiologically, we work best in spurts of 60 to 90 minutes, followed by 15- minute breaks (more on that later). If you wait until you feel tired to take a break, it’s too late-you’ve already missed the window of peak productivity and tired yourself unnecessarily in the process. Keeping to a schedule ensures that you work when you’re the most productive and that you rest during times that would otherwise be unproductive.

• Lean on your support system. It’s tempting to withdraw from other people when you’re feeling stressed, but they can be powerful allies in the war against burnout. Sympathetic family and friends are capable of helping you. Spending time with people who care about you helps you remove yourself from the stresses of work and reminds you to live a little and have fun.

DITCH THE TRADITIONAL EIGHT-HOUR WORKDAY

• What mattered was how people structured their day. In particular, people who were religious about taking short breaks were far more productive than those who worked longer hours. The ideal work-to-break ratio was 52 minutes of work followed by 17 minutes of rest. People who maintained this schedule had a unique level of focus in their work. For roughly an hour at a time, they were 100% dedicated to the task they needed to accomplish. They didn’t check Facebook “real quick” or get distracted by emails. When they felt fatigue (again, after about an hour), they took short breaks, during which they completely separated themselves from their work. This helped them to dive back in refreshed for another productive hour of work.

• Real breaks are easier to take when you know they’re going to make your day more productive. We often let fatigue win because we continue working through it (long after we’ve lost energy and focus), and the breaks we take aren’t real breaks (checking your email and watching YouTube doesn’t recharge you the same way taking a walk does). The eight- hour workday can work for you if you break your time into strategic intervals. Once you align your natural energy with your effort, things begin to run much more smoothly. The following four habits will get you into that perfect rhythm.

• Break your day into hourly intervals. We naturally plan what we need to accomplish by the end of the day, the week, or the month, but we’re far more effective when we focus on what we can accomplish right now. Beyond getting you into the right rhythm, planning your day around hour-long intervals simplifies daunting tasks by breaking them into manageable pieces. If you want to be a literalist, you can plan your day around 52-minute intervals if you like, but 60 minutes works just as well.

• Respect your hour. The interval strategy works only because we use our peak energy levels to reach an extremely high level of focus for a relatively short amount of time. When you disrespect your hour by texting, checking emails, or doing a quick Facebook check, you defeat the entire purpose of the approach.

• Take real rest. In the study conducted by the Draugiem Group, they found that employees who took more frequent rests than the hourly optimum were more productive than those who didn’t rest at all. Similarly, those who took deliberately relaxing breaks were better off than those who, when “resting,” had trouble separating themselves from their work. Getting away from your computer, your phone, and your to-do list is essential to boost your productivity and sanity. Breaks such as walking, reading, and chatting are the most effective forms of recharging because they take you away from your work. On a busy day, it might be tempting to think of dealing with emails or making phone calls as breaks, but they aren’t, so don’t give in to this line of thought.

• Don’t wait until your body tells you to take a break. If you wait until you feel tired to take a break, it’s too late-you’ve already missed the window of peak productivity. Keeping to your schedule ensures that you work when you’re the most productive and that you rest during times that would otherwise be unproductive. Remember, it’s far more productive to rest for short periods than to keep working when you’re tired and distracted.

Become a Great Leader

• Do you go above and beyond?

  • Followers do their jobs, and that’s it. No matter how good they may be at those jobs, it rarely occurs to them to go beyond their basic functions. Leaders, however, see their job descriptions as the bare minimum the foundation on which they build greatness. Leaders see their real role as adding value, and they add it whenever and wherever they see an opportunity.

• Are you confident?

  • Followers see the talents and accomplishments of other people as a threat. Leaders see those talents and accomplishments as an asset. Leaders want to make things better, and they’ll take help anywhere they can find it. Leaders are true team players. They aren’t afraid to admit that they need other people to be strong where they’re weak.

• Are you optimistic?

  • Followers see the limitations inherent in any situation; leaders see the possibilities. When things go wrong, leaders don’t dwell on how bad things are. They’re too busy trying to make things better.

• Are you open to change?

  • Followers are content to stick with the safety of the status quo. They see change as frightening and troublesome. Leaders are maximizers who see opportunity in change. Because leaders want constant improvement, they’re never afraid to ask, “What’s next?”

• Are you decisive?

  • Followers often hesitate to act, out of fear that they’ll do the wrong thing. Leaders aren’t afraid to make a call, even when they’re not sure if it’s the right one. They’d rather make a decision and be wrong than suffer from the paralysis of indecision.

• Are you accountable?

  • When mistakes are made, followers are quick to blame their circumstances and other people. Leaders, however, are quick to accept accountability for their actions. They don’t worry that admitting fault might make them look bad, because they know that shifting the blame would just make them look worse.

• Are you unflappable?

  • Followers often let obstacles and mishaps throw them off course. When something goes wrong, they assume the whole project is doomed. Leaders expect obstacles and love to be challenged. They know that even the best-laid plans can run into unexpected problems, so they take problems in stride and stay the course.

• Are you humble?

  • Followers are always chasing glory. Leaders are humble. They don’t allow any authority they may have to make them feel that they are better than anyone else. Thus, they don’t hesitate to jump in and do the dirty work when needed, and they won’t ask anyone to do anything they wouldn’t be willing to do themselves.

• Are you passionate?

  • Followers are trapped in the daily grind. They go to work and complete their tasks so that they can go home at the end of the day and resume their real lives. Leaders love what they do and see their work as an important part of not a weak substitute for real life. Their job isn’t just what they do; it’s an important part of who they are.

• Are you motivated from within?

