The Centered Leader: Take back control, banish stress and quiet your mind in less than a minute
By Katherine Lewis
Even successful, highly regarded leaders often feel overwhelmed by the pressures they face daily to perform and innovate. One of my main goals as a leadership coach is to help my clients lead from the “center,” a place of focus and control where confidence and creativity can shine. Many of my clients contritely admit they have been told to meditate to improve mental clarity but don’t actually do so. They’re not alone. Only 14.2 percent of adults aged 18 and older use meditation, according to the latest available CDC data.
But people seem more receptive when I share what are called haptic practices, involving light touch and deep breathing, that can quickly and discreetly be used at the office, while working from home or before a big meeting, to regain focus. Requiring much less time commitment than classic meditation, these techniques can still help you feel mindful and centered, a state of being present in the moment, with your awareness shifted to the body rather than the mind.
By the time you finish reading this, you too will have gained some knowledge to combat the amygdala hijack, or the fight/flight/freeze reaction, and approach every business task feeling less defensive and more in control, ready to get the best from yourself and your team.
This is the first in a short series of articles where I will show you how to tap into practices that have been around for thousands of years, in many cultures and incorporate them seamlessly into the modern workplace. I learned these easy methods years ago when working with Dr. Ann Marie Chiasson, MD, an integrative medicine practitioner who works with Dr. Andrew Weil at the Center for Integrative Medicine in Arizona.
I enjoy teaching my colleagues and clients these centering techniques since they are so accessible yet have a big impact. They require almost no time investment and don’t necessarily have to be done in private, making them perfectly suited to busy executives. I use them too whenever I’m about to undertake a challenging project.
The first one is called “Ten Seconds to Center.” Use this whenever you feel that your thoughts or an external event are triggering a stress reaction. You can do this before a presentation, in your cubicle or even while talking on the phone.
Place one hand on the lower abdomen and one hand at the mid-chest. Imagine your breath going back and forth between the two hands as you breathe. Focus on the lower abdomen and the heart and give the mind a rest from any concerns. Do this for ten to twenty breaths, pause, and repeat over the course of a few minutes to bring yourself back to center. Click here for an image you can print or turn into an icon as a reminder. (By the way, it’s the same image as you see at the top of this article.)
Still not convinced this works? I have found that my clients are more open to using centering techniques after I share with them the research behind my advice. Forms of touch such as reiki, massage, hugging or even hand holding have been shown to promote the release of serotonin, dopamine and oxytocin. Translated to the corporate world, having the power to quickly increase levels of these brain chemicals can promote feelings of well-being, creativity and trust while combating the stress hormone cortisol.
However, there’s no reason that this touch has to be someone else’s. Placing your own hands along certain pathways on your body called meridians, combined with deep and slow breathing as I showed you in this first exercise can immediately unlock your body’s own ability to transform from a state of tension to one of calm. Since we already know that deep breathing reduces blood pressure and lowers heart rate, combining this with touch delivers even more powerful results in the same short amount of time.