Sidelined—When you Need to Focus on Weaknesses
Working on your strengths is important, and in a previous post I talked about the need to spotlight strengths rather than weaknesses and how giving employees the opportunity to do what they are good at can keep them motivated. But there comes a time when a flaw interferes to the point that it can’t be ignored. Whether it’s a physical injury that sidelines an athlete or a mental lapse due to stress, these pain points are valuable signals that it’s time to pay attention and give those areas special focus.
Recently, I’ve had an injury to my shoulder that has kept me from engaging fully in my workouts. It’s frustrating to have to adjust my routine, but it doesn’t mean I have to sit idly by; even when football players aren’t in the game, they are continuing their physical training. They simply modify their workouts to support their injured areas rather than strain them. I’ve done the same in my case, scheduling sessions of physical therapy and forcing myself to be patient.
The same approach can be used for mental and emotional stress. It seems counterintuitive to suggest that focusing on something can help it go away, but there’s a different way of focusing, just as there is a different way of exercising an injured body part. The practice of mindfulness has taught me that giving something my full attention doesn’t mean I’m giving it too much power; in fact, its power often dissipates when I shine a light on it.
According to an article in the Harvard Health Blog, mindfulness can help you retrain your brain, not to forget your worries, but to think about them differently. The article quotes Dr. Elizabeth Hoge, a psychiatrist at the Center for Anxiety and Traumatic Stress Disorders at Massachusetts General Hospital and an assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, as explaining, “Mindfulness teaches you to recognize, ‘Oh, there’s that thought again. I’ve been here before. But it’s just that—a thought, and not a part of my core self.'”
When things have gotten stressful at work or in life, I may have felt sidelined, but I haven’t stopped showing up. I’ve stayed engaged with my company, my community, and my family. But I have made an effort to stop and acknowledge the pain, and then keep it in perspective. Noticing the pain lets me know where to do the work and the healing.
The process can feel like it takes an eternity, and it’s tempting to want to wish it away, insisting things shouldn’t be like this. As difficult as it is to not be fully in the game, it’s important to remember that it’s part of the journey. As top NFL quarterback Drew Brees puts it,“it is funny how you can look at something and say, for example with my shoulder injury, when it first happened I said this is the worst thing that could happen to me. Why me, why now? Now I look back and say it was probably the best thing that happened to me.”
Stopping to focus on weaknesses is sometimes just the thing that will make the healing happen faster.