  • Followers are motivated only by external factors: the next title, the next raise, the next gain in status. Leaders are internally motivated. They don’t work for status or possessions. They are motivated to excel because it’s who they are. True leaders keep pushing forward, even when there’s no carrot dangling in front of them.

• Do you focus on titles?

  • Followers care a lot about titles, both their own and those of the people they work with. They’re very conscious of who outranks whom because they lack the skill and motivation to create leadership from within. Leaders, however, focus on what each individual brings to the table, regardless of what’s printed on a business card.

• Are you focused on people?

  • Followers focus on what they can achieve individually. Leaders are team players because they know that greatness is a collective feat. A leader is only as good as what they can achieve through other people.

• Are you willing to learn?

  • Leaders, although confident, know that they’re neither superhuman nor infallible. They’re not afraid to admit when they don’t know something, and they’re willing to learn from anyone who can teach them, whether that person is a subordinate, a peer, or a superior. Followers are too busy trying to prove that they’re competent to learn anything from anyone else.

THE DEFINING HABITS OF GREAT LEADERS

• When I ask audiences to describe the best and worst leaders they’ve worked for, they inevitably ignore innate characteristics (intelligence, extraversion, attractiveness, etc.) and instead focus on qualities that are completely under the leader’s control, such as passion, insight, and honesty. Most of the habits they describe are products of emotional intelligence. This means that all of us can study the unique habits of great leaders and learn and improve. Great leadership is founded on good habits. Through a leader’s actions (what they do and say on a daily basis), the essence of their leadership becomes apparent. Behavior can change, and leaders who work to improve their habits get results. The following are the essential habits that exceptional leaders rely on every day. Give them a try and see where they take your leadership skills.

• Great leaders are passionate. Few things are more demotivating than a leader who is bored with their life and job. If the boss doesn’t care, why should anybody else? Great leaders are passionate about what they do. They believe in what they’re trying to accomplish, and they have fun doing it. This makes everyone else want to join the ride. Passion and enthusiasm are contagious. So are boredom and apathy. No one wants to work for a boss who’s unexcited about their job, or one who’s just going through the motions.

• Great leaders play chess, not checkers. Think about the difference. In checkers, all the pieces are basically the same. That’s a poor model for leadership, because nobody wants to feel like a faceless cog in the proverbial wheel. In chess, however, each piece has a unique role, unique abilities, and unique limitations. Great leaders are like great chess masters. They recognize what’s unique about each member of their team. They know their strengths, weaknesses, likes, and dislikes, and they use these insights to draw the very best from each individual.

• They are a port in a storm. Great leaders don’t get rattled, even when everything is going haywire. Under immense pressure, they act like Eugene Kranz, flight director for the Apollo 13 mission. In the moments after the explosion, when death looked certain, and panic seemed like the only option, Kranz kept his cool, saying, “Okay, now, let’s everybody keep cool. Let’s solve the problem, but let’s not make it any worse by guessing.” In those initial moments, he had no idea how they were going to get the astronauts home, but as he later explained, “You do not pass uncertainty down to your team members.” People who’ve worked for a great leader often look back later and

marvel at their coolness under pressure. That’s why, more than 50 years after Apollo 13, people are still talking about Eugene Kranz and his leadership during that crisis.

• They are who they are all the time. Great leaders don’t lie to cover up their mistakes, and they don’t make false promises. Their people don’t have to exert energy trying to figure out their motives or predict what they’re going to do next. Equally important, they don’t hide things they have the freedom to disclose. Instead of hoarding information and being secretive to boost their own power, they share information and knowledge generously. Have you ever worked for an information hoarder? Some bosses seem to think that every piece of information they share reduces their authority. In fact, just the opposite is true: Great bosses know that sharing information empowers their employees, instead of diluting their own power.

• They are empathetic. Bad leaders see their employees only from the perspective of how they reflect on them. If their employees are doing a great job, they look good; if their employees are performing poorly, they look bad. Great leaders, however, see their employees as more than just extensions of themselves. They’re able to get inside their employees’ skins and understand things from their perspective. That doesn’t mean they’re pushovers, or that they just say, “Oh, sorry you’re having a bad day; don’t worry about that deadline.” But it does mean that they recognize that their employees are human and treat them as such.

• They look for and celebrate wins. Bad leaders think the work their employees do is something the employees owe them. After all, they’re getting paychecks, right? That’s true-but great leaders look past work as a transactional relationship and realize that people are putting a huge part of themselves into the work they do. They say thank you, even if it is “just part of the job.” Great leaders don’t have a “Why should I praise you for doing your job?” attitude. They look for reasons to praise their employees, both privately and publicly, and they take the time to celebrate milestones, instead of just driving everybody on to the next project or deadline. They understand that getting a paycheck doesn’t cancel out that inherent need to feel valued and appreciated.

• They create a sense of purpose. Whereas vision is a clear idea of where you’re going, a sense of purpose refers to an understanding of why you’re going there. People like to feel like they’re part of something bigger than themselves. Great leaders give people that feeling. I think Ken Kesey said it well: “You don’t lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case.”

• They are accountable. Bad leaders are quick to point their fingers when something goes wrong. Great leaders understand that a large part of their job is being accountable for the team’s performance. They know that this just goes along with accepting a leadership role. That doesn’t mean that they don’t offer the team feedback on what’s going wrong, but it does mean that they take the blame publicly. Even privately, they see the team’s failure as a failure of leadership on their part, and they act quickly to correct it.

• They are approachable. You know those people who have time for you only if you can do something for them? Great leaders truly believe that everyone, regardless of rank or ability, is worth their time and attention. They make everyone feel valuable because they believe that everyone is valuable. Great leaders make it clear that they welcome challenges, criticism, and viewpoints other than their own. They know that an environment in which people are afraid to speak up, offer insight, and ask good questions is destined for failure. By ensuring that they’re approachable, great leaders facilitate the flow of great ideas throughout the organization.

