The Inner Game of Stress: Leading from the Inside Out | #20

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Welcome to Unleash youh Impact Unlock Others. This is a leadership unscripted episode that we're calling the Inner Game of Stress Leading from the Inside Out.

And what we're going to explore here is what if your biggest leadership challenge might be your own reaction to the things that are happening around you? In this podcast, Rich and I are going to explore that stress isn't just what happens to us, it's how we relate to what happens to us.

And that leaders at all levels need to learn to spot, understand and manage their own internal stress patterns before they can lead other people affected. We'll unpack what we call the inner game of stress, drawing on Timothy Galway's thinking as discussed in our previous podcast.

We'll also relate it to our own mind management model again that we discussed last time and talk about some real leadership examples. So, Rich, hi.

Hi, Dave.

Alright, today we're going to talk about stress. I guess my first question to you ought to be, how do you feel at the moment? Are you stressed? Are you nice and relaxed?

We've had quite a good day, haven't we? So we've. Yeah. Been to Birmingham.

Is that a good thing?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no, we've had a good day. So, yes, I feel okay.

Good. So I think it's a really important topic to talk about stress because, you know, actually what do we mean when we say we're stressed?

What do we actually mean? And then maybe we can unpack that a little bit. Today in terms of actually leading from the inside out is about understanding what's happening to us.

Yes.

And more importantly, as I said in the introduction, how we relate to what's happening to us. So it's not the pressure necessarily that actually is the problem, it's the interference that that pressure triggers.

We talked about interference last time, didn't we? Yes, it's the interference that that pressure triggers. Actually being under pressure sometimes isn't a bad thing.

Yeah. And I think fundamental to this is this concept that actually what you might find stressful and pressure, I might not.

No, absol.

Actually, when we talk about stress and stressors in the system, people respond to stressors in their system in very different ways. So actually how we interpret those stressors is a key factor in terms of how we respond.

In your experience then, apart from me, what stresses you out?

Apart from you, yeah. Well, I guess if I feel overwhelmed.

Right.

I remember particularly there was a time in my career where I used to get, I don't know, upwards of 100, 200 emails a day. You know, just ridiculous amount of email and feeling of overload and ability of how am I going to cope with all of this stuff?

How am I going to sift out the important stuff? That felt quite overwhelming to me. And actually, even now, sometimes when I open my email, sometimes now, I can almost like that, like re.

Triggers that feeling from of old where that feeling of overwhelm. So sometimes the impact of stress can live with us.

Yes, interesting.

Yeah. Sometimes I find social situations difficult. Difficult to cope with. Depends on what they are.

So if it's new people I'm meeting in a different environment, if there's lots of noise in the environment, for example, I find that quite difficult to cope with. So lots of different things.

Yeah, yeah. And as you quite rightly said, those are probably slightly different things to what stresses me out.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. So what stresses you out then?

It's a good question, Rich. What stresses me out?

I think one of the answers to that question would be if I'm in a situation where I feel I've got no control whatsoever, I've got a lack of control over what's going on that can be quite stressful.

Not that I'm a control freak at all, but like most human beings, I do like to sort of feel like I've got some kind of agency over what's going to happen to me. So there are examples where that has happened and maybe I just. Just trigger some stuff that's not helpful.

The other situation where I would answer that question in the affirmative is when I'm in a conversation with somebody who's not acting particularly emotionally, intelligently.

Oh, right, yeah.

That can really trigger me as well. Yeah. So those are just off the top of my head, two examples. Right? Yeah.

Yeah.

So in terms of this conversation today, it might be worth diving into what we mean by stress, the nature of stress.

And I know, and I've heard you talk about this before, there's different definitions and distinctions of types of stress, and maybe you'd like to unpack that for us as a sort of starting point. Yeah.

So I've used the concept of the golden mean previously in podcast, and the idea behind the golden mean is you get two extremes, and then in the middle is what we call the. If you like, the healthy balance, the sweet spot. The sweet spot, yeah. Right. Okay. So it's the same idea with Stress.

