The LONGEST conversation you will ever have with anyone is the one you have with yourself, for life.
The conversation that will IMPACT your life more than any other is the one you have with yourself.
So why then do we give this conversation so little ATTENTION?
And why does it affect our business life? because all brutality within us uses energy, valuable energy that we could use for our business relationships and beyond. Put simply, all that is within us is transferred to our business. So, we have a fantastic opportunity to evolve our businesses by taking control of what we can within us and paying attention to the relationship we cultivate with ourselves.
- Talk to yourself as if you’re a friend and companion. Vow to never bully, or berate yourself. Make a commitment to your conversation style within your own mind and build a companionable relationship with yourself. (one of company, friendship, & camaraderie) Remove all inner brutality, and replace with kindliness, curiosity, interest and trust that you can do differently if you want to.
- Talk to yourself with genuine consideration. The more humanity and humility you bring into yourself and your life the more your workplace will thrive. All human beings want to be accepted, including your staff, including your family, including you. Consider complete acceptance of yourself. Consider and explore without judging yourself where you have influence on yourself and what you can change if you desire. This then creates an upward spiral of energy, of good feeling and good energy. 3 Talk to yourself with consideration of how your day is going. Within every busy and crazy day there is choice. Ask every hour if you can ‘What do I want?’.
- Talk to yourself with care. Speak to yourself within with an air of care. Turn do’s into wants. Simple things like making your ‘To do list’ into a ‘Want to do list’. Why? Talk to yourself in a kindly, and companionable manner, for a whole day and then try a week.
Check consistently throughout the day, each hour. What do I want?
Ask most leaders and they will readily acknowledge that they are pushed for time, energy, that staff is their biggest expense, and recruitment is tricky.
Few business leaders will have the realisation that the relationship they have with themselves can help improve all of these pressures, and in turn their profits. Cultivating a kind and companionable relationship with yourself, is your path to ease all of the above.
Cultivating a kind and companionable relationship with yourself is taking true responsibility, for your emotional, psychological, behavioural and BUSINESS HEALTH.
Our stiff upper lip ‘carry on regardless’ culture, creates mean spirited dialogues within our minds, and is not a necessary element to healthy buoyant and growing business. The great news is it’s not our fault! We are all at the mercy of our history and our neurology. Better still however we can literally change our minds with courage and commitment. ‘You can teach an old dog new tricks’.
We carry on regardless through fear of not being good enough; fear of humiliation; and ironically fear of weakening. Ignorance of the care of the inner self is leading to anxiety, depression, substance misuse, trauma and sometimes complete breakdown. Persistent release of stress hormones causes many of these symptoms.
Though similar to self-care and compassion, companionship is much more dynamic because you are intentionally practicing kindness towards yourself. You ‘carry on with due regard’ for yourself, with love, respect, patience, encouragement, humour, and flexibility all the elements that suit a generous thriving business environment.
This doesn’t mean being too soft! Or too flimsy! It means the exact opposite in fact. You see the leader who has an inner relationship with themselves that is based on kindness, and companionship have no requirement to extinguish inner angst on to others. These leaders act with due care and attention, and consideration and so business is conducted in a humane manner and with humility. This makes difficult decisions, difficult communications and difficult tasks easier. How come? Because you are not wasting any energy on an internal fight within yourself. You don’t waste time in anxiety, under pressure, overwhelm, tiredness, because you’re already treating yourself with full consideration and care.
Working with business leaders in the business of kindness and companionship I have seen multi-millionaires and many businesses improve when leaders are aware of their internal relationship.
Leaders lead and they also transfer everything that is within them.
If self hatred, self harassment, self sabotage is familiar to you, this is your sure way through it, once and for all.
Anna Pinkerton
Business Therapist, Speaker, Coach, Author
To find out more on how Anna Pinkerton can help your business , click on the link to her website
anna@annapinkerton.com || 07899 688 845 || annapinkerton.com