• They’re self-aware. Leaders’ gaps in self-awareness are rarely because they’re deceitful, have Machiavellian motives, or have severe character deficits. In most cases, leaders-like everyone else-view themselves in a more favorable light than other people do. Self- awareness is the foundation of emotional intelligence, a skill that 90% of top-performing leaders possess in abundance. Great leaders’ high self-awareness means they have a clear and accurate image not only of their leadership style but also of their own strengths and weaknesses. They know where they shine and where they’re weak, and they have effective strategies for leaning into their strengths and compensating for their weaknesses.

• They respect your time. Great leaders don’t give you the impression that their time is more valuable than yours. They don’t keep you waiting for scheduled meetings. They show up prepared and get to the point, instead of trying to impress you. And they don’t goof off on your time. It’s not that they’re unwilling to have fun at work, but they don’t do it at your expense, causing you extra stress or making it necessary for you to stay late to catch up.

• They don’t forget that people have lives outside of work. Bad leaders tend to see people as one-dimensional: They show up and get the work done, and the boss doesn’t have to worry about them again until the next day. Great leaders, however, never forget that work is just one facet of their employees’ lives. They never forget that they have families, friends, hobbies, and other interests and obligations outside of work, and they don’t infringe on their “real” lives by asking someone to work late, for example without a very good reason. And when they do have a good reason, they acknowledge that they’re asking for a sacrifice and express their gratitude accordingly.

• They create leaders. Have you ever noticed how sometimes all the promotions come from within one manager’s team? That’s no accident. Great leaders pull the very best out of their people. They inspire, coach, and lean into people’s strengths, and when their employees are ready for new challenges, they gladly send them on their way.

GREAT LEADERS’ HABITS ARE DRIVEN BY THEIR BELIEFS

• Growth should be encouraged, not feared. Average bosses fear their smartest, hardest-working employees, believing that these individuals will surpass them or make them look bad. They hesitate to share information or to enable authority. Exceptional bosses, however, love to see their employees grow. They’re always grooming their replacements and doing whatever they can to create leaders. Research shows that the number one thing job seekers look for in a position is growth opportunity and that 80% of all job growth occurs informally, such as in conversations with managers. Great leaders want their best employees to maximize their potential, and they know that good feedback and guidance are invaluable.

• Employees are equals, not subordinates. Ordinary bosses treat their employees like children; they believe that they need constant oversight. These bosses think that their role is to enforce rules, make sure things run their way, and watch over people’s shoulders for mistakes. Great leaders see employees as peers who are perfectly capable of making decisions for themselves. Rather than constantly stepping in, great leaders make it clear that they value and trust their employees’ work and intervene only when it’s absolutely necessary.

• Diversity, not like-mindedness, bears fruit. Average bosses want their employees’ ideas to align with their own, and because of this, they try to hire like-minded individuals. They encourage their employees to think similarly and reward those who “just put their heads down and work.” Exceptional leaders actively seek out a diverse range of individuals and ideas. They expose themselves and their companies to new ways of thinking.

• Motivation comes from inspiration, not agony. Ordinary bosses think that strict rules and rule enforcement drive employees to work effectively. They believe that people need to fear layoffs, explosions of anger, and punishment in order to operate at 100%. People then find themselves in survival mode, where they don’t care about the product, the company, or the customer experience; they care only about keeping their jobs and appeasing their boss. Great leaders motivate through inspiration—they know that people will respond to their infectious energy, vision, and passion more than anything else.

• Knowledge should be constantly pursued. Great leaders know more than others do because they’re constantly working to improve. They vow constant growth. Whenever they have a spare moment, they fill it with self-education. They don’t do this because it’s “the right thing to do”; they do it because it’s their passion. They believe in it. They’re always looking for opportunities to improve and new things to learn about themselves and the world around them.

• Change is an opportunity, not a curse. Ordinary bosses operate by the motto, “This is the way we’ve always done it.” They believe that change is unnecessary and that it causes more harm than good. Exceptional leaders see change as an opportunity for improvement. They constantly adapt their approach and embrace change to stay ahead of the curve.

GREAT LEADERS FOCUS ON RESULTS AND PEOPLE

• Leaders who can focus equally on results and people motivate people to be their best without losing sight of the bigger picture. This balance enables them to achieve extraordinary results because they do six things that few other leaders are able to accomplish.

• They put the right team of people together to execute a plan. Putting together a good plan of attack can require a heavy-handed focus on results. You have to foresee obstacles, find the right approach, and then make certain you have the right people to make it happen. Many good leaders out there are capable of putting together a perfect plan. However, it takes a great leader to actually pull a motivated team of people together who can execute that plan and are interested in doing so. Leaders capable of blending a people focus into their results- oriented plans select the ideal people and know their strengths and weaknesses and how these can be made to work together.

• They deliver feedback flawlessly. It takes a tactful leader to deliver feedback that is accurate and objective but also considerate and inspirational. Leaders who are balanced know how to take into account the feelings and perspectives of their employees while still delivering the message they need to hear in order to improve.

• They solve problems as a team. Research shows that poorly structured meetings stifle creativity and hinder teams from reaching good solutions. Often, this is because people either yield to the most outspoken member of the team, are afraid to share their opinions, or don’t know how to effectively critique others’ ideas. When results-focused leaders bring a people-focused mentality to the table, they create the right environment for new ideas to thrive. These leaders are able to draw out as many good ideas from their team as possible while prudently steering a process that creates workable solutions. Their work is truly a team effort, and their people feel accomplished when group goals are met.

