High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 319: 3 Tips to Reduce Fear

Episode Date: March 17, 2020

We are living in unprecedented times and given all the uncertainty in our world, it is essential we manage our fear. The best don’t let fear get the best of them. They train their mind in times of stress. They notice the fear, getting their mind back into the present. This is a great time to use a GRIT Priming Exercise in the morning, take several deep breathes, engage in meditation, spend time with family, or focus on a new project. To download the Grit Priming Exercise go to: beyondgrit.com/morning. Today’s Power Phrase:  “I calm my anxiety and fear. I get my mind back to the present, choosing faith over fear.”

Hi friends, my name is Dr. Sindhra Kampoff, a national leader in the field of sport and performance psychology. Every week I'm on the local radio sharing my top tips on exactly how to develop the mindset of the world's best, so you can accomplish all your dreams. Get ready for a jammed, packed episode focused on practical tips to help you get after your goals and step out of your comfort zone. Let's go. Time for Talk of the Town. And I think this is probably the perfect guest to have on the air

with us. Dr. Cinder Kampoff. How are you doing? How are you doing? I didn't mean to hit you with that kind of news right away. Here we are. Yeah, we're going to be talking a little bit about, well, now, I suppose, some real fear that people might be having in our listening area. As we are all experiencing this together, I literally found that news out probably 30 seconds before I went on the air. The beauty of having the live and local radio station here to give you that kind of news, and then to have somebody like you who deals a lot with our mindset and a lot with how we should be handling information as this comes in. Things are changing on a minute-by-minute basis, Cendra, and we've got some tips not to let the fear overtake us as we head through our day. Yes, and you know, I think,

first of all, I will just be vulnerable for a minute and also let people know that I've had a hard time sleeping. I've had to really manage my energy and focus during this time. And I think, particularly with everything that's going on in the world right now, it's even more important to manage our mindset. We need to get the facts of the virus. But I think the key is to not let fear overtake your mind and live in a constant state of it. I know for me, I've had to really pay attention to that. And because I know it's not healthy to live in fear from a mental or physical perspective. How do you approach somebody that actually has anxiety and has some disability with that when you tell them, hey, don't be afraid? I think the first thing to know, and I talk a little bit about this in my book, Beyond

Grit, but it's really helpful to know that fear lives in the future. And it's really easy to live in fear right now. But I think the key is, is to pay attention to how you're feeling. It's normal to feel how you're feeling right now. And we need some strategies to be able to manage that fear. I think what I would tell people to do and what I've been using myself is some breathing, maybe some counting with my breathing. I've been doing meditation. I've been listening to music. I've been doing something fun with my family. I've started a new project. I was writing a book in January and I'm like, well, I'm back at it now. So I think the key is,

is like, what is your plan when you're feeling overwhelmed is really important. I think feeling overwhelmed is what a lot of people with the news that just came in might be feeling. And I think it's really important that what you said, fear lives in the future. We are fearing things we don't know yet. Right. And so to cope with that, the best thing to do is take your attention back to the present. That's why the breathing or meditation or distracting yourself with something you can do in your home is helpful to not live so much in the future. And it's really easy to do that right now with

all the news coming in and, you know, the news on TV is constant about the virus. And so as we watch that, we should probably monitor how much of that we're ingesting, correct? Because we want to know what's going on. I think it's important to be aware of what's going on, but to not let that just overtake. And I mean, I think you start just going in a circle, you know, you can start thinking and thinking and thinking. And is the first step to not doing that just the awareness that you're doing that? I think we must stay informed. But I noticed myself in the days that I've been consumed by the media, I felt the most anxious and unfocused. And so pay attention to that. We want to stay informed, but I think we also want to choose faith over fear. And what I mean by that is we can get so

consumed with this fear in the future. I read this awesome study, Lisa, over the weekend, and this is great for leaders who are listening, leaders of their home or leaders of a business. And it was a study by Todd Herman, where last week he interviewed 92 or 29 CEOs about their psychology. And he found that there were three groups, one that was really fear-focused. They were five times more likely to consume media, and they spent a lot of their time blaming, like, whose fault is this, right? There's been a lot of that. Yeah, I've seen that on social media where people are blaming, you know, the people in charge. They're blaming people for going out in public or people for staying home're blaming definitely the media. I feel that because we are members of the media and we're trying to do the best to get you the information that we're given.

