There’s a great book by Shawn Achor titled The Happiness Advantage. An insight from a Harvard researcher about happiness and how happiness fuels success, not the other way around. There’s a section of the book where he discusses control and how feeling that we are in control, both at home and at work, is one of the strongest drivers of well-being and performance.
The most successful people, in work and life are those people who have what psychologists call an internal locus of control.
They believe their actions have a direct effect on their outcomes.
If you take some time to reflect, you will realise that this is liberating. It means that instead of going through life feeling like things are conspiring against you, that daily events are a result of external forces, you have the power to increase your level of performance, positivity and happiness by shifting your focus from external to internal.
Shifting your locus of control internally can make a world of difference.
I recommend you take some time to see where you are placing your locus of control.
3 questions to ask yourself as you go about this week.
Where am I letting the external world dictate my mood?
How would I feel if I knew that my happiness and performance were within my control?
What areas of my life can I take a proactive approach to change?
2 lessons from history to help you on your way.
Viktor Frankl the Austrian psychologist who wrote “Man’s search for meaning” (about his time in the concentration camps in Nazi Germany) discovered that the people who survived Nazi Germany were often the one’s who were able to respond to their circumstances with hope and still find a sense of meaning in spite of the dire situation they found themselves in. Their “spirit” was driven by internal feeling not external events.
Martin Luther King Jr is perhaps the greatest example of choosing action over helplessness. In a period in history where he and his African American peers were persecuted, he chose to fight for freedom for all. He didn’t let the external world keep him from taking action on what he believed to be right and just.
1 way you can raise your level of performance this week.
Commit to focusing your efforts on small areas where you know you can make a difference.
Thank you for taking the time to read this post. I hope it helped you to stay focused on your purpose, get clear on your priorities and challenge your actions.
Until next time, remember, the best way to predict the future is to create it.
Take care,
David