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. I've been thinking a lot lately about burnout in part because I am going to be on a panel at a conference coming up and that's the topic that we're going to be addressing and it's for this group of people that are all in the legal profession. Some of them are lawyers. Some of them are Staff or they
work adjacent to the law. So I was thinking about my back story because I also had become a lawyer, but then chose a different path. And one of the things I wanted to share with you, as I was thinking about this in planning, this was, you know, for me, when I went into the law, one of the things that I found to be really fascinating. Is that the story of the law is the story of human conflict? Act. How do we as humans address
conflict when it comes up? Whether it's in a business, whether it's between strangers, whether it's within a family. So much about the study of law is the study of human stories and what happens when we come into some kind of friction, or some kind of problem, and the human part was always the most interesting part to me and it's part of I ended up going down the path that I went to with my career was that the human
element was so interesting. And especially within the legal profession, where the job is to be an advocate to professionally speak up on behalf of your client. I also thought it was really interesting how so often lawyers had a hard time speaking up for themselves which was why There was so much burnout. This is one of my observations and so I became very interested to and how do we create norms and a sense of professional culture, that can create
outcomes that aren't that great. And everyone is really smart and everybody knows this is the thing that's very common. And so even in the legal profession, where the job is to be a professional. Kit lawyers can have a hard time speaking up for themselves and, you know, and then as I changed and moved careers and became more focused on the human part on the coaching and the facilitating and supporting people in work and life, it just all started to click for me.
That's something that I wanted to continue to study and help other people with. And that brings us Into our topic today where I want to talk about presence and what that
means and why it's important. And I also wanted to give a celebration and a shout-out to one of my clients to Laurel and she is starting a new job and we started working together earlier this year and she specifically was really interested in growing her feeling of confidence and in being able to You speak up for herself and what she told me as she was celebrating that she's caught in this new job and just the whole journey that she's been on over the last six months of us working together.
I asked her, what would you now? Tell yourself of like three months ago, what would you want her to know? And she thought about it and she said, I wouldn't want to tell myself that you can identify those feelings of imposter syndrome. And remember to trust yourself? And trust that your skills and drive are enough.
And it felt so incredible to see her really reflect on that and understand that and really own that as she's continuing to grow in her career and into this next step and it was such a great message. I wanted you to have it as well. What would happen if you trusted yourself and remind yourself that your skills and your drive are enough and this Ties into our topic today of presence. So presence. I want you to think of it as a quality of attention.
Where is your attention is that in this present moment? Or is it someplace else? And when we're not present, there's a good chance that your mind. It's like left of the room and it's now comparing its comparing yourself to other people. I hear this a lot when my clients come to me and say I'm the youngest person on the team. I don't have as much experience as other people, I'm Worried
that I won't be good enough. I'm worried that because my career path went this way, instead of that way that there's going to be something you know wrong with me. I have to prove myself like when you're not in the present and when you go into that comparing place where you're comparing yourself to that people around you or to the imagined, perfect version of yourself. You probably have a version of yourself that lives in your imagination.
And there's something about this person that you look up to as the perfect version of yourself, and they have the perfect background and they had, the perfect parents and the perfect relationships. And they went to the perfect school and they got the perfect grades and they have the perfect, like, you know, whatever, whatever that kind of fantasy. Imagine self is, it might even be this version of you if you had perfect. To discipline and you followed through and we're timely and did
all the things. You know you're supposed to do, you know this imaginary version of how your life would be. That is an illusion. It doesn't exist, but we can spend a lot of time in this comparison and then that undermines any roads your confidence because when you're doing that, you're not Looking with value and respect and appreciation at who you actually are and the path that truly brought you, here we are. Overlooking that your talent, your drive, your experience is enough.
Like, how can that be true? Let's, let's talk about this. So when we're not present, we go into comparison mode when we're not present, we can also get Lee overwhelmed, and it's this sense
of, oh my gosh. There are so many things to do, where there are so many people who require my time, there are so many things that need my attention and I'm not entirely sure which one to choose first to focus on because I feel guilty or I feel like I should be able to do all of it like when our attention is not in the present moment, it's very easy. Easy to get overwhelmed as opposed to right when we're present the alternative. What it sounds like is okay.
