Crying at work
Dear Team Joy,
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This week’s note is inspired by an incredible client who talked to me two weeks ago about a very challenging moment at work. With her permission I am sharing it anonymously with you today.
I hope hearing her story, brings you emotional awareness and empathy if you ever find yourself in a similar situation.
Leadership coaching client profile:
High-performer
4-5 years post-graduation
Management consultant
Aptitude: Creative, collaborative, high-energy, practical
Vision: Desiring to be chief of staff at a mission driven organization
Why she came to coaching: Looking to strategize her career within her company, have more clarity about what is important to her and how to be ready for her next promotion. She also wanted to explore how to make meaningful contributions that energized her outside of work.
I got screamed at, it was awful
When I first met this client, she was about a year into her role at a management consultancy.
We met every few months over the last year. Slowly overtime her enthusiasm for her role began to wane. She was still learning a lot, but it wasn’t feeling sustainable, or aligned with her values. She was toying with the idea of leaving, but she wanted to give herself enough time to find a role she was excited about first. In the meantime, the status quo was mostly tenable.
Then two weeks ago she booked an urgent session.
She got on the phone and said:
“Last week my team was preparing for a meeting, and granted I could have done more, but I didn’t think the meeting was that important…it was just a meeting to prepare for an actual meeting with our client.
As soon as we got off the call my manager yelled at me saying it was unacceptable to be so unprepared.
The worst part is as she’s yelling at me…I started crying.
Then I felt embarrassed that I was both being yelled at, and crying in public. I was surprised that I started crying, but once I started I couldn’t stop.
Then my manager’s manager, the leader on the project, came over to see what the commotion was about. My first instinct was that he might be empathetic, given he saw I was yelled at.
If he cared, he didn’t show it. He just walks over to me and asks, “Why are you being so emotional?”
I knew in my heart, immediately, instinctively that I was done. I felt so disrespected and unsupported.
I quit three days later…
Which is why I am here. Now I want to talk about what my game-plan is. ??
领英推荐
Sound familiar? Why it ends in tears
Raise your hand if you’ve found yourself at work on the receiving end of anger and responded with tears?
I have.
I have worked with a number of clients who have had eerily similar situations unfold. Both genders are programmed to believe crying is unprofessional, or that crying is weak. Yet for many of us (women especially) in the presence of anger, inside of a power dynamic we crumple.
So what’s actually unfolding here?
Trigger occurs: Yelling + accusation.
We start with feeling emotionally, and in extreme cases physically threatened. We are asked:
The yelling triggers our nervous system into defense mode. We quickly cycle through our options for self-protection: fight, flight or freeze.
Fight: Women are taught from a young age that our anger is inappropriate. We gaslight ourselves with impressive speed, “Maybe I really did mess up? Maybe this is my fault and this reaction is justified.” We intuit that yelling back would only escalate the situation. With our anger response repressed it’s hard to find our center in the moment to establish a boundary. Saying something like, “Do not talk to me like this.” Instead most of us choose another protective mode and don't fight back.
Flight: This is a tough option too. From the cases I have heard about (and experienced), the person chastising you is likely your superior. What if running is seen as inappropriate or dismissive?
Freeze: This is where most of us land. The shutdown. It feels unwarranted, and yet sadness is the emotion we are allowed to express, when anger gets repressed and we go into a state of overwhelm. Especially for those of us that are sensitive, the tears flow. We have failed in our gendered mission to be “good” and are being called out for being “bad.” Shame is surely soon to follow.
How we can handle other’s anger at work:
The first step is recognizing that you are triggered. The more you can become aware of what this feels like in your body, racing heartbeat, pressure in your head, coils in your stomach that most closely reflect shock, the more you can recognize in the moment that you’re triggered (and choose how you want to handle it). If you can take a second to inhale, you can slow down your nervous system response and create more options. This isn’t always possible, but it’s hugely helpful.
When someone is coming at you with this much dominance and energy, you are nearly guaranteed to go internal. That’s where the shame spiral starts. But there is something we can do to intercept the shame spiral.
Self-compassion: what do I need right now?
The inward spiral and criticism is a mechanism we use to feel safe. Maybe this is my fault? If I go toward self-blame, then I can prevent something like from happening in the future with enough self-criticism. Self-compassion is much harder to find but is MUCH more powerful. If you ask yourself what do I need, you have a chance of attending to it.
To access this kindness it might require closing your eyes for a second, and putting your hand on your stomach or heart to ground. You are the best care-taker of you. Signal to your body that, “I got you.” If you typically trust the other person and this is an outsized example of their exasperation, then it may be safe enough to stay present in the moment but set a boundary, “We can come back to this conversation when we are both calmer.” But if it dose not feel safe it might be time to exit. If you give yourself the grace of listening, your body will tell you what you need.
Third option, shift attention. If anger is coming at you, the fastest way to direct the flow of attention is to ask a question. “Is this the best way to communicate with me?” Reflect their behavior back to them. If you can’t come up with something this contextually relevant you could also just say, “Woah, what is happening right now? This feels very elevated.” Shifting attention get’s the intensity of anger off of you temporarily, and allows you to bring your full capacity back online instead of spiraling further after being triggered.
Lastly, practice. These skills are very hard to do in the moment. Role-playing how to handle difficult conversations can be useful, as is trying them out in low-stakes environments where you don't feel yourself in full-shut down, but you notice yourself going into defense mode. Practicing these skills expands your capacity to handle tough conversations (especially yelling) with more agency. It’s completely fine to cry, and give yourself permission to cry if that’s whats needed. But the pause, redirection, or exit or also options.
Avoiding the shutdown gives you agency for how you want to handle the behavior in real-time, with an orientation towards being compassionate and honoring your own needs instead of worrying about the other person’s reaction if they will feel called out or if it will be awkward. The other person’s anger is not your job to soothe. It’s your job to re-regulate, self-soothe, and take action from there.
In summary:
These situations are difficult, but they aren’t uncommon. Because these incidents are covered in shame we often don’t hear about them, or develop tools for handling them. But we can start to shift that.
If you want to learn more about these topics, here is my suggested continued reading:
Much love,
Isabel
P.S. Ready to dig in and start practicing these skills?
I teach rebellious ??women to harness their power from SELF-LOVE ??
6 个月Gosh... Isabel reading this, you took me back to the times when I felt helpless against someone with position of authority. I still remember how mad I was at myself - Why am I crying, when I'm raging inside? After years of inner work and insights from experts - now I know WHY. Thanks again for another beautiful letter from your heart.
Chief of Staff & High Performance Team Coach @Happiness Squad
6 个月I'd love to hear your thoughts: What part did I get right, where did I get it wrong? ??