• They sacrifice themselves for their people. Some leaders throw their people under the bus without a second thought. Great leaders pull their people from the bus’s path before they’re in danger. They coach, and they move obstacles out of the way, even if their people put those obstacles there in the first place. Sometimes they clean up messes their people never even knew they made. If they can’t stop the bus, they’ll jump out in front of it and take the hit themselves. The best leaders will do anything for their teams, and they have their people’s backs, no matter what. They don’t try to shift blame, and they don’t avoid shame when they fail. They’re never afraid to say, “The buck stops here,” and they earn people’s trust by backing them up.

• They hire the best employees. The foundation of any good company is a great hiring system. Effective hiring leads to high levels of performance, a strong workplace culture, and a high retention rate. We’ve all seen new hires who are brilliant but a horrible fit socially. Bad leaders think nothing of hiring a jerk with great credentials because they’re only interested in how that person will perform. Likewise, we’ve all experienced the new hire who fits in socially and makes friends but who doesn’t produce quality work. Great leaders know how to find employees who do their jobs effectively and are good social and cultural fits. This kind of hire builds morale and improves your bottom line. Great leaders think of the entire team. They recognize that their current employees are going to have to work with the new hire every single day, and they look for someone who will complement the team holistically rather than just fill in a certain skills gap.

• They balance work and fun. There are plenty of bosses out there who know how to have fun. Unfortunately, this is often at the expense of results. And for every boss out there who has a bit too much fun, there’s one who doesn’t know how to have any fun at all. It takes a balanced leader to know how to motivate and push employees to be their best but to also have the wherewithal to slow it down at the appropriate time in order to celebrate results and have fun. This balance prevents burnout, builds a great culture, and gets results. Great leaders love their jobs and believe that everyone else can, too. They give people assignments that align with their strengths, passions, and talents. They celebrate accomplishments and douse people with positive feedback when they do good work.

GREAT LEADERS ARE GREAT COMMUNICATORS

• They know their audience. Great communicators don’t worry about sounding important, showing off their expertise, or boosting their own egos. Instead, they think about what people need to hear, and how they can deliver this message so that people can hear it. This doesn’t mean that leaders tell people what they want to hear. Quite the opposite-they tell people what’s important for them to know, even if it’s bad news.

• Their vision is infectious. Great leaders know that having a clear vision isn’t enough. You have to make that vision come alive so that your followers can see it as clearly as you do. Great leaders do that by telling stories and painting verbal pictures so that everyone can understand not just where they’re going, but what it will look and feel like when they get there. This inspires others to internalize the vision and make it their own.

• They are experts in body language. Great communicators are constantly tracking people’s reactions to their message. They are quick to pick up on cues like facial expressions and body language because they know this is the only feedback many people will give them. Deference to authority is common, and many times, body language is the only way for a leader to know what people really think. Great communicators use this expertise to tailor their message on the fly and adjust their communication style as needed. The chapter on reading body language in the first section will help you with this.

• They are honest. The best leaders know that for communication to be effective, it has to be real. They can’t have people parsing every word, trying to separate fact from spin. When great communicators can’t share certain information, they come right out and say it, because makeshift, half-truth answers breed distrust and anxiety. In good times and bad, honesty builds trust. Great leaders trust that honesty and integrity, although painful at times, always work out for the best in the long run. They know that honesty allows for genuine connections with people in a way that dishonesty can’t, and that lying always comes back to bite you in the end.

• They are human, and they aren’t afraid to show it. Great leaders are personable and easy to relate to. They’re warm. They realize that people have emotions, and they aren’t afraid to express their own. They relate to their people as a person first and a boss second.

They speak to groups as individuals. Leaders rarely have the luxury of speaking to one person at a time. Whether it’s a huddle around a conference table or an overflowing auditorium, great leaders know how to work the room and make every person feel as if they’re being spoken to directly. They make people feel like they’re having a one-on-one conversation, as if they’re the only person in the room who matters. And for that moment, they are. Great leaders communicate on a very personal and emotional level. They never forget that there’s a flesh-and-blood human being standing in front of them.

• They are authentic. Great communicators don’t try to be someone they’re not just because they’ve stepped behind a podium. Great leaders know that when they stay true to who they are, people gravitate toward their message. They also know that the opposite happens when leaders put on an act. Authenticity refers to being honest in all things-not just what you say and do, but who you are. When you’re authentic, your words and actions align with who you claim to be. Your followers shouldn’t be compelled to spend time trying to figure out if you have ulterior motives. Any time they spend doing so erodes their confidence in you and their ability to execute. Leaders who are authentic are transparent and forthcoming. They aren’t perfect, but they earn people’s respect by walking their talk. The chapter on authenticity in the first section will help you to live as authentically as possible.

• They speak with authority. Great communicators don’t try to cover their backs by being ambiguous, wishy-washy, or unassertive. Instead, they stick their necks out and speak very directly about how things are and how they need to be.

They’re proactive. Leaders with the best communication skills don’t waste time playing catch-up. They’re quick to head off the rumor mill by sharing bad news in a timely manner. They also give clear, concise goals and directions, so people don’t waste their time heading in the wrong direction.

• They have ears (and they use them). Great leaders know that communication is a two-way street, and what they hear is often more important than what they say. When someone else is speaking, great communicators aren’t thinking ahead and planning what they’ll

say next. Instead, they’re actively listening and fully focused on understanding the other person’s perspective.

• They use phrases like “It’s my fault,” “I was wrong,” and “I’m sorry.” When great leaders make a mistake, they admit it right away. They don’t wait for someone else to find and point out their blunder. They model accountability through their words and actions, even when they could have easily “gotten away” with the mistake. And they do it matter-of-factly, without drama or false humility.

