Staying Positive

The only time I watch the news on T.V. is when I am at the gym. However, the last time I was there, I noticed something interesting. Although, exercising usually is a stress reducer and energizes me, I was feeling stressed, anxious and down by the time that I was finished and ready to leave the gym. What was going on? I thought back to the last hour and remembered the discussions around me coupled with the constant stream of incredibly bad news on the T.V. And then I checked into what I was thinking about and I understood the problem. I was swirling with all the negativity that I had just witnessed on the T.V.

 

There’s a lot of negative news out there to consume lately. If you’re keeping up on just the daily political news, you can become quite overwhelmed, stressed and frankly, a bit depressed. There’s just so much and the rate at which it is changing, is dizzying. So the question is, is this negative news affecting you in your personal and professional life? Well, the truth may surprise you.

 

In 2012, a preliminary study with Martin Seligman at the University of Pennsylvania found that just a few minutes of negative news daily has a significant effect on your mood. An additional study examined the longer-term impact of negative news on your well-being and performance. The results stunned the research team when they found that individuals that watched just three minutes of negative news in the morning were profoundly impacted. This group had a 27% greater chance of reporting 6-8 hours later that they had been unhappy during their day. Did you hear that? Over 25% of the group was severely affected by the negative news.

 

So what does it matter if employees are unhappy at work? Does that really affect the bottom line? Theresa Amabile and Steven Kramer, authors of the Progress Principle, collected 12,000 entries, from 238 employees, where their daily emotions were tracked. Surprisingly, 1/3 of the entries revealed employees that were unhappy, unmotivated or both. Research shows that how you are feeling has a huge impact on your creativity, productivity, commitment and social interaction in the workplace.

 

I had already figured this out. Days when I’m not feeling my energized confident self, I have difficulty focusing, being productive and creative.

 

I know it’s impossible to be happy all the time. Things happen that derail you from your usual productive self, no matter how hard you try and how much resilience you possess. Couple this with our 24 access to news information daily, and you can better understand the problem. However, having awareness of how negative news can impact your emotions and moods and in turn, your work performance, can help you make better decisions about your “negative news consumption”.

 

In today’s fast paced, over stimulated world, it’s definitely something to think about.

 

Staying Positive

The only time I watch the news on T.V. is when I am at the gym. However, the last time I was there, I noticed something interesting. Although, exercising usually is a stress reducer and energizes me, I was feeling stressed, anxious and down by the time that I was finished and ready to leave the gym. What was going on? I thought back to the last hour and remembered the discussions around me coupled with the constant stream of incredibly bad news on the T.V. And then I checked into what I was thinking about and I understood the problem. I was swirling with all the negativity that I had just witnessed on the T.V.

 

There’s a lot of negative news out there to consume lately. If you’re keeping up on just the daily political news, you can become quite overwhelmed, stressed and frankly, a bit depressed. There’s just so much and the rate at which it is changing, is dizzying. So the question is, is this negative news affecting you in your personal and professional life? Well, the truth may surprise you.

 

In 2012, a preliminary study with Martin Seligman at the University of Pennsylvania found that just a few minutes of negative news daily has a significant effect on your mood. An additional study examined the longer-term impact of negative news on your well-being and performance. The results stunned the research team when they found that individuals that watched just three minutes of negative news in the morning were profoundly impacted. This group had a 27% greater chance of reporting 6-8 hours later that they had been unhappy during their day. Did you hear that? Over 25% of the group was severely affected by the negative news.

 

So what does it matter if employees are unhappy at work? Does that really affect the bottom line? Theresa Amabile and Steven Kramer, authors of the Progress Principle, collected 12,000 entries, from 238 employees, where their daily emotions were tracked. Surprisingly, 1/3 of the entries revealed employees that were unhappy, unmotivated or both. Research shows that how you are feeling has a huge impact on your creativity, productivity, commitment and social interaction in the workplace.

 

I had already figured this out. Days when I’m not feeling my energized confident self, I have difficulty focusing, being productive and creative.

 

I know it’s impossible to be happy all the time. Things happen that derail you from your usual productive self, no matter how hard you try and how much resilience you possess. Couple this with our 24 access to news information daily, and you can better understand the problem. However, having awareness of how negative news can impact your emotions and moods and in turn, your work performance, can help you make better decisions about your “negative news consumption”.

 

In today’s fast paced, over stimulated world, it’s definitely something to think about.

 

Bad Habits

bad habits

After my two appointments downtown today, I got in my car, turned onto Fifth Street and carefully made my way onto 71 N.  I’ve driven this route way too many times. In fact, I think my car knows the way to the freeway and to my house by now.

 

The point of me sharing this bit of information with you is because of what happened in today’s journey.  15 minutes after getting on the freeway, I was passing an exit when I realized that I didn’t remember much about getting there.  How is that possible?  How did I drive 15 minutes without really being aware of what was going on?  The thought terrified me.

 

I bet each of you have had this experience at one point or another.  You wake up in the morning and you have your routine.  Maybe you get up and automatically run the shower and jump in.  Maybe you instantly go over to the sink to wash your face and brush your teeth.  Whatever it is, if you do it enough times, you don’t have to think too much about what comes next.  In fact, you don’t have to think at all— you just do.

 

Research has been done to explore this very fact.  They positioned rats in a maze and monitored their brain activity to see how long it would take them to find their way out.  In the beginning, the rats needed to search and sniff to find their way.  Time and time again, they ran through the same maze.  As the number of times that they ran through the maze increased, their mental activity decreased.  The rats no longer had to think very hard to find their way because it had become their habit.

 

You probably don’t like being compared to a rat, but we experience this same exact effect. When you have completed the same task time and time again, you no longer have to be fully present.  Your brain can take a little rest. Thanks to habits, you get to preserve your brain energy for the more daunting tasks.

 

You know those positive affirmations that you enjoy reading on Facebook?  They make you feel good for that moment but you might have problems making them stick before the bad thoughts sneak up on you again. You know why?  The very same reason that you automatically get up in the morning and fix your breakfast without having to think so hard.  It’s possible that these same negative thoughts have become a bad habit for you.

 

They creep into your mind without you even being aware of it.  They run on an endless loop in your brain and reading a positive statement once a day is not going to solve the problem. Being told to “change your attitude” is not going to solve it either. The problem runs deeper than that.

 

The good news is that you can break this bad habit.  You can learn to change the thoughts in your head but you need to be present. You need to be engaged in the process and be at full brain capacity to make this change. By consistently monitoring the conversation in your head and using targeted strategies to change each negative statement into a more positive one, you can slowly change your life.

 

It’s hard to quit a bad habit. To make a change, it takes hard work, commitment and consistent awareness. However, it’s worth the work when you realize that the change can positively impact every single aspect of your life.