Memorable quotes
What makes o ur intervention with athletes unique is that we spend no time focusing on the ir technical or tactical skills. Conventional wisdom holds t h at if you find talented people and equip them with the right skills for the challenge at hand, they will perform at their best. In our experience that often isn’t so. Energy is the X factor t h at makes it possible to fully ignite talent and skill. We never addressed how Monica Seles hit her serves, or how Mark O’Meara drove the ball, or how Grant Hill shot his free throws. All of these athletes were extraordinarily gifted and accomplished when they came to us. We focused instead on helping them to manage their energy more effectively in the service of whatever mission they were on.
Because we have overridden the natural rhythms that once defined our lives, the challenge is to consciously and deliberately create new boundaries. We must learn to establish stopping points in o ur days, inviolable times when we step off the track, cease processing information and shift our attention from achievement to restoration. Moore-Ede calls this a “time cocoon.”
We grow at all levels by expending energy beyond our normal limits, and then recovering. The same is true we have found, of “muscles” at all levels—emotional, mental and spiritual. The catch is that we instinctively resist pushing beyond our current comfort zones. Homeostasis is a state of equilibrium—the biological maintenance of the status quo. When we challenge our equilibrium, discomfort serves as an early warning system, alerting us that we are entering uncharted territory and urging us to return to safe ground. In the case of real danger, the experience of alarm is useful and self-protective. Subject a muscle to excessive demand, for example, and you risk significant damage. BUt expose the muscle to ordinary demand and it won’t grow. Expanding capacity requires a willingness to endure short-term discomofrt in teh service of long-term reward. The same paradoxical phenomen applies to achieving longterm satisfaction and well-being.
“We can experience pleasure wi thout any investment of psychic energy, whereas enjoyment happens only as a result of unusual investments of attention . . . ,” writes psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, author of Flow. ‘ The best moments in our lives usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish some thing difficult and worthwhile.” Most of us have experienced this phenomenon. The intensity of pleasure that we derive from a given activity tends to diminish over time. Much as we fear change, the deepest satisfaction comes from our willingness to expose ourselves to new challenges and engage in novel experiences.
For as long as he could remember, the two experiences that George most associated with food were intense hunger and bloatedness. As he began to eat smaller amounts at regular two- to-three-hour intervals, it dawned on him that for the first time he felt satisfied. Carrying a water bottle wherever he went and sipping at it all day long helped to keep his hunger at bay.
On Churchill sleeping habits: “You must sleep some time between lunch and dinner and no halfway measures. Take off your clothes and get into bed. T h a t ‘s what I always do. Do n ‘t think you will be doing less work because you sleep during the day. Tha t ‘s a foolish not ion held by people who have no imagination. You will accomplish more. You get two days in one—well, at least one and a half, I’m sure. When the war started, I had to sleep d u r i ng the day because that was the only way I could cope with my responsibilities”
Rigorous training improves a person’s ability to perform on the battlefield. .. The concept of stress inoculation is very much like the concept of preventing a particular disease through vaccination. Like immunization, which occurs only when the vaccine is given in the proper dosage, stress inoculation occurs only when the stress intensity is at the optimal level—high enough to activate a person’s psychological and biological systems, but low enough so as not to overwhelm them. If the stress level is not high enough, inoculation will not occur; if the stress level is too high, stress sensitization will occur, and the individual will probably perform less effectively when he is stressed again.
The key supportive muscles t h at fuel optimal mental energy include mental preparation, visualization, positive self-talk, effective time management, and creativity.
The problem is that thinking uses up a great deal of energy. T he brain represents just 2 percent of the body’s weight, but requires almost 25 percent of its oxygen. T he consequences of insufficient mental recovery range from increased mistakes of j u d gme nt and execution to lower creativity a nd a failure to take reasonable account of risks. The key to mental recovery is to give the conscious, thinking mind intermittent rest.
The creative process itself is oscillatory. Beginning with the German physiologist and physicist He rmann Helmholtz in the late ninet e enth century, many thinkers have sought to define the sequential steps of the creative process. Five stages are now widely recognized: first insight, saturation, incubation, illumination a nd verification.