• They solicit feedback. The best communicators never assume that the message people hear is the one they intended to deliver. They check in to verify that their message was understood, and if it wasn’t, they don’t blame the audience. Instead, they change things up and try again.

GREAT LEADERS ARE LIKEABLE

• They’re kind without being weak. One of the toughest things for leaders to master is kindness. It’s a balancing act, and the key to finding balance is to recognize that true kindness is inherently strong-it’s direct and straightforward. Telling people the difficult truth they need to hear is much kinder than protecting them (or yourself) from a difficult conversation. This is weak. Moreover, true kindness doesn’t come with expectations. Kindness is thin when you use it in a self-serving manner-people can see right through kindness when a kind leader has an agenda.

• They’re strong without being harsh. Strength is an important quality in a leader. People wait to see if a leader is strong before they decide to follow their lead or not. People need courage in their leaders. They need someone who can make difficult decisions and watch over the good of the group. They need a leader who will stay the course when things get tough. People are far more likely to show strength when their leader does the same. For the courageous leader, adversity is a welcome test. Like a blacksmith’s molding of a red-hot iron, adversity is a trial by fire that refines leaders and sharpens their game. Adversity emboldens courageous leaders and leaves them more committed to their strategic direction. Leaders who lack courage simply toe the company line. They follow the safest path-the path of least resistance because they’d rather cover their backside than lead.

  • Many leaders mistake domineering, controlling, and otherwise harsh behavior for strength. They think that taking control and pushing people around will somehow inspire a loyal following. Strength isn’t something you can force on people; it’s something you earn by demonstrating it time and again in the face of adversity. Only then will people trust that they should follow you.

• They’re confident without being cocky. We gravitate to confident leaders because confidence is contagious, and it helps us believe that there are great things in store. The trick, as a leader, is to make certain your confidence doesn’t slip into arrogance and cockiness. Confidence is about passion and belief in your ability to make things happen, but when your confidence loses touch with reality, you begin to think that you can do things you can’t and have done things you haven’t. Suddenly, it’s all about you. This arrogance makes you lose credibility.

  • Great, confident leaders are still humble. They don’t allow their accomplishments and position of authority to make them feel that they’re better than anyone else. Thus, they don’t hesitate to jump in and do the dirty work when needed, and they don’t ask their followers to do anything they aren’t willing to do themselves. The chapter on confidence in the first section will help you with your confidence.

• They stay positive but remain realistic. Another major challenge that leaders face is finding the balance between keeping things positive and being realistic. Think of a sailboat with three people aboard: a pessimist, an optimist, and a great leader. Everything is going smoothly until the wind suddenly sours. The pessimist throws their hands up and complains about the wind; the optimist sits back, saying that things will improve; but the great leader says, “We can do this!,” and they adjust the sails and keep the ship moving forward. The right combination of positivity and realism is what keeps things moving forward.

  • Likeable leaders maintain a positive outlook, and this shows in how they describe things. They don’t have to give a presentation to the board of directors; they get to share their vision and ideas with the board. They don’t have to go on a plant tour; they get to meet and visit with the people who make their company’s products. They don’t even have to diet; they get to experience the benefits of eating healthfully. Even in undeniably negative situations, likeable leaders emanate an enthusiastic hope for the future, a confidence that they can help make tomorrow better than today. Likeable leaders see this brighter future with crystal clarity, and they have the energy and enthusiasm to ensure that everyone else can see it, too. Their belief in the good is contagious.

• They have substance. Daniel Quinn said, “Charisma only wins people’s attention. Once you have their attention, you have to have something to tell them.” Likeable leaders understand that their knowledge and expertise are critical to the success of everyone who follows them. Therefore, they regularly connect with people to share their substance (as opposed to superficial small talk). Likeable leaders don’t puff themselves up or pretend to be something they’re not, because they don’t have to. They have substance, and they share it with their people.

• They’re role models, not preachers. Likeable leaders inspire trust and admiration through their actions, not just through their words. Many leaders say that integrity is important to them, but great leaders walk their talk by demonstrating integrity every day. Harping on people all day long about the behavior you want to see has a tiny fraction of the impact you achieve by demonstrating that behavior yourself.

• They’re graceful. Graceful people are the perfect combination of strong and gentle. They don’t resort to intimidation, anger, or

manipulation to get a point across, because their gentle, self-assured nature gets the job done. The word gentle often carries a negative connotation (especially in the workplace), but in reality, it’s the gentleness of being graceful that gives likeable leaders their power. They’re accessible, affable, and easy to get along with all qualities that make people highly amenable to their ideas.

• They’re generous. We’ve all worked for someone who constantly holds something back, whether it’s knowledge or resources. They act as if they’re afraid you’ll outshine them if they give you access to everything you need to do your job. Likeable leaders are unfailingly generous with whom they know, what they know, and the resources they have access to. They share credit and offer enthusiastic praise. They want to inspire all of their employees to achieve their personal best not just because it will make the team more successful, but because they care about each person as an individual. They want you to do well more than anything else because they understand that this is their job as a leader and because they’re confident enough to never worry that your success might make them look bad. In fact, they believe that your success is their success.

• They appreciate potential. Robert Brault said, “Charisma is not so much getting people to like you as getting people to like themselves when you’re around.” Likeable leaders not only see the best in their people but also make sure that everyone else sees it, too. They draw out people’s talents so that everyone is bettering themselves and the work at hand.

Make Your Workplace a Better Place

• To prevent brownout and retain top talent, companies and managers should understand what they’re doing that contributes to this slow fade. The following practices are the worst offenders, and you should abolish them if you’re going to hang on to good employees.