So here's what's going on right now. As far as I can tell based on X Y and Z, I'm going to choose to focus on this for these reasons. We start to tap into your strategic thinking, which is what do we need to focus on now and why? And then we understand what we're going to let go of and we unhook our attention from those other things. So you can focus your attention on what you've chosen and attend to that.
And when we have that sense of focus, then even when the world around us is chaotic, or the people around us are really Anxious and Urgent when we are present, it allows us to bring into any situation the measure of being grounded and calm and very, very clear about who we are.
What we're here to do and why. So, another thing, you'll notice when your attention is not in the present moment, when we're not present, anxiety is really easy because what that means is your Attention has gone into the future, you've played out some worst-case scenarios, you've probably scared yourself about the things that might go wrong, or you simply tried to imagine all the possible variations of what might happen and then plan
for those and then you feel overwhelmed because you got all these different scenarios that you're trying to track and plan for. And it's this way that we're, you know, I think as humans were so Desiring of certainty and control. And when we're facing uncertainty or the unknown, one of the ways we try to solve for it in our mind is to plot out all the possible variations. And then kind of, you know, we create this internal schematic
like this. This internal diagram if this then that, but that can start to feel really overwhelming and really heavy, and then we're not paying attention. Shinto. What's actually happening in this moment because we're looking at those internal notes of how we are anticipating the future to go. And that feels like, anxiety, we get worried and fearful about the future and what we can, and can't control. And then the other thing and this is, I think so.
So important to remember in relationship Is that when you are not present in a relationship that will erode trust? And you know what? This feels like if you have been in a relationship and you feel like, even if the person is physically there, you feel like they're emotionally or like their attention is just someplace else. You know, they might be in the room with you and they might be looking at you.
But you feel like they're kind of looking through you, or you feel like they're not really listening because they're not really present, we can sense this and it starts young as children. We understand the quality of attention that we are receiving from the people around us.
We're so finely tuned to perceive that and we'll start to feel less trusting if we And that another person is not fully present with us either because they're distracted, their mind is someplace else or if we're feeling that they're in a lot of Judgment of us. If we feel like this person is judging us, we think all that are not really listening. They're judging me. We tend to withdraw, we tend to shut down. Sometimes we're not right about
that. Like, we can be with someone and they're actually judging themselves, but we are able to perceive, oh, this person is holding a lot of judgment and because we're humans, we tend to take things personally. I have an episode about that earlier. In this podcast, I should probably revisit it because it's something that comes up so often.
And when we Overlook that and we forget how to deal with that, that can actually create a lot of friction, and a lot of just negative outcomes for us. And for the people that we care about both at work and in our lives. So the quality of your attention is really valuable and very
important. Aunt and in the workplace and when you're thinking about the work that is on your plate to do and you're thinking about the quality of relationships that you wish to have with the people on your team, with your manager with cross-functional Partners, there's a lot that you will accomplish when you start to be very intentional about the
quality of your attention. So these are things to watch out for being The comparing mind State feeling, a lot of overwhelm having, a lot of anxiety because of future casting and future thinking. And the awareness that we can erode trust unintentionally when our attention is not in the present moment or if it's in the present moment, carrying a lot
of judgment. So here's what happens when your attention is in the present moment, when the presence that you bring in. Into a situation is in the moment. It allows you to be focused and when you're able to focus, when you're able to place your attention on one thing that creates a feeling of calm. That's that feeling of even though there's all of this chaos and noise and urgency around me, that's fine. That's like the wind howling outside this.
Very calm and cozy, space that I have and when you have that ability to access an internal sense of calm, it allows you to be relaxed. And I don't mean relaxed like feet up on the couch, you know, taking a nap but that kind of relaxed where your body is not carrying unnecessary tension. And so you're able to perceive with greater Clarity what is really going on here, and it allows you to become responsive in the most useful and appropriate way.
