Have you put your face on today?
How can we stay grounded and feeling in control when the world is whirring around us and all the people in it? As a leader, providing an anchor is more important than ever, and that anchoring needs to start with the self. At the start of COVID-19 lockdowns, in what seems like a lifetime ago already, I wrote a blog ad vlog on developing #FACEPOWER – a list of strategies to help ground ourselves and motivate ourselves to move forward in what was an intense time of VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity), with credit to guru of acceptance Psychologist Russ Harris for his own blog on FACE COVID (2020). It was very popular, so I’ve decided to break FACE and POWER down for us and focus more on how we develop our FACE.
I’m focusing on FACE, as this is about grounding ourselves and anchoring ourselves, when it feels like everything is hitting the fan in front of us – seemingly highly relevant right now. At this point of whirring or overwhelm we thankfully have a choice: regulate ourselves OR get pulled into the current. Which would you like to choose? FACE is a set of strategies that helps us to re-focus and re-anchor, (and the good news is I’ve been working with the Wendy-Ann Smith and Matt Rodda to develop these strategies further in a beautiful and exciting chapter of Wendy’s book on positive psychology coaching in the workplace coming to you soon in 2021).
Having our ‘face’ on is the dream state of feeling calm, in control and in flow, working on something you need to get done with clarity and focus. So how do we put our FACE on? Here I break down F-A-C-E.
F: focus, this is about getting your mind to zoom in on what’s in your control, and sphere of influence. It’s easy for us as leaders to get lost in the worry and rumination in VUCA contexts. To help us develop focus on what matters in times of crises can help to defragment our mind of competing thoughts.
Example approaches of coaching ourselves or writing for Focus include:
creating lists of what’s on our mind without problem-solving, or
drawing concentric circles – for example Covey’s circles of influence (Covey, 1989) – writing in the inner circle what’s in our circle of control, in the next circle what you can influence and finally in the outer circle what’s a circle of concern only and therefore outside of their control. This supports a visual letting go of troubling thoughts or feelings, or,
writing journal like reflections down on paper (a big practice in all forms of psychological thought management – see Pennebaker, 1997).
ACE are then a sequence of steps for grounding our mins and bodies to further fin some clarity, peace and focus.
A: acknowledging what is going on for you in your mind. What are the thoughts and feelings arise for you in the VUCA environment? The key here is to encourage yourself to take the time and space to notice what is coming up for you, not to push the thoughts and feelings away (which could increase anxiety) but to hold them lightly. From a behavioural therapeutic perspective, uncomfortable unwanted thoughts and feelings are an inevitable part of life and provide a colour and richness of a fully lived life what is important is how we respond to them and create psychological flexibility to avoid getting stuck (Harris, 2009). Again, you can write difficult thoughts and feelings down, draw them out, or even get more creative to get fused thoughts and feelings from your head into the outside.
The F & A steps are all about building awareness to focus really on what matters to you and to those around you (Harris, 2009).
C: is about you taking a moment to get control back physically of your body. As often our minds carry us away from our body. This part is all about physical grounding. There are many ways you can reconnect to your physical presence and not be ‘away with your mind’. Some questions you can ask yourself are:
Slowly push your feet hard into the floor. Notice how does that feel?
Slowly straighten up your back and spine; if sitting, sit upright and forward in your chair. How do you feel now?
Slowly press your fingertips together. What do you notice?
Slowly stretch your arms or neck, shrugging your shoulders. How does that feel?
Slowly breath (count your breath in and out for a count of four if that helps). What can you notice now?
E: engagement, is about attain re-engagement with all your physical senses and what’s around you, so you can re-engage with the present moment physically and re-engage with the task at hand. Some questions you can ask yourself are:
Look around the room and take notice: what 5 things can you see?
Notice, what 3 or 4 things can you hear?
Notice, what can you smell or taste or sense in your nose and mouth?
Notice, what are you doing?
The C & E steps are about the mindful regaining of physicality. There are a host of mindfulness apps and online resources that can help with this grounding and body scanning process and it’s worth taking the time to find one that suits you.
So take some time to give this a try this week. Good luck with getting your face on, so you can feel a bit calmer in the whir around us.