• They create a lot of stupid rules. Companies need to have rules (that’s a given), but they don’t have to be shortsighted and lazy attempts at creating order. Whether it’s an overzealous attendance policy or restricting what people can place on their desks, even a couple of unnecessary rules can drive people crazy. When good employees feel like Big Brother is watching, they’ll find someplace else to work. I understand the temptation. As TalentSmartEQ grew rapidly in the early years, so did our difficulty maintaining standards. There were many instances in which someone crossed a line, and we were tempted to respond with a new rule that applied to everyone. But that’s where most companies blow it. In just about every instance, upon closer inspection, we realized that establishing a new rule would be a passive and morale-killing way to address the problem. The vast majority of the time, the problem needs to be handled one-on-one by the employee’s manager. When companies create ridiculous and demoralizing rules to halt the outlandish behavior of a few individuals, it’s a management problem. There’s no sense in alienating your entire workforce because you don’t know how to manage performance. It makes a bad situation that much worse.

• They don’t recognize accomplishments. It’s easy to underestimate the power of a pat on the back, especially for top performers who are intrinsically motivated. Everyone likes kudos-none more so than those who work hard and give their all. Rewarding individual accomplishments shows that you’re paying attention. Managers need to communicate with their people to find out what makes them feel good (for some, it’s a raise; for others, it’s public recognition) and then reward them for a job well done. For top performers, this will happen often if you’re doing it right.

• They restrict Internet use. There are certain sites that no one should visit at work, and I’m not talking about Facebook. But once you block pornography and the other obvious stuff, it’s a difficult and arbitrary process to decide where to draw the line. Most companies draw it in the wrong place. People should be able to kill time on the Internet during breaks. When companies unnecessarily restrict people’s Internet activity, it does more than demoralize those who can’t check Facebook; it limits people’s ability to do their jobs. Many companies restrict Internet activity so heavily that it makes it difficult for people to conduct online research. The most obvious example? Checking the Facebook profile of someone you just interviewed.

• They treat everyone equally. Although this tactic works with school-children, the workplace ought to function differently. Treating everyone equally shows your top performers that no matter how well they perform (and, typically, top performers are workhorses), they’ll be treated the same as someone who barely manages to punch the clock.

• They have ridiculous requirements for attendance, leave, and time off. Salaried employees are paid for the work they do, not the specific hours they sit at their desks. When you ding salaried employees for showing up five minutes late, although they routinely stay late and put in time on the weekend, you send the message that policies take precedence over performance. It reeks of distrust, and you should never put someone on salary you don’t trust. Likewise, when companies are unnecessarily strict in requiring documentation for bereavement and medical leave, it leaves a sour taste in the mouths of employees who deserve better. After all, if you have employees who fake a death to miss a day’s work, what does that say about your company?

• They tolerate poor performance. It’s said that in jazz bands, the band is only as good as the worst player; no matter how great some members may be, everyone hears the worst player. The same goes for a company. When you permit weak links to exist without consequence, they drag everyone else down, especially top performers.

• They don’t let people pursue their passions. Google mandates that employees spend at least 20% of their time doing “what they believe will benefit Google most.” Although these passion projects have made major contributions to marquee Google products, such as Gmail and AdSense, their biggest impact is in creating highly engaged Googlers. Talented employees are passionate. Providing opportunities for employees to pursue their passions improves their productivity and job satisfaction, but many managers want people to work within a little box. These managers fear that productivity will decline if they let people expand their focus and pursue their passions. This fear is unfounded. Studies have shown that people who are able to pursue their passions at work experience flow, a euphoric state of mind that is five times more productive than the norm.

• They ban mobile phones. If I ban mobile phones in the office, no one will waste time texting and talking to family and friends, right? Yeah, right. Organizations need to do the difficult work of hiring people who are trustworthy and who won’t take advantage. They also need to train managers to deal effectively with employees who underperform and/or violate expectations (such as spending too much time on their phones). This is also hard work, but it’s worth it. The easy, knee-jerk alternative (banning phones) demoralizes good employees who need to check their phones periodically due to pressing family or health issues or as an appropriate break from work.

• They don’t show people the big picture. It may seem efficient to simply send employees assignments and move on, but omitting the big picture is a dealbreaker for star performers. Star performers shoulder heavier loads because they genuinely care about their work, so their work must have a purpose. When they don’t know what that is, they feel alienated and aimless. When they aren’t given a purpose, they find one elsewhere.

• They steal employees’ frequent-flyer miles. If there’s one thing that road-weary traveling employees earn, it’s their frequent-flyer miles. When employers don’t let people keep their miles for personal use, it’s a greedy move that fuels resentment with every flight. Work travel is a major sacrifice of time, energy, and sanity. Taking employees’ miles sends the message that you don’t appreciate their sacrifice and that you’ll hold on to every last dollar at their expense.

• People don’t help each other out. There’s a big difference between delegating responsibility and abdicating it. A boss who abdicates responsibility thinks that it’s your problem, not theirs, and that you alone are responsible for solving it. However, researchers have shown that managers who support their employees in tasks that they delegate produce better team players who are more willing to help others and are more committed to their jobs.

• They make failed attempts at political correctness. Maintaining high standards for how people treat each other is a wonderful thing, as we live in a world that’s rife with animosity and discrimination. However, employers have to know when and where to step in. Going on a witch hunt because someone says “Bless you” to another employee who sneezed (a real example) creates an environment of paranoia and stifled self- expression, without improving how people treat each other.

