How to move beyond your F.E.A.R. & do the D.A.R.E

Bouncing back from past failures & moving ahead

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“I am drained & depleted. I don’t feel like working. I want to do something else. I don’t know but I am not able to think & act clearly. I am confused & exhausted”, told 40-year-old Ritesh to his mentor Abinash.

Ritesh works as an assistant general manager in a manufacturing company at Manesar, Haryana. In the last seven years with this company Ritesh has never missed a single deadline. He has always been known for his discipline and dedication at work. His team members look up to?him as an ideal candidate for a leadership?role. But Ritesh feels otherwise, for him it is an exploitation because he is one who ends up doing anything and everything for everyone in his team.

Delegation is visible in his team but mostly it is upward not downward. Ritesh finds it challenging to delegate and on the contrary takes up all his team member’s work, especially in emergency situations. He understands that as a leader he must learn how to delegate but his past failures in delegation keep him hooked in fear.

Abinash listened to Ritesh patiently & asked, “Ritesh do you agree that fear is the main reason behind your struggle with delegation and it is what ends up making you drained & depleted?” Ritesh nodded with a hope for a solution and said, “Yes, you are right, I agree, I must move from my fear but in the past, I delegated & failed. That fear still haunts me and prevents me from delegating again.”

Abinash calmly suggested, “The opposite of FEAR is DARE and today let’s do a little reflection and move from FEAR to DARE.”

F.E.A.R. is a barrier, let us see how Ritesh used this:

F: Fusion with a story: I fail when I delegate. I prefer to work alone because it is easy, and delegating is hard. I can’t delegate and wait patiently for the result. I need to do it myself and see the progress at every minute.

E: Excessive Goals: I agree I had excessive goals in delegation. Last time when I delegated, I set a too big goal for my team without even consulting with them. I kept a deadline which was impossible for my team to achieve. I didn’t provide adequate support to my team for achieving the same.

A: Avoidance of discomfort: I wanted to avoid the discomfort in delegation. I didn’t want to delegate and wait as it created anxiety, fear of failure & frustration. I was not at all comfortable with the speed my team was working, and it created anger. I wanted to avoid these negative feelings, stopped delegating, and ended up doing everything myself.

R: Remoteness from your values: I lost touch with values as a leader. I forgot that as a leader I must create more leaders and for that empowerment & delegation are the key components. I was also moving away from empathy, trust & compassion as a human being. Remoteness from my values made me more frustrated & depleted.

After this reflection Ritesh moved to D.A.R.E.

D: Defusion: I know what my mind is telling me, yet I will practice delegation. There will be some confusion and I will treat it?like thought waves which come and go. I will stick to the way I must act.

A: Acceptance Strategies: I will practice mindfulness, narrative therapy, and breathing exercises to accept the anxiety involved with delegation and move forward.

R: Realistic goal setting: I will take my team’s capability into consideration, consult with them, and co-create the target. I will provide the required support to enable my team for success. I will monitor the progress periodically to keep the team on track. I will break down the big goals into smaller chunks so that we don’t get overwhelmed.

E: Embracing values: I will practice my leadership with trust, compassion & empathy. All my communications & actions will be aligned with my values so that I will emerge as an authentic leader.

Be it delegation, weight loss, relationships or any past failure that keeps you stuck, use your F.E.A.R. & do the D.A.R.E. to break the barrier and grow.

Published earlier in the newspaper tabloid "The Desert Trail"?