Is your head filled with thoughts all the time? Do you sometimes feel you have several people in your head, talking at you at the same time – worrying, reminding you of things to do, comparing you to other people, daydreaming and lots of other things? If you do, don’t worry – you’re just being human. But here’s a simple way to regain some control and calm your mind.

Our capacity for reflective thought is an incredible asset to human beings, but it can also be a source of great misery. We can waste such a lot of our time (I know I have) getting immersed in thoughts that serve no real purpose except making us unhappy, anxious or distracted from getting on with life.

So, you may find it useful at times to be able to take control and manage your thoughts – in other words, to be able to choose to ignore them sometimes, or to just deal with the ones that are relevant to you. Below is a simple approach to help you do this.

You don’t have to engage with your thoughts
First, let’s be clear about what thoughts are. They are electrical and chemical impulses in your brain. You do not have listen to them and you certainly don’t have to drown in them.

So, you can choose which ones (if any) you want to listen to, and which ones you can just ignore. By learning to do this, we enable ourselves to spend more time being present and open to life, as well as calming ourselves and possibly controlling our outlook on life more effectively. Of course, we can choose to spend more time with our thoughts if we wish, but learning to manage our minds gives us that choice.

Our process comes in 2 steps:

Step 1 – Fishing for useful thoughts
My suggested approach to managing your mind is to only engage with the thoughts that will actually be useful to you. This is as simple as asking, when a thought pops up, ‘Is this thought actually useful to me right now?’. If it is, engage with it. If it isn’t, just let it go.

You can see it as a bit like fishing. A common analogy is that thoughts are like a river flowing through our minds. We can take this analogy further to say you can actually just ‘fish for thoughts’ instead of jumping into the river each time and being swamped by your thoughts – unless you want to!

Instead, you can stand on the bank and watch the thoughts flow past you, and you can choose to select the ones that you do want to engage with from there.

Step 2 – Categorising your thoughts
The question is, how can we pull ourselves out of the river of thoughts that is constantly moving through our heads in daily life, and get ourselves up on to the river bank? And from there, how do we identify the thoughts that are actually useful to us?

Mindfulness techniques like meditation work for many people, but I have another method you could try.

You can start by categorising your thoughts under different themes as they enter your head. For example, some might relate to ‘The future’, others might be ‘Things to do’, some might focus on ‘People’, others might involve you using your ‘Imagination’ etc. This helps you to identify individual thoughts more easily as they arise.

For example, while I am writing this, a thought has just come into my head about what to have for lunch. I’ve now categorised that as an ‘Action’ thought and have ignored it as I don’t need to think about that at this moment. Another thought has come into my head about my mum. I categorise that as a ‘People’ thought, and again, don’t need to engage with it as I’m working.

This all may sound very simple, but once you start putting this categorisation process into practice, it not only helps you to identify each thought more easily, but also enables you to recognise that the thing popping into your head is just another thought, and not something that needs to overwhelm you. You can then choose whether to ignore it or to ‘pull it out of the river’ (to think about it, worry about it, act on it – or respond to it in some other way) – it’s your choice.

The important thing to realise is that it is possible – and often enjoyable – to be without thoughts, even though it may feel a bit odd and unfamiliar to be in this calm state.

Why do we struggle to calm our thoughts?
The process above is a simple one, and can really help us in managing our thoughts. Having more control over our inner lives can be a massive benefit to our well-being.

It can however be harder than we think to do this, and this is for many reasons. One reason worth noting is that there may be external pressures encouraging us to keep our minds busy.

One of the great benefits of managing your thoughts like this, and of mindfulness generally, is being able to have a calmer mind. One theme that often arises in my coaching sessions is that clients just want to experience life in a state of calm. This is a state that many people are seeking, but struggling to find.

Perhaps many of us in the modern Western world have been brought up with the idea that having a head full of thoughts all the time is good – in the same way that being busy is an admirable state to be in. Both might suggest that we are fulfilling the capitalist goal of being productive, active individuals. On the other side of the coin is the idea that being calm or seeking this as a goal for one’s experience of life is something to be frowned upon as lazy, or a luxury.

These assumptions are nonsense of course. We can choose our own experience of life, and for some of us, a calmer life may be what we want. Managing our thoughts can help us move towards this calmer way of living, and give us more control over how we experience it.