So at two extremes, you get to unhealthy stress levels, if you like. So what we call distress at one extreme. So that's where stress is overwhelming, paralyzing.

And it essentially ends up with our system, if you like, our human system being dysregulated, overloaded. Effectively overloaded.

Yeah.

Burnout. Stress. Burnout. And sometimes when people talk about stress, that's what they're talking about.

At the other extreme, actually, is what we call hypostress.

Okay.

And hypo, it means understimulation. So the word comes from. If you think about somebody who's hypoglycemic.

Right.

That means their sugar level is low.

Yes.

Okay. Hypo means low. So hypostress is where we're understimulated.

The level of stress is so low that people become bored or apathetic that they end up with like, a loss of meaning or challenge. So people that are bored, that's really stressful.

So if people are in a job where they're not stimulated, they're not challenged, that can be stressful. Okay. So you get distress and hypostress. And in the middle is what we call eustress.

Just picking up on that. Hypostress. I'm guessing that would show up differently to what distress would show up as, potentially.

Yeah. In what way do you mean?

So I think we've all know when someone's overwhelmed or paralyzed and yes, they might be crying, they might be shouting.

Oh, right.

Okay. But actually, it might not be so obvious when they're in hypostasis.

No, definitely not. No, definitely not. And that will be, you know, boredom, disengagement, all of that sort of stuff.

And people just want to leave and go somewhere where they feel more stimulated, more challenged. Yes.

I would find that a problem. I think being in a situation where I'm bored and not challenged enough for me would be an issue.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So that dysregulates our system, but in quite a different way.

Yeah.

So, yeah, so we're talking about eustress. So let's go back to the idea of eustress, which is the sweet spot in the middle.

Yeah.

So eu, stress, that's eustress, that's how it's pronounced is eustr E, double S. So eu means good. Okay. So the root derivation, eu means good. So a eulogy, E, U, L, O, G, Y. That's a good speech that somebody gives.

Or the sense of euphoria, you know, that's a good feeling that we have.

What I'M going to experience tonight when Bristol City win in the promotion playoffs. Yeah.

Euphoria.

Yeah.

So good luck to Bristol City. So I think this is a useful framework in which to think about stress because not all stress is bad.

No.

A healthy level of stress in our system and in our environment is a good thing for us as human beings because we feel challenged and stimulated and that's a good thing.

But then the moment you start to increase the stress level in the system, what you'll find is people's interpretation of the stressor in the system will be very different.

So some people might get a real buzz of getting loads of emails in and they see that as a challenge and they're right into their email system and banging away the email and I'm not sure whether I suspect I'm dyslexic. I don't know.

Right.

But you know, so getting overwhelmed with lots of sort of written information is quite difficult. I find that quite difficult to process. So that's quite a stressful thing for me, you know.

So people respond to stresses and stressors in a different way. So our interpretation of the stressor is often a key factor in terms of our response to what's going on.

Do you think? I mean I like the idea of thinking about this as a continuum where you've got that lovely sweet spot in the middle.

Yes.

Where we'd all like, ideally like to be. But obviously there's these two other ends of the spectrum. One which is more overwhelming, one is more under stimulating.

Do you think it's easy to recognise where you are on that continuum at any given time?

Well, I think often what happens, I mean we advocate bringing self awareness and intentionality to all forms of sort of leadership and management. And I think often what happens is we respond to our environment, to our system in a very reactive, non aware way.

Yeah.

Okay.

So the reason for bringing the model and articulating stress in this way is it to get people to think differently and more intentionally about actually what's happening to them and to bring some awareness around. Okay, that's interesting. I noticed my heart rate is rising here. What's actually going on here?

What's the stressor and what is my interpretation and response to that stressor?

And it's probably not realistic to assume that we should never be in distress or never be in hyper stress. There's always going to be situations where we will feel both of those things.

Yes, yeah, yeah.

You just don't want to be in those situations that often, do you? Ideally.

