We sometimes think that a blame culture, stress-leave threats and a general reluctance to take responsibility are personality traits or a form of unfit behaviour. But actually these are quite common and rather frustrating symptoms for a misunderstood low state of the mind.
Every other conversation I have about stress at work is always about the number of jobs on people's desks, tight deadlines, budget restrains and of course the unrealistic client, who wants it all for as little money as possible. The other half of those conversations is about how people just don't pull their weight and leave everything up to a handful of high-achievers who then feel overstretched and left alone.
Last week I was chatting with a client of mine about her team. Apparently, most of them just come to work for the coffee, are reluctant to take on anything outside their comfort zone, spend all day pointing fingers and complaining. And the workload is getting unmanageable. WOW! My own sister told me similar things and even my mum agrees, so many people just don't want to work!
I get stressed even writing this down. It feels like a battle which is already lost. What do you do? Fire them all and hire new staff? And when they get to that point as well, you do the same again? And most of all, is it even true?
My client and I started talking about the nature of stress. It was beautiful to see how quickly she realised that looking at stress as something that is entirely thought-created, instantly changed her response to it. We talked about the fact that there is no connection between our workload and the level of stress we feel other than the thought we attach to it. On a good day, the same to-do list might feel uplifting and fun whereas on other days it feels like an impenetrable jungle of chores.
Stress is a feeling, which is like every other feeling a thought, manifested in our body through our senses. There is no direct cure for a feeling other than allowing a new thought to come in.
My client suddenly realised that her way of managing other people's stress may have, inadvertently, let to them feeling even more stressed. She was being kind and helpful, sat down with her colleagues to go through their to-do lists, trying to distribute jobs more evenly, only to find the same colleagues on sick-leave the week after that. Suddenly she said, "so my well-meant intervention only supported the idea of overwhelm and underperformance! As in, 'if I even feel stressed with half the workload, it clearly must mean I'm not good enough and everyone will now know about it. And I can't even blame it on the workload anymore!...'"
We went on talking about 'work avoiders'. I confessed that in all my years of talking to people I have not once met a person who doesn't want to do well. People may have different ideas of what that means, expectations, standards and yes capabilities but deep down we all want to shine. I met people who gave up, were disillusioned, disappointed, felt misunderstood or were just tired of trying. But they all cared and all would have given anything to be able to perform at their best. I simply do not believe, that so many teams are full of people who don't want to work. There must be something else at play.
I see that there is a world of difference between thinking that a colossal mass of unmanageable tasks is rolling me over, that I'm defenceless and at mercy, or knowing that I'm creating my experience moment to moment and stress is just one of them. I know there is a huge difference between trying harder, only to see that I'm still never quite good enough, and knowing that I can access my full potential at any given time, simply by stepping out of the spiral of thought that is wearing me down. This is not a technique. This is a different understanding of how things work.
With a clear mind , we can sort out anything. With a clear mind we just know how to set priorities, we know who to ask for help, how to troubleshoot and most of all how to sit down and do the work.
Does that sound too simple? And if it was true, why is having a clear mind such a big deal? Well actually, a clear mind is much less mysterious than we think. It is our default setting. It's the normal without the noise. What stops us from accessing this well of clarity is nothing but thought. The challenge is that we live in thought, so it is easy to get lost in it. And, we all do, from time to time. But knowing that we are are dealing with thought rather than workloads or lazy people or deadlines or difficult bosses, will allow entirely different ways of dealing with all of these. It will allow finding new and unexpected solutions.
Knowing this alone would save organisations a lot of money on relaxation courses, wellness, bonding and trust exercises, not to speak of the countless working hours, which are lost through stress related absences. Knowing this would change the way we fear and combat stress all by it self.
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