Ep. #82 The Neuroscience of Misery at Work - Part 2

Speaker 1: 0:00

You are listening to Making Sense of Work with Jean Balfour. Hi everyone, and welcome to Making Sense of Work. This is part two in a two-part series on understanding the neuroscience of the misery of work and exploring how we can work with this to help us to move forward. If you haven't listened to part one, you might find it helpful to listen to this before enjoying this one. In a nutshell, in the last episode, we saw what was happening to our minds and our bodies, from a neuroscience perspective, when we're feeling stuck or when we're feeling unhappy at work. We saw that it has an impact on our whole system, which, in turn, can stop us from taking action and that can stop us from getting out of the situations we're in. We get caught in fight, flight, freeze or fawn, and if we're caught in that, if we're caught in that stress, we can end up feeling very pessimistic, feeling we've got low energy, low memory and we really struggle to take action. When we're here, we're caught up in something we called the sympathetic nervous system. Our job, therefore, is, in order to solve the problem, is to see how we can get out of that state, into what we call rest and digest, also called the parasympathetic nervous system, because that's where we're able to do the things that are going to be able to help us. We're able to observe what's happening and we're able to see what choices we have in making the change. We also saw that we have two amygdalae and that one plays a part in curiosity and connection and creativity, and this might be a way out of misery. We're calling this the right side, with the left side being the danger alert amygdala, so we can make a choice to move towards curiosity, connection and creativity and away from fear. And we talked about how we can choose to do that by letting our minds wander, letting the default mode network take over, and that this might help us find solutions With all this neuroscience and with all of these ideas.

Speaker 1: 2:18

This episode then focuses on what can we put into place to bring about the change, and I've come up with four stages to help us with this to move from misery to action and the four stages of this. The first is that we actually have to decide that we want to make a change. Sometimes we're quite enjoying the misery, we're a bit stuck there, but it's really kind of comfortable. So we want to make a decision to change it. Then I think we need to become calm. I think it's really hard to move forward if we're in that stress state, so to find a way for us to engage with some calm really helps. The third step is then to start to notice and name what's happening, to get really clear about the situation, and then, finally, we can engage our values, our curiosity and our creativity to help us, and I'm going to work through each of those in turn and share some ideas that I have on how we can work with them. Let's start with this idea of that we need to decide to make a change. We've seen in the last episode that our right amygdala has the potential to help us. If we can drive ourselves not just towards the amygdala but towards the parts of our brain that hold creativity and curiosity and compassion, and if we can move away from what we're calling the left side, the fear side, then we might be able to think about how to bring about change.

Speaker 1: 3:52

But the thing is we have to make a choice to go to the right. We have to drive towards it. We need to become aware that we're feeling trapped and that we need to open up our brain to possibility and option. I mean, if you think about the example that nearly everybody has at the moment, and that's a workload overload problem. We have to move from I've got too much to do and there's nothing I can do about it. Out of that we end up in a spiral, I think I. I mean, if I think about myself here, I say to myself, oh, I've got too much to do, what can I do about it? But I have to move into believing I can make a change. I have to believe that there's something there, because instantly that we do that, we open up to possibility. Instead of saying there's nothing I can do, we say what can I do? What can I do? How can I engage a creative mind to think about solving this problem? When we're doing this, when we're making this decision, we're actually making a decision to move away from negativity, bias, to move away from the pull to this sort of danger alert signal into hope that there is change.

Speaker 1: 5:07

And a model that I've worked with that I particularly like is something called the Choice Point by Russ Harris. There's a great video that he's done about this and I'll put a link to this in the show notes. Russ Harris is essentially writing about the same idea that we get very hooked on the left side. We have a situation and we get hooked into it, and then we have to bring about change in order to move towards something, to move towards the right side. But the thing about this is that we've got to make that choice, and that's why it's called the choice point, because we have to choose to go to the right. And the starting point is to admit that we're stuck, that we're hooked, that we're in a bit of a negativity spiral. We're human and to make a decision to see if we can move out of that. And I believe that step two, once we've made that decision to move out of it, is actually to go to calm first. I think, before we can take any action, we actually need to calm our nervous system, we need to move into rest and digest, we need to be there in order to start solving problems, and so we need to move through calm into the right, and I've got a few suggestions for this.