And I think that the other important thing to realize is by, if you like, reframing our response to those stressors, we can change our emotional reaction to it and we can train ourselves actually to become, if you like, more comfortable with discomfort. Because, you know, we're human beings and we live in a universe where there are just natural stressors all the time. That's part and parcel of life.

So to be resilient as a leader, we need to develop the ability to be more comfortable with the discomfort.

Yeah, that makes sense.

Does that make sense?

Yeah, it does make sense. Yeah. So does anybody listen to this?

Maybe here's a thing to think about as a reflection item of today's conversation and understanding that continuum that Richard just described. How do you typically experience stress and how do you think other people around you experience and perceive it?

That's really interesting because once you are aware of where you are in that continuum, you can do something about it and manage your responses to it.

I think the other important thing is if you manage the team, what you might find stressful, your team members might not, and vice versa.

Yeah.

So it's possible that from some sort of decision that you've made or a project that you introduce or whatever that might be, you introduce a stress into the system, you think, oh, this is really exciting, new project, new thing to do. Whereas other people's response to that might.

They might find that distressful, they might find that stressor not exciting, they might find it overwhelming depending on their workload and how they've interpreted, you know, what you've introduced into their system.

Well, and a good point of that is, you know, we both just described the sort of things that maybe stress us out, but actually yours is different to mine.

Yes.

We could be that thing that stresses each other out.

Yes. Yeah.

Inadvertently, without realizing it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, so let's sort of develop this a bit further and let's sort of tie it back to the last conversation we had where we talked about what goes on internally inside us. Yeah. So when stress gets amplified internally, what actually happens? Should you just unpack that a little bit and explore that?

So last time, I'm not going to go into too much detail around this, but we talked about the Zentano mind management model of three components is what we call the filter hub. In other words, that's the part of, if you like, our mindset that interprets our environment.

Yeah.

So all the beliefs and the values and the stories and the experiences that we've picked up through childhood and through our sort of through our adult life that frames the way we interpret the world. In other words, when we have a stressor that comes into our system, if you like, that filter hub is what unconsciously interprets that stressor. Yeah.

That in turn then drives what we call the hot head response. That's the second component part of our mind management model.

And what we want to be doing is to be engaging the cool head to first of all just put the stressor into perspective and thinking about actually what do we need to do to manage our reaction to this? What do we need to do to process that stressor?

Because, for example, you know, at the extreme end of distress, we get things that are really hard to process. So if we get a death in the family, for example, that is a stressor that's been introduced into our system and we don't just like.

That doesn't just happen to us and then the next day we leap out of bed and get over that.

No.

You know, that requires us as human beings to process that distress in a healthy way.

But sometimes what happens is the filter hub, if you like, amplifies a stressor in the system where actually we don't really need to get as stressed and overwhelmed as we need to because we've have a tendency to catastrophize or overgeneralize or whatever, you know.

So, you know, a common root of anxiety is people thinking ahead to, say, a future meeting and then going through all the catastrophic outcomes of that potential meeting. And that's just a story in their head.

I'm just thinking of an example here. So let's say we have somebody who is a bit of a perfectionist. You can't help the fact that that's how you are.

You're a bit of a perfectionist and you're doing a piece of work, whatever that piece of work might be, and all of a sudden you've been told you've got a lot less time to finish that piece of work than you thought you had. Potentially, that's going to stress you out.

Yes.

Because now I think I haven't got the time to do this perfectly, which is what I would prefer to do. So these things can happen in these everyday situations. It's recognizing a. That I'm a bit of a perfectionist and I want to get everything right.

Well, you can't get everything perfect, you know that.

But also, if that does happen and you are put into that stressful situation, how do you interpret and manage that and not amplify that internally like you've just described?

Yeah. And I think at the heart of this is engaging the cool head.

So in other words, that's the rational, aware part of our mindset that says, actually, let's take a step back. So this is a stressor, and it is a stressor. Is my interpretation of that stressor proportionate to actually what is actually happening?