That level of clarity creates a sense of Surance. It allows you to address difficult situations more easily and it instills a sense of confidence in the people around you because they see. Okay so this person is not you know you're both not freaking out with reactivity but you're not carrying this burden of stress in your and you know crunched up shoulders and for me it when I'm feeling that sense of stress and I'm kind of distracted.
It often shows up, right in my eyebrows, like I can feel my eyebrows and my forehead getting really tense. And in fact, one of the ways that I've learned to just check in with myself, is just to ask Kim, where are your eyebrows right now? Where are your shoulders? Are they all crunched up? Okay, let's take a breath and let that soften a little bit because it doesn't actually help. And so when we're able to come
and be present in the moment. And were able to access a bit of focus, create that space of internal, calm to find a bit more years to relax. The unnecessary tension then it feels like the weight lifts, it allows us to create more connection and trust with others. And this is that really beautiful sense of. I might not have all the right answers but I am I'm here in this moment and I have every faith that we will find a path through this together because we are right.
Like we are capable. We are intelligent and like we are here. Like I've got your back, let's figure this out. That is so valuable, we all feel better and then we work better when we are in that state of being present and feeling connection and feeling trust. And it's really easy to lose track of. That quality of presence partly. If you are surrounded by other anxious, people, it's easy to match their anxiousness and, you know, just like operate that way on kind of a Other basis, but
also distraction is a thing. We've got lots of that in the world around us and I love to, to remind my students, you know, and this is something that I really discovered in my meditation and mindfulness practice because you're a human, you are really intelligent, you're very smart, but also because you're human, you're very forgetful and so even though, you know, conceptually and on an intellectual level.
That being present is valuable and perhaps even more enjoyable, you will forget and you will get caught up in a distraction and
that is human. And that is fine, but the skill, we want to build is we want to grow your own awareness so that you understand more quickly when you've dropped being present, so that you can then come back to that state when you wish to I also want to acknowledge that sometimes we're not good at being present because the present moment can be very uncomfortable and sometimes we're like I would rather not deal with this discomfort in the present moment and it actually
is a source of Escape for me in order to be distracted or to ruminate or to compare myself and that's a pattern that we can learn when we're really young and haven't developed this. Skills and abilities to deal with big emotions and big stuff. And so, if that is your pattern to you, it's okay. It's a thing that you can learn alternative ways of dealing with that, and it's also just a call to bring a lot of compassion to
yourself. When you notice, oh, yeah, my tendency is to try to escape the present moment because it hasn't felt safe. Or it just has felt very painful or uncomfortable. So those are some ideas. I wanted to offer to you. Today is the value of your presence, the quality of your attention, that this is a thing that is learnable and trainable. You can make it a habit just in the same way that your default habit might be distracted or comparing or going into self-judgment.
You can it's like strengthening this other muscle and we do it in All steps and we do it repeatedly in order to gain that ability and to have it available more quickly and more often. So thank you so much for listening. If you want to do this, work with me one-on-one and really take, you know, the concept that I share with you here on the podcast and really go into the work of implementing it.
This is what I do with my clients in coaching and one of the things I love about working with you one-on-one, is that it gives us the space and the time to really understand how do you personally connect with the concepts and how will you specifically Implement these ideas and, you know, Concepts and teachings in your specific life and with Specific work situation and personality that you have.
This is also what makes it more fun than just like reading a book or listening to the show in and of itself. So, if you want to do this work and like a deeper more full and personally, engaged way, I want to invite you to come coach with me, we work together for six months. I'll tell you all about the details when we get on a consultation together, which is where you tell me more about,
About you. You can answer or you can ask me any questions you want about me and how will work together. And it's where we get really clear about what your goals are and how I will help you get there, how you will Implement them and identifying what's in the way so that you can start to make progress on those goals and desires a lot more quickly and a lot more sustainably. So thank you so much for listening and I will 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.