How to Tame a Stressed-Out Mind

When I work with a client to help them achieve what matters most to them, we spend a great deal of time and focus on the relationship between them and their mind. (Sometimes I’m the couples therapist of last resort — things can get ugly in there.)

I talk about “Mindset Mastery,” but that’s not exactly accurate.

(Alliteration rarely is.)

Because as anyone with a mind knows:

You can’t master your mind.

At least not in terms of dominating it, controlling it, and forcing it to think and feel and remember and imagine what you want it to.

When your mind gets an idea in its head, are you not pretty much along for the ride?

Let’s say, for example, that you present an idea in a meeting, and Sally follows up by pointing out a couple of serious flaws in that idea.

The Ideal Mind

If you were in control of your mind, how would you want it to react to this turn of events?

• You’d want it to get curious, so you’d ask questions about her perspective.

• If you found her concerns valid, you’d want it to be grateful, so you’d express your thanks graciously.

• You'd want it to be open to exploring what you had missed and why, so you could learn from the experience.

Most of us aren’t in possession of that kind of mind, are we?

I know I’m not.

The Actual Mind

When I receive any kind of “constructive feedback,” my mind orchestrates a bodily reaction that has more in common with the klaxon alarm that accompanies the meltdown of a nuclear reactor than the gentle ringing of a meditation gong.

How about you? Does your mind insist that the person who just criticized your idea in a meeting is a present and lethal threat to your life? Does it scream that you must either destroy them or run away as fast and as far as you can?

Here’s how you might tell: it might initiate a whole bunch of physiological changes without asking for your input:

• dilating your pupils (so you see your attacker better)

• raising your heart rate and blood pressure (to increase your available energy stores)

• sending blood and energy where it's needed (to your legs so you can run away or to your jaw so you can to bite)

• pausing long-term projects like digestion, immunity, repair, and reproduction so it can shunt all available energy into staying alive

None of that is helpful when you’re dealing with Sally and her concerns.

In fact, your mind’s strategy can be downright calamitous. And if you don’t intervene quickly, you’ll almost certainly end up doing or saying something you’ll regret later.

How to Invite Wisdom

So how can we insert wisdom into this process, in order to override the wildly misguided fight-or-flight mind and instead engage with curiosity, compassion, and courage?

There are many ways, and you can alway go deeper and discover more about yourself and your mind in the process.

But for now, I want to focus on a single, simple, powerful practice that can begin to break the pattern. Their goal isn’t to create wisdom per se, but rather the space in which wisdom can enter.

Are You Inhibited Enough?

In 1989 I stumbled upon Michael Gelb’s wonderful book, Body Learning, which introduced me to the work of F. M. Alexander, founder of the Alexander Technique. And one of the technique’s key principles Gelb highlighted was “inhibition.”

That is, if you want to adopt a new behavior or way of being, first check and see what you do naturally, by default, and inhibit it. Don’t try to replace the old behavior with the new one; not at first, anyway.

Instead, just practice NOT doing the old thing.

That’s easier—what we coaches call a “dead person skill,” because a dead person can

When it comes to habits of mind that arise in the face of a perceived threat (aka “stress”), inhibition is the first step.

Stress Inoculation: A Powerful Practice of Mental Inhibition

Let’s practice some stress inoculation. Like a real inoculation, you’re going to give yourself a tiny, attenuated dose of the real thing so you can learn how to deal with the full-blown experience should it arise.

Identify a mildly stressful thought. It might be something that happened that you are angry or upset about. It might be something you fear might happen in the future that would make you angry or upset.

Ideally, your stressful thought will be about a 1 or 2 on a scale of 1-10, where 1 is “no biggie” and 10 is imagining being dropped into a lake of boiling lava by a Bond villain.

Step 1: Bring the thought into awareness.

This is a key step — you assuming agency over the thought. It’s not mugging you. You’re inviting it to a cage match.

Step 2: Notice your body’s response.

This may include any of the stress symptoms I mentioned earlier, or your own special kaleidoscope of hormones and neurotransmitters gone apeshit.

Step 3: While focusing on the thought AND your body’s response, begin to breathe in a way that calms you.

If you’re new to this, just take long, slow, deep breathes.

If you’re familiar with breathwork, you’ve got a whole array of techniques at your disposal: coherence breathing; box breathing; 4, 7, 8 breathing; exhale longer than inhale; xi breathing from Qi Gong — it’s all good.

If you feel the thought losing potency, bring it back with slightly heightened intensity.

If you find the stress response in your body fading, amp up the thought.

And keep breathing those calming breaths.

Doing this for 3 minutes, twice a day, will create an inhibitory habit.

And once that’s in place, you can begin to fill the space with wisdom.

Which we’ll talk about in an upcoming edition of the newsletter.

Are you a leader responsible for the activities, mindset, and emotional tone of a team? I specialize in Mindset Mastery, so you and your team can focus on What Matters Most and Uproot your Blockages. Email me at [howie AT askhowie DOT com] to find out more and book a free 30-minute discovery call.