Yeah.

So if we're experiencing an extreme personal stressor in our personal life and we need to take time out to process that, you know, an extreme emotional response might be a very proportionate response to that stressor, but often what happens is our anxiety is rooted in a disproportionate response to the actual situation.

Yeah. And if we don't get in the habit of when we start to feel these stressors.

Yes. Yeah.

Taking a little step away and thinking, why am I feeling this? What story or narrative is this driving in my head? Or what is this cutting across one of my core values?

Or is there some sort of bias here that I'm reacting negatively? If we don't make the time to do that, then we can't do what you're describing.

Yeah. And notice the language I'm using.

I'm calling these stressors in our system because we have a tendency as human beings is to get completely subsumed by our emotional response. So we say, I'm stressed. So just using the language, I'm stressed. There's a sense in which we're like caught in the middle.

Middle of our emotional response to the stress in the system.

So by engaging the cool head and lifting ourselves out and recognizing the stress for what it is, and then making an assessment, is the way I'm responding proportionate to actually what's going on. And if it is, fine, process that in a healthy way. If not, reframe some of the internal language that's causing the stress for you.

I think breaking this down is actually quite helpful because you're right. Everyone says, oh, I'm stressed. Well, that could mean a multitude of things. If we just say, there's a stressor in my system.

Yeah.

It's triggering me putting a name on how that. And then emotionally you react to it. So am I, what, frustrated, angry? What is that emotion specifically that that stressor is triggering?

Yeah, yeah.

That's going to be much easier to process that.

Yes. Yeah, it is. Yeah.

Yeah. So again, maybe a reflection point for anybody listening to this is what's the story or stories that you tell yourself when you feel under pressure?

Because you will. We'll all have go to stories. We'll all have Things that we sort of regularly encounter.

Yeah.

Because, you know, I have a tendency, if I'm not careful to catastrophize, you know, so to think, I don't know, you know, I'm going to an important sales meeting, say, for example.

Yeah.

And then to, you know, to. To think imaginatively, if you like, about all the terrible, you know, scenarios that could play out in that meeting.

So that imaginative sort of thinking through some of the stuff that can. That can serve me well because I'll think, okay, so what do I need to do to manage that? What do I need to do to manage that potential outcome?

That's all healthy, but actually what often happens is that runs away with me and I start to catastrophize. So that's an example of sort of distorted sort of thinking amplifies, over amplifies the stressor in the system.

The stressor in the system is, I got a sales meeting tomorrow. My interpretation of it causes a disproportionate emotional response.

Yeah. And catastrophizing is really, really common. Being perfectionist is a common thing.

Another one which is really common that people might recognize is black and white thinking. So it's either X or it's Y and there's nothing in between.

Yeah, exactly.

Actually, most things are not X or Y. There's usually a lot of stuff in between.

So again, recognizing that, am I going into this black and white thinking mode where it's either got to be one end of the scheme or the other end of the scale? Actually, life isn't like that.

So it might also be worth now taking this conversation on to how this plays out, not just for individuals, but for teams and into the wider organization that you work in.

Yeah, yeah.

So let's talk about self. Is there anything about individual stress and stressors that we haven't yet picked up on?

I don't think I've got much more to add.

I mean, you know, it's a hugely deep subject, but I think it's just bringing self awareness to what are the unhelpful beliefs or control habits that we have in place that cause a disproportionate response to the stressors in our environment? So it's just bringing self awareness and intentionality to that.

Okay, so let's widen that out into the team.

Yes.

So most of us are part of teams in one way, shape or form. And I think we talked about this in the last podcast about emotional contagion in teams.

Yeah, yeah.

So maybe let's just unpack that in the context of what we're talking about today, how does that play out?

Well, I think again, we talked about unhelpful, sticky stories.

Yeah.

And what I mean by that is teams can create a narrative around the stressors in their system, and sometimes those unhelpful stories can magnify some of the issues and people lose perspective.

