Do you have the power to control your responses?
Power feels good (unless it’s in the hands of a psychopath, then it feels like a scary movie). When we feel personal power, we feel we have the ability to direct what happens to us, what we pay attention to, and how we navigate our relationships with others – like we are directing our own movie AND we wrote the screenplay.
However, there are several external, macro-factors (global, political, financial, societal, cultural) that can move us towards feeling powerless, voiceless, ‘scriptless’, or having little influence on the outcome.
Sitting alongside the macro-environment, there are also factors closer to home that can prompt the same feelings to surface:
- The environment we hang out in – does it provide regular opportunity to bolster our skills and talents, or does it reinforce our self-doubt?
- Our closest relationships past and present – do they fuel our self-worth and align with our values, or do they unsettle our identity and sense of place?
- The relationship we have with ourselves – what messages do we send via our internal narrative? How do we view our own talents, characteristics, and presence? What self-limiting or growth beliefs do we hold about ourselves?
A question for you: How can you work towards holding onto your power more and becoming the director of your own show?
Get out of BED and grab the OAR!
- Identify your talents, strengths and skills – what do others say about you, what can you be relied on for, what skills feel effortless, energising and self-affirming?
- Practice creative visualisation – daydreaming on purpose, forward-wind to the desired outcome and your brain will start to work on the route to get there
- Go to work on your thoughts – where are your ‘cognitive distortions’? (How do I know this is true? What could be another reason? Am I keeping perspective? What is the realistic worst-case scenario? Is this the only option? Where am I on a rational:emotional ratio?)
- The smallest step is still a step forward – just get started, take actionable steps to alter/reach the outcome, make the steps super manageable, almost easy
- Always be learning – evaluate your decisions and consider what you could do differently next time
- Supercharge your ‘Why’ – what’s your real motivation, what’s the purpose? Buy-in to the higher reason and you’ll find it easier to align with the work to get there.
- Set values-based boundaries – what is and isn’t acceptable to you? What do you stand for and what won’t you stand for? Become more skilled and comfortable with saying ‘no’ or sharing with others when something doesn’t feel right to you
- Create valuable thinking/reflecting time – you can’t solve a challenge you don’t know about and you can’t shift a mindset you aren’t aware of
- Get a coach – a coach specialises in supporting others to develop personal ownership, they help you to help yourself
- Write – give yourself the opportunity to clarify and reflect on thoughts and ideas, create a ‘mental screenplay’, revisit your plans and celebrate the accomplishments
- Seek inspiration – take guidance from chosen virtual mentors, read their subject, learn their approaches, model their strategies
- Watch your language – I’m too busy, not enough time in the day, there’s no way – change what you say to start to reframe your possibilities.
- Work backwards – what do you look, sound and feel like at a future point? What will you pay attention to, prioritise and de-prioritise to get there?
We know that we can’t always control what happens (sorry psychopaths) but we absolutely have the power to control how we respond to what happens – we look forward to watching your screenplay!
Welcome to the ICC Experience, you’re In Cool Company.