7 Ways to Build Your Emotional Immunity

If you're like most people, there are probably times when life gets you feeling like this guy:

As you probably know, it's hard to accomplish anything productive in this state - everything can seem dark, negative, unpleasant, and toxic. Feeling this way easily spills over into your attitude about your work, family, friends, and social situations, which can cause some major problems if left unchecked. Hopefully these negative times are infrequent for you - I experience this kind of a dip in my emotions from time to time, and it can definitely hurt my productivity and relationships at home and work.

 The ideal, of course, is to feel like this guy:

In this state, you are more positive, energetic, bright, upbeat, and full of resilient energy. When you are in this state, you feel immune to the negativity in the world and are prepared to deal with the obstacles that you face in life. You are more effective and positive in everything you do. But sometimes these feelings can feel fleeting or random. So, how can you build emotional immunity and maintain your positive energy? 

Building Emotional Immunity

Just like your body's immune system that prevents and fights disease in the body, you can build an emotional immunity to the noxious negativity that is part of life. There are specific things that you can do to build this immunity and increase your personal sense of vitality, energy, and health in life. Certainly, things that happen to you can affect your emotional state, but since you can't really control these things, you might as well focus on the things that you can control.

Below are seven tried and true strategies for building a powerful emotional immunity. These habits are like vitamins that keep your mind, body, and spirit in good health. 

1 Eat Healthy Food.  What you eat has a profound impact on your well-being. Eat the foods that are nutrient-dense and avoid foods that deliver little or no value. Fruits and vegetables are powerful sources of nutrition. I find that I am most energized when I limit dairy, meat, and refined foods and focus on eating whole grains, fruits, legumes, and vegetables.

2 Exercise.  Exercise has a significant impact on your attitude and your ability to succeed at what you are doing. It boosts your energy level and helps you stay clear and focused. When I lift weights, walk, run and stretch, I have a greater sense of health and well-being and feel better about my day.

3 Sleep. Sleep 7 to 9 hours a night for optimal health. I have found that I need about 8 hours to be in a healthy, clear state of mind. When you have been working long hours or need to recuperate, sleep for 10 or more hours and you will find yourself significantly refreshed.

4 Prayer and Meditation. Prayer and meditation allow you to go inside and connect with the source of joy, peace, and life. I have found this to be a profoundly positive way to build my mental and emotional strength and immunity.

5 Inspirational Learning Read and listen to uplifting books and audio programs. These help program your mind with the positive and the pure and help you se the world from a positive lens. Listen to spiritual leaders who can provide you with perspective and messages of peace, hope and joy. I am constantly listening to motivating, inspiring authors and speakers as I commute to and from work.

6 Nurture Relationships. Nurture and enjoy positive relationships your family and friends. Serve and support the people around you. My beautiful wife is my best friend, and she provides me with a great deal of love, kindness and joy. Uninterrupted time with her is a great source of joy and rest for my mind and heart.

7 Hobbies. Be sure to take time to work on personal projects that give you a sense of purpose and enjoyment. I have many projects that I like to work on - blogging, writing, yard work, etc. If I don't work on these hobbies and projects, my sense of well-being decreases.

These are 7 ways to build your emotional immunity. I often use these to infuse my mind, body, and spirit with positive energy, and they bring me a sense of balance, joy, and purpose.

If you feel like you need a boost in your emotional state, try a couple of the strategies above. Give them time - try it out for 30 days, and soon you will find yourself in a healthier, more positive state with greater happiness and success in everything you do. Just like this guy.

How to Have a Happy Boss

Updated May 2, 2016
Your supervisor can make your life great or make it terrible. I have had bosses that have inspired me and bossed that have stamped out my creativity, drive, and happiness. I've realized that I have significant power over how my boss perceives and supports me in my work. In this post, I will share strategies for having a helping your supervisor be a happy boss so that you can move forward in you work and career more effectively.

What to Assume About Your Boss
Before we get into the strategies for helping your manager be a happy boss, you must assume the following: Your boss is likely very busy. Your boss wants you to succeed. Your boss will give you benefits and opportunities if you do excellent work. If you observe that this is not true, then you may be in a toxic situation (see my posts about toxic coworkers and office zombies). If so, and these strategies are not effective, you may need to move on to a healthier work environment and begin applying the strategies below immediately.

Managing Your Boss Through Action
What do you want your boss and coworkers to think about you? Hard working? Team player? Problem solver? Positive? Good communicator? Ultimately, you really need to BE the kind of employee that gets respect, support, and earns rewards and opportunities. To do this, you must be willing to apply the strategies below to your work.

Here are the strategies:

1. Take responsibility for your work! The most fundamental you can do is do a great job at your work. Meet deadlines, work hard, and do everything you can to achieve your boss's expectations and the goals you set for yourself.
2. Build positive relationships! Positive relationships are pleasant and productive. Build these relationships with everyone you work with.  
3. Don't cause unnecessary problems! Avoid creating extra work for your boss. If there is a problem that needs to be brought to your boss's attention, share the problem and offer to solve the problem. This will go a long way to move your relationship forward.
4. Pay attention! What bugs your boss? What does she like? Figure out how to avoid irritating your boss.
5. Make your boss's life easier! Do everything you can to assist them in their work. Remember, your boss is likely overworked, so anything you can do to ease her burden will be welcomed.
6. Succeed! If you succeed, your boss succeeds. Do everything you can to help the organization achieve its goals, and your boss will be happy with you.  
7. Make your boss successful! Do what you can to move your boss and her organization forward. She will appreciate it and will think of you when greater opportunities come along.

