Three Things To Lift Your Mood

In today’s fast world, we are sometimes overwhelmed with how 'busy' life can be. Life IS getting faster, the world IS becoming smaller, everything IS instant. Taking time out alone for an hour is a way that will allow you to shut the world out, to think about things, to put issues into perspective and to slow your brain down.

For some of us, we are simply too busy to have the time to spend an hour alone in silence. Sad but true. Isn’t it the case that often the things we should be doing at the time we need to do them is when we least want to. This 'busyness' can sometimes leave us feeling drained and our mood can drop. We feel tired and flat.

There are some immediate things that you can do to lift your mood – talking with others, smiling throughout the day and hugging people will give you an energy boost. (Be careful with the last one, oxytocin is a powerful chemical!).

Another option is to do one thing each day that makes you happy. A walk, going to the movies, a sport, whatever you choose must be something that you want to do.

A combination of all of the above will allow you to keep your head (brain) above water so that you can breathe...

If your mood is a bit lower - in other words you are flatter (sadder) - here is something that research tells us will go you a longer lasting boost in just 20 days. The 20/20/20 method.

The first 20 is twenty minutes of continuous exercise - a medium to fast paced walk is all it takes to burn off the accumulation of adrenalin and cortisol in your body. The second 20 is twenty minutes of laughing or smiling – this needn’t be continuous, across the day will do. The third 20 is twenty minutes of looking forward (in your head) to good things coming up, thinking of happy things, recalling a holiday, visualising a place you like to be at or want to visit, or any other thought that makes you feel happy. You cannot do this continuously; although I challenge you to do so.

For those of you who are really busy, I suppose that you could combine smiling with your exercise thus eliminating twenty minutes from the sixty-minute process.

For the fastest results in lifting your mood, you must combine physiology with psychology. Mind and body. We often focus on the body and forget about the mind, the mind being the most critical part of the process.

What I Learned When Conducting Suicide Intervention

You get to know people very quickly when you come together in times of crisis. Pressure situations tend to create a bond between people like no other and you get to learn a lot about the other person in a very short space of time.

Here's what I found in common with those who I conducted suicide intervention with;

·        The person often does not know how they got to where they are at that immediate moment. Reality is long forgotten, every negative thing in their life is as clear as though it happened just yesterday, their emotions are raw and any seemingly innocuous comment can cause an adverse reaction. 

·        The person's mind does not function as would a reasonable person. You cannot reason with them, you cannot tell them to "Snap out of it" nor to "Shake it off", "Harden up", or "Get on with life". They've tried to do that already.

·        Suicide is an emotional event, not a mental illness. They may have a mental illness which has impacted on their emotional brain and it is important not to confuse the two. They are simply in a state of turmoil from which they can see no escape.

·        The 'emotional brain' is what is driving them to take their own life. Often it is something that has occurred within the last 24 to 48 hours that has caused them to take the ultimate step but know that it is a battle that has been raging in their head for some time.

·        These are very brave people. Brave to want to kill themselves and even braver to hang on. Having battled for long periods, their brain is telling them to take their own life as part of the fight or flight response - "Here's a way to stop the pain". That’s what their brain is telling them. 

·        Suicide is not an act of cowardice or a sign of weakness; the opposite is mostly the case. The person believes that they are hurting others, the ones that they love, and so want to stop the hurt of others as well as themselves.

·        Sometimes the person can't do it, they can’t take the ultimate step, there is something that is holding them back. They are not seeking attention; they want to kill themselves but are confused as to what to do. This may then lead to a sense of embarrassment, a loss of face, even feelings of defeat during an intervention. That is why you must be trained to deal with these situations before attempting to help someone no matter how well-meaning your intentions.

·        I am proud of those who kept going, who waited for the negotiator to arrive, who listened to us, and who came away with us to get help.

·        I am also proud of those who work in this difficult area – most of us have a 100% success rate.

·        You can save a person who wants to kill themselves. They can recover. They can go on to bigger and better things. They just need to work through their pain, through their issues, through their emotions.

Do not judge those who have been suicidal, do not unfairly label them, and never blame them. They are some of the bravest people you are ever likely to meet. They have fought a battle with themselves and won.

For those who took the ultimate step, do not speak ill of them for you know not what they have suffered. 

What I Discovered While in the Mire.

In 1999, while not looking after myself, I went down into a deep hole that a lot of us go into from time to time. Unlike most other times, I went deeper than before and found it was much easier to go down further than it was to climb back up.

Replacing: natural sleep with medicated rest; talking with others to talking with myself (inside my head); looking others in the eye with staring at my feet; talking with my wife with avoiding contact; asking for help with going it alone; and identifying that I was unwell and needing help with 'hardening up'.

Where did that get me, at the bottom of a pit, stuck the mire. Not a nice place to be. So what was I thinking;

·         The longer you stay in the mire the deeper, and faster, you sink.

