0:07

Hello, and welcome to life beyond the numbers, the podcast, for those curious about creating a more fulfilling work life.

0:16

Every business boils down to two basics people and money.

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Here we focus on the human side.

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Numbers masher, but people matter most.

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And people drive performance.

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I'm Susan Ní Chríodáin your host, coach consultant, facilitator, and author of leading beyond the numbers.

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It brings me joy to speak to people and explore together how, although we share many similarities as humans each of us navigates the world through our own unique lens.

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This adds intricacy to our interactions and contributes to both the depth and difficulties of interpersonal relationships.

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Join us for stories, strategies, and insights to help you lead your life beyond the numbers.

1:20

Hello. And welcome to episode 185 of life beyond the numbers.

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And this episode is going out on Saturday.

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September 14th, 20, 24.

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If you're a regular listener, you'll know that the podcast was off air for the month of August.

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And this is the first episode back since late July.

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And there's a change in format.

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For the foreseeable. There will be a new episodes going out every second week.

1:52

So every fortnight you can tune in for a new episode of life beyond the numbers.

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Those episodes will mainly be conversations with guests and every now and then.

2:03

I'll surprise you with a solo episode.

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Or perhaps a compilation one.

2:11

Or maybe even one from the archives.

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Although I was off air for the month of August.

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I didn't stop recording.

2:21

And I've had some fantastic conversations with people that I can't wait for you to hear.

2:29

First off is a conversation with David Lee.

2:33

And If you're a regular listener, you'll know that David Lee Appears regularly on this podcast, usually with Dr.

2:41

Suzanne Evans and myself. And during the summer, David got in touch with me to say that he'd like to record an episode.

2:51

About my book and this one comes from a different angle because he's coming at it from his perspective as opposed to mine.

2:59

And we have a. Brilliant chat about.

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The significance of self-regulation emotional self-regulation and co-regulation.

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In our workplaces. In fact, we enjoys this conversation so much that it.

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Got us thinking about why don't we do this more regularly?

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And what if. Rather than just having these conversations amongst ourselves.

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And recording them because we didn't originally set out to put this out as a podcast episode.

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That we would start doing LinkedIn lives.

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And from September 23rd, we will go live on LinkedIn for about 30 minutes.

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With a series called how to up your people game at work.

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we'll start that series on september 23rd and we'll do it for four weeks, Monday five o'clock UK time, 12 o'clock Eastern standard time.

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Be great. If you joined us for that.

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And the beauty about LinkedIn live is those.

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Recordings stay on the platform.

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So if you're listening to this episode in.

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November 20, 24 or some other time in the future.

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Obviously, it's not the future. Now, if you're listening. Those recordings will still be available on LinkedIn.

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And you'll get a flavor of it from listening to this episode.

4:39

However, this episode is a bit longer.

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Than our intention for our LinkedIn lives.

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And just a teaser on the LinkedIn lives.

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If you're like most of us, the biggest challenges in the workplace don't come from the technical demands of work.

4:58

They come from those perplexing people we work with.

5:02

And often to our surprise, we are their number one source of stress.

5:08

If you'd like to up your people game.

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Come join me and David Lee.

5:15

For a series of live conversations on LinkedIn, we'll share some of the challenging situations we've experienced, what has worked and what didn't.

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We'll also share some practices and strategies that we use continually to work on improving our ability to bring our best selves to our interactions with others.

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The format will be story and discussion-based, we'll be sharing stories and engaging in real conversations.

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No slides. Just insights.

5:51

I hope. That we'll see some of you there.

5:56

So that's a series of LinkedIn lives starting on September 23rd.

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For four weeks. And maybe more who knows.

6:06

as you listen to this episode, you'll actually hear us come up with the idea for this.

6:12

Or maybe not for that but developing our thinking as we had this conversation about how we'd like to do more of these.

6:22

I hope you enjoy this episode. It was.

6:24

A great one to record us with David.

6:27

I always love our conversations.

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And the next episode of life beyond the numbers will be out on September 28th, 2024.

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That's two weeks from today. In the meantime, I wish you all the very best wherever you are.

6:46

Hey, here we are. We're

6:48

back again. We are.

6:51

So, we're going to talk about our mutual interests in constructive conversations, psychological safety, all that great stuff.

7:02

I'd love it if we could, start off with one of the many things I loved about your book.

7:07

And is there a copy available?

7:10

In fact, there is. it's like attached to me.

7:13

I walk around with this all the time.

7:16

You never know when I need to show it. I love it.

7:20

besides the cool stories.

7:23

One of the things I loved about it and so resonated with is your emphasis on emotional self regulation.

7:32

And then also I can't remember if you talked about it, but like we could talk about it.

7:36

well, I'm sure you did, around co regulation and the whole concept that the human brain, or her nervous system was primarily designed for co regulation.

7:46

So, Do you want to start riffing on that?

7:49

And then we'll go from there. Fantastic.

7:51

I'd love to. And just for those listening, and maybe there's no video the name of my book is leading beyond the numbers, how accounting for emotions tips, the balance at work.

