Welcome to the new manager podcast. I'm your host, Kim nickel. Hello and welcome. I'm glad you're here and I hope you're doing well. You know, it's the end of the year and so I'm feeling really reflective. I'm also feeling really connected to the people in my life that I really care about. So my family, my dear friends, my partner and for today's episode I wanted to talk with you.
You about emotions and connection and to just slow down a little bit to really enjoy this time of year and what often can happen? Those there can be a little bit of breathing room where even if your workplace is in crunch time because for a lot of folks, this is actually the busy time of the year, but I think what happens collectively is we all become a Know that more reflective, we all start to look back and ask ourselves. What was this year about? How did I grow? What did I learn?
What were the highlights and the hard spots? And we then cast our gaze forward into the coming here and take a moment to ask. What do I want this next year to
be about? And we think about out that in terms of our personal lives, our relationships, our health, and also, our work, our finances, you know, whatever is happening for us in that part of our own world and in light of all of that, I guess there are three things I want to ground us with in this conversation and it really is the foundation of all of the work that I do with my clients and also with when I am teaching Oops, and it really starts with presents.
How can we be present to What's Happening? Now, how can we be present with each other? How can we be present for the emotions or the thoughts, or the things that are happening? Whether we're looking inward being present to our own internal experience or being present. Not with what is unfolding and happening outside of us and in front of us and this matters so much because the opposite of presence you can think of almost
like absence. So when our attention isn't present, it's absent from this moment when our attention isn't here, it might be in the future. It might be in the past it might be in an ideal. Fantasy of how we wish things would be. If only everyone saw things our way or our attention can be in kind of this dystopian, you know, vision of how you know, seeing the worst case scenario play out in really Vivid detail. Our attention can also be on the
hamster, wheel of rumination. So spinning around and around and never finding any answers. Sirs and always asking, you know, how and why, and I don't know, it can kind of spin in this kind of Vortex of confusion and anxiety and I found over and over again. That simply the practice of, okay, can I unhook my attention from all those things and can I just gather myself back into this moment and just take a moment here? Can I just be present and notice what I am? Experiencing and what is
unfolding here? Can go a long way to creating a sense of relief. I'm currently present to the big truck outside my window that is breaking as it comes to a stop at this traffic light that when were able to become present, it can create a lot more ease bring a lot more awareness, a lot more energy. We can exhaust ourselves when we send our attention someplace. Else. So that's the first thing is presence.
The second element is curiosity and by curiosity I don't mean like an interrogation and I don't mean like digging or prying to try to uncover something. Instead, I want you to think about curiosity in the same way that when you were a little kid, maybe even as a baby, you couldn't talk. It, you hadn't learned how to judge yourself. You are just This, brilliant wide-eyed, curious, tiny human, and you were so interested. You just wanted to learn about everything.
You are so interested to find out. And that kind of curiosity, feels really good to be in because we're not in any judgment, we're not in any comparison and it's what allows us to To see our own situation and our own self more clearly. And when we're able to see ourselves more clearly, with this, very loving and gentle curiosity, it really does change everything.
It starts to open up the way. We see what's possible, it reveals those Hidden Truths, the things that are true for you that you weren't even fully aware of because you were in the comparing, or you were in the self judging. It really does change the way you see things and then it changes the options that you see available to you. And what's great about that is that, that then brings you back to a feeling of agency and autonomy.
So agency, the sense that you get to decide for yourself, it's not someone else who decides for you. And autonomy, the sense that you have power over your own life, over your own Decisions. And there are a lot of situations that shape our life that we really have no control
over. Like, we have no control over what other people do, what other people think, we don't have control over the people at the highest level in the organization and the decisions that they make, we truly don't even have control over the people who report to us. They're still autonomous humans. They get to make their own decisions at best. We get to work cooperatively and Italy and in a way that is of benefit to everyone in that
relationship. But ultimately, there's a lot, we don't have control over, but we do have autonomy in any situation when we begin to get curious about ourselves and our experience, and how we are seeing things in the way that we're thinking about things, and when we come back to that, it feels really good because it's a way of creating a sense of Of meaning and purpose and seeing what our active role is in the life that you're in and what's unfolding in front of you, and
the third part that is the foundation for everything. I do is this deep sense of kindness. And what I've noticed is that I think we often get really hard on ourselves or put pressure on ourselves because we think that's required in order to take action or an order to follow. Through and what I found time and time again, is that can work for a while. But it doesn't work sustainably over time because it takes too much energy becomes heavy.
