Good Health Starts Up Top
Stressed about the state of the world and/or your sanity? We’ve got four simple but essential tools to help you adapt and overcome, this year and beyond
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IF YOU DO ONE THING...
■ Too much time spent browsing other people’s political opinions on Twitter (sorry, X) can fuel nostalgia for the ‘good ol’ days’, back when the world was calm and stable. Except that’s only wishful thinking, says performance coach and author Brad Stulberg in Master Of Change. ‘Things are never as static as we pretend they are,’ he says. ‘We’re always in a cycle of order-disorder-reorder.’ To actually cope with the churn, Stulberg suggests something he calls rugged flexibility. The ruggedness is about holding on to what’s essential to you, knowing what your core values are. And the flexibility comes from letting the rest go. This is an approach, he says, that will help you adapt, evolve and grow, so you’re not constantly feeling unstable. Anon-political example: an injured runner understands that while he can’t run right now, what’s important to him – movement – is still possible. Depending on his injury, he could transition to rowing or lifting.
Use It: Think of change as a constant, Stulberg says. Ask yourself where you want to be rugged and where you can be flexible. ‘This helps you view change and disorder as something you’re in conversation with,’ he says, not as something you need to white-knuckle your way through.
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IF YOU DO TWO THINGS...
The polarisation and digitisation of everything has left us all feeling isolated – so much so that many experts have declared a loneliness epidemic –which is profoundly rubbish for our physical and mental health. And building true connections with others is not only satisfying but also life-saving. For his new book, Supercommunicators, Charles Duhigg analysed people who were naturals at creating deep, meaningful bonds. He found that anyone is able to do this.
Use It: The first rule? Listen and ask a lot of questions – ‘nearly 10 to 20 times as many as the normal person’, he says. The next thing that supercommunicators do is figure out exactly what kind of conversation they’re having. Is it an emotional one? Practical? Social? One helpful way to think about it is to consider what the other person needs from you. Do they want to be helped, hugged or heard? You might even ask them, ‘Do you want me to solve the problem or do you want to vent?’ Cool fact: when you’re both having the same kind