8:01

And it just came out in May. And One of the interesting quotes in the book is from Lisa Feldman Barrett, who we've talked about before, she's a neuroscientist and psychologist, and she says one of the best things for people is other people, and one of the worst things for people is other people.

8:23

and she's talking about this co regulation, that actually we need others to help us co regulate.

8:29

And for those of you who don't know what that means, I guess, the simplest way of thinking about it, I think is when you're a baby and you're born you need another human being to give you some of the things, your basic needs, like feed you and keep you clean and keep you sheltered and all of that.

8:50

basically your parent is co regulating with you so they can calm you down and so on.

8:56

But in a workplace perspective, oh yeah, sorry David.

8:59

Yeah, before you go on related to that.

9:01

And so one of the things to really appreciate around that is the baby doesn't have what neuroscientists will use the term the neural architecture to self regulate.

9:15

And so the, walking around and the cooing and the patting the back and everything, that's literally training the baby's nervous system.

9:25

So it develops the neural architecture for self regulation.

9:30

Absolutely. That's very critical to all of this, because if that isn't right and right, it's not the right word.

9:38

And we'll talk about words later, but if you're not co regulated in a way that helps your nervous system, that can impact how you self regulate and co regulate later as well.

9:50

It has a knockout impact on your life.

9:53

And if you can even self regulate.

9:57

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think in the workplace, the easiest way to think about something like co regulation from a very basic standpoint is moods and how moods spread.

10:12

if you go into an office and everybody's greeting you with good morning, David, it's wonderful to see you.

10:19

Where were you last week? I missed you. And there's all of this camaraderie, but from a collaborative point of view, then we're more likely to regulate ourselves into that way of being as well.

10:32

So if we arrived in kind of a bit not everything being all right with the world, spending time with people who have that positive influence on us or a more upbeat, open influence on us can help us to regulate that way.

10:49

And the opposite is also true. So you walk into a room and you can feel it often.

10:54

I mean, this is something I would notice. you walk into a room where, oh, well, it's all just a bit hard.

11:03

And, oh, I don't really want to be here.

11:05

And, oh, I'm miserable. That's also going to have an impact on how you feel about yourself, your colleagues and your work.

11:14

that's a really simple explanation of co regulation.

11:19

And we can talk about that before we go to self regulation, I think.

11:22

Yeah. Yeah. you're describing like, what's the ambient mood on the team, in the room, et cetera.

11:29

It reminds me of I love this term.

11:33

I don't know if Daniel Goleman coined it, whether he did or not.

11:37

That's who I heard it from. And when he talked about mirror neurons.

11:42

And if you want to talk about that, because I know that's in your book and how mood, the emotional contagion, he described it as emotional Wi Fi.

11:54

And I love that term.

11:57

So, before you talk about the mirror neurons, it's one of the many reasons why doing the work what we're broadcasting emotionally as individuals and then as a culture is so important because of emotional wifi.

12:15

So do I say a little bit about the mirror neurons.

12:20

So the mirror neurons, I don't think I know a whole lot about mirror neurons.

12:24

So maybe I'll pass back to you. No, no, no.

12:27

But rather than just going off on one, which I could do.

12:33

Sorry about that. so mirror neurons are in the prefrontal lobe and they pick up on the nonverbal signals of other people and then create in our brain, the emotional physiological nervous system stuff that was going on in the other person.

12:54

In fact, there's a wild research where, researchers would like wire up a husband and a wife.

13:02

with the EEG, and they'd separate them and rile up the husband.

13:07

I could tell him stuff that would make him mad and then bring him back into the room with, with his wife.

13:13

And they'd be monitoring them. And within, I don't know if it's moments or minutes, I can't remember the wife's EEG pattern is mirroring his.

13:24

So, mirror neurons play a major role in emotional Wi Fi.

13:31

And the contagion thing, because that's a great word as well, isn't it?

13:34

contagion. Because things spread, and I guess that's maybe one of the underlying concepts in the book as well, is that if you think about the cumulative emotional states of everybody going to work every day, If we talk about people being upbeat and optimistic and hopeful and collaborative, then that's going to have that impact on the bottom line.

14:01

People will be more productive, their performance will be better, they'll be more of the

14:09

And again, the reverse, if you go into work afraid of your boss, afraid to speak up, afraid to take any risks, afraid to make mistakes, that's likely to be shared by other people too, which means we probably won't be as productive or performance won't be as strong as it could be.

14:33

Thank you. And I think the interesting thing about all of that is, how do you prove it?

14:40

it's never obvious when you're in the situation you're in.

14:43

And people put a lot of emphasis on, well, we must make that budget, or we've got to hit that target.

14:49

But not necessarily allowing people that openness to explore things that might impact them.

14:57

performance, productivity, and profit for other reasons.

15:03

So they get hemmed in by numbers, which can have an impact

15:08

on the mood. Yeah.

15:10

You know, two things come up for me related to that.