• They shut down self-expression. Many organizations control what people can have at their desks. A life-size poster of a shirtless Jason Momoa? I get it; that’s a problem. But employers dictate how many photographs people can display, whether they can use a water bottle, and how many items they’re allowed to place on their desks. Once again, it’s the old “If I could just hire robots, I wouldn’t have this problem” approach. The same goes for dress codes. They work well in private high schools, but they’re unnecessary at work. Hire professionals, and they’ll dress professionally. When someone crosses the line, their manager needs to have the skill to address the issue directly. Otherwise, you’re making everyone wish they worked somewhere else because management is too inept to handle touchy subjects effectively.

• They overwork people. Nothing burns out good employees quite like overworking them. It’s so tempting to work your best people hard that managers frequently fall into this trap. Overworking good employees is often perplexing to them; it makes them feel as if they’re being punished for their great performance.

• They don’t make things fun. Strong social connections are an integral part of a healthy workplace. People who have strong connections with their colleagues get sick less often, are less likely to become depressed, learn faster, remember more, and simply do a better job. If people aren’t having fun at work, then you’re doing it wrong. People don’t give their all if they aren’t having fun, and fun is a major protector against brownout. The best companies to work for know the importance of letting employees loosen up a little. The idea is simple: If work is fun, you’ll not only perform better but also stick around for longer hours and an even longer career.

HOW SMART LEADERS FAIL THEIR COMPANIES

• They viewed themselves, and their companies, as untouchable. There’s nothing wrong with having lofty goals or a healthy sense of pride, but these leaders took their success for granted. They became so enamored with their ideas that they believed their competitors would never catch up, their circumstances would never change, and no disruptors would ever surface. These unrealistic expectations made failure inevitable. Leaders must continually question their positions, especially when they’re on top.

• They couldn’t tell where they stopped and the company began. The leaders in Finkelstein’s study had high profiles and were obsessed with their company image. As a result, they were too busy being the face of the company to lead it effectively. This not only led to stagnation but also engendered dishonesty and corruption. A leader who sees a company as their own is more likely to hide anything that could tarnish that image, whether low numbers or faulty products.

• They thought they were the smartest person in the room. Many intelligent leaders know quite well how smart they are. Their identities become so wrapped up in their intelligence that they believe input from others is unnecessary. They make decisions quickly and refuse to answer questions when there’s a misunderstanding. Although this may fit the TV image of a strong leader, making split-second decisions with imprudence often leads to major mistakes. Your chance of failure is heightened when you don’t want to know what other people think.

• They surrounded themselves with yes-men and women. Some leaders become so obsessed with loyalty that they expect mindless support for every decision they make. This alienates valuable employees and silences voices that could otherwise help the business succeed. When a leader begins to equate disagreement with disloyalty (or worse, the undermining of their authority), no one raises warning flags.

• They drove past red flags and warning signs. Some leaders are so enamored with their personal visions that they’re willing to drive the company off a cliff in pursuit of them. Many of these leaders solicit input and suggestions, but they just can’t take their foot off the gas. Persistence is a great quality in a leader, but not if it means ignoring the facts.

• They relied too much on what worked before. Evaluating your previous successes and failures can help a business thrive, but the past shouldn’t be the driving force behind a company’s future. Finkelstein’s team found that many failed leaders took one pivotal moment in their careers and continually tried to repeat it, even when their previous strategies no longer made sense. Customer needs, technology, and the competitive landscape can change on a dime. For this reason, successful leaders are constantly adapting to their surroundings. Finkelstein’s research shows us that most business failures can be avoided. The smartest leaders look deeply at their own behavior to fix potential problems before it’s too late.

WHY EVERYONE SHOULD HAVE UNLIMITED VACATION DAYS

• However, just because there’s flexibility at Netflix doesn’t mean there’s no accountability. Employees have to keep their managers in the loop, and they’re expected to perform at a very high level. High performance is so ingrained in Netflix culture that they reward adequate performance with a generous severance package. Netflix employees have unlimited vacation time because no one is tracking their time. Instead of micromanaging how people get their jobs done, the leadership focuses only on what matters-results. They’ve found that giving people greater autonomy creates a more responsible culture. Without the distraction of stifling rules, employees are more focused and productive.

• Although workaholic employees might sound good on paper, that’s not what smart companies want. Smart companies know that when employees take time off to recharge especially when they have the freedom to take time when they need it-they come back even more

creative and productive. Subsidizing that time off is money well spent. It’s sad that we’re still compensated according to an assembly-line mentality. We work from whenever and wherever necessary to get results, so it only makes sense that our compensation and benefits reflect that shift.

Be Open and Be Curious

• Give people enough information about you that they can understand your perspective. Ask others questions to learn about their perspectives.

Remember, Little Things Pack a Punch

• Little Courtesies such as please, thank you, and I’m sorry can make a big difference in your relationships with others.

Take Feedback Well

• Listen carefully
• Ask for examples of what you have said or done that led the person to view you in a certain way.
• Whether you agree with the feedback or not, thank the person for being willing to share their perspective
• After the feedback, think seriously about what you heard. How did you react to it emotionally and rationally?
• Create a plan to make some adjustments so the person knows you took their feedback seriously.

Build Trust

• To build trust, you will need to be consistent in your words and actions over time. You will need to do what you say you will do.
• Gradually share things about yourself so the other person understands you better.
• Watch and listen closely to gain an understand of the other person.

Have an Open-Door Policy

• Be as accessible as you can while realizing that you cannot be there for everyone at all times.

Don’t avoid the inevitable

• Don’t avoid a person with whom you must interact.
• Strive to put boundaries in place to make your interaction as helpful as possible for both of you.