Absolutely. I think it's really important to know that there's so many things outside of our control. So I've used that in my own mindset in just realizing, wow, this is a great lesson of controlling what you can control. I can control my decisions and my choices and the meaning I'm providing to the situation and the words I'm using, but that's really what I can control. I can't control anyone else. So this fear-focused group, five times more likely to consume more media and spend time blaming,

what was one of the other groups that you were talking about? One of the other groups was an unfocused group, and they used words that were pretty extreme, like hysteria. So we also kind of have to watch the words we use to explain what's going on. And then the last group was a strategy-focused group, and they were way more likely to lean on, like, healthy networks. They were overall more positive, and the Calm and Cool Collected CEOs actually did daily meditation. So it also gives you kind of more evidence why do some breathing, do some meditation. There's some amazing apps you can find.

One of my favorite is Stop, Breathe, Think. You could go to YouTube and you could find just meditation recordings that you could listen to at this time. I think that people, when you hear the word meditation, people either think, okay, that's something I can try or, oh, that's a bunch of, like, that's a bunch of hooey. There's a group out there that just doesn't believe in that. And what do you say to people like that? You have to decide what you're most comfortable doing. But I think the key is using strategies that you have within your body, you know, meaning a deep breath or watching what you're thinking about, watching your focus, watching your meaning and distracting yourself. You know, this is a great time to spend time with the people that you love.

Spend some time connecting with others. Maybe via phone or FaceTime. Maybe start a new project. Lisa, I was reading about how Isaac Newton actually discovered calculus in quarantine. And Shakespeare wrote like King Lear. So, you know. While in quarantine? While in quarantine. So, you know, while in quarantine, while in quarantine, so good things

can happen. Good things can happen. And why not look around your home and, and see what maybe you like to start, maybe pick up a new, a new hobby. I was thinking about this as I have a boy that's a senior, and I've seen this meme circulating around on the Internet that talks about how the kids that are seniors this year, they were born into 9-11 and they're graduating from high school with this pandemic. Right. that those kids are resilient. And I mean, this is something that I asked my son yesterday, who's getting ready to graduate. He's had things cancel on him. His, you know, world robotics competition was canceled. Now they're, you know, who knows? We don't want to speculate about how long this will last, but they're thinking about things like graduations and their future. And how do you talk to kids about that? He doesn't seem to be very concerned for himself. He's like, you know, you do what you do, which I think is a beautiful way to look at it. But how do we talk to those

kids that maybe don't, you know, they might have some anxiety or some, you know, like they're missing out on a portion of what the rest of us went through. Listen, I think that's the most important thing is that, you know, we can kind of brush these feelings away. But what's most important is to talk to a friend about it or, you know, talk to a family member. Like it's normal to feel anxious or angry or frustrated at this time because I think about for me, there's some really amazing things I was looking

forward to this month. And, you know, I'm not able to do any of those, but we have to really stay focused on what we can control. Lisa, I have this great morning routine that would be an ideal time for people to start using. Can I tell you a little bit about it? You can. And I've heard morning routines are phenomenal because you get up and you start your day. It just primes you to go through your day in the most positive way. So I think if we can, at this point in time, try to adopt any morning routine to keep us healthy and happy, it's a good idea. So what is it that you do? So I call it the grit priming exercise. And priming is a great way to intentionally choose your thoughts and focus to really help you choose this mindset so you can thrive.

And there's four parts, G-R-I-T. And G stands for gratitude. And that means for a minute, just think of all the things you're grateful for, big things, small things, maybe even the difficult things. And that's going to give you, you know, really, really some positive emotions. R means remember your why or your purpose. And what that means is like, think about why you do what you do and what good comes from you being here and the work even that you do and consider the ripples that you create in this world and to keep you excited and motivated. And I stands for intention.

And just think about, you know, at least three things of how you want to show up today. Who do you want to be? Maybe even what you want to do to help you kind of plan out your day. And then T stands for talk to yourself. And Lisa, this is anywhere between 10 and 30 statements that really are going to help you think more powerfully about how you can use this time or powerfully about yourself. And these statements are things like I am or every day in every way I am. And it's great to be able to change your focus, prime your mind with some gratitude and positivity to be able to handle the changing circumstances. Dr. Cinder Kampoff on the line with us today to try to help us be a little bit more positive in kind of an uncertain world that we're in right now.

You talked earlier about the Todd Herman study and the strategy-focused group that was more likely to lean on their networks and positivity and calm. It sounds like they might be employing something like a good morning strategy. Yes. And actually, all of them, the really calm ones did this morning meditation. And so you might not want to do meditation, but why not just spend four or five minutes getting your mind right at the beginning of your day. Maybe refocus it if you're feeling a lot of anxiety and fear. Get back to having some gratitude, thinking about your why, setting some intentions, and then thinking really powerfully about yourself. And if people are at the computer and want to download instructions on how to do this, they can go to beyondgrit.com slash morning.