15:14

So it's in terms of Like, what's the proof in that?

15:20

well, actually three things. I'll see if I can hold them in working memory.

15:23

So, the first is, in the world of elite athletics, one of the, like, foundational principles is state determines performance and how much effort goes into getting into a peak performance stay.

15:45

Number two is, I remember somebody talking about, challenging people who poo poo, motivation and mindset.

15:54

And this person said, think about

15:59

Well, American football, I'm sure the same is true.

16:02

And, and football, football, soccer is, if a football team is down, after the first two quarters and they're in the locker room during halftime, what does the coach do?

16:14

The coach does this big, like motivational speech, get people fired up again.

16:21

And this person said. Think about it.

16:24

If people who are being paid millions of dollars a year and are the best of the best need some sort of help to shift their state to perform well, what about the rest of us?

16:37

do you think maybe that's important?

16:40

And like, what a good point.

16:44

and then the third point, is, there's plenty of research and cognitive neuroscience, et cetera, around how the emotional state profoundly affects perception, like forget about performance.

17:05

and I know we're both fans of polyvagal theory where Steven Porges talks about When people are in the fight or flight state, it literally tunes the nervous system to look for cues of danger and literally tunes its awareness of frequency to lower frequencies, which are predatory sounds.

17:28

So. kind of a mishmash of like, Hey guys, like dealing with emotions is super important.

17:38

It's critical. It's crucial.

17:41

it's fascinating because I don't know about you growing up, David, and I'm sure we've had this conversation before, but I don't remember, emotions weren't something that we talked about, expressing how you felt wasn't really other than a couple of very basic words like happy, sad.

17:59

glad, mad, that was kind of it.

18:03

And the emotional side of things was dismissed and poo pooed and not acknowledged and not allowed.

18:14

And I think that fundamentally had an impact on the human race.

18:21

The state of the world we're in now, I think a lot of what we see is because people, and we haven't talked about self regulation, but people are unable or unwilling, perhaps in some cases, to emotionally self regulate.

18:35

Or, another way of talking about it is to be emotionally mature.

18:41

And you've just talked about the benefits of all of that, which are that maybe pointing out some of the key critical factors that it helps,

18:54

and the more awareness that can be raised around those things.

18:59

Amazing. And just to go through those three points very quickly, you talked about stage determining performance.

19:06

I had a conversation with somebody last week who had missed a flight.

19:11

Oh no, their flight had been cancelled on a Monday and on a Tuesday morning the flight was rescheduled to go but this person was going to have to come back Wednesday morning and they were like, oh I don't think I'll go for 24 hours, it's not really worth it, it's too much hassle, all of these kind of things.

19:27

And then suddenly went I'm just gonna go and off that person went and had the most amazing trip and they said nothing changed in the external circumstances the flight the day before had still been cancelled the flight had still been rescheduled all that changed was that person's state from oh it's not worth it to I'm doing it.

19:50

And that is incredibly empowering, I think.

19:55

Motivation and mindset. you talked about football, football and American football, but let's mix the two of them and talk about Ted Lasso.

20:02

I don't know if you've ever seen Ted Lasso, but he's an American football coach.

20:06

It's a comedy program. And he comes to UK to train the soccer team or football team.

20:12

And his way with the team.

20:16

It's incredible. And I think if you want to understand emotions TV can be very good from that perspective.

20:22

This is one of the best programs for helping you see emotions are part of who we are and that motivation and mindset help people to regulate and co regulate,

20:33

And then the third one, the, the perception.

20:38

I suppose maybe the one and three are kind of related, however, external circumstances can impact number three more because if you are in danger, then you need that fight or flight to kick in.

20:54

Don't you? You need those survival emotions, that fear response, you need it.

20:59

And it's determining when one is necessary or what is possible so that I can change my state or when three is necessary so that I keep myself safe.

21:11

Yes. when you say what is possible, so a couple of things.

21:15

So I think to me back to the concept of the, what's the ambient emotional state.

21:23

And, and every time we talk about emotional state, I'm talking to the listener viewer, I know, like understood that we're also talking about physiology.

21:33

Cause there's no, Particular emotion without its concomitant particular physiology.

21:41

And so back to like, what's the ambient emotional state.

21:46

and this is one of the reasons why I've been like harping on the importance of reducing, stress level with employees, because If a person's emotional state is one of stressed out, then they can't help but see the world as a threat because their nervous system is tuned in.

22:11

So just like a simple example I think anybody can relate to this, where if they've had a not so great relationship with a supervisor and the supervisor says, I'd like to have a conversation with you or I've got some feedback for you and instantly, we're super on guard and whatever comes at us gets filtered through that lens.

22:37

So it can be internally created state versus triggered by the external.

22:45

So one of the examples I use that this, when you mentioned your friend with, the flight, And then oftentimes I'll use if I'm doing like a resilience program and talking about state is remembering.

22:58

I mean, this has happened many times. I remember the first time I was aware of it and reflected on it.