In a similar experiment, a Japanese neuroscientist p ut a g r o up of young people on a jogging program of thi r ty minutes, two to three times a week. When he tested them at the end of twelve weeks on a series of memory skills, their scores significantly increased, a nd so did the speed with which they completed the tests. Of equal note, their gains disappeared a lmost immediately when they s topped jogging. Epidemiologist David Snowden’s n u ns study suggests t h at ongo-
At the practical level, anything that ignites the h u m an spirit serves to drive full engagement and to maximize performance in whatever mission we are on. T he key muscle that fuels spiritual energy is character—the courage and conviction to live by o ur values, even when doing so requires personal sacrifice and hardship. Supportive spiritual muscles include passion, c ommi tme n t, integrity a nd honesty
connecting to deeply held values and a purpose beyond one ‘s self-interest. Purpose creates a destination. It drives full engagement by p r omp t i ng our desire to invest focused energy in a particular activity or goal. We become fully engaged only when we care deeply, when we feel that what we are doing really matters. Purpose is what lights us u p, floats o ur boats, feeds o ur souls
hero’s journey begins when some thing awakens us to the need for change—illumination, discomfort, pain. Campbell described this as the “Call to Adventure.” Once we accept the call, he said, we push forward into the u n k n own. Along the way we face d o u b t, uncertainty, fear a nd hardship. At some point, we realize that we cannot make the journey alone, and we seek help from a “mentor.” A series of tests push us to the brink of giving u p, b ut in the “Supreme Ordeal” we finally slay the dragon—facing down the darkness within ourselves, calling on previously unt apped potentials and creating meaning where it did not previously exist. We celebrate and acknowledge this accomplishment, b ut the process does n ot end there. Living o ut o ur purpose is a lifelong challenge. The journey cont inues and the true he ro is always awaiting the next call to adventure. From the perspective of o ur program, the hero’s journey is grounded in mobilizing, n u r t u r i ng and regularly renewing o ur most precious resource—energy—in the service of what matters most. We are all facing extraordinary d ema n ds in extraordinary times. Few of us are satisfied to be ordinary—in o ur work, o ur marriages, as pa r ent s, as children to aging parents and as cont r ibutors to o ur communi t i e s. Ordinary is n ot enough. We want more from ourselves and others need more from us, whether it is o ur employers, o ur spouses, o ur children, o ur parents or o ur fellow citizens. In each of these s i tua t ions, we want to be the best we can possibly be
The things that keep us from finding meaning are failure to actively engage in life and a certain laziness or lack of caring t h at allows us to let othe rs make o ur decisions a nd tell us what things mean.”
Defining what mattered to him most created a br e akthrough for Andy. He settled on five key values—persistence, integrity, excellence, creativity a nd c ommi tme n t. They became his touchstone—and the source of his motivation for change.
Purpose also becomes a more powerful source of energy when it moves from being externally to internally motivated. Extrinsic motivation reflects the desire to get more of some thing that we d o n ‘t feel we have enough of: money, approval, social s t anding, power or even love. “Intrinsic” motivation grows o ut of the desire to engage in an activity because we value it for the inherent satisfaction it provides. Researchers have long found that intrinsic motivation t ends to prompt more sus t a ining energy
Nowhere are the limits of an external source of purpose so clear as with money. While money serves as a primary source of motivation and an ongoing preoccupation for many of us, researchers have found almost no correlation between income levels a nd happiness. Between 1957 and 1990, per person income in the United States doubled, t aking i n to account inflation. Not only did people’s reported levels of happiness fail to increase at all dur ing the same period, b ut rates of depression grew nearly tenfold. T he incidence of divorce, suicide, alcoholism and drug abuse also rose dramatically
Work makes life better,” writes Joanne Ciulla, a u t h or of The WorkingLife, “if it helps others; alleviates suffering; eliminates difficult or tedious toil; makes someone healthier and happier; or aesthetically or
is no coincidence that every endur ing spiritual t r adi t ion has emphasized practices such as prayer, retreat, cont empl a t ion and meditation—all means by which to quietly connect with and regularly revisit what matters most. You might begin your own inquiry very simply by giving some t h o u g ht to the following question: “Is the life I am living worth what I am giving up to have it?