It becomes a burden and we tend to avoid things that create a feeling of pressure. And so, when we dial up the kindness a little bit, if we just increase, the self-kindness the rug, Guard that we have towards ourselves especially when you are facing growth and a new challenge and a thing that you've never done before and all of your insecurity and uncertainty is getting activated and you're starting to feel scared that you might mess up that it's all going to get found
out. And people will learn that. Maybe you're not actually cut out for this. Like when all of that gets activated that is where the kindness helps to move forward. Even when you have uncertainty, or you're dealing with a difficult person or a difficult situation, when you're able to increase a bit of kindness for yourself, that's actually what allows you to access bigger, ideas, more specific approaches. Like, it helps to get you out of the confusion and out of this stress.
It allows you to sleep better, it allows you. You to connect with and enjoy spending time with the people that you care about. Instead of having part of your mind, always at work and feeling worried about what's going to happen. And did you make the right call? And why did you do this? And not that like that, kindness of reminding, you know what? I am a human, sometimes that is hard, but I'm not going to beat myself up about it. I don't have to be hard on myself.
It's okay. I'm a human, you know like we can learn as we go that's one of the things I think is great about humans is we're kind of designed for learning, right? Like humans love to learn. It is interesting to keep learning new things. So these three elements being present, being curious being kind, really become a stable and sustainable Foundation for growth and facing Challenge.
And they also are really useful for deepening the enjoyment that you have with people that you care about and that includes yourself. Imagine if you just enjoyed spending time with yourself and you weren't always having a little inner critic voice, talking to you about how you could be doing things better and how things would be better if only you are different. That's Nobody needs that.
So from this place from this Foundation, one of the other ideas I wanted to share with you is when we become aware of what our emotions are doing and how they are shaping our experience in our decisions, it begins to change things in a really gentle and really powerful way. So, for example, let's say that you've noticed, there's tension at work, it might be with one specific. Pacific person, or it might be just the vibe happening in the workplace.
Maybe everyone is feeling a little more tense and you're thinking there's tension at work. What do I do? So, the first thing we want to do is get present and notice, what do you do by default? When you notice tension at work, so we get present, right, okay? There's tension at work. Let's notice what that feels like. Then let's bring some curiosity. Like, what do you do? When you notice that there's
tension at work? And here are some things that might come up, you might say, well I avoid, I avoid that person or I avoid certain topics or I avoid certain meetings or, you know, I just I avoid I move away from tension, maybe you try to change it, maybe your inner people-pleaser activates especially if that was your role in your family growing up.
Yup. If you were the one who would step into deescalate things and make people feel better, you might try to change the tension that you're noticing. You also might try to adjust yourself. So, instead of trying to improve things to help other people feel better, you might take it in word and you might try to adjust how you're being like, oh, maybe I'm doing something that is making this person uncomfortable and then you unilaterally Side.
I'm just going to make some changes for myself, to try to reduce the tension. Maybe I'll not talk to them, or maybe I'll talk to them in a certain way you can over adjust for yourself. You might also withdraw or ghost, just silently step away. Remove yourself from the conversation, and the relationship, maybe nobody will notice if you just stopped showing up and then Laughing. No, it does. It's funny but because I have
been there, I am a human. And there were times when that seems like the best strategy, well, maybe nobody will notice, if I just silently withdraw. And the other thing that might happen, when you notice tension at work, you might take it personally, you might think, what does this person have an issue with me? Are we good? What's going on? Did I do something which again, is a really normal human thing. I think we're kind of wired. Just take things personally at the beginning.
So we get curious about that and once you understand your experience, so when you're feeling tension, what do you do? You know, do you disengage? Do you walk on eggshells? Do you get impatient? Do try to change things. Do you avoid things? Like, how is your personal strategy once you understand that, then we can get really curious about? Well, Else could be going on here. So for example, you might ask like, what, what is this about and you'll have some ideas.
You'll have some guesses about why do you think this tension is here? Why is this happening? And then once you get that out in front of you, like in front, where you can see, okay, this is what I'm experiencing. This is why I think this is happening.
