Ep #132: A Different Kind of Action

Hello, Empowered Principals. Welcome to Episode 132.

Welcome to The Empowered Principal Podcast. A not-so-typical educational resource that will teach you how to gain control of your career and get emotionally fit to lead your school and your life with joy by refining your most powerful tool, your mind. Here’s your host, Certified Life Coach, Angela Kelly Robeck.

Well hello, my empowered leaders. Happy July. Happy summer. I hope you are on break and I hope you are relaxing and not thinking about work. For those of you who are new, it can be really challenging to turn your brain off.

I have several brand-new clients who are brand-new to being a school leader, and their brains are not allowing them to enjoy their break, their summer break. So, we have been coaching on how to get that done, how to relax and how to think about work in a way that serves them and is purposeful and useful, versus just creating a lot of anxiety and worry.

And it came to mind that one of the most important skillsets that we can every acquire as a school leader is that of emotional resiliency. I have been thinking so much about our emotional reaction to all of 2020, all of the things going on that is 2020; from coronavirus to first responders, to COVID, to the stats and the number of deaths and the suffering we are seeing, and the grocery stores and the need for all the toilet paper and all of the sanitizer wipes. And then into the economy and the worries about money and businesses and how people are going to pay for their rent or their mortgages, feed their children.

And now, layer upon layer upon layer, we have this grave injustice that’s been happening in our country and it has come to the surface in a way like we have never seen before, and what that has done, this coupling of us being at home with our thoughts and our feelings and the news and watching all of this unfold, we’re left with intense emotions.

And normally, what we do with our emotions is we buffer them. We avoid them. We resist them. We try to rush through them. We try to hide them. We try to pretend or we stuff them down. But we’re left with this slowness that has come into play, where we have slowed down.

We are no longer keeping ourselves busy. We don’t have a space where we can avoid our emotions any longer. So, what’s happening for all of us is that we are literally left with our thoughts and our emotions. And it has been painfully obvious and painful for so many of us to have to acknowledge the thoughts and feelings and belief systems and emotions that are coming up for us during a time when we have lots of time to think and process emotion.

But one thing I will say is that this is a skillset that we have not been taught. It’s not your fault if you’re feeling like you have no idea what to do with yourself or your feelings because you’re used to shoving them down and not feeling them or avoiding them or going and doing something or taking tons of action to make you feel better.

Principals are very action-oriented. That’s why we’re in this. It’s hustle, right, when you get into that job, it’s hustle. And for many of us, we have this urge to always be taking some kind of action. And it feels off. It feels almost wrong not to be in motion all of the time.

It’s very uncomfortable to relax and to allow ourselves to feel. Which is why sometimes summer can feel a little bit irritating or aggravating because we don’t know what to do with ourselves when we’re not so busy being busy. And this particular year, it’s especially challenging because some of us are not sure how to process and allow ourselves to feel badly for long periods of time, to be enraged, to be horrified, to be sickened, to be terribly sad and grieving over the deaths, over the loss, over the suffering, over the pain, over the years and years of oppression, over the stats about how COVID is impacting our nation, our people, our communities, our first responders, all of that. There’s so much emotion.

I was listening to Brené Brown’s podcast and she has an episode on over and under-functioning And I was laughing to myself because I noticed that at least my experience and the principals that I know tend to be over-functioning, over-functioners.

And what that really means is that when a crisis hits, when strong emotion hits, our reaction, our response is to go into overdrive. We want to over-function. We’re like, “Alright, what do we need to do? Here’s the checklist…” and we start delegating or we start doing it ourselves and we just want to be doing and being highly functional and overacting, not overreacting. Not just being a drama person, but really getting into action.

Because our brain is telling us action feels safe. It feels comfortable. It’s what we know. So, when we’re faced with an extreme challenge or an extremely sensitive topic, we want to kick into gear and take the action so that we can feel better because action feels good to us.

So, I was thinking about what it means to have to sit over the summer and not be doing so much, but to be thinking and feeling and processing. And I know for me, it has been extremely difficult. And because I have the tools and understand how my brain works and how my emotions work and how to process and allow myself to feel, in my body, the emotions that I have been avoiding feeling – shame, regret, guilt, disappointment, anger, frustration, disbelief almost. And I have been sitting for the last two weeks in this intense emotion and I’m allowing it.