So that's beyondgrit.com slash morning. So can we talk for a minute about what you did this morning? Like, what are you grateful for this morning? When Cinder Kampoff woke up, what is she grateful for? I'm grateful for my boys and that I have a safe home. And I'm grateful for this opportunity to work on my next book. I'm grateful for the university for making a great decision to put our classes online. I'm grateful for our governor for keeping our kids safe. Those are some things I'm grateful for. And you can even hear my voice change, right? Right. Yeah, absolutely. And so much of what you just said, why you're grateful for, I'm grateful for the same reasons. I'm grateful to have my kids at home because I know that there's going to be such a short time with all of them at home,

especially with one getting ready to go off to college in the future. Right. They're all together right now. And it's a great time to play some games. Right. Or interact as a family that maybe you wouldn't because you're busy going to sporting events or, you know, robotics or things like that, that, you know, this gives us also time to slow down and to connect with people that we love. It's been a really busy few years in my family. So, yeah, this is a good time for us to just kind of reconnect. How about your why? Why do you do what

you do? I do what I do to really provide tangible strategies for other people so they can live their best life and manage this anxiety and fear that we can have in our mindset. I do what I do to make a positive impact in the world and be able to live kind of what I've been learning and sharing with other people. I think my why is doing exactly what I'm doing right now, being able to get information to the masses that might need it and might make their lives better in some way, whether it's a laugh or some just some good solid information like we're getting from Dr. Sundekamp off today, setting your daily intentions. We didn't plan on having you on KT or we when we woke up. This is kind of a surprise, but it's a nice surprise. Yeah, absolutely. I agree. So my

intentions this morning were I will write like three hours today. So I'm going to dive in and I will spend time with my boys today and I will manage this mindset that I have in terms of thinking really about the facts and we're going to take the emotion out of it so I can be a good leader with my family. And then, of course, talking to yourself powerfully and with positivity. We've talked about these automatic negative thoughts that a lot of us have where we just go to the pessimistic kind of thing right away. But really, if we change the way we talk to ourselves, we will listen. We will listen. And that's really the powerful thing is you're going to have a lot of automatic negative thoughts right now. But let's work to change them, particularly if you're feeling a

lot of overwhelm. And so some of mine every single morning are I'm courageous. I learn like I change a million people's lives. I provide value in the world. So those are a few of mine. Every day in every way, I'm getting more courageous to post on social media. That's what I want to do. So, you know, those are small things, but really talking to yourself powerfully. Maybe it's like I'm calm. I am in control.

I will be present right now. I think that all of this is a good thing to remember as we go through the day, especially with some of the news that might tend to scare us. We don't know what's going to be happening, but we will do the best we can here at KTOE to keep everybody up to date. Cindra, when you work with your high performers, how do you kind of summarize this whole topic with people that have a good positive outlook? I'd say they don't let fear get in their way and get the best of them, really. They train their mind to, especially in times of stress, to notice the fear. Work to get back in the present more often, and you can do this in a lot of different ways.

We talked about this morning routine, grit. We talked about taking some deep breaths or focusing on a project, or we said, you know, spending more time with your family, watching how much media you're consuming. But the key is to really fuel that mind with more positive energy than fear or anxiety. Choose this idea of faith over fear. And you usually, if people follow you on Twitter, you have a power phrase that you put out there. Do you have a power phrase for the day? I do. I call my anxiety and fear. I get my mind back to the present, choosing faith over fear.

I like it. Cinder Kampoff, thank you so much for your time today. Thank you, Lisa. Yeah, I appreciate all of the wisdom that we get from you. And it's a great asset to have right here in our community. Even if it's by the phone, we get some good info. Absolutely. That was fun today, Cinder. Thank you so much. Thank you, Lisa. We'll check in with you later. Sindra, once again, how do people get in contact with you if they need you? You can head over to Dr. Sindra, so D-R-C-I-N-D-R-A dot com. And today that morning routine was at beyondgrit.com slash morning. Go check it out over there. It's Sindra Kampoff, Ph.D PhD on Talk of the Town on KTOE.

Way to go for finishing another episode of the High Performance Mindset. I'm giving you a virtual fist pump. Holy cow, did that go by way too fast for anyone else? If you want more, remember to subscribe and you can head over to Dr. Cinder for show notes and to join my exclusive community for high performers where you get access to videos about mindset each week. So again, you can head over to Dr. Sindhra. That's D-R-I-C-I-N-D-R-A.com. See you next week.