Sara J. is the forty-nine-year-old president of a small consul t ing company. She began by identifying six core values: integrity, respect for others, excellence, gr a t i tude, self-care and service to others. Next, she got more specific a b o ut what these values meant to her in practical, everyday terms. She defined integrity, for example, as “ma t ching my behaviors to my promises, holding myself accountable and making amends as quickly as possible when I fall short.” She embodied gratitude by ” t aking time o ut each day to appreciate and acknowledge the blessings a nd good fortune in my life a nd focusing on what is best in people and in my everyday experience.” For Sara, living o ut the value of self-care meant “making my own health and happiness a priority by addressing my impor t ant needs and seeking regular renewal in all dimensions of my life.”
vision s t a t ement is a declaration of int ent about how to invest one ‘s energy. Regularly revisited, it serves as a source of sus t a ining direction and a fuel for action. For Vince K., an executive in charge of traders on the New York Stock Exchange, changing his energy management habits both at work and at home proved to be a t u r n i ng p o i nt in his life. “Connecting to my core values was ins t rument al in refocusing my energies,” he explains. “I was pretty s t rung o ut and the whole process of defining my purpose was the catalyst for realizing that I needed to reengage with my family. T h at was my n umb er one value. It’s easy to give lip service to being a good husband and a good parent. Through the self-evaluation process, I realized the importance of really c ommi t t i ng my energy to what I care a b o ut on a day-to-day basis. T h at required giving up dr inking, because it was impossible to truly be with my wife and my kids if I dr ank. It also meant getting back into shape, which was a way to handle the pressures of work better and have more energy when I was at home. Qu i t t i ng dr inking, working o ut regularly and r e commi t t ing to my family changed my whole a t t i t u de about life. It made me a better h u s b a n d, a better father and a better boss.”
Toby had allowed himself to be defeated by the story he told himself rather t h an by the t r u t h. His friend, fortunately, found a more motivating way to look at the same s i tua t ion, which helped transform
Toby’s a t t i t u de and the quality of his energy. As the psychologist Martin Seligman p u ts it: “When o ur explanatory beliefs take the form of personal, permanent and pervasive factors (It’s my f a u l t . .. it’s always going to be like t h i s . . . it’s going to affect everything I do”), we give up and become paralyzed. When o ur explanations take the opposite form, we become energized.” In the absence of confirmation, neither Toby’s nor Gail’s interpretation was necessarily more truthful t h an the other, b ut a more optimistic take was clearly more empowering
To the degree that o ur sense of self-worth is fragile, opening to unpleasant information a b o ut ourselves can feel threatening. We need courage to j u mp i n to the unknown but also compassion for o ur resistance to accepting what we discover. We must keep moving deliberately in the direction of t r u t h, recognizing that the forces of self-protection will slow o ur progress at times. As we clear o ur sight lines, we become more aware of the blocks that stand in o ur way. Facing the most difficult t r u t hs in o ur lives is challenging b ut also liberating. When we have nothing left to hide, we no longer fear exposure. Vast energy is freed up to fully engage in o ur lives
A c ommon form of self-deception is assuming t h at o ur view represents the t r u t h, when it is really just a lens through which we choose to view the world. • Facing the t r u th requires t h at we retain an ongoing openness to the possibility that we may not be seeing ourselves—or others— accurately.
