Inch by inch, it’s a cinch
Negative emotions limit your brain’s perception of possibilities,
while positive emotions open us up to creativity and flexibility.Doc Childre and Deborah Rozman, Transforming Anxiety
When the COVID-19 crisis hit, my publishing consultant, Shel Horowitz, was one of the first people I called. I’d been working for almost five years on my next book, The Productive Perfectionist: A Woman’s Guide to Smashing the Shackles of Perfectionism—which I was close to finishing. In despair, I asked, “Now, what should I do?”
Shel enthusiastically replied, “Now is the time to launch a new eBook—quickly. Write it in 20-30 hours. There is no time to make it perfect!”
As a “recovering perfectionist,” my first reaction was, “Are you kidding me? When or how am I going to get that done?”
After I freaked out, I remembered advice from a writing instructor: aim for 30-minute writing shifts, three days a week.
So, I took a deep breath. I thought, “If I take those sorts of tiny steps, I can calm down. And I can write that eBook.”
“Inch by inch, it’s a cinch” became my new mantra.
First Reactions Quiz
I decided to pilot the concepts from my eBook with a small group of trusted allies. We discussed which reaction is most typical for each of them:
FLIGHT/ESCAPE
FOCUS ON OTHERS
FOCUS ON SELF-CARE AND STAYING CALM
FIGHT/TAKE CONTROL
Think about your own answer.
In the pilot group, the two most common responses were Flight/Escape or Fight/Take Control.
One participant shared that, like me, she makes her bed over and over, until it is perfect, because that was something she could control. Others were bingeing on Netflix or tackling 1,000-plus-page books.
We all wanted to feel calmer and more joyful. How do we get there in a crisis?
Two Key Foundations for Staying Calm During a Crisis
Taking tiny steps is the key to smashing the fight-or-flight reaction and moving toward more mindful responses.
This idea comes from two well-tested practices:
The ancient Japanese technique of Kaizen (continuous improvement in small, incremental steps). Japanese corporations have long used the gentle technique of Kaizen to achieve their business goals and maintain excellence. Your brain is programmed to resist change. By taking small steps, you literally rewire your brain so it bypasses the fight-or-flight response and creates new connections so that you can move rapidly towards your goal.
Example: After the first session of the pilot program, a participant shared her new practice of spending five-minutes every morning writing down what she was grateful for. As a result, she was starting to feel more positive and beginning to look at her challenging work situation through a more optimistic lens. This tiny shift led her to consider new ways of working.
Taking small physical actions. Research demonstrates that taking several slow deep breaths can reduce stress in the body and help to manage your emotions (instead of letting them manage you).11 You build new sensations in the body that are lighter, more expansive, and full of oxygen, which will eventually override the tight, heavy, constrained feelings of perfectionism and negative emotions.
Example: Because of social distancing and working from home, I’m also exercising at home—I hula-hoop three to five minutes several times a day. It makes me feel silly and child-like, which is the perfect antidote to my serious, perfectionist style. I’m always amazed that five minutes of hula hooping can take me from feeling anxious or overwhelmed to light and relaxed—which makes me more productive.
Moving from actions to habits
Actions turn into habits if you repeat them enough. There are many myths about how long it takes to form a new habit. I used to believe it was 21 days, but recent research has found that it takes 66 days—that’s more than two months!
The range was wide: from 18 days—say, to drink a bottle of water with lunch every day—to 254 days to start running 20 minutes a day, 5 days a week.
During a crisis, don’t expect to be at your best. Give yourself permission to make mistakes, to slide back to old ways—to perfect a new habit over time, not all at once.
As a newbie, you might feel like you are “faking it till you make it.” This is normal. Every top achiever started as a clumsy beginner. Superstars in sports, arts, science, business, and every other field had to start at square one.
It takes some discomfort to grow. Remember the first time you rode a bike? You probably wobbled and likely fell.
A core driver of success is to learn how to be kind to yourself, so you can bounce back more quickly. Throughout my brief eBook I offer options for you to experiment by adding tiny, new actions to your repertoire, with the larger goal of making them habits. These new habits may enrich your life for years to come.