Deploying our Awesomeness
“How are you feeling right now?” I start most of my sessions and presentations that way. When ‘confronted’ with that question for the first time in a while, most people answer quickly: “fine.” Fine is not a feeling, so I press them to pick an emotion word. It is surprising how challenging it is. To you reading this: how are you feeling right now? [come on, you can do this; please stick with me and take 10 seconds to find the right word.]
I could go on for hours on the many layers of benefit produced by naming our emotion. For now, I will focus only on the first layer. The practice is a simple ‘forcing function’ to bring us back to the present moment; right here, right now. Most of us spend too many of our waking hours thinking about the future or the past; while some of that can be productive, most of it is not. That mental time travel often serves as a derailing distraction from what’s in front of us. Thomas Edison wrote: “There is no means to which a human will not go to avoid the real labor of thinking.” He was referring to each of us, himself included: the guy with more than a thousand patents! Our antiquated survival instinct has us wired to be easily distracted from the task at hand. Knowing this, and having this simple cue in our metaphorical back pocket to bring us back to ‘here and now’ is a superpower. Allow me to expound.
Most of the people with whom I work face a similar crisis: far too much to do, too little time, and an unsustainable* pace of work. Sound familiar? When that is our reality, we want to be at our most efficient. The only way we can be efficient is to be effective. Each conversation we have, each task we complete should be done well, the first time. Conversations that don’t get to the point, or meetings that don’t produce actionable outcomes, create more work. We need to do them over again. I liken it to pedaling a bike as fast as we can, uphill, with the chain off: we end up further back down the hill than when we started, and we are exhausted. Ouch! In many cases, doing nothing might actually be more productive than doing things in a way that is not effective. Efficiency requires effectiveness.
If we want to be effective in what we do, we must give it our full attention by being fully present. Consider a challenging conversation with a colleague: really listening, speaking succinctly, emotion regulation, creativity, and effective collaboration each require full presence. The same goes for completing a project: distractions impede our ability to be effective. Presence is key. Quick review: efficiency requires effectiveness; effectiveness requires presence.
What is required to be present? The awareness that we can choose to be present. The intention of this article is to create that awareness, or to offer a reminder that this choice is available to us at any time. It would be a disservice to suggest this is always an easy choice to make. Just because it’s available doesn’t mean it’s easy; we have oceans of distractions beckoning to us. THIS is when the aforementioned superpower comes in handy: ask yourself the question ‘how am I feeling right now?’, and notice yourself brought back to right here, right now. Presence, Effectiveness, Efficiency, {{Jazz hands}}!
Want to get stuff done in the most efficient way possible? Accept that you are a finite resource, and “Be here now”, to quote Ram Dass. You will maximize your contributions and feel more fulfilled; you will feel less stress from ruminating about the past and worrying about the future; your relationships will benefit; and awesomeness might very well ensue.
*There is much to scream about here, but I committed to a succinct article.