Do give it a try and let me know how you get on!

Are you setting clear boundaries as a leader? In a recent coaching session, a senior charity client noted they were struggling to set boundaries. We found a great insight that helped them feel much better about doing this…

My client was stuck between his board and his staff team, trying to fulfil each party’s expectations of him and ‘being a good CEO’, but both he and the whole organisation were struggling to nail down where one person’s responsibilities ended and another’s began.

We discussed how it is critical for leaders to set clear boundaries, as this is part of their role in setting clear expectations of themselves and others – whether this the teams they oversee or the trustees or directors they report to. Failure to set boundaries can lead to confusion, resentment, unrealistic expectations, stress and many other problems – for everyone.

It emerged that my client was worried about getting into confrontations with people if he set out a boundary for himself that they disagreed on. But I asked him to look at it in different way – perhaps rather than seeing this process of setting boundaries as confrontational, it is more like giving a gift to people or helping them?

In other words, we can see it as a way of bringing clarity and stability into an organisation or a team, making people feel reassured that they know the parameters of their role and the expectations of them. It really is a profound gift to give to others.

Seeing boundaries in this way (‘boundaries as a gift’) made the client feel much more confident about having setting, and negotiating, his boundaries with other people.

 

If, like me, you go to the pub regularly with middle aged men (!), you’ll find that the conversation sooner or later turns to Artificial Intelligence, and the growing number of ways it is being used to enhance our lives.

Many people see it as a tool that could potentially be used for almost anything, and this in turn is generating a feeling of genuine fear that it will take away millions of jobs from people.

Coaching is one area in which some people have turned to AI as a cheaper alternative to getting a human being to help them deal with their challenges. There are vast numbers of AI coaching platforms springing up over the internet, and these may well be useful in helping with some coaching tasks, such as setting goals when the coachee has a clear idea of what they want to achieve and needs assistance in plotting out their steps to it.

Despite the rise of AI though, I strongly believe that coaching is one area in which it will not replace human beings. This is for one specific, and critically important, reason – human contact.

When people look for a coach, they are not simply looking to solve a problem, overcome a challenge or achieve a goal. They are looking to be heard, seen and supported. And specifically, looking to be heard, seen and supported by another human being.

The thing that has perhaps surprised me most in my work as a coach is how much value a client gets just from having a 50-minute space in their week in which another human being is completely focussed on them and their needs.

Even if a coach was to do nothing else in this session but be there for the client and actively listen to them in dedication to supporting them and their needs, this would provide enormous benefit to the client. It would be an experience that most of us would gladly pay for.

Needless to say, coaching provides a great deal more than just this space and human connection, but I suggest it is at least 50 per cent of the value of coaching. And this element of coaching cannot be replicated by Artificial Intelligence. It can only be provided by human beings – those trained in coaching.

This space and human connection are valuable even when a client feels they have a clear idea of what they want to achieve. Human beings are complex emotional creatures, and not simply ‘calculating machines’. A client may be carrying many hidden beliefs, assumptions and ideas below the surface of their mind that they need to bring into the open before they can move forward in a way that truly feels right for them. A trained human being can help a client access these things.

So, when you are thinking about getting coaching, remember the value of another human being, and what their dedicated focus and support might mean to you.

 

Book a free 30-minute discovery call to discuss what you’re looking for and how I could help you!

A recent session with a client revealed the extraordinary potential impact that a culture of reflection could have on an organisation and the people within it.

The client began the session wanting to find ways to build the process of reflection into their own life more, both at home and at work, in order to give them more time and space to make more use of the rational, deliberative part of their mind, rather than being led by the quick, instinctive and emotive side. They felt this would ultimately enable them to make better decisions, through having the time to work through ideas and consider the consequences of different actions.

When the client considered how they could take a more reflective approach in their work, they quickly realised that their ability to do this was restricted by external factors – not just the culture and processes of their own organisation, but also the overarching expectations and assumptions of our society as a whole about work.

As we explored this topic, my client felt there was a pressure in the modern workplace towards action and ever-increasing intensity and productivity – summarised by one tech giant’s philosophy of ‘move fast and break things’. In such an environment, the idea of taking time to pause and reflect can seem at best like a luxury that an organisation can’t afford and at worst a waste of time due to laziness.

