Sleepless nights, dry flaky scalp, breakouts of blotchy skin… These were the symptoms of the stress my client was going through as a result of changes being made in the organisation that she worked for.
The organisation was going through a restructure and she had to reapply for her job. There were 5 people competing for 2 positions, meaning 3 people would have to be let go. My client had convinced herself that it would be her that would lose out.
Her story is not uncommon to many women that I work with who are going through change. We are creatures of habit and we like to be in control of our circumstances. We like to know what lies ahead.
When there is a threat to our personal security we panic
When that control is threatened and there is uncertainty for the future, we panic. We feel insecure, we feel despair, we feel powerless. It is a threat to our personal security and we imagine the worst possible outcome will happen. For my client in her mind, this meant that she was going to be homeless.
She hadn’t stalled on her mortgage payments, she hadn’t got herself into so much debt that she would lose everything, but yet in her mind she had done the following sum:
ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE + JOB LOSS = HOMELESSNESS
As a result of this, she was extremely stressed. The stress was not just displayed in her behaviour but also by the things that were happening to her body. She had convinced herself that she was going to fail the interview.
When we are faced with change that takes us in to the unknown it can be far too easy to imagine that the worse is going to happen. This could be changes that you are going through at work, it could be changes that you want to make because you are unhappy and unfulfilled in what you do, it could be changes you want to make in leaving employment and starting your own business. Because you cannot see what lies ahead, it makes you feel out of control.
When we are faced with situations that we perceive to be a threat to our physical survival, our fight or flight instinct kicks in as toxic stress hormones flow through our bodies. We focus on our short term survival rather than the longer term consequences and choices available. This was good back in the day when we were being hunted by sabre tooth tigers because we needed to react instantly as soon as we became aware that one was approaching us.
However, we are no longer hunted by tigers and this immediate threat to our physical survival is no longer there. And should it be, this response will be invaluable. However, when the perceived threat is the consequences of changes you are going through or changes that you need to make in your career, having this focus on your short term survival is not helping you.
If you can ease off that need to be in control of everything, you are on your way to embracing change. When we are faced with change, the way we talk to ourselves about what will happen determines how we feel about it. If we view it in a way that means we won’t ‘survive’, this is how we will feel, causing us to feel stress, anxious, powerless and fearful.
Develop an optimistic outlook
If you can view the change optimistically, you will be more open to identifying opportunities that lie ahead.
The organisation that I had worked in since the age of 16 was restructuring. There was talk of job cuts and my post was to be deleted. I saw this as an opportunity. An opportunity for me at the age of 44 to pursue something that I was really passionate about and start my own business. My colleague on the other hand could not imagine an optimistic future and was having sleepless nights and was very stressed.
Which would you rather be, optimistic and hopeful or stressed and hopeless?
I firmly believe that with every change there is opportunity, you just need to be open to see the opportunities that exist. When you are focused on the worse of what will happen, it is not possible to see the opportunities.
By the time the client I mentioned above came to me for coaching, she was practically imagining herself as homeless, despite the fact that she had a very good chance of securing the position.
She believed that if she didn’t get the position, she would be jobless. If she was jobless, she wouldn’t be able to pay her mortgage. If she couldn’t pay her mortgage, her home would be repossessed and she would be made homeless.
I asked her what she would do if the worse happened and she didn’t get the job. After some thought, she told me that she would get another job and if she didn’t get one straight away, she could rent out her spare bedroom. Even though this is something that she did not want to do, at least it meant that she would keep the home that she loved. She realised that, no matter what happened, she would be ok. After all, she would still be alive and she would be able to pick herself back up.
With her skills and experience, she also recognised that she should not have a problem getting another job. With this realisation, the anxiety and stress about what lay ahead were lifted. And you know what, she went in to that interview feeling a lot more confident and furthermore, she got the job.
Stress and worry adds nothing to help the situation
All that stress and worry had added nothing to her situation apart from blotchy skin, flaky scalp and sleepless nights. It wasn’t enough for her that people had been telling her that she had nothing to worry about and that she would be ok. She had to come to this realisation herself. And the space that coaching provided for her to reflect and think enabled her to do this.
What changes are you going through or are wanting to make? What do you fear will happen as a result of these changes? What do you think you will lose?
Now look at your situation in an optimistic way. What opportunities could lie ahead for you as a result of this change? Make a list of all the possible opportunities that could arise. What do you need to do to make these opportunities happen?
You can either fear the change, worry, stress, feel anxious and powerless (as well as all the physical symptoms that arise as a result) and not move forward. Or, you can look at your situation rationally, view it optimistically and identify the possible opportunities and go for them. What is it to be?
If you now have a list of opportunities, I would love to hear so please share your comments below. If you are going through change or want to make changes in your career or business and you are fearful, what is it about this change that worries you? Or, if you have been through unwelcome change or overcome your fears and made changes that you really wanted to make, what helped you to overcome those fears?
Original Content Published on LinkedIn
Photo by Alexandra Gorn on Unsplash