So, what I want to talk about today in this very short podcast is going to be how to take a different kind of action. As school leaders, you know how to build your schedule, build an agenda, build a checklist, prioritize your checklist, and get to work. You know how to hustle. You know how to take a lot of action to keep you busy and to keep you feeling good. What we don’t understand how to do is how to just be; be present with heavy intense vibration in our body, which is emotion.

So, this list is something that I have been creating over time, over what can I do? I’ve wanted to jump into action and I’ve realized, this time, it’s time to take a different kind of action.

So, let me just share with you my list that I plan to do over the summer, and invite you to consider one or some or all or none of them. It’s up to you. But if you have this urge to take action, consider one of the following.

So, number one, this is the most active thing I’ve been doing is I’ve decided to step back from trying to serve and start doing more learning. I’ve been prioritizing my own education and exposing myself to information that I have not yet been exposed to, to ideas, to concepts, to history, to people’s experiences and opinions and their emotions.

I’ve exposed myself to the pain of other people without wanting to jump in and fix it and try to help them feel better. I’ve let myself feel the pain and burn of their emotional situation; their response to their situation and how awful they must feel, I’ve let myself feel awful about them feeling awful.

And what you’ll find is as you’re reading or as you’re listening to different podcasts or books on tape or documentaries, you’re going to notice that your emotion are triggered because you’re being exposed to new concepts, new ideas, new thoughts, new belief systems. Oftentimes, ones that are in opposition of what you currently think and feel and believe.

And I believe it’s very important for us to do that as school leaders because what it trains us to do is to allow other ideas, opinions, values to be exposed without our need to try and change somebody or defend ourselves or to change their mind, change their values. We just sit in that uncomfortable space.

And if you can practice that over the summer then you can put it into practice when you go back to work next year. Because I promise you this, tough conversations are coming. Opinions that are different than yours will be exposed to you.

So, I invite you to bring it on now, to allow yourself to feel what that feels like inside your body, to educate yourself and prioritize practicing feeling those emotions. And when you do this, you can also practice listening very openly.

So, step number one is just opening yourself up and educating yourself up to consume content versus try to push it out. Instead of being the leader, be the student.

Number two is to really listen openly. So, open up conversations. You can start with safer conversations, people who you know are already likeminded. You can bring those conversations up and then start to maybe push into some more uncomfortable territory. But the key is to really truly listen without trying to fix, change, respond, solve, be defensive.

Let another person speak and just take it in for what it is and see if you can tap into curiosity. Like, why would they be thinking and feeling that way? Why might they be acting that way? What is it about their experience that has them thinking and feeling and acting in this way? And just leaving that be, not trying to change it.

Number three, explore ideas and concepts that you don’t feel you understand. Really go to the place of what if everything that you believe to be true right now were the flip, were the opposite? What would it feel like if the entire world had flipped to the reverse? And explore how you respond in your body, through emotion, what that is like.

Number four, spend more time being introspective and reflective. Looking into your belief systems, your values, your thoughts and really going intro, versus outro. I feel like, as principals, we are always exhibiting and pushing out energy and support to other people. We are the ones running around, “What can I do to help you? How can I put out this fire? How can I solve this problem? How can we make this work?”

Instead, going inward, what do I think and feel? What can I do personally in my internal work, in terms of what I’m thinking and feeling, and what can I do to question myself and challenge myself? Not in the physical sense or in your principalship, but just in your humanity, in who you are as a person. How can you open yourself up more to allowing differences, allowing new opinions and ideas, and just playing around with what that feels like?

Number five, I guess this kind of actually goes – I had a long list of this, but I was reading it, I see that this kind of goes hand in hand. Number two was listen openly. But number five is more, like, discuss. Don’t just listen, but practice being courageous in speaking up.

So, if you’re a person who tends to listen all the time and just consume other people’s opinions but not share your own, be courageous and be open and start discussing how you think and feel. Talk with other people. Share your thoughts. Share your fears. Share your feelings.

