In a sudden and potentially difficult situation, your initial reaction may be easy, immediate and briefly satisfying, but potentially very expensive. Photo: livemint.com.
Faced with a sudden adverse situation, it is all too easy to overreact and live to regret it, says Paul Lyons. He suggests a three-second mental toughness exercise that helps you regain control of your emotions.
If I had to pick one place where mental toughness becomes visible very quickly, it would be what happens between your first reaction and your final response.
Not the big life strategy; not the five-year plan. It is the four or five seconds after something unexpected and unpleasant hits your system and you have to deal with it. That is where your self-control lives, and that is where a lot of damage is either done or avoided.
Many people hear the word ”control” and picture someone who is calm all the time — unflappable, Zen-like, nothing getting through. That is not the goal, because it’s not even realistic. You are human.
You get an email that feels unfair; someone cuts you off in traffic; a family member says something clumsy at exactly the wrong moment. Your body reacts, your jaw tightens, there’s a quick story in your head about what this means and who is at fault.
That first version of you wants to act right away — type the reply; lean on the horn; walk out of the room.
Reacting is easy, immediate and briefly satisfying, but potentially very expensive. Control is not about never having that first response. Control is about building enough space that the first version of you does not get full and permanent access to your mouth, your keyboard, or your steering wheel.
Most real control is not glamorous. There is no applause for the email you do not send, or the argument you do not escalate, but they are the moments that quietly change everything.
Instead of that first reaction, you give yourself three seconds — to breathe, to feel your feet on the floor, and to ask: “What is actually happening here?” That small pause does not make you weak. It makes you available for a better response.
You can still be clear; you can still be firm; you can still say “no” or “that is not OK”, the difference being that your response is chosen, not sprayed. Sometimes the right response is strong. Sometimes it is soft. Sometimes it is silence. Sometimes it is: “I need a break before we talk about this.”
The point is you are deciding, not your adrenaline. There is another part to control that does not get talked about enough, and that is where you put your attention.
Many of us burn a lot of energy trying to control things we simply do not own. It could be other people’s motives; past events that cannot be changed; imaginary arguments we keep winning in the shower.
Meanwhile, the things we can influence get ignored — sleep, preparation, breath, words, timing, whether we are escalating or calming the room.
Mental toughness is not about having more power over other people. It is about taking better care of the power you already have over yourself.
A useful question in any tense moment is: What is mine to manage here? The answer is almost always some mix of your response, your effort, your honesty, your next step.
For the coming week, pick one situation where you tend to overreact quickly. It may be emails, in traffic, family conversations or work frustrations. Your only job is to add a three-second pause before you act in this one situation. Three seconds before you press send; three seconds before you fire back; three seconds before you decide this is a disaster.
Perhaps most importantly, three seconds before you let your bad day become somebody else’s.
At the end of the week, ask yourself these questions: Did this make anything worse? Did it make at least one thing slightly better? How did I feel about myself when I remembered to do it? If you like the answers, that is mental toughness training. It is nothing dramatic, just you using ordinary moments as practice.
Control is not about becoming a different person; it is about giving yourself a chance to choose a better version of you, more often.
That is where real mental toughness begins.
Paul Lyons is an experienced business leader, adviser and coach enjoying a diverse career across Australia and Asia. He can be contacted at [email protected]. This article first appeared on the Mental Toughness blogsite.