Speaker 1: 6:23

You have your own strategies for doing this, but here's a couple of ones that I use. The first is to use grounding, and you can try this now. Just notice where your feet are on the floor and if they're not on the floor, maybe put them on the floor and then take a little breath in and then do a really long breath out and just keep going until you've expelled all the air and then just go back to normal breathing. There's some amazing neuroscience which I don't fully understand that tells us that breathing out is very, very good for calming our nervous systems. So if you want to get calm you're in a meeting, you're really feeling miserable in the meeting start by putting your feet on the floor, noticing where they are, just very quietly do a long out breath.

Speaker 1: 7:14

Another way of moving to calm is to move from resistance to acceptance. I know the times that I've been really miserable at work. I've been really kind of resisting. It's like I'm pulling against it and when we're doing this we actually can't change because we're in a tension state, we're resisting anything and we're not open to change. When we move into acceptance, then we're in a different state. We're in a present moment state. We're saying, okay, I accept the situation is really difficult, I don't like it, but I accept it. I know it's what it is and I'm just going to accept it. And even as I say that now I notice my system. Calming Gratitude is another place that we can go. Sometimes, when we're miserable, it's really hard to feel grateful. But if we can just notice small things, notice the sky, notice the taste of coffee, that can help.

Speaker 1: 8:14

And this is also connected to something called glimmers. We have a new blog on our website about glimmers and again, there'll be a link to that. In a nutshell, they've come out of someone writing about the opposite of triggers. We've heard a lot in recent years about being triggered towards something, and when we talk about that, we normally mean being triggered towards a negative reaction. But what they noticed was that there were lots of things that could trigger us into a good space, and they called them glimmers. If you think about what that might be for you, it could be the sound of a baby laughing or the smell of coffee. A glimmer for me is a little bit of jazz. It can make me smile in a moment. What are your glimmers? And then thinking about how you can work with them. Maybe it's a photo of your children, and when you're feeling a bit stuck, just pull that photo out and look at them and see what happens in your system.

Speaker 1: 9:14

So we've got these steps We've got. Step one is that we decide to make a change, and step two is that we calm ourselves so that we can begin to look for ways out. And then step three is about noticing and naming what state. And then step three is about noticing and naming what's happening. When we're in the left state, we get what's called fused with the idea of what's happening. We believe everything negative about what is happening and we refuse it with ourselves. So I'm not good enough to solve this, I'm not clever enough, and we identify as it being fully a part of us. It gets caught in our system and what we want to learn to do is to step back from that, to become the observer of this.

Speaker 1: 10:04

I had a really small, in a way, recent example. I started learning Italian on Duolingo, so it's on my phone and I'm with my phone. Having all these feelings and they were things like this is really scary. I'm going to get it wrong. I'm no good at this. I was completely fused with the idea that I'm no good at languages. I'm no good at learning a language. This is ridiculous. Nobody is looking at me, I'm on my own, I have the phone, but I've still got all these feelings of self-doubt coming up, and they're, of course, impacting my experience. So, because I've been thinking about this, I thought huh, that's really funny. I became the observer, I stepped back from it and then I laughed and I was like look at me, thinking I can't do this, it doesn't even matter if I can't do it, I could try, I can give it a go. Because I became the observer, I stopped feeling anxious and I began to enjoy it, and I have been really enjoying it. I'm not doing it for any reason, I'm doing it just to enjoy it.

Speaker 1: 11:08

So the thing we want to do here is we want to notice our thoughts and become the observer of them, because when we're caught up in them, we believe them as all to be true and we want to really see that they're not always true. So we might be saying things to ourselves like I want to get a new job, but I'm worried I'll fail, or I'm ready for promotion, but I can't do it, or somebody is upsetting me and I can't do anything about it. These are just stories we're saying to ourselves. They're the stories that are holding us back, and what we want to do is to notice those stories. Don't try and argue with them or change them, just notice them and name them. Notice them and name them.

Speaker 1: 11:50

One exercise that you can do is to think about a situation you're in and take your journal and write down all the thoughts that go with it. Just keep going, write down every thought about that situation. Maybe come back to it over a few days and you will be surprised how many thoughts there are going on and on in your mind oh, I can't stand working here. I can't stand working here. Whatever they are, just keep going, write them down until they're all out and then, when they are all out, start to look at them and see what's the story that's going on here, what's behind all of those thoughts? So back to my Italian example. What was behind all of those thoughts was that I was no good at learning languages.

