It’s not stress, but our reaction to it that kills us. ~ Hans Selye

Yoga, meditation, exercise, mindfulness. All of these are wonderful tools for helping to manage stress. The moment you leave a class and you feel that zen like bliss. Nothing can touch me now. Then you get on the tube or in your car and someone rudely crosses your path. Zen gone. Back to reality.

What we don’t learn is how to get to that place of near like zen in everyday life, without having to leave it. We learn Mathematics, English, Sciences and a number of other wonderful subjects at school, but I certainly didn’t learn how to cope with the stress of everyday life. I didn’t learn how to bring myself back into a place a balance once something happened to throw me off. And yet, there are tools that that we can learn to help us cope with life more effectively and not let it de-rail our day. 

Since we didn’t learn this in school, shouldn’t we as leaders be learning these tools, so we can ensure we are aware of our impact on our teams, as well as be able to support our teams when their day is de-railed.