Just ONE Thing
Mastering Emotional Control in Your Auto Repair Shop
Episode 197
with Rick White, 180BIZ
Good morning, good afternoon or good evening. My name is Rick White from 180BIZ, and this is my Just ONE Thing.
So let's get started. What I want to talk about is REACTING. And the word is actually STOP. Why? Because it's an acronym to help you to stop reacting. And it works out really, really, well, I've been using it, so I want to share it with you.
What it means, number one is STOP. Like if you're going into a situation, you can feel yourself getting heated — stop. What that means is, just don't react. Take a minute. Okay?
And then T stands for TAKE A BREATH. Take a step back — whether that's physically or mentally — take a breath. So you want to stop, like ‘be aware.’ Like ‘you want to freeze.’ Like ‘I'm getting upset.’ Freeze, don't react. Take a step back, whether that's physically or mentally. Take a breath. Now, why do you want to take a breath? Because when you start to get upset, you tighten up, and when you tighten up, it's harder for you to breathe. And part of the emotion that you're feeling is actually your body requesting more oxygen. That's why so many times, just taking a couple of breaths make all the difference in the world.
Okay, so you're going to stop, freeze, take a step back, and then you're going to OBSERVE. What do I mean by observe? Notice what's going on, notice what's going on in you, and notice what's going on around you. Super, super important, when you can give yourself the gift of observation, more options become available. Does that make sense? Because when you're really upset, it's linear. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. That's all you got for options. But when you can stop or you freeze, take a step back, either physically or mentally. Now, take a step back doesn't mean one step if you're really upset about a situation. Maybe the kindest thing you can do is just to be quiet and walk — walk away and just like go for a walk around the building or something. Give yourself some mental space, some physical space from the situation, and then observe, man, what's going on inside of me. So when you observe, I want you to step back and ask, What's real like, what am I feeling? What's the story I'm telling myself? What's real? Okay, these are really important. You can't go to what's real first. You've gotta be able to understand what you're feeling right, like name the feeling, and then ask yourself, What's the story I'm telling myself? Like maybe somebody didn't do something you asked them to do. So what you're doing is you're getting really upset, right? And you just want to go in there and just assert yourself, but if you do that, you're going to push them away. Now there are times we need to talk to people, for sure, but it can be done respectfully. It doesn't have to be done with a lot of emotion. I want you to be able to recognize that you can step back and get through the emotion if you give yourself just a little bit of time, because what happens is it only takes about a when you start getting super emotional. It only takes about a quarter of a second for your your neocortex, right the frontal part of your brain. This is the logical part to be able to step back in. So being able to step back, take a breath, go for a walk, if you have to ask yourself:
“What am I feeling?”
“What's the story I'm telling myself”
“What's real?”
So let's get back to this.
“Tech didn't do what I wanted him to do. I'm getting really, really upset. And I go for the walk, and I go, Okay, I want to take a minute I go for the walk, and I start to tell myself, I'm really mad. Why am I mad? Because he's disrespecting me. You know, I worked hard to build this shop up. Why is he not listening to me?”
But then, if I can go into what's real, you know, something, he didn't rotate the tires. That. That's what's real. And then I can step back a little bit and observe. I can start to get curious. Hey, is there something? Is there something going on maybe? Is there something, maybe that going on with the car that I'm not aware of.
So now what it does is it allows me to do the P which is, PROCEED MINDFULLY. I want you to understand that every time you react emotionally, it is going to hurt you. It's going to hurt the relationship, and it's going to hurt your business or your family, depending upon what the situation is.
This skill, this thing I'm talking about, this isn't something you do just at work. This is something you do with your spouse. This is something you do with your kids. This is something you do with your friends. Because it's real. You gotta understand that we tell ourselves stories all the time, and we personalize stuff that's not meant for us to personalize.
So first of all, please share this video. I promise you there is somebody out there that needs to hear this.
Now, where did I get this from? I got this from a therapy model called DBT, or dialectical behavior therapy. It what it means is you're able to see two things at one time, like you can feel what you're feeling, but be able to step back and observe observation, stepping back and giving yourself the gift of observing and then proceeding mindfully. Right? A while back, I talked about we have the logical mind, the emotional mind and the wise mind, right? This is another DBT thought and and it really is true. If you think of it logically, it's great. Think about it emotionally, that's true. But man, bring them together. This is a big deal. We've got to stop doing this emotionally. It doesn't mean don't have emotions, but it means don't live life through your emotions. Your emotions are indicators. Okay? They are not. They're not. I should never let them drive the car. They're a gage on the dash. Right?
Now, I want to just say God bless, Have fun and have a great week. Make some money and remember — stop, take a step back, observe, proceed mindfully. Really does work. It's awesome, guys. I also wanted to say one more thing, remember that this is a process. This is something where you will never master it, but it's something that you can get better and better at.
I'll talk to y'all next week. Take care. Bye, bye, bye.