Acknowledge the Other Person’s Feelings

• Rather than stifle or try to change people’s feelings, simply acknowledge them. You don’t have to agree with their feelings, but it helps to let them know you notice their struggle.
• When you sense that a person is upset of troubled, here is a process that may help:
  • “It appears something is troubling you.”
  • “I’m sorry you are upset”
  • “Do you want to talk about it?”
  • “If they do, then listen carefully”
  • Summarize what you heard

Complement the Person’s Emotions or Situation

• Your role is to notice other people’s moods and be there for them in a helpful way.

When You Care, Show It

• When someone does something well, don’t hesitate to let them know you notice it and appreciate it.
  • Vary the way to do this. For example, try some of these:
    • In person thank you
    • Email note
    • Greeting card
    • Inexpensive gift tailored to their preferences.

Explain Your Decisions, Don’t Just Make Them

• Tell people the alternatives you considered and why the final choice makes sense.
• Acknowledge how the decision will affect everyone.

Make your Feedback Direct and Constructive

• Consider the best way to give hte feedback, so it’s easiest fof the person to understand and accept.
• Strive to be clear, direct, constructive and respectful.

Tackle a Tough Conversation

• Start your conversation by stating the common ground you share.
• Ask the person to share his or her point of view
• Resist the urge to plan a rebuttal
• Help the other person understand your side. Communicate clearly and directly
• Even if there is disagreement, once you understand both perspectives, find a way to move the conversation to closure.
• After the meeting, keep in touch with the person to see how they are doing.
• Pausing between points allows the audience to take in your idea
• Slow down when explaining unfamiliar concepts
• Communicate to express not impress
• Talk with a strong confident voice (be conscious of the 3 V’s)
• Only share what your audience must not forget in terms of level of detail
• Follow the 3 What’s to keep conversations organized (see below)
• Use stories, examples and analogies to make your points more memorable and relatable for the audience
• Standing up when presenting gives you a wider range of motion, you typically have more visual gestures (talking with your hand) and your audience can hear a difference in your voice (important even if you are in a voice only call)

Being empathetic

• Listen and ask open questions
  • Do not interrupt just listen, ask open ended question to keep them talking
  • You will know they are done talking when they ask a question
• Acknowledge and Pause
  • Doesn’t mean agreeing with the emotional response
  • Acknowledge what has happened and the circumstances
  • Pause is to ensure they have said everything they want/need to say
• How do we fix this?
  • Majority of people in this state already know what they want to happen
• Actions
  • List and confirm actions that will be taken, committing to time frame and ownership
  • Following through with commitments is crucial
• Support
  • Say “What else can I do to help?”

Questions

• what the worst things that could possibly happen?
  • what’s the underlying core emotions?
  • what’s my need?
• how do you either limit or mitigate the risk from occurring?
  • what would need to happen for this not to be a problem
  • what beliefs would you need?
  • what training or skills? what emotions would you need?
  • what do you physically need?
• what is the easiest way to solve this?
  • what is the hardest way to solve this?
  • what is the quickest way or the longest way?
  • how would you feel if you solved this?
  • do you want to feel like that?
  • what is the first step to making this happen?
  • what could you do right now?
• how do you current responses make you feel? why is this a problem?
• how do you think you could leverage your mindset in different situations, to your advantage?
• how do you think we can be more accommodating of each other’s dominant modalities in a collaborative setting?
• What is our motivator/emotional driver?
• What are our values and beliefs?
• what are our default emotional responses
• what are our Style of Praise?
• what are our style of feedback?
• How to Create a Connection?
• How can you be empathetic if you have never felt the emotion someone is feeling before?
• Has anyone in your life stood out as being very empathetic? What did they do that made you feel this way?
• What is your EI profile?
• What type of person are you? Work machine, analyst, innovator, tech guru, people lover?
• “What Your Emotions are telling you to do” Vs “What Your Reason is Telling to do
• Where are your emotions clouding your judgement?
• Where is your reason blocking important cues from your emotions?

Quotes

“Emotional intelligence is your ability to recognize and understand emotions in yourself and others, and your ability to use this awareness to manage your behavior and relationships”

“If I could sum up emotional in 2 words, it would be ‘own it’”

replace “why is this happening to me” with “what is this trying to teach me?”, everything shifts.

“today I refuse to stress myself out about things I cannot control or change?”

“be crazy, be stupid, be silly, be weird, be whatever, because life is too short to be anything but happy.”

“Our own minds is what created fear and our own mind is the only thing that can smash through it”

Begin by asking yourself, “What emotion to I want to trigger in this situation?

Ask yourself: ‘Do I want to change this? Why do I want to change this? What stands to happen if I don’t change this?’

Accepting that something is going to happen and that the only thing we can control is how we choose to respond is where EI comes in

“The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.”

“People who are truly successful use their emotional intelligence to focus on activities that address a variety of needs, not just immediate achievements.”

“Stop chasing the things that you think will make you happy and successful, and start realizing that you are the sum of your habits.”

“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.”

“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.”

References

• https://aimwa.com/workplaceconversations/growth-development/workplace-skills/five-steps-to-managing-your-emotions/
• https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/emotional-intelligence-with-amy-jacobson/id1345245341?i=1000528823565
• https://fourminutebooks.com/emotional-intelligence-2-0-summary/#:~:text=1%2DSentence%2DSummary%3A%20Emotional,social%20awareness%2C%20and%20relationship%20management.
• https://readingraphics.com/book-summary-emotional-intelligence-2-0/
• https://www.getstoryshots.com/books/emotional-intelligence-20-summary/
• https://lifeclub.org/books/emotional-intelligence-2-0-travis-bradberry-and-jean-greaves-review-summary
• https://thepowermoves.com/emotional-intelligence-2-0/
• https://gracelead.files.wordpress.com/2016/09/emotional-intelligence-summary.pdf
• https://biglifejournal.com/blogs/blog/fixed-mindset-vs-growth-mindset-examples