If you would like to improve your relationship with your boss, start with number 1 and work down the list. You will be astonished by how things can change over time through consistent, positive effort.

What else would you add to the list? 

Using the Power of Positive Affirmations

Having a positive attitude is absolutely critical to success. A positive attitude gives us the fire and energy necessary to move forward in the face of opposition. However, it seems that we live in a mostly negative world, and we are bombarded with negative, defeating messages. If we are not careful, we may unconsciously accept these messages as truth, thereby decreasing our sense of personal power. It is absolutely critical that we develop habits that help us build positive, empowering beliefs about ourselves and the world we live in.

Use Positive Affirmations
One way to combat negativity and build positive beliefs and energy in your life is through Positive Affirmations. Positive Affirmations are positive, present-tense phrases that affirm strengths and infuse the mind with empowering beliefs. I have worked on developing and using these messages over the years, and over the past several months I have used them almost daily. I have found affirmations can bring an instant sense of empowerment, and if used regularly they can positively influence our overall view of life.

How to Create and Use Affirmations
Based on my experience, the following strategies are helpful in creating and using positive affirmations to improve attitudes and beliefs
When writing affirmations:

• Use the present tense using terms such as "I am" or "I have."
• State the affirmation as if the desired state is already attained. 
• Make the affirmation concise. It should be one sentence long.

When reciting affirmations:

• Recite the affirmation when you wake up in the morning
• Stand or sit in a confident poise
• Smile with sincerity
• Breathe deeply
• State the affirmation with confidence
• Recite affirmations daily

Example Affirmations

I have used the following affirmations in my own life (among others) and have found them to bring me a great deal of positive energy.

• I succeed and excel at everything I apply myself to.
• I always have a positive attitude and bring light and happiness into others' lives each and every day.
• I am a child of God, and as one of His children, I am endowed with the seeds of greatness.
• I am willing to pay the price to receive blessings in my life.

I have found that reciting these and (several other) affirmations regularly has given me immediate positive energy. And over time, it has infused empowering beliefs into my mind, giving me a greater sense of confidence. I highly recommend writing and using affirmations!

The Office Zombie

Updated May 16, 2016

This is serious, reader - Beware of Office Zombies! In every organization across the United States and in some parts of Canada and New Zealand, offices are being infected by a wave of zombies. These are not the actual zombies that stumble and eat human brains - they are devious, sinister office zombies that zap the energy and life out of their coworkers' minds and hearts, causing havoc wherever they go.

Come on, you know who I am talking about. Think of coworkers in your office that make everybody feel depressed, angry, and upset. These toxic coworkers literally steal your capacity to do your work with a positive attitude, infecting you with warped, debilitating negativity. I ought to know - I have been infected from time to time as an office zombie, and I have learned some important methods for healing myself and others of this highly infections state.

A 1950s Office Zombie, courtesy Wikipedia

Actual Zombies
To combat the office zombie, you need to consider what we know about their distant cousins: actual zombies. If you talk to a zombie expert, you will learn very quickly that there are many types of zombies: viral, radioactive, toxic, etc. But regardless of their type, actual zombies always follow a very specific pattern:

1. Actual zombies are undead, and they don't necessarily realize that they are zombies and that they are infected. 
2. They are lifeless and they suck life out of others. 
3. They are infectious - coming in contact with an actual zombie can infect you.
4. They eat brains, immediately stealing the mind of their prey.

The Office Zombie
Office zombies follow a pattern which is very similar to the actual zombie:

1. undead - office zombies often don't realize that they have entered a negative, zombie-like state. This is particularly problematic because they often spew out their toxic, infectious ideas and attitudes to everyone they meet, not realizing that they are infecting others with their disease. 
2. lifeless - office zombies very often go through the motions of their work, not realizing that they are giving little or no energy or life to their work. And in this state, they act as energy black holes, performing their work poorly and sucking life from others.
3. infectious - office zombies often infect the people they interact with through their negative, toxic, viral attitudes.
4. eat brains - office zombies don't eat actual brains, but they certainly poison the minds of the people they infect, rendering them powerless in their work.

Dealing With Office Zombies
So, how can we avoid being infected with the poisonous ways of the office zombie? Here is a set of strategies:

• Avoid Office Zombies! Stay away from them at all costs, and if you must interact with an office zombie, do one of the following.
• Distract the Office Zombie! If you must interact with an office zombie, keep them on the topics that you must discuss and keep them from entering the zombie state of negativity in your presence.
• Heal the Office Zombie! The negative, twisted, self-defeating office zombie can sometimes be healed. However, an office zombie must want to be healed, and some office zombies do not. If