23:04

I was trudging through an airport after a multi day business trip and was worn out.

23:10

And. Anybody who does business travel knows it's not glamorous and, all that.

23:16

And, and so, as I'm just slogging along the concourse and I'm thinking of all the stuff that I had to do and, my to do list and some of the challenges that I was facing and just feeling really beleaguered by that.

23:30

And then I spotted, I might've told you the story one time, I spotted a Starbucks.

23:37

And you're like, cue up angelic choir, like, Oh, and this is back in the day when I would drink the four shot espresso drinks.

23:48

I know, I know.

23:51

And within it felt like seconds, but it's probably a couple of minutes.

23:56

I go from like, Oh, I've got all this stuff to do.

23:58

And there's this and that. To like, Oh, that project, I'll just do this, this, and this, that, that hard conversation.

24:06

That's not hard. I'll just, like when you're jacked up on caffeine, you know?

24:10

And later I thought, notice what happened.

24:13

Like, obviously my workload and the pressures and demands didn't change.

24:19

Like that's obvious. The interesting thing was I didn't like talk myself into.

24:25

a productive state, like you can do it and think of the bright side, all that.

24:30

All I did was change my physiology.

24:33

My biochemistry changed and then my emotions changed.

24:37

And literally the way I saw the world changed.

24:41

And I think everybody has their own version of that.

24:44

If they have any doubts about the power of emotion slash physiology, Just think about your own experience, or if you're really tired and how hard it is to be patient with somebody, like as simple as that, you know.

24:59

Yeah, there are so many examples, and I'm not sure, though, that we understand, or we've had the language, David, to connect what we've just been talking about.

25:13

We go back to emotional self regulation or whatever, I mean, it's not that long since I heard that term before.

25:18

I can remember the first time I even heard somebody say to me, I help people become emotionally mature.

25:25

Yeah. was 2018. That's like six years ago.

25:30

So I've come a long way in six years myself.

25:33

I still have a long way to go. But again, I think a lot of us were brought up or grew up believing that our emotions and our emotional reactions are automatic, hardwire responses, and that there was nothing we could do about that.

25:52

And If that was going to happen, we should do everything in our power to shut it down, or we'd look like a fool.

26:01

And it was always from a perspective of you looking like a fool, or looking foolish, or instead of actually this was necessary and you needed to learn how to be able to regulate that for yourself.

26:19

And so for all of us that have spent a lot of our lives shutting these things down and avoiding them and burying them, we now have the not so pleasant task, probably some of the time of letting that go for want of a better term.

26:39

But actually we need to exercise, exercise or exercise those emotions and understand that.

26:51

We have. the ability to regulate ourselves.

26:58

We have the ability to respond and not react, and even in the heat of the moment.

27:06

And that's not to distract from the fear response and needing to be safe, if it's absolutely legitimate and your life depends on it, but most of the time our nervous systems and physiology have become attuned to reacting or responding when the threat level is not a life or death situation.

27:30

And that's not our fault.

27:34

We've been brought up like that. We've been conditioned like that.

27:37

We've done it to ourselves. It's never too late to change.

27:43

You gotta. And so this might be a good jumping off point.

27:51

to talk about, some of your favorite emotional self regulation techniques?

27:58

And then, and I'll share some of mine.

28:00

And then maybe, since you brought up that important issue of how most of us, you know, Got taught, don't show your emotions, especially in the workplace.

28:11

Don't be vulnerable. Maybe then we can watch the video and then sort of riff on that.

28:18

Yeah, that sounds great. Yeah. So what are some of your favorite emotional self regulation techniques?

28:26

for me, learning that When somebody provides me, let's say with feedback, if it's critical or even if it was good or positive or whatever, my automatic reaction might be to dismiss it or to avoid it or, there's a whole host of different ways to react to that.

28:47

And actually being able to listen to the person and take in what they're talking about.

28:54

so that I can reflect on it later.

28:56

So I think reflection has become a very big part of my self regulation, owing it to myself to listen, take in what the person is saying.

29:08

I don't have to agree or disagree.

29:11

And then actually reflecting on it because,

29:17

there's several ways of looking at this. Sometimes it's opinion.

29:21

The feedback doesn't mean anything if somebody comes along and writes, this is me practicing as well, but if somebody writes an Amazon review that tears my book apart and says it's rubbish, I have to be able to regulate myself so that doesn't upset me.

29:38

Because what is the point in worrying about what one person says when actually the book wasn't for them, and that was their opinion, and I can't write a book for everyone.

29:50

Now, that sounds fine, doing it is something else, and the only way I believe that you get to a stage where you can do what we're talking about here is practice.

30:06

And in the beginning, self regulation looks like a chaotic zone.

30:12

Because you don't really know what's going on.

30:15

And I think listening, listening to understand became a really important thing for me to do.

30:25

And then myself as well. If, if I'm in a situation, like you say, getting impatient with somebody because you're feeling tired or something.

30:34

And I recognize that in myself. Recognizing.