·         Trying to stop the negative thoughts is overwhelmingly difficult, impossible in fact.

·         My brain told me to do the opposite of what I should do to stay well, 'it' became selfish, therefore so did I.

·         A simple automatic process of breathing became the most difficult thing in the world to do and consumed everything.

·         I could function but did not know what I was actually doing, I was an automaton.

·         Every single negative thing that I had done in my life was as real as though it had happened just yesterday.

·         I kept telling myself that this sort of thing only happens to other people and I just needed to work through it. Keep going, it will get better, you got this. 

·         I was stuck and didn't know what to do and felt that life was going to be like this forever. Why couldn’t I just be normal again?

Of course none of this was 'real', it was all inside my head. But you could never have told me that at the time because rational thought had long disappeared. 

If you had told me at the time that I could recover I would have dismissed you immediately. I can’t, you don’t understand.

I, like many others who end up in this situation, are much stronger than we think that we are. We can get through this, we can recover, we are stronger than we ever could imagine. And it is all up to you.

Heaven forbid you should ever find yourself sinking into the abyss, go and get some help or at least tell someone. You can, and will get through this. Just not by yourself. And asking for help makes you stronger and your recovery faster than simply going it alone.

Let’s not talk more about suicide, let’s talk more about what takes us there and how to avoid it!

Play Nicely!

It's time for a post that I need to pay more attention to myself, playing nicely with customer service agents. 

I am continually surprised at the way in which some people treat those who work in the customer service industry - banks, shops, hotels, restaurants, call centres, and the like.  Treating people with disdain, disrespect and rudeness is not a sign of their behaviour, it is more a sign of who you are.

We sometimes get annoyed, frustrated and disappointed when things don't go as well as our expectations demand that they should. Because of this we get angry and demand better, often we react in the heat of the situation and say or do something that we might later regret. 

In these situations, it is important to determine if the poor service you are receiving is a result of the person who is helping you or is something out of their control. If the service is something that is out of the agent’s control then the agent has limited ability to assist you in meeting your expectations.

If the poor service is within the agent's control, treating them with disdain or becoming angry at the time will only make the situation worse. If you change your attitude in these situations there is a good chance that you can positively change the outcome.

Additionally, the nicer you are the more likely the agent will regret the way in which they dealt with you. 

Don't treat people how you would like to be treated, treat them with respect and see what happens. You may be pleasantly surprised at the outcome.

Workplace Bullying - How To Confront It.

Following on from my recent post on concept creep, it's time to focus on the elephant in the room at work, bullying. What is it, is it actually a thing, and what can you do about it if it is real?

We have come a long way since the 1970’s and 80’s when it was common for our boss to tell us that we were “useless”, “needed to lift our game”, to “get on board or leave”, or worse still that if we didn't perform to his or her expectations we would be fired.

Was that generational thing? Possibly so. In those times there were around four recognised leadership styles, one of which was autocratic. Autocratic was identified as being the wrong leadership style if you wanted to get people to follow you however there was never any strong active move to eliminate that kind of bullying behaviour.

I was told recently that today there is over 1200 leadership styles. While autocratic is still in there somewhere, it is now openly suggested that this style is inappropriate, demeaning, dangerous, and that you need to change if you use that style. Rightfully so. 

Workplace bullying comes in many forms, the most common being a supervisor 'motivating' a direct report to perform to a higher standard. Overbearing direction, close monitoring, in-depth scrutiny, and often blatantly rude interactions.

There is a right way and a wrong way to correct poor performance, bullying isn't on the list the last time that I looked. So what should you do if you believe you are being bullied? I work on the rule that everyone should be given at least one chance, possibly two. Our behaviour for the most part is ingrained therefore difficult to change. Hence, two chances I think is fair.

If your supervisor does or says something to you that you believe is bullying, and for each of us bullying is different, then do not confront them at the time it occurred. Wait until the next day. This gives you time to reflect on what took place and to put some context and structure around it. 

The following day, speak with that supervisor. Go over what they did or said and tell the supervisor that you were unhappy with being treated the way you were. What you do next depends on their response.

If they agree what they said or did was wrong, ask the supervisor what you should do the next time this occurs - "Next time this happens would you like me to bring it to your attention immediately or should I wait for the next day like I have done so this time". This serves as a warning, a shot across their bow. 

If the supervisor disagrees with your comments, put them on notice that if it happens a second time then you will take it to the next level. Next, if (when) the behaviour happens again, speak with a colleague to gain a better understanding. Is this unacceptable behaviour limited to you, is it a pattern, or is it wider than just you?

If a pattern is emerging, either towards you or towards many, then it must be taken to a higher level - either to the union or to that supervisor’s supervisor. If you go straight away to this level, it is harder to prove that it is a pattern. A single event doesn't indicate a pattern and is easy to defend. 

Remember, when confronting bullying behaviour it is important to do so respectfully. After all, you don't want to be labelled a bully!