So, to help people live more reflective lives we need to make more reflective organisations. But what is reflection and why is it worth sacrificing speed in favour of it?

What is reflection?

Reflection isn’t simply about taking time to think, although this is clearly an important feature of it. For my client it also meant deeply listening and paying attention, rather than simply behaving like a computer processing something. They felt it was slower, deeper and more meditative than normal thinking and there is a sense of curiosity within it.

There is a deeply personal side to reflection, and it may mean different things to different people, and this is a fascinating and motivating thing to explore with teams when thinking about it. Reflection doesn’t just have to be about an individual retreating into themselves though – it can also be a highly social activity within groups such as organisations, where individuals have time to share their experiences, hear those of other people and appreciate different perspectives on the world or specific issues. This is of course a valuable function within organisations, where misunderstandings and limited viewpoints can lead to costly mistakes, inefficiencies and delays.

Some key components therefore include:

• Investing time
• Slowing down rather than acting instantly
• Being curious
• Paying attention to our feelings and those of others
• Considering different options

The benefits of reflection

We have already mentioned some of the benefits of reflection, but here is a (non-exhaustive) list of some of them:

• Working practices that make better use of human thinking – giving people more time for thinking and to access human capabilities, including creativity, empathy and decision making.
• Increased innovation
• More consideration of alternative options
• Reduction of mistakes and poor decisions – potentially a large financial benefit
• Increased quality communication between people and understanding of other people’s perspectives
• Deeper learning – from taking the time to review projects and processes properly, and to put this learning into action
• Working practices that promote human flourishing – by bringing in more opportunities to reflect, we make workplaces less frenetic and pressurised and more human-friendly.

Ultimately then, adopting a more reflective approach as an organisation isn’t about sacrificing anything in terms of productivity or profitability. It is actually about making organisations – and the people within them – more effective, by making them more effective at harnessing the power of human thinking.

Conditions for reflection

The next point we looked at in the session was what type of environment is needed in an organisation for reflection to take place. Factors include:

• Time – reflection time to be built into processes and departments at all levels – from individual meetings to phases in project development processes.
• Permission – giving teams and individuals permission to engage in a reflective approach, without worrying that they are doing things wrong or that they will be penalised or frowned upon for taking this approach.
• Encouragement – moving beyond just giving people permission to reflect, and instead to to actively encourage it, as part of their own effectiveness and well-being, as well as the organisation’s values.

If we are to create conditions in which reflection can take place, we therefore need to establish a workplace culture in which reflection is encouraged rather than criticized. In order for this to happen, organisations need to appreciate the value of reflection – at every level.

What does a reflective organisation look like?

There are countless ways in which organisations can be made more reflective but here are just a few ideas and practical examples to illustrate:

• Encourage a ‘pause and reflect’ process in decision making – when an individual has a decision to make, encourage them to pause and take a short time to reflect rather than making the decision instantly, in order to activate the rational side of their brain, not just the automatic, intuitive side.
• Promote daily reflection routines – encourage each member of staff to have 10 minutes in their day for quiet reflection on their work.
• Build time into projects – build extra stages into project development processes to enable teams to gather and reflect on where the project is at.
• Make reviews essential – ensure that enough time is given at the end of projects or processes to reflect upon how they went and what can be learned – both in terms of results and other factors, such as how teams worked together.
• Establish peaceful physical spaces in the workplace where people can have time to reflect without distraction from others, or from digital devices.

These points will differ for each organisation, but they can be identified by going through their own process of reflection.

How to build a reflective organisation

As a footnote to this piece, I wanted to mention what happened when my client took the idea of reflection back to his organisation following our coaching session. When he explained the ideas above to members of his board and his team, they were thrilled by the idea of building a more reflective organisation. He said it was one of those rare ideas that just struck a chord with people and that they found intuitively compelling. They could instantly see and feel the benefits for them as an individual, but also for the organisation and its effectiveness and culture.

For this reason, at The Life Guide, we are now providing coaching, consultancy and workshops to help you build a more reflective organisation. We can run workshops with your teams to help them explore the benefits of reflection, what a more reflective workplace might look like for you, and how to work together to build a reflective organisation.

If you’d like to find out more about how to build a more reflective organisation, do get in touch.