30:38

That I'm feeling impatient means I need to stop, that I need to take a break, that there's something not quite right here because actually that's the other thing, David, isn't it?

30:50

When our system is stressed, our capacity to cope and to regulate goes down.

30:59

Absolutely. the overarching thing for me then I suppose, it's in the book, isn't it?

31:07

I talk about a seesaw and sea is sleep, eat, exercise.

31:13

And if you get those fundamentals right, if you are well rested, if you are getting outside, getting fresh air, eating properly, having the right amount of nutrition, you are using everything in your power to help your body physically stay regulated.

31:28

And if your body is physically staying regulated, it is so much easier to keep your mind regulated and your emotions regulated as well.

31:37

When any of them go drop a bit.

31:41

Then it is harder. You are fighting against your physiology and that is always more difficult.

31:48

Amen. Super important point.

31:53

Yeah. And that speaks to, I think one of the most important things in general in life is making sure we have the physiological foundation solid again, just like elite athletes, they're not trying to compete at elite level and they're eating junk

32:14

food and getting not enough sleep, etc And if I could just put a quick little plug in that's why doing things that bring you joy and peace and whatever fun feelings isn't self indulgent.

32:34

It allows you to be in that emotional physiological state where you can respond in the most productive helpful way.

32:43

So absolutely. Yeah, I would have

32:50

some others. Yeah, so I'm a,

32:54

a big fan, because I'm so good at the dysfunctional side of it, of challenging the stories we tell ourselves to be really aware of, like, what are you telling yourself about why this person said what they did?

33:11

Are you mind reading and assuming negative intent, you know, places I can go to so https: otter.

33:18

ai like talk myself back from the ledge, and remembering, I don't know.

33:27

And so, rather than buying into the explanation I've made, and then that helps me get into that curious mode.

33:35

So, the saying I think we've talked about get curious, not furious, which I love and there have been times, plenty of times where.

33:44

I've gotten so, outraged, about what somebody said or did that I had to like whip into action with direct state change activities, like do a really vigorous workout.

33:59

that's typically my go to venting with a friend.

34:04

Those are the two big ones, but there's more than just that to just get my state in a place where then I can entertain a more rational explanation for their behavior.

34:20

And I love what you said about practice.

34:24

And again, just like in sports.

34:29

What do you know, what do athletes do, they practice in low stress situations so it becomes, as you know, more hard wire.

34:39

And so sometimes if I'm doing a program on constructive conversations, and I'll walk people through the process that I sometimes have to go through to get into a productive state to have a productive conversation.

34:53

Sometimes people will say, man, that seems like a lot of work.

34:58

It's like, yeah, it is. But without that, the conversation won't go well.

35:03

And back to sort of like the implied point.

35:09

message and your practice recommendation is the more we do it in practice, the more likely it is to be natural when we can't practice when it's right in the moment.

35:21

So instead of, snarking back at the person, because we practice, the deep breathing, the listen to understand, etc.

35:31

We're like, hold on, in our head.

35:34

so those are a few of, of the things that I find helpful.

35:39

And I think the practice David as well is because we have to unlearn the habits that we've picked up and our habits are everything and our habits seem normal and natural to us and actually we've created them all so we're going to recreate habits that eventually with practice will seem normal and natural.

36:06

And we're human we're going to make mistakes.

36:10

And I think if we talk about maturity, maturity is when we recognize in ourselves, I think, that we have made a mistake.

36:19

Emotional maturity is no different.

36:22

it's that ability to look at ourselves and kind of say, whoops, maybe that wasn't the way to go there.

36:30

What would I do differently the next time?

36:32

And not necessarily better, even just differently.

36:36

So you can imagine a different outcome.

36:38

And the beauty of the brain is that even if we imagine it.

36:45

It's counted as experience, it's counted, it creates a neural pathway, and that's amazing as well, because then you can practice.

36:54

when I say practice, it's also about doing it for real.

36:58

And all the time, you're going to be building up that muscle, you're changing the wiring and it feels easier.

37:07

Yeah, if I could, play off the wiring piece and then I want to back up to the emotional maturity.

37:13

I'm glad you mentioned that again. So, for the realizing it takes many times of practicing that new response.

37:24

And I'd like to recommend to viewers or listeners, don't bite the hook by Pema Chodron.

37:31

And I would recommend the audio version because she just has a delightful personality.

37:35

So she's a Buddhist nun, a beloved teacher.

37:39

And I've re listened to that. I don't know how many times And one of the things that she says that I love is how it feels good when we react in the moment to somebody like, Oh, I told them off.

37:53

They didn't get one over on, you know, like, yeah.

37:56

and she talks about that as discharging energy.

38:00

And I'd never really thought about it.

38:03

And that's really true. It's like, I can't hold onto this, this anger or this irritation.

38:08

I need like, Mouth off to them in some way.

38:12

And now I feel better. And the problem is every time we do that we strengthen that reaction.

38:20

So the what's that the neurons that fire together wire together and to realize that every time we choose not to react.

