Another story on the importance of understanding the impact of fear. Enjoy :)

Overcoming Fear Brings About Greater Accountability on the Job

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVCBrkrFrBE

We touch people's lives. Everyday, we have experiences with others. These experiences shape us, change us and sometimes alter the entire path of our life. They profoundly impact our perception, our actions and affect the core of who we are. Enjoy this amazing TEDtalk and feel free to share your lollipop moment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHjpOzsQ9YI

About 18 months ago, my son bounced down the stairs from his room beaming from ear to ear. He had heard an amazing new artist and couldn’t be more pleased at his “discovery”. I followed him up and together, we watched her youtube video. Her talent was undeniable and I would find out more recently, that her teachings (however unconscious) were even more meaningful.

For Christmas, we purchased tickets for the family to see Lindsey Stirling in concert. She was coming to a venue in our area and I thought my son would love it. He did. Her concert was unbelievable and her talent unquestionable, but what I took away from that night would forever change my worldview.

I occasionally show her early music video (attached below) with leadership teams that I work with. I love watching the audience’s reaction and I am sure it echoes mine the first time I saw it. Some are brought to tears, others remain speechless, many are moved beyond words and ALL are awestruck. At her concert, Lindsey shared a portion of her journey with the audience. 18 months ago, this talented young girl was told by record producers (do we still use this term?) that she was not good enough. Really? She was not good enough?

As she thanked her audience for making her famous through social media venues such as youtube, I was inspired by a new reality. So often, our fear limits our choices. It forces us to relinquish to old paradigms that seem stable and true, but actually are outdated and antiquated.  We believe that what is stopping us is a true opinion others have projected unto us. Too frequently, this opinion becomes our reality. This was my first lesson that evening: nothing can hold back our passion and purpose. Sometimes, we just need to move past our own paradigms of what is and is not possible.

Her concert featured several others artists who “opened” for her. Like her, their fame has been driven by social media and an adoring public following. This became my second lesson of the evening: collaboration.  From these artists radiated a core belief that we can all be successful if we support and collaborate with one another. Too often in our society, we hold and act on the perception that your success must equal my failure. We step over each other in the hopes that it will help us “get ahead”. Yet, our evolutionary survival has always been contingent upon supporting one another through cooperation and collaboration. Where did that message get lost? When did we begin accepting the belief that for me to win, you must lose?

That became my final gift from the night. A continued renewal and reminder that we can all be successful. There is room and space for everyone to show up and contribute their best. We have an ability (and actually an obligation) to move through our fear and support our deeper calling- despite all the barriers others throw up in front of us. The fears the others project do NOT need to become our reality.

An introduction to the results from a phenomenological study of the emotion of fear in the workplace.

[download]

I love this quote by Eckhart Tolle, "Set goals, but know that the arriving is not all that important".

We live in a culture that demands goal setting. . . with ourselves, in our families, schools, workplaces- we set goals. We have goals for our weight, for grade point average, for salary expectations, for getting somewhere in a certain amount of time, for completing tasks, for points scored in the big game, or for achieving work performance.

When we speak about emotion, goal setting is a critical driver of whether we experience happiness or anger; joy or fear; love or shame. If we desire a different emotional outcome, we can either switch the goal or hold it more loosely. In the end, perhaps the arrival is not as important as the vision set.

Such a simple statement yet the organizational consequences are significant. We wonder why our workplaces are plagued with fear, anger and resistance. With every new change we implement, we are already changing again. There is often no ability to settle into a change, no room for compliancy (even for a moment); and no space for reflection. Ultimately, there is a dichotomy between what is required of us within the organizational context and what we physically and psychologically are able to manage.

I have often found myself contemplating why we spend such time and energy resisting what is or what we know will be? Yet, the answer is simple. We are genetically and evolutionary programmed to survive. Our current mechanisms to do this remain with fight or flight. When we cannot cope with our present or predicted circumstances, we move into fear; and when we move into fear, we defend ourselves.

For organizations, flight results in passive resistance to change, denial, apathy for our jobs, lack of engagement and turnover. When we move into fight, we see aggressiveness with leaders and teams, lobbying the troops against “the establishment” or acts of retaliation.

For years, I have studied, taught and led change within teams and organizations. Despite every effort to the contrary, change results in very predictable employee behaviors. As organizations and leaders seek to better manage change efforts and enhance acceptance to change initiatives, we must begin to increase individual resilience and aid them in not only understanding the change, but managing their emotional response to the “abandonment of everything” we have come to know.