Then you're in a great position to intentionally choose Choose a strategy to address it, if that is what you want to do and so you might be intentional about, okay, let's have a conversation and clear the air about what's going on or you might be intentional about speaking to your team and, and acknowledging, you know, I think I know I've noticed there's people seem a little tense right now and I'm wondering if it's because, you know, the changes that are happening in the
organization, you know? What's Going on here. You might choose to approach it. That way, you might even choose to Simply acknowledge like it is a tense and stressful time and I completely understand why people are feeling tense and in the presence of that. Here's how I want to show up for my team for my colleagues, I want to show up bringing a sense of groundedness and calm and want to connect with them and
invite them to share what? Feeling and what they're thinking about so that you know, on two levels that you have more of the information, so you know what's going on with them. But also so that you provide a direction-- for some of that tension and worry to go, right? Like it's one of the ways that you can build trust is by listening and slowing down to connect with people to understand more about about what are they experiencing and what's happening?
And what's interesting to, you know, remember that as humans were very social creatures. So we're very tuned in to the emotional tone of the humans around us. So if you go into work one day and you notice, everyone is walking on eggshells and seems very tense, you will probably notice. And on some level, you will decide oh, Wonder why everyone is tense and walking on eggshells? Maybe, I need to be doing that too. I'm suddenly now feeling a little more nervous and stressed and anxious.
What's happening? I'm not sure but now I am with them. Now I am in this place of belonging and now like I've kind of matched where they are. It's super interesting. I remember this for myself distinctly, like so many years ago when I was taking the bar exam and it was a Three-day exam in this huge hotel conference room and it was like hundreds of very stressed out, students for three days. And I knew that going into that
exam. I would be surrounded by people who are had a lot of stress and I thought I don't want to manage their stress. I can only manage mine and so I'm going to be very intentional about for myself like imagining this little bubble of safety around. Myself. So that the stress around me doesn't land in me and it's just going to kind of bounce off. And that way I'm going to be surrounded by people who are really stressed, but I'm not going to let that affect me.
I'm going to really manage my side. I'm going to really manage myself and I'm there to focus on how I can bring more calm and groundedness into that room because I certainly need that. And I want One else who comes into contact with me, I want them to get a little bit of that
calm. And that groundedness to so, when you're thinking on the Strategic level of, if I walk into a room with people who are feeling tense, I am going to make an intentional choice for how I want to show up in the presence of that, and that becomes really powerful. If the room you're walking into is one where people look to you for leadership. And guidance and that has
nothing to do with your title. By the way, I mean, we've probably all worked with someone who was not officially a manager but they really could influence the emotional tone of how people
felt just their presence alone. Could either tip people into being more anxious or more cynical or could tip people into Feeling more hopeful, more optimistic, more calm, more focused and it's helpful, you know, speaking of autonomy, speaking of agency, you are always in the best position to influence when you are aware of what's happening for you and the intention that you choose to bring into a situation.
So whether that is acknowledging that there's tension at work and how you want to address it. Whether it is acknowledging that the emotion of discomfort, like a fear of someone's anger or a fear of someone's volatility is activating for you, the behavior of avoidance. Like you want to be really clear about what are you choosing and why? And the way we get there is through this Foundation of presence and curiosity and kindness and I'm sharing all of
this with you. Now, as we come into the end of the year because this is such a reflective time and it's a time to also connect with the people that matter most to you and it's
hard to do that. If part of your brain is worried about work or thinking about stressful, work things, the more that you learn how to direct your Or attention, the more you learn how to bring that quality of curiosity, that can gently untangle, the not and slow the wheel of anxiety and the more that you are able to bring a little more kindness and a little more compassion, to yourself as a human, the better.
It makes everything like it pays off in your immediate experience as a human, as a colleague, as a manager. And in all The relationships with the people in your life so my hope for you and my wish for you. As you come into the end of this year is that you feel more calm and grounded, you feel more kindness and compassion for yourself and you feel a real sense of autonomy and a sense of possibility for what's next? So that is what I wanted to
share with you today. Thank you so much for listening and I'll talk to you next time. Hey, before you go if you like this podcast, leave a review. Tell me why you listen and what has helped you? Thanks so much. I'll see you next time. Hey, before you go if you like this podcast, leave a review. Tell me why you listen and what has helped you? Thanks so much. I'll see you next time.