38:32

it strengthens the little neural pathway, but it's a little tiny footpath compared to a super highway.

38:39

So yeah, it's going to take a lot of those practices to even come close to what we've been doing for years.

38:47

So having compassion for ourselves when we don't do the, the most, optimal response.

38:54

And then the other thing, when you talked about emotional maturity, I think it's also one of the things I found, from geeking out over neuroscience over the years is understanding that when somebody gets what Daniel Goldman calls emotional hijacked, so the amygdala, the primitive part of the brain takes over, or there was an educator named Dr.

39:22

Leslie Hart, who termed it downshifting.

39:27

And he was trying to figure out why do really smart students, do really poorly on tests, you know, test anxiety.

39:36

So we studied Dr. Paul McLean's work, etc, etc.

39:39

so I've used the term downshifting over the last 20 to 25 years.

39:43

And one of the things that's so helpful, both to help us have compassion for people, when They're just emotionally dysregulated, downshifted, emotionally hijacked, or whatever, is to realize just like a tantruming two year old doesn't have the neural architecture to emotionally self regulate, like they don't have the wiring to do that.

40:12

When adults get triggered, If they're moderately triggered, they're age regressing to like a obnoxious teenager.

40:26

So, I mean, everybody has dealt with people in the workplace.

40:30

You know, we're like, are you like 13 or 45?

40:33

Like, which is it? So to realize, or when somebody really down shifts, really gets triggered, they're like a tantruming two year old.

40:44

And they're not trying to be that way.

40:47

It's like, that's what's left of the brain that's functioning.

40:51

So at least I'll speak for me.

40:55

Oftentimes, not always, oftentimes knowing that saves me from getting super judgy and therefore triggered like, Oh, they're doing that to be a jerk.

41:06

It's like, no, that's all they've got to work with in their nervous system, in their brain right now.

41:15

I forget about the old wiring sometimes, which is the old wiring.

41:21

It's the. The wires that we've built up over time, the experience, the wires that have kept us to safe till now, the wires that have worked for us, but they might not be optimal.

41:33

And it says a lot, as well about the culture in an organization, because often that is all that culture is, I think, is the combination of the wiring of individuals.

41:47

And if you want to change culture. then you have to tackle these kinds of issues.

41:54

You have to help people bring their emotional side to work and help them understand how to regulate and be mature so that you can influence the culture in the right way.

42:07

are in the optimal way, which is a much better word than rice.

42:12

Yeah. So here's my question for you.

42:15

So with that in mind, I'm aware of the time.

42:21

And do you have a preference?

42:23

Because the one of the really cool parts of your book is where you talk about emotional granularity and how that.

42:33

relates to the, when you name it, you tame it related to emotions.

42:38

And what I'm wondering, what do you think about if we talk about that and save the video for another time?

42:46

Is that okay? It is because we've gone completely in a different direction.

42:51

And actually, as we're talking, I think that doing a few more of these would probably be great, like picking one topic, even, David, and going deeper into it.

43:02

we can talk about that later. So for now, emotional granularity.

43:07

And again, this is a term coined by Lisa Feldman Barrett, who I mentioned at the outset of this conversation.

43:16

And I've heard someone else describe it, I think, in a great way, and it's like become a connoisseur of words, so when, if you drink wine, which I'm sure plenty of people listening or watching probably do, we have all of these words to describe our wines.

43:36

I mean, we can go into granular detail about whether it's bold or fruity or doesn't taste of vanilla or strawberries or was it oak, blah, blah, blah.

43:46

And, and people become connoisseurs of, of things they enjoy perhaps is one way of doing it.

43:53

But get to know yourself and become a connoisseur of your experiences.

44:01

Be able to describe your experiences.

44:05

And it's so easy to default to certain words like, How are you?

44:09

I'm fine. I don't even know if fine is an emotion and grand certainly isn't one, but all Irish people will tell you they're grand.

44:17

And actually start to talk about when somebody asks you that question, How are you?

44:23

Give a sentence that describes what's going on for you now.

44:29

The caveat here for me is make sure it's appropriate to the conversation you're in.

44:36

You know, if you're in a job interview and they say, how are you, you might not want to like reveal everything that's going on.

44:43

But it's no harm to bring the human side into the room.

44:48

And I think it gives permission to other people to bring their human side in as well.

44:55

And there are nuances.

45:01

I think that's the beauty of life and experience is it isn't black and white, it isn't grey, it's colourful and the colours are those nuances, like what's the difference between feeling aggrieved, aggravated, frustrated, annoyed., there

45:24

are these amazing beautiful words that we have and once you can define your experience in broader terms or use more words, your life becomes richer and you start to seek out like the joy, like you say, because you know what it is.

45:44

And I think that's another important point.

45:46

If you don't know what joy is, you probably don't really know what sadness is either.

45:54

And so you've shrunk your emotional experiences world and The broader and bigger your experience is, the more willing you are to go out and have more, and the more you want to describe them.

46:13

And you can make up a word. you can make it up.