So I think one of the managers key jobs to do around a team is to understand the stories that are circulating inside the team, to understand when those stories are helpful, and to challenge, Be continually challenging, unhelpful stories. So where the stories are driving, a disproportionate response to what's going on.

So to watch people's language, you know, the team might say, oh, that department over there is an absolute nightmare. You know, so they might not be a nightmare. They're just.

They've got a different perspective, a different set of drivers that are driving them as a department which are different to ours.

But even if your perception is that they're a nightmare and maybe they have got some performance issues.

Yeah, maybe. Yeah.

That isn't necessarily still a helpful story to drive, is it?

No. No, it's not. So like with individuals, we have unhelpful beliefs and stories inside our head. Teams also create those as well.

And to be very cognizant as a leader and a manager, what are those stories? And to challenge them, bring proportionality, bring perspective, and, you know, keep bringing the team back to the facts. What are the facts?

We've both run teams in our past. How did you do that? How did you sort of keep yourself cognizant of the stories that were going around in your teams?

Yeah, well, I mean, a common thing I would often do if there would be like a story that, you know, a team would start to talk about in a team meeting. Okay, what are the facts? What's actually going on? So bring some objectivity to the conversation.

Cut through some of the emotional language and say, what are the facts?

So there's a couple of things here that leap out to me straight away is listen to the language that you're hearing.

Listen to the language. Yeah.

And don't get sucked in by it.

Yes. And, yeah, don't collude with their stories. I think that's really important.

Leaders often collude with, you know, because they want to feel part of the. The team. And.

And, you know, there are times where you let teams vent and you let teams have a rant, because that can be cathartic, but that can very quickly escalate into unhelpful stories and sticky stories which cause this emotional contagion inside a team.

So again, anybody listening to this who runs a team, who leads a team?

Yeah.

Are you listening to the language that you're hearing?

Yeah.

Are you be honest colluding sometimes with the stories that you're hearing? Because actually, you do need to actually pull yourself away from that.

Yes.

If you're going to do this effect. And obviously, if you can do that, you will start to help maybe pull down the stress levels in your team. Otherwise you just become another stressor.

Yes. Yeah.

In that environment, don't you? Okay. Anything else on the team level before we go into the wider organization?

No, I don't think so. No.

So again, we talked about this in terms of organizational stress that is often caused by systemic issues. And that could be an unclear business strategy.

It could be that we've just got narratives in the business that induce fear rather than something more helpful. So there could be all sorts of things going on inside an organization that drives stress. You just want to unpack that for.

Me a little bit.

I mean, how a senior team communicates to the organization the language that they use is really important and to be aware of some of the systemic things. And actually, are you addressing those at a strategic level? If there's systemic overload throughout the business, that's not sustainable.

So what are you doing strategically to manage the overload? How clear are your business priorities, and do those business priorities trickle down all the way through the organization?

So people are clear if they got more than if they got too much to do. They have a clear strategy for prioritizing, for example.

Yeah. And it might be that maybe you have got a strategy. Maybe you have actually communicated that strategy pretty well.

So you think, okay, well, we've got one. We've communicated it. So why aren't people following it?

Well, the answer might be there's other stressors in the system that are getting in the way of that, actually. So it's not just about that one particular issue. There's a whole multitude of issues here. They're all very interconnected.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So you've got to take that wider, deeper perspective on.

Yes, yeah.

Anything to add, Rich, on sort of organizational systemic stress?

No, I don't think so.

So imagine you are a leader that's trying to coach your team to manage stress. One of the things I guess you need to look at is what is the environment like inside our team?

Are we creating an environment where people can recognize those stressors, reduce those stressors, or actually is the environment? The opposite, yes. Are we adding to the problem?

Yeah, yeah, indeed. Yeah.

So practical tools to regulate it.

So when we recognize that either as an individual or as a team, we are in that kind of very stressed state that you talked about earlier on, what are some practical tools rich for reframing that stress, dealing with that stress.

