How many of your colleagues, clients, or family members are facing significant challenges right now? Whether you’re formally a coach, or someone using “the coach approach” to support people, in a complex world, you and the people around you are are facing complex challenges.
To address this need, we just launched an engaging new eLearning course is full of tools to use coaching strategies to more effectively support people in challenging situations. It starts with our definition of “coaching,” continues to explore the meaning of “challenge,” and then puts these together with emotional intelligence solutions.
One of the key ideas in this course: We are all affected by the increased volatility in the world.
It sounds simple, but has profound implications. As we learned from the recent State of the Heart research, at a global level, people are less able to navigate emotions. At the same time, emotional distress is at an all-time-high level. In the Coaching Through Challenge course,
The neuroscience of escalating stress
From a neuroscience perspective on the way our brains react to stress, this escalated stress makes our threat-response-system more highly activated. In turn, that causes us to become likely to assess a stimulus as a threat. In other words, in a threat-state, we treat more things as threats. This threat-appraisal process becomes a self-reinforcing cycle. In addition to current distress, our threat appraisal is affected by past trauma, strength of support relationships, perceived resources, and the people around us.
The algebra of stress in a coaching relationship
As coaches and people using coaching skills to support people, we need to understand this from two perspectives: Our own reactions, and our client/people’s reactions. To understand reactions, we can apply one of the core competencies in the Six Seconds Model of Emotional Intelligence: Recognizing Patterns. It’s our ability to notice our own recurring reactions.
When ___(stimulus)__, I ____(typical reaction)____.
We can convert those blanks to X & Y, A & B, and dig into the algebra of the coaching relationship. Even if you hated algebra word problems in school, please give this a try, because it’s an “emotional math” formula that has profound implications.
What’s happening with people you’re supporting?
It’s often easier to see other peoples’ patterns more clearly than our own. Think about a person you’re supporting as they face challenge, and fill in the blank:
When they feel a lot of stress, their typical reaction is ____X_____.
Next, consider, what is the effect of their typical reaction?
When ___X____, they become more ___Y___.
Since our brains are wired to escalate stress, it’s likely that X increases Y which leads to increased stress (or reduced ability to cope with stress). For example: “When I feel a lot of stress, I work harder. When I work harder, I become more tired. When I become more tired, I feel more stressed.”
Be careful, because seeing this, you might be tempted to blurt out, “you’re reacting that way because you’re caught up in the threat-appraisal cycle and it’s not helpful.” That is unlikely to be helpful.
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What’s happening for you-as-coach?
Again, consider the factors that contribute to your own threat-appraisal. Consider your current stress, trauma, support, resources, environment, and fill in the blank:
When ___A____, I feel stressed.
Next, look at the effect. When you are feeling increased stress, how do you typically react?
When I feel stressed, I __B____.
As above, it’s likely that A → B → More Stress.
Putting them together: What do coach & client cocreate?
You’re probably already seeing that there could be a relationship between your person’s X&Y and your own A&B. Fill in this blank:
When I’m with someone who’s reacting to __X__ & becoming more __Y___, my typical reaction is ____ C____.
C is the result of your cycle.
Now consider: How does your A + B + C affect your ability to show up “in coach mode” to be fully present and supportive?
What’s the effect on your client?
When they are ___Y___ and someone gets more ___C___, their typical reaction is ___Z___.
Z is your client/person’s result from this cycle.
Adding up the math
The fundamental question: What’s C + Z?
Remember C is the result of their patterns, and Z is the result of yours. Are you and this other person fueling one another’s volatility, or are you co-creating greater equilibrium? In other words, how is your reaction combining with their reaction? If that combination is increasing the peace, fantastic! If not, it’s time for you to dig in and shift your own reaction to a more productive response (here are resources for that). The first step is awareness.
C+Z … Most likely, the answer varies. Ideally, it’s more peace, clarity, and strength of purpose… and some days it might be more chaos. We’re not at our best all the time. Awareness supports change. And, as we learned in Balancing Burnout to Embody Coaching, we can be proactive and set up conditions for us to do a better job of supporting the people around us.
To build your toolbox for helping yourself and others in complex times, join the Coaching Through Challenge course here.
See you next month for the next 🌱EQ Coaching newsletter.
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Warmly,
– Josh
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