Speaker 1: 12:35

When we can understand that overarching story like I'm not enough, or I'm not good enough or I'm not capable, then actually even just seeing that story and naming it is very powerful Because we can just say, oh, there's that story again. That's the piece that's in my mind that's telling me I can't change my work situation, there's nothing I can do. It gives us hope. Noticing and naming moves us out of stuck into hope. The other part about noticing and naming is also about learning to notice and name our emotions and because when we're miserable and stuck, sometimes actually we want to just push all the emotions down. We don't want to feel those and we're kind of labeling them as being negative emotions. But doing that is like trying to push a beach ball under the water, because the ball is going to want to pop up, and that's what happens with our emotions they pop up, but when we become granular, when we name them, they hold less power over us because we can see them, we bring up the experience we feel of it and then it feels easier so we can name our emotions and move forward from them. We can go one step further when we're naming emotions and that's get really granular. So if you think you're feeling miserable at work, try and dig into what are all the feelings about it. Maybe it's I feel threatened or I feel nervous or whatever it is that's going on. See if you can get right to the heart of the real emotion. That's there.

Speaker 1: 14:04

Again, there's more tips in one of the guides that we'll put a link to. So we've got these three steps so far. We've got decide to make a change, get back to calm, notice and name. And then step four is about how we can engage our values, our curiosity, our creativity and our connection to help us to move, to help us to get out of the situation. If we look at this vicious cycle of negativity which I talked about in part one, we want to change that into a choice cycle. We want to see that, instead of ruminating, we can become calm and that we can use our default mode network. We can use the creative side, the creative parts of our brain, for change. We can move away from negativity bias towards a creative plan. We can notice a name bias towards a creative plan. We can notice and name.

Speaker 1: 15:01

And for me, the first place to start here is creativity. So I'm going to think about ways that I can start to generate ideas. One option here is just to start by going for a walk or going to the shower or swimming or somewhere where you can engage your default mode network and take a question with you. Don't focus on the question really hard, but just take a question with you. I recently read in a gorgeous book that we can just say hmm to ourselves and it will energize us into pondering things. Try it now. Just go see what happens when you just go. Hmm, or you can try, I wonder, and it's wonderful, I wonder, opens up all sorts of possibilities. So start to really engage, start to shift your mind towards that creative angle, towards the right to thinking about that. Try saying hmm or hmm, I wonder, and see if you can feel a shift in energy. Essentially, what we're doing here is we're moving away from a kind of task-focused problem solving to opening ourselves up, opening ourselves up to option and, as I've said, this is very connected to the default mode network.

Speaker 1: 16:16

There's one other small thing I want to say here. I've been reading a little bit about what's happening to us when we're looking at computers for too long and that we essentially are in a very tunnel vision space and then we're not engaging our peripheral vision. So we're seeing what's in front of us but we're not seeing what's beside us or sort of slightly to the back of us. And this is another reason I think that it's good for us to get away from our computers, to go outside or to find a window. Look at the clouds, look at the trees, talk to a friend, go to a different space, try not to look at screens, because in that process we might just see more possibility than we would in the tunnel vision of the screens that we're looking at.

Speaker 1: 17:03

Another way we can look at moving towards change is actually to work with our values. There's a podcast episode about values episode 75. But one of the ways of doing this is to think about what are the values that I need and what are the values that I've got being supportive at the moment and what are not helping me. Maybe I can find the top five values that I need to be happier at work and then work with those, find moments in the days where those are being exhibited. There's a nice example that also links to the brain, which is that humor may be an important value for you, and if it is, even if it isn't, humor is a great way of moving into creativity. And so are there ways that you can have a laugh with somebody in the office? Is there somebody who you really enjoy talking with? You love their humor, go for coffee with them and just have a laugh, just get into that kind of space of freedom With values. What we're wanting to do is just explore what's important for us and then see how we can get more moments of those, because if we have moments of the things that bring us joy at work, that feed our values, then we might move more easily into the creative space, into looking for solutions, into finding a way forward, and maybe we'll see that actually there is lots of work that is aligned with our values, or the work itself is aligned with our values, and actually if we look at that more, maybe some of our unhappiness will slip away.