So in terms of building resilience as human beings, I suppose there are a couple of factors. So there's actually how do we manage our physical response to the stressors in the system?

So that's things like, you know, eat well, sleep well, the basic hygiene things. But in the moment, you can do things like. We've talked in a previous podcast about square breathing.

So square breathing is where we breathe in for a count of four, we hold for a count of four, and we breathe out for a count of four.

So in other words, you're regulating your breathing balances the parasympathetic nervous system that manages your dysregulated physiological response to stress. So doing some basic physical things like that can help regulate our response.

I think that's one of my favourites.

I think the importance of breathing is really underappreciated sometimes, but, you know, when I get stressed, I think that's one of my favorite go to things.

Yeah. So top tip, breathing is a good thing to do.

Breathing is a good thing to do, guys.

Yeah, so that's the physical stuff, but in terms of the cognitive stuff and reframing from either reframing your own personal internal narratives or reframing the language in a team or organizational context is really important. So very simple reframing tool is what I call the three lenses.

Tell us more.

So if you want to coach yourself or coach someone in your team that's struggling with a particular stressor in their system and you have a sense either you or they are responding in a disproportionate way to the stressor. Okay. You can use the three lenses as a means to think. How can I reframe my. If you want my cognitive response, what's going on?

So the long lens, what we call the long lens is the lens where actually in six months time, in six years time.

Yeah.

Okay. If I was looking back on this event, what would my future self be telling the present self about my response to that situation?

Does it really matter how significant really is it?

Yeah, how significant is.

And if you want to just, you know, really put some perspective on this, you know, sorry to sound a bit, bit dark, but imagine, you know, you led on your deathbed and you're looking back at that situation. Why, you know, why on earth does I think that really matters?

Yeah, well, and I'm sure we've all had moments like that.

Yeah.

Not on our deathbed, I don't mean.

But yeah, but you know, some of the emails where we get so, you know, so stressed and uptight about actually, you know, if we put that into. Into perspective, does it really matter? So the long lens is about putting stuff into perspective and imagining your future self looking back.

But that's a really good point because it probably feels like in the moment, like it does matter.

Yes.

But if you can just step away.

Yes.

Get your long lens out.

Yeah, yeah.

And do what? Exactly what you said.

Yeah.

Actually, does it really matter?

Yeah. So the long lens is one way to lift yourself out of your emotional response, to engage the cool head.

Okay.

So this. Reframing these lenses, three ways to engage the cool head. The reverse lens.

Oh, go on.

Okay, so the reverse lens is basically saying, what would other people say about this? So in other words, what you're trying to do is it's almost like a fly on the wall type approach. You're lifting yourself out of yourself.

What would other people say about this? What actually is really true about this situation? So it stops us getting caught up in our own head around this. So what would other people think?

What would my mum say about this? What would my friends say about this? What? You know, it's just a useful way to again, just bring a different perspective onto the. Onto the stressor.

Yeah, no, I like that one.

Yeah.

Good.

And the final one is, you know, sometimes we come across situations which are really difficult to, you know, we just got to suck it up and just experience the thing and go through that situation. And we engage what we call the wide lens. So the wide lens.

Okay, so no matter what happens in this situation or no matter what has happened, what can I learn from this?

Yeah, okay.

You know, so it's perspective, but just in a different sense.

Essentially what that's doing, then it doesn't see the stress and the stressor as this catastrophic thing that then becomes just a very negative thing that impacts us. We say, okay, let's treat this as a learning event.

Are you saying that we use the wide lens in the moment or is that easier to use after the stressor has gone away and learn it as a retrospective?

Yeah, maybe it's a post processing tool. Yeah, I think. And it helps us to bring perspective on actually what has happened.

I'm guessing, though, actually saying that you could Be going through something which is pretty painful, emotionally challenging, whatever. But if you really are able to say, okay, I know this is emotionally painful, I don't want to be going through it, but I've got no choice.

But there's an opportunity to learn here as I go along. I mean, not many of us probably do that in the moment.