46:15

It doesn't matter. This is about what you are experiencing, and I think the beauty of your experience is it's your experience and no one can argue with that.

46:25

So just say what it is that's going on.

46:30

There are some fabulous resources out there to explore more emotion words.

46:36

I have two dictionaries. the Book of Human Emotions by Tiffany Watt Smith and the Emotional Dictionary by Susie Dent.

46:47

And then I have a Dictionary of Emotional Sorrows.

46:51

I can't remember who's written that, you can find different words from different languages.

46:56

So for me, when I talk about excitement.

47:02

I think there you can have different levels of excitement and there's one word in the Irish language or a phrase which is sceiteimhine ois and that just means kind of a building up of excitement.

47:15

And it just conjures up way more bubbling up and joy than just excitement does.

47:21

there are so many ways we can develop that,

47:25

more words. and.

47:29

Play with them. Look up a different word every now and then.

47:33

just play with different words. Look up the meaning of them as well.

47:37

Because I think there's a lot to be gained from the etymology of words as well.

47:41

Because it might help you to use a different word in a different experience.

47:46

Or to describe a different experience. So the granularity, a bit like grains of sand.

47:53

You can use as many words as you like, and the more the better.

47:57

Because who wants to go to a beach that has just two grains of sand?

48:02

And also, and probably this is the former therapist in me, like who tends to go to, how do you work with your emotions?

48:11

And you think about if somebody has a real limited emotional vocabulary, like, I'm angry at my boss.

48:20

Thanks. And if they develop the self awareness and emotional vocabulary, maybe it's really, I feel hurt that my supervisor didn't express appreciation over me doing X.

48:37

so I feel hurt and unappreciated.

48:41

And unseen or whatever else comes up.

48:45

And so, yeah, having greater precision gives us more clues about like, well, what do I need to do about this?

48:55

So, there's like huge utility.

48:59

to being more precise with our self awareness.

49:04

And you used a really important point there as well, David, about saying I feel,

49:10

because oftentimes we'll say I'm angry and I am angry and It isn't really that you are angry, it's that you feel anger towards something or you feel upset.

49:26

And often in the English language in particular we leave out that feel and we go straight to I am.

49:33

And actually you're telling your stage something that's Your body doesn't really want to hear, I'm angry.

49:40

whereas actually by separating, I feel anger towards, or I feel hurt because you're also distancing yourself a little bit from you being the anger to you experiencing the anger.

49:57

And that's a very subtle, again, it helps the vocab, I think, and the granularity.

50:06

Absolutely. It's funny.

50:09

I feel like, I'm going to be a proxy author who says like, in my book, I talk about this, because didn't you write about that in your book?

50:18

I'm pretty sure you because, because I'm, unless I'm making up this memory, I'm pretty sure I remember like, damn, that's a good point.

50:26

I need to remember that. The I feel versus the I am.

50:30

Yeah. And it's the same when it comes to hunger and things, to say, I am, I feel hungry, not I am hungry.

50:37

Because it's like, I am Susan. Yeah, that's it.

50:41

I am Susan, but I'm saying I am hungry and yeah, I feel hunger for example, in the Irish language, when I would say I feel hungry, I would say Tá ochras arom, which means there is hunger on me.

50:56

So it's not that I am hungry, but it's It's on me, and that's how we describe things in the Irish language, and I think it's the same in French as well, and others, but in English, we've, shortcut, we take a lot of shortcuts and again, that's practice, take, it's practice.

51:15

This will kind of add to our far ranging conversation, but it makes it makes me think that that's cool to hear the different languages and how that frames how you perceive hunger, or whatever the thing is.

51:32

And it's a great reminder of for all of us to be so cognizant of the language that we use.

51:41

And again, back to the, connoisseur of emotional language.

51:46

I wrote down emotional sommelier, because the terms we use will shape our perspective.

51:53

And I flashed onto I remember listening to this interview with Tony Robbins, and he's, of course, really big on how language affects the way you see the world and operate in the world.

52:08

And he shared this fun story of how, he and a, co owner of a business, were, scammed by one of their partners that they embezzled like millions of dollars or whatever it was.

52:22

And Tony was like, super outraged.

52:27

And this other partner goes, yeah, I'm feeling kind of peeved.

52:31

Tony's like, peeved? You're feeling peeved?

52:34

And the guy goes, yeah. And then I can't remember if the guy said he, uses that term on purpose to down regulate his emotional state, but they burst out laughing.

52:47

And Tony said ever since then, that's sort of their code phrase.

52:51

If one of them is getting too upset, like are you getting a little peeved?

52:55

And it's just like a fun little example.

52:59

Be aware of the language that we're using to talk about ourselves.

53:04

So like, I'm Susan. I'm not angry.

53:07

I'm not hungry. I feel hungry. I feel, yeah.

53:11

it's fascinating language. And again, we, because we speak the way we speak, we don't notice things.

53:18

I think if you don't, or find it difficult to notice in yourself.

