You're the Boss of Your Mind : How You Can Shift from Stress to Success at Work and in Life

I’m busy doing a project for a big corporate, and we are focusing on helping the people in a department go from feeling stressed, unhappy, and unable to meet their targets to feeling more productive and successful. I am helping them to build a toolbox filled with brilliant tools so that they can pull out the perfect tool at the right moment and keep their system calm and regulated - whatever happens in the world around them. They are working towards being the boss of their minds and taking charge of their biology.

Reclaiming Mental Control: The Power of Awareness and Intention

It’s been really fun to watch them awaken to the news that they can change the racing of their minds, they can choose what they focus on, and they are not the victims of their own thinking. The amazing thing is seeing how this knowledge (and the tools) have changed the way they are operating. Seeing the change inspired me to write this blog to you today.

My Personal Experience with Trauma and Mindset Tools

When I found myself unable to move and precariously perched on the side of a steep mountain slope in the Drakensberg three years ago, having fallen 60 meters from the top, I needed tools to help me stay calm and keep myself alive. There was a further mammoth drop right below me, and I had, by some miracle, come to a halt on this minute ledge. I had a body full of broken bones, damaged organs, and I had just come around from a severe concussion. I needed a long, drawn-out, and difficult rescue mission to get me into a helicopter and to a hospital. All I could do was work with my mind, and these are the tools which got me through.

Practice Before Panic: Building Resilience Day by Day

I can't describe them all in a short blog, but here are the basics - and I am sure this isn’t the first time you are hearing about them. You have probably heard of some of these tools and knowledge nuggets from me already, but the secret is to practice using them when you are not in a crisis, so that when you are in a state of extreme fight or flight, they come easily to you. Practice on the small things that happen in your life - the stressors that just irk you and don’t panic you.

Five Tools to Help You Take Control of Your Mind and Body

1. You are the boss of your brain

Which means you can decide what you focus your attention on. Your attention is like a torch. You can shine it wherever you wish, and you can move it at will if you need to. I practiced moving my attention from the pain and panic I felt rising inside me to the sun on my skin, and the warmth of my son’s support as he did whatever he could to help.

2. Shift your attention with kindness

If your mind wanders back to what you are trying not to focus on - which it will - you can shift it again. If you do the shifting gently and kindly, your attention will learn to stay a little longer where you choose to put it. Compassion is key. Be kind and patient with your mind.

3. Understand your brain's protective instinct

Your mind will choose the negative, the threatening, the scary, the painful to focus on - unless you take charge of it. This is because it is trying to protect you. It’s not the good, happy, upbeat stuff that protects you - it’s being forewarned about the threats that will be protective. But since you aren’t in mortal danger right now, you can afford not to focus on the danger and peril.

I had just survived a fall that should have been fatal. I had to work hard to convince my mind that I was going to be okay. I kept bringing my mind to the fact that my body is a healing machine. I kept reminding my mind that I was fit and strong and would recover. I kept telling my mind that the expert rescue team had done this kind of rescue many times before, and they would find the way to get me off the ledge without endangering anyone else. I took the spotlight of my attention off the danger over and over again, and it got me through that dreadful day.

4. Become the observer of your thoughts

To be able to work with your mind, you need to be aware of what you are thinking about... That requires being the observer of your brain. Watching it as if you were a fly on the wall in your own head and gaining insight for yourself about your thinking patterns. You have between 60,000 - 100,000 thoughts a day! That is a LOT of thoughts. Some of them are recurrent and play like a stuck record in your head. But you can stop that! You can intervene - and when you do, it will change your life. It will change the outcomes you experience.

5. Notice how your thoughts affect your body

Your thoughts have an impact on your psyche and your biology. They cause bodily sensations, emotions, urges, and images. It’s a really worthwhile practice to notice this and track what is arising in your body and nervous system.

Let’s take an example: if you have the thought that someone doesn’t like you, you are likely to experience a tightening in your chest and throat, maybe a knot in your stomach. You are likely to feel sad and maybe defensive or even angry, and you may have the urge to clench your jaw, scream, or have a conversation in your head with that person. If you track what is happening, you may find an image arising or an idea. You might want to check your assumption that they don’t like you - or you may find a thought arising that it doesn’t matter! You might become aware that you need to soothe yourself in the face of this uncomfortable experience. Maybe you want to stroke yourself, or rock gently, or just say something compassionate in your own head, like: “It’s okay, you’ve got this.” or “Lots of people like you, so who cares if she doesn’t?” or even “Who is she anyway?”

Please try these simple but profound tools and come back with feedback. I am curious to know how they work for you. I am fascinated to hear if they are as life changing for you as they have been for me.

With love,

Sue