And you can start again, doing that in a safe space, but I really encourage you to start speaking up for what you believe in. And I’m not trying to judge whether you speak up or not, but I encourage you as a leader to hone that skillset of being able to speak up on your own behalf. Have your own back. Know what you value. Maybe start there. Know what you value and why you value it and get very grounded in that so you feel less afraid to speak up on that behalf.

And finally, I, more than ever, believe that coaching is the answer. Now, I’m not plugging myself right now. If you feel connected with me and you want me to be your coach for the next school year, and I can certainly help you process emotion. But I’m also highly encouraging you to hire a coach who’s different then you, who is going to challenge your ideas, who is going to see blind spots that somebody who is just like you might not see.

So, a diversity coach, or just a professional coach who’s very different than you, maybe very different – obviously maybe skin tone is different and culture, but more in, like, beliefs and ideas and experiences. You want somebody who has had very different experiences so they can help you see bigger, see better, see bolder and encourage you and push you to be the best version of yourself.

I cannot teach you how to be anti-racist because I’m White. I’m learning how. I will share with you my journey and my process along the way as I go, but I am not in the space of teaching you how to be anti-racist. I’m here to teach you that emotional resiliency is the most empowered thing you can do right now to practice feeling an emotion and, in the next podcast, I’m going to talk about what emotional resiliency is, what it looks like, how to do it, how to make sure that you aren’t, kind of, cheating your feelings.

And I just want you to know that my offer to school leaders is how to be a new leader, how to process when you don’t know what you don’t know, how to feel confident when you’re new at something, and how to process other people’s emotions by allowing them to be present.

So, there are layers here, guys. You have to understand your own thoughts and feelings and emotions, and learn how to hold space for other people’s emotions. And that can be really tough.

So, I encourage you to hire a coach that’s different than you, or at the very least, listen to podcasts, read books, documentaries, all of the things, anything you can do to expand your knowledge, your thoughts, your understanding of the world, your understanding of our humanity and our equity issues.

Because we have inequity issues in education. They will be coming to the surface and I encourage you to be thinking about what your thoughts and feelings are about those right now so that when you are addressed – and you will be addressed with this – that you are prepared, at some level, to handle it.

So, finally, I just want to say that I am going to be offering a series of podcasts through July and into August on this topic of emotional resiliency. I don’t know of a skillset more important and I don’t know of a time that’s more relevant then now to build up your emotional resiliency.

So, we’re going to talk about what it is, what it looks like, and how to process different emotions that tend to be the most difficult for people. This one skill, in my humble opinion, is the missing link in education and in leadership. And actually, now that I think about it, in just about everything.

When you think about your relationship, your relationship with your partner, your relationship with your children and parenting, your relationship with your parents and your family, your siblings, your friends, your colleagues, in politics, all of it. It really comes down to how we are able to handle our emotions and what we do in response to feeling that way.

I know, in an earlier podcast – and I will bring this up again for those of you new to the podcast – about our ability to process emotion and what we tend to do. We either react to it, we stall in inaction, we freeze up, or we slow down, we process that emotion, and we intentionally choose and decide how we’re going to act, no matter how we’re feeling.

So, we will talk more about this in the upcoming podcasts. But I invite you to spend this summer in a different kind of action; an action that will feel much more difficult, a slower more intentional, purpose-filled action. Which is introspection, reflection, learning, and processing the emotions that are coming up for you and for those around you.

Have a very empowered week Happy July. Be safe, be well, and I’ll talk to you next week. Take care, bye-bye.

Hey, principals, listen up. I’ve created a professional learning program for you and your team to build your capacity and lead your staff through the empowerment process. I’ve designed personalized growth experience for you and your school. You’ll learn how to apply the leadership triad to empower your staff and students.

This is the moment where the perfect time and opportunity meet. Education will never be the same and I have the tools to help you navigate the change. To learn more, sign up for a free consultation at angelakellycoaching.com/programs. I’ll see you on the inside.

Thanks for listening to this episode of The Empowered Principal Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode and want to learn more, please visit AngelaKellyCoaching.com where you can sign up for weekly updates and learn more about the tools that will help you become an emotionally fit school leader.