perfectly logical to assume t h at Lendl excelled in pa rt because he had extraordinary will and discipline. T h at probably isn’t so. A growing body of research suggests that as little as 5 percent of o ur behaviors are consciously self-directed. We are creatures of habit and as much as 95 percent of what we do occurs automatically or in reaction to a demand or an anxiety. What Lendl unde r s tood brilliantly and instinctively was the power of positive rituals—precise, consciously acquired behaviors that become automatic in o ur lives, fueled by a deep sense of purpose
Every t ime we participate in a ritual, we are expressing o ur beliefs, either verbally or more implicitly,” wrote Evan Imber-Black a nd Janine Roberts, a u t h o rs of Rituals for Our Times. “Families who sit down to dinner together every night are saying wi t h o ut words that they believe in the need for families to have shared time t o g e t h e r . .. Nightly bedtime rituals offer parents and children an oppor tuni ty to tell each other what they believe a b o ut all kinds of matters. T he sheer act of doing the bedtime ritual expresses a belief in a certain kind of parent-child relationship where wa rmth and affection a nd safety are available
Because Peter told us that he felt freshest early in the morning, we had him begin his workdays at 6:30 A.M. and write for ninety mi n u t es before he did anything else. To minimize distraction, he agreed to t u rn off his p h o ne and n ot to check his email dur ing his writing hour s. At 8:00 A.M., Peter s topped to have breakfast with his wife and three children. We also suggested that he shift from his previous rout ine of eating a bagel or a muffin and a glass of orange juice, to the more sus t a ining energy of a protein drink. Peter returned to work at 8:30 A.M. and wrote wi t h o ut interruption until 10:00. At t h at point, he took a twenty-minute recovery break—ten minut es of training with light weights followed by ten minut es of meditation. He also ate a piece of fruit or a handful of nuts before he ading back to his desk. Peter’s third writing session went from 10:30 until 12:00 NOON, at which point he went jogging and then ate lunch. Du r i ng those 4½ h o u rs of focused morning work, Peter was able to write nearly twice as much as he had sitting at his desk for up to ten h o u rs a day in previous years. In the afternoons, he turned his a t t ent ion to reading and research for the book, and to o t h er business. In the evenings, feeling good about his productivity but also reasonably rested, Peter still had the energy to focus on his family
ur me t h od is to build rituals in increments—focusing on one significant change at a time, and setting reachable goals at each step of the process. If you have been completely sedentary and want to begin exercising, it doe sn’t make sense to s t a rt by trying to j og three miles a day five days a week. Your o d ds of success are far higher if you begin with a
1. Marry someone you love and respect and always make your family your highest priority. Everything else comes and goes, b ut your closest relationships are forever. 2. Work hard, keep your s t anda rds high, and never settle for anything less than you are capable of achieving. 3. Treat other people with respect and kindness
, like many of o ur clients he commi t t ed himself to a routine of p u t t i ng off responding to email and voice mail each morning until he first addressed at least one impor t ant, longer-range challenge
Skeptical and resistant as he was when he first came to see us, Roger was able to identity values a nd to create a vision that proved to be deeply compelling to him. They became b o th a high-octane fuel and a reliable touchs tone when he was faced with difficult choices. His rituals were the means by which he lived o ut his vision, both at work and at home. “What amazes me most,” Roger told us, “is that once my values became clear and I got the h a ng of building rituals, most of the changes I made weren’t t h at hard. My life acquired a certain rhythm. I can feel how much my energy has rubbed off on the people in my life. My challenge now is just to feel the pulse a nd keep the beat
Full engagement requires drawing on four separate but related sources of energy: Physical capacity is reflected in one’s a b i l i ty to expend and recover energy at the physical level. Emotional capacity is reflected in one’s abi l i ty to expend a nd recover energy at the emot ional level. Mental capacity is reflected in one’s ability to expend and recover energy at the mental level. Spiritual capacity is reflected in one’s abi l i ty to expend and recover energy at the spi r i tual level. The most fundamental source of energy is physical. The most significant is spi r i tual
Mo st of us are undertrained physically and spiritually (not enough stress) and overtrained mentally and emotionally (not enough recovery).
Go to bed early a nd wake up early 2. Go to sleep and wake up consistently at the same times 3. Eat five to six small meals dai ly 4. Eat breakfast every day 5. Eat a balanced, healthy diet 6. Minimize simple sugars 7. Drink 48 to 64 ounces of water daily 8. Take breaks every ninety minutes d u r i ng wo rk 9. Get some physical activity dai ly 1 0. Do at least t wo cardiovascular interval wo r k o u ts and t wo strength t r a i n i ng wo r k o u ts a week