Speaker 1: 18:40

There's another exercise that we teach on the level two part of our coaching program, and this encourages you to use kind of three different parts of your mind. The first is you start with your logical mind and this is really engaging the prefrontal cortex and you say what are the options here? You look at what's logical, what's the pragmatic thing that I need to do here, and when you're in that state you don't get caught up in the emotion, you just look at it. You'd be very practical. Then, when you finish that, you move over into the emotional side and you think what are the feelings that I have about this and what feels good, what doesn't feel good, what's possible? And then finally, when you've done those two, you ask your wise mind what's best for you? We all have a beautiful wise mind. What's best for you? We all have a beautiful wise mind and I don't think we tune into our wise minds enough. And you can simply ask your wise mind hmm, I wonder what's the best thing to do. What would you suggest? Wise mind, what's best for me? And if you find that a bit uncomfortable, ask your friend. Ask a good wise friend to be that wise mind for you and ask that question. See if they can help you to generate different solutions, because all of this is about moving into solution focused mode in a creative way.

Speaker 1: 20:03

Another thing that we can do is just to engage with lots of creative problem-solving tools, and there's lots of these. I'll give you a couple of examples of these. One is mind mapping. I'm a massive fan of mind mapping. I use it myself. You can put Google mind mapping and you'll see lots of examples. And there are beautiful apps that you can use to help you and just basically throw ideas around, put them up, connect them. Maybe put the question up there how do I move from miserable to happy and how can I dial up my state, how can I get there? And just start brainstorming ideas and putting them up.

Speaker 1: 20:37

You can also use Edward de Bono's six thinking hats, so his hats give you thinking from a different perspective. For example, they say play the devil's advocate. What if you just stay in your job? What are you complaining about anyway? Or look at it from an optimistic perspective, what's entirely possible here? And then, finally, I just want to go back to Daniel Pink's work on motivation. I talk about this work a lot, so I'm not going to talk too much about it here, but there are some clues for us. I think when we're unhappy at work, it can be that it's a motivation issue.

Speaker 1: 21:15

And Daniel Pink says that there are three things that are fundamental once our basic needs are met. One is that we have the right amount of autonomy for us. The second is mastery that we're learning and getting better at things. And the third is that we have some sense of purpose. Do I feel like my job is connected to something that matters to me, or connected into the organization? And you can do this on a very practical level. You can say on each of those have I got the right level of autonomy, am I learning enough and am I connected into the purpose? And then, if you discover one of them is struggling. For example, maybe you feel that you don't have enough autonomy. Can you talk with your line manager about a project that you can lead on? Or maybe you need more challenge, maybe you need stretch because you're really plateaued and you're bored in your work.

Speaker 1: 22:11

Now, with all of this, journaling is your friend. I would say that because I always talk about journaling, but I wanted just to give a neuroscience perspective on journaling. When we're thinking things in our mind and we're just thinking, when we're thinking things in our mind and we're just thinking, we often end up in the rumination space, in the negativity bias space, and that can be challenging. When we're journaling, actually, just very naturally, we become a bit more of the observer, we're just a bit more separate from it, so we're able to see things from afar and that can be really helpful for processing, for noticing, naming and also moving things into a different mindset. Now it doesn't mean that you have to write happy thoughts in your journal. Write them all down, write all the miserable thoughts down, but you will be the observer of them so you'll be able to see them, notice them and name them.

Speaker 1: 23:03

Now, before we finish, of course, if you're really struggling, get help. Create a peer coaching group in your workplace or outside your workplace. Get friends, find mentors and, of course, find a coach. Get all the help you can need. I'm a great fan of getting help. I always have people I'm talking to to help me in my working life, to to help me in my working life.

Speaker 1: 23:29

So here are these four steps that can take you, that can begin to help you to think about how do I move out of misery and the insights from neuroscience that give you some idea and understanding about why the misery is happening. And also you can work with those to help you move out of it and make a decision to change. Get some calm work with noticing and naming, and encourage and engage that curiosity and that creativity. It is possible for us to shift. I've seen it in myself. But we have to start with moving our mindset and that's where neuroscience and the creativity mindset comes in.

Speaker 1: 24:04

Just a very final there is a webinar version of these two podcasts, part one and part two, and if you would like to see the models visually, there's a link in the show notes to the webinar and you can go and watch it there. So I really wish you well on this journey out of misery into finding more moments of calm and enjoyment and satisfaction at work. Thanks for joining this episode of Making Sense of Work. If you enjoyed it, please go and subscribe, rate and review. If you have a topic you'd like me to explore in the podcast, please follow the show notes and send me a message.