No, no.

But that can be quite powerful.

Yes, it can.

And I think if I think of some of the really challenging things I've experienced in my life, actually, I think, although I wouldn't want them to happen again because they were nasty things, but actually, I hope I'm a better person as a result. As human beings, we learn through suffering and we learn through, you know, different things. So.

Yeah.

So it's changing our perspective on that.

Okay. Anything else?

No. So I think those two key things are the two key tools, I would say, really important to regulating and managing our internal stress.

Yeah. Reframing is so, so important.

Yeah.

And particularly if you lead a team, helping teams to reframe some of these stories and narratives and responses to stressors. Because, as you said, we're not going to be able to get rid of all the stressors.

No.

What we can do is we can respond in a different way.

And I go back again to the comment I made earlier. Being comfortable with the discomfort.

So to be resilient as a human being, sometimes when we experience stress is to bring some awareness to actually what's happening. Because when we think about that feeling in the stomach that we get, the stomach is churning.

Rather than trying to push that feeling away, we engage with that feeling. Sometimes something magical sort of happens. Actually, we realize it's just a feeling. It's just. It's just a feeling.

And actually our emotions, if you like, are signposts and warning signs to us to keep us safe.

Yeah.

So, you know, so what is that feeling telling me?

In this situation, we can get very deep here, but actually, human beings need to experience risk. They need to experience pain.

Yes.

To develop as human beings and to be resilient. You're not going to be resilient if you never experience bad stuff, are you?

So all of this, you know, developing resilience as a human being is developing a healthy relationship with our emotional warning systems. Yeah, that makes sense.

Yeah. And that's what we meant at the beginning of this podcast where we're talking about leading from the inside out.

Yes.

Yeah, that's what we mean, isn't it?

Yes, exactly right. Yeah, exactly right.

Okay, so let's wrap up this conversation so my key sort of insight from listening to your responses to my questions is we can't lead others if we're just constantly reacting.

No, no.

This is something we have to be conscious and proactive about.

Yeah. And if you're reactive, that's going to have an emotionally contagious effect on your team.

Yeah.

So managing yourself, that self leadership aspect is an important part of managing the culture inside your team.

So I guess the next lead on from that is, to anyone listening here is, well, okay. Reflect on your own inner game, what's going on inside your head.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's bringing perspective and proportionality to the situation. So recognize the stressor. Am I responding in a proportionate way?

And do things like manage your physiology, get in touch with your physiology, don't dismiss it, understand what it's telling you and use the, you know, there's all sorts of cognitive tools that we can use to help us reframe. But the three lenses is a very simple way to reframe our cognitive response and emotional response to what's going on around us.

Yeah. So I guess I'm not sure this is a question. It's probably a statement. Where do you notice interference that you think is stress?

You're calling it stress, but actually it's coming from your reaction to a stressor in your environment.

Exactly.

Yeah, exactly. I think we need to be really cognizant of that.

And I think the other thing to say is this is a deep, deep subject.

Oh yeah.

One of our associates, Andy Flack, who's a performance psychologist, he's actually got a background in psychotherapy as well and he did a podcast Right.

In the early days when we, when we set this up, is running a workshop with us at Stanbrook Abbey where he's going to talk about this sort of stuff more deeply and to explore how we respond to this using his four ways system.

Yeah. So anybody's around on, I think it's 10 June in Worcestershire at the lovely Stanbrook Abbey.

We'd love to have you there, look for those on our website. All those events are on our website. Andy's got some really great tips and techniques for dealing with the inner game.

As it were, and check out andy Flack on LinkedIn and connect with him.

But you know, we're really excited to be working with him with his four way system and he really has a deep understanding, a profound understanding of how human beings can develop resilience and particularly leaders as well.

Right, Rich, I think that's a wrap up for today.

Yeah. Thank you.

Thanks for your time.

Thank you. And I'll see you again soon.

And I'm going to go off to watch football.

Good luck, Bristol City.

Thank you.