How to overcome workplace anxieties?
30 September 2014
Read by 3191 persons
Your hands are shaking, you are breathless, you are ready to bite... The unknown, failure, judgment make you lose your composure. How to overcome your fears and turn them into strengths? Nathalie Dédebant, coach and consultant at Cegos, provides insight.
Fear is a basic emotion. It is useful because, in a specific situation, it alerts us to danger, allowing us to avoid or counter it. The limbic brain then analyzes the situation to choose the most appropriate response. It is therefore important to let this fear express itself, to live it, to verbalize it before reasoning and examining the context. But fear also resides in an irrational scenario where signals are deliberately interpreted as negative, creating inhibitions and undermining self-esteem. This is what the American psychologist Will Schultz worked on, captivated by group dynamics and self-knowledge. He identified three types of fear that stiffen our behavior. Here are the most effective responses.
1. The fear of being ignored
You feel excluded from a circle of privileged people. You fear not being invited to important meetings and sense that you will be forgotten during reorganizations. Your manager asks someone else about an important file. A colleague speaks to your neighbor without seeing you, or answers a call in the middle of your conversation. You need to feel important, alive, present.
Associated fears: being abandoned, not being recognized, not knowing how to value oneself, losing one's place.
What's wrong: you make yourself noticed by repeated lateness, or by your omnipresence; you speak too loudly or conversely you withdraw completely.
Solutions: attend meetings and look at people you know; visualize a meeting in advance to reassure yourself; make a list of your qualities to give yourself courage; ask yourself: "Is it really personal, against me? What is really important?" ; work on yourself and your environment through meditation for example.
2. The fear of being humiliated
You are paralyzed at the idea of taking on a new mission, of not getting the expected results from the team, of missing a speaking opportunity or a PowerPoint presentation. At the idea of not being up to par or failing, your ego takes a hit. You need to feel competent, able to cope with situations, to control risks.
What's wrong: you want to control everything all the time - including yourself - and struggle to delegate; you multiply dashboards, emails; you are authoritarian or conversely laissez-faire; you demand perfection.
Associated fears: being squeezed, doing badly, making mistakes, not being up to the task, being ridiculed.
Solutions: question yourself about the essentials - "What is expected of me?" - so as not to make mountains out of molehills. Evaluate your added value, everyone has one; set realistic and measurable goals for yourself and write them down; tell yourself 15 times a day: "I have the right to make mistakes"; remember your successes, this will balance your perspective.
3. The fear of being rejected
You spot all the signs that prove your colleagues hate you, that your boss doesn't appreciate you, that your peers despise you: yes, they avoid your gaze, are silent when you pass by or stare at you. On high alert, you are ultra-sensitive to the "What will people say?", "What will they think of me?" Obsessed with affection, you need to be appreciated by everyone and all the time. You find it difficult to feel worthy of being loved, to accept yourself as you are.
What's wrong: you say too much or not enough; you keep your distance and are cold in your exchanges or conversely overflowing and excessively warm; you talk a lot about yourself, you listen too much or not enough.
Associated fears: being betrayed, judged, manipulated (my words could be used against me), showing weaknesses.
Solutions: confess your emotions, gradually open up to others, starting by surrounding yourself with people you trust; prepare interviews to find the right balance; tell yourself that you have the right not to please everyone; at the thought "I'm useless", answer yourself "OK, I've noted that, it can happen"; allow yourself to express your feelings to the other: "On the project, I feel more comfortable with..." ; take care of yourself in every area.
Marie-Madeleine Sève.
Lexpress.fr
Published September 29, 2014.
Online September 30, 2014.
Fear is a basic emotion. It is useful because, in a specific situation, it alerts us to danger, allowing us to avoid or counter it. The limbic brain then analyzes the situation to choose the most appropriate response. It is therefore important to let this fear express itself, to live it, to verbalize it before reasoning and examining the context. But fear also resides in an irrational scenario where signals are deliberately interpreted as negative, creating inhibitions and undermining self-esteem. This is what the American psychologist Will Schultz worked on, captivated by group dynamics and self-knowledge. He identified three types of fear that stiffen our behavior. Here are the most effective responses.
1. The fear of being ignored
You feel excluded from a circle of privileged people. You fear not being invited to important meetings and sense that you will be forgotten during reorganizations. Your manager asks someone else about an important file. A colleague speaks to your neighbor without seeing you, or answers a call in the middle of your conversation. You need to feel important, alive, present.
Associated fears: being abandoned, not being recognized, not knowing how to value oneself, losing one's place.
What's wrong: you make yourself noticed by repeated lateness, or by your omnipresence; you speak too loudly or conversely you withdraw completely.
Solutions: attend meetings and look at people you know; visualize a meeting in advance to reassure yourself; make a list of your qualities to give yourself courage; ask yourself: "Is it really personal, against me? What is really important?" ; work on yourself and your environment through meditation for example.
2. The fear of being humiliated
You are paralyzed at the idea of taking on a new mission, of not getting the expected results from the team, of missing a speaking opportunity or a PowerPoint presentation. At the idea of not being up to par or failing, your ego takes a hit. You need to feel competent, able to cope with situations, to control risks.
What's wrong: you want to control everything all the time - including yourself - and struggle to delegate; you multiply dashboards, emails; you are authoritarian or conversely laissez-faire; you demand perfection.
Associated fears: being squeezed, doing badly, making mistakes, not being up to the task, being ridiculed.
Solutions: question yourself about the essentials - "What is expected of me?" - so as not to make mountains out of molehills. Evaluate your added value, everyone has one; set realistic and measurable goals for yourself and write them down; tell yourself 15 times a day: "I have the right to make mistakes"; remember your successes, this will balance your perspective.
3. The fear of being rejected
You spot all the signs that prove your colleagues hate you, that your boss doesn't appreciate you, that your peers despise you: yes, they avoid your gaze, are silent when you pass by or stare at you. On high alert, you are ultra-sensitive to the "What will people say?", "What will they think of me?" Obsessed with affection, you need to be appreciated by everyone and all the time. You find it difficult to feel worthy of being loved, to accept yourself as you are.
What's wrong: you say too much or not enough; you keep your distance and are cold in your exchanges or conversely overflowing and excessively warm; you talk a lot about yourself, you listen too much or not enough.
Associated fears: being betrayed, judged, manipulated (my words could be used against me), showing weaknesses.
Solutions: confess your emotions, gradually open up to others, starting by surrounding yourself with people you trust; prepare interviews to find the right balance; tell yourself that you have the right not to please everyone; at the thought "I'm useless", answer yourself "OK, I've noted that, it can happen"; allow yourself to express your feelings to the other: "On the project, I feel more comfortable with..." ; take care of yourself in every area.
Marie-Madeleine Sève.
Lexpress.fr
Published September 29, 2014.
Online September 30, 2014.
