The Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda Dilemma - Part 3 of 4

3 Secrets for Managing Your Emotions in the Workplace

If you already read Parts 1 and 2 (posted 5/25 & 6/1), congratulations! You are ready for Secret #2 where you’ll add to your toolset of ways to minimize future woulda, coulda, shoulda moments.

If not, then I strongly advise you to start here and read both first.  

To briefly the last installment, I introduced the concept of truly knowing thyself because as humans, we are often not aware of how we do what we do or why we do what we do. Challenging, for sure, but very telling of whether you are grounded on a fixed mindset instead of a growth mindset.

Another concept was reframing the idea of controlling your emotions and how this reframe gets you out of the failure loop and helps reduce that woulda, coulda, shoulda dilemma. Onward.

Secret #2: Staying positive is not the best strategy

Staying positive is not the best strategy sounds counterintuitive, I agree. After all, positive thinking has been a hallmark of corporations, leadership mantras, and business training programs or self-help books.

Dale Carnegie, who first started the philosophy of positive thinking, encouraged people to NOT see the negative or darker side of things.

Long ago, a wise mentor of mine advised me - 

“If you want to deliver real value, become a problem finder, not just a problem solver.”

It has prepared me well in helping my clients become future-ready by discovering or anticipating problems that damage the business or a person’s career. Honing those techniques allows me to equip clients to do it themselves. 

Take, for instance, the practice of proactively bullet-proofing plans, ideas, strategies, and decisions. It takes courage to let go and see things for what they really are. It is also not smart to attempt it as a DIY activity.

Bullet-proofing is critical but it fell by the wayside because of the positive thinking movement. Score: Positive thinking – 1, Bullet-proofing – 0.   

‘Positive thinking appears benign, but it is antithetical to bullet-proofing and negates critical thinking, Socratic discussions, and analysis.’

Personal story – they both matter:

As an analytical person, I’d bullet-proofed ideas, plans, or strategies for their viability and merit. If they could hold up to tough critique, then they were supporting.

The problem is that most peers didn’t have the same point of view, especially in consensus-driven cultures [Carnegie followers]. What they saw was negativity. That conclusion felt unfair.

Alas, if only I woulda known then what I know now, I’d go back and coach myself on building emotional intelligence. I’d say: ‘Know thyself much??’

Lesson learned: ‘Emotions play a huge role in the workplace and in every decision we make. It needs to be factored and addressed.’

At the time, I did not realize that poking holes in an idea could be viewed as poking holes in the person. That’s on me and my, then, lower EQ. I shoulda prioritized learning this.

As a result, feedback from one manager was that ‘I was doing a disservice to myself ‘ and another suggested I ‘..change the color of my lenses (to rose color)’. See my response on the right although I coulda been more willing to listen.

Warning: Rose-colored glasses can harm your vision

The point of my personal story and emphasis on emotions being a big factor is to springboard the problems and risk of misusing ‘positive thinking’ as a mask that fools you and hurts others.

Almost two decades later (it’s about time!!), we are seeing evidence that ‘staying positive’ is not benign after all.

Psychologists have come to recognize this when helping clients out of denial states. Clinical psychologist and professor, Barbara Held, acknowledges the drawbacks of positive thinking to include feelings of guilt or defect from being unable to shake negative feelings by using positive thoughts.

It has also been dismissed as ‘bulls—t’ and ‘the philosophy of hypocrisy’, by spiritual guru Chandra Mohan Jain aka Osho. He further described it as being untruthful, dishonest, and deceiving yourself and others. (Inc Magazine, 2017)

New concept:

‘Toxic Positivity is ‘a thing’ and it’s worse than negativity.’

Toxic positivity is an unintended consequence of popular self-help books and social media spread of ineffective attempts to make yourself or someone else feel better by focusing on positive emotions.

The rise in toxic positivity is also credited to the rise in spirituality and mindfulness practices according to Bianca L. Rodrigues, LMFT, a licensed psychotherapist.

“People confuse the actual value of the zen-like movement.”

The misuse leads to labeling emotions as being either positive or negative. The truth is that emotions are not inherently good or bad, they are merely a natural instinctive response to circumstances, mood, or relationships.

The damage to others and yourself is real.

People guilty of partaking in toxic positivity are misguidedly using a Band-Aid for a rupture.

They place a higher value on masking emotions as a solution instead of digging deeper and looking under the hood to repair what’s broken. 

Mantras that force positive thinking and reject other’s emotions are commonly used oblivious to the damage it causes.

For instance, if a co-worker or employee reaches out when they are struggling with something, it overrides that person’s struggles or emotions. It negates what they are going through.

My Spidey sense about only seeing the world with rose-colored glasses being horsesh*t was on point back then. Even so, it does NOT mean I handled it the best way. I coulda been a lot better back then. 

Lesson Recap:

·        Be careful about rose-colored glasses.

·        Steer away from toxic positivity. Don’t practice it, don’t let others dish it to you.

·        Have the courage to stand in your truth and be willing to discover yourself.

·        Learn to do better now, not 20 years from now.

Reach out if you want to learn how to do better. I’m here for you. Standing for justice and equality is part of my DNA.

My vision is to improve the human condition and inspire others to be better.

Our future depends on it.

Sneak Peek: Here you’ll get meaningful stats and research findings that reinforce the challenges and importance of understanding how to self-regulate and achieve greater success in your communications and your business/career.

Feedback please - Your thoughts and ideas are important to me. Please comment, challenge, and share. 

Stay safe. Stay healthy. Stay Connected.