Six Influencers That Hinder Your Progress
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How come we lose interest, drift, or simply stop working on our goals? Why certain events, like returning to the office, are harder than we expected? The answer could be related to the six influencers.
To operate at our peak, we need alignment in six key factors (or influencers): spiritual, mental, emotional, physical, social, and environmental. When any of these are missing or not functioning to our liking, we drift from our goal, our performance suffers, and we feel unmotivated to continue.
Having clarity about what I need to perform at my best, gives me control over any situation and it is easier to choose how to act (vs. react). I become aware. I remind my inner critic of its revised job description (to cheer me on) instead of judging me for the feelings I have.
What does each influencer entail and how can we realign them?
1) Spiritual Influencer
This influencer involves our purpose, beliefs, values, and gifts in relation to what we specifically want to accomplish and how we want to achieve our objectives. When there is no alignment between our activity and our purpose, values, or beliefs, we start to disconnect and to question our actions.
A few years ago, I had a mid-career crisis. I asked myself if what I was doing at work was aligned or not with my life purpose.
When I learned about the spiritual influencer, all started to make sense. I realized there was misalignment between the activities I spent my time doing and the impact I wanted to create.
Since then, I articulated my life mission and I aim for the 80/20 rule – I use 80% of my time and energy in activities and goals aligned to my overall purpose. Even choosing how I am going to proceed toward a goal at work, for example, reignites my sense of purpose.
“Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose.” Viktor Frankl, Austrian neurologist, and Holocaust survivor
2) Mental Influencer
This influencer entails our clarity as to what we are doing and our ability to remain focused with no distractions. It also includes if the task at hand is interesting to us and has the right level of difficulty.
As you know by now, there is no such thing as multi-tasking. The key is to learn how to focus on our big rocks, and stop wearing the ‘I am busy’ badge of honor.
When we get distracted and start going from one task to another or have too many conflicting demands, the mental influencer suffers. This can take us down a spiral of ‘busyness’ and even more distraction as a way of ‘escaping’ our malaise.
“Concentration and mental toughness are the margins of victory.” Bill Russell, American former professional basketball player
3) Emotional Influencer
This influencer involves how well our needs and desires are being met by what we are doing, how enthusiastic we are, and if we have the emotional control to choose how we respond (vs. react) to any situation.
Our thoughts determine our emotions, which in turn determine our actions, or lack thereof.
Let us imagine there is an organizational change and as a result you will have a new manager. If your first thought is ‘why bad things happen to good people?’, it is highly likely that you will feel angry, frustrated, disappointed, etc. These emotions could make you resign, resist the change and become passive aggressive, move to another area, etc.
If, on the other hand, your first thought after hearing the news is ‘I can’t believe my luck! I get to know this person even better. I can’t wait to have our first meeting’, you would feel excited, happy, curious. As a result, you would perhaps draft a revised set of goals, jot down a number of questions to ask your new manager, will be open to learning from her, and so on.
Having this awareness of thought, emotion, action is especially important when we are the leader (at work, at home, in our communities). People will gage our reaction and will create their own thought/emotion/action process.
“You have power over your mind and emotions, not outside events. Realize this and you will find strength.” Unknown
4) Physical Influencer
This influencer entails our awareness of what our bodies are telling us and how proactive we are in taking care of our physical self (eating healthy foods, exercising, sleeping, etc.) so that we have the physical energy to best accomplish our tasks and goals.
During the pandemic, understandably so, many people let themselves go downhill with no exercising, stress eating, and decrease in quality of sleep. Thrive Global has several posts on sleeping that you may find useful.
Last week, I had a severe case of seasonal allergies – itchy eyes, runny nose, congestion. I could not sleep well. As a result, I went through the week in a literal brain fog. I could almost feel the neurons trying to connect to create a coherent phrase.
When we are in poor physical shape, we cannot effectively achieve our goals and tasks.
If you already established healthy habits continue with them and do not take the eye off the ball. If you are building them, keep going; they will become automatic and less difficult with time.
“To keep the body in good health is a duty… otherwise, we shall not be able to keep the mind strong and clear.” Buddha
5) Social Influencer
This influencer involves having the ‘right’ amount and type of interaction with others we work with and feeling supported in our role or position.
Many of my clients find themselves in toxic working environments, which can be as bad as being in an abusive relationship. Some of them cannot sleep well, get sick often, and start to show symptoms of depression or anxiety.
This influencer is important outside of work as well. This became apparent during the pandemic when many of us suffered isolation. I do not want to imagine what the lockdown would have been like without video calls – I would take Zoom fatigue over not seeing anyone.
Let us use our precious and time and energy to spend them with people (in and out of work) who lift us up. For people we cannot completely cut off from our lives, we can manage how much time we spend with them and how we take care of ourselves after each interaction.
“Choose people who lift you up.” Michelle Obama, former First Lady of the United States
6) Environmental Influencer
This influencer entails our belief that our environment will allow us to complete or enjoy the task we are about to do in the way we would like to do it.
The return to office has been more challenging than I originally expected. I could not understand, at first, why I wasted more time and got more distracted in the office than when I worked from home. It did not have to do with the commute. I am not waking up earlier than before.
I realized that it was simply that the physical environment in the office is not as comfortable as the one I setup at home. For example, I have an ergonomic keyboard and mouse at home. Going to the restroom or getting coffee in the office takes at least twice as much time than at home. On the plus side, I get to take more steps when I am in the office.
Now that I am aware about the environmental influencer I can, first and foremost, change my perspective of the situation. It is no longer ‘worse than’, it is only different.
“Working environment, be like a playground, not a battleground.” Unknown
Understanding the emotional components involved with these influencers helps us re-align them and get back on track towards our goals and vision. We can create the conditions to have all influencers working for us at most times.
Having this knowledge is valuable especially in times of crisis and/or notable change. It will give us clarity on the factors we can and cannot control, as well as observing and assessing our emotions instead of judging them.
Which of these influencers is having the most impact for you now? Please, let us know in the comments.
Source: Institute for Professional Excellence in Coaching (iPEC)
As a leadership coach, I enable talent to achieve bold goals with high standards. My mission is to help underrepresented women in the financial industry transition from mid to senior level leadership positions by creating awareness, increasing emotional intelligence, and unveiling the tools and choices available to them.