53:25

Then start noticing in other people first, and it's always helpful to notice even maybe on television with caricatures or something because they'll exaggerate things.

53:37

And it's picking up where people say things and you kind of go, Oh, I could have said that differently, and then trying to put something into practice for you and I think, a lot of what we've talked about today, David.

53:49

doesn't change overnight. And you're better off just picking one thing that you want to start with and practicing that.

53:59

And I say that because I remember when I unlearned swimming a long time ago to learn properly, one of the best pieces of advice the swim instructor gave was, you're correcting all of these things.

54:11

Problem is if you do them all together simultaneously, you'll forget to breathe.

54:17

So just work on one at a time and then add the next one on and the next one and the next one.

54:24

And before you know it, you're swimming effortlessly.

54:26

And I have been ever since. Along with CrossFit.

54:30

Well, that's never effortless.

54:34

Yeah. And actually, I'm glad you mentioned that. I tell people school is never out.

54:38

Like I've been working with this stuff for 30 plus years and it's a never ending process and it gets easier.

54:48

but yeah. yeah, but life gets easier, doesn't it?

54:51

Ab abso it's so, it's so worth the effort.

54:55

Yeah. And, and as we start to wind up, I love what you said about like.

54:59

It's easier to notice than other people.

55:01

And so one really simple next step for people is to pay attention to the people that you interact with.

55:09

And just notice, I'll think of two, I'll just say one thing if you want to add another thing to notice.

55:18

So in the realm of emotions.

55:22

Since I'm like, so hyper focused on psychological safety, like notice what people do, how they show up, how they respond, et cetera, that helps you feel safe enough to be open and vulnerable and share your emotions.

55:39

And then notice things that people do. They're like, yeah, I guess I'm not going to talk about this.

55:44

And like, what did that person do?

55:47

That was a signal for you? Like, maybe not so safe here.

55:51

And that can be like an ongoing seminar of things to do more of and less of.

55:59

Totally, and a similar vein, I think, is the yum and yuck test.

56:07

Exactly. if you really want to, like, practice, notice things that bother you, or that you enjoy, again, it's like if somebody asks you to do something and your immediate reaction to that is, oh, I don't want to do that.

56:20

There's something going on there. it's yuck.

56:23

It's giving you information. Cause that's what emotions are doing.

56:26

They're giving you data. They're giving you information.

56:28

And the same if somebody goes, do you want to do this?

56:31

And you go, yes, I've been dying for you to ask me.

56:34

Well, that's giving you information as well.

56:36

And they're the things you can notice in yourself.

56:39

to make a difference. Cool.

56:44

And at the risk of, adding one more thing, is that Susan David, there's some cool quote where she talks about emotions are information.

56:53

They're not, they give you direction, but not a directive.

56:57

Is that well, I think she might, she might say that Susan David, yeah.

57:00

And emotional agility. Yeah.

57:03

I think somebody I, I had on my podcast, Steve Haynes would say they're information.

57:10

They're not a beacon of truth, you know, so

57:14

yeah, like that too. Yeah. Yeah.

57:16

You know that actually you can disagree with them, but they're, they are providing information.

57:22

And often I think probably like what echoes what we've been talking about today, the information they're giving you might be out of date.

57:30

But until you notice that it's out of date, you can't do anything about it.

57:34

Yes.

57:37

So just to make this super practical for people.

57:39

So to kind of hearken back to some of the things you talked about earlier with somebody giving you feedback, that if you feel outraged by the feedback, treating it as a beacon of truth is that person's a jerk and they're so wrong

57:57

and what they said as opposed to like doing this emotional self regulating and then looking at is there some truth in that and may and like what's the difference between maybe they said it in a harsh way like not so good.

58:13

And there's some really truth in there that would be helpful for me to look at.

58:18

And I think I'd add another like dimension to that is, am I reacting more strongly that makes any sense to this feedback as well, it's my reaction proportionate.

58:34

to the feedback that I've been given, or is it out of proportion completely?

58:39

Because that might be information too. So it mightn't

58:42

be just about the other person. It might be about yourself.

58:45

No. Yeah. And sorry, I didn't make that clear.

58:47

That's absolutely point I'm trying to make is just because I'm upset.

58:52

That doesn't mean it's about them.

58:55

It very much is likely a big part of it is my stuff getting triggered.

59:00

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

59:03

and I think it all sounds very serious the way we've been talking about it.

59:08

I know we've had plenty of laughter as we always do.

59:12

Thing is to remember is we're all in the same boat.

59:17

We really are. We're all human.

59:20

And the majority of us have these reactions to things that we just don't really know how to regulate ourselves.

59:29

And there's no right or wrong.

59:35

There's just you and your experience is valid, whatever it is.

59:39

And if you want your life to just be a little bit easier and a little bit less efforts, then try a few things out.

59:49

Great way to end. Thank you for joining me today on life, beyond the numbers.

59:57

If something in this episode resonated with you, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

1:00:03

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1:00:10

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1:00:17

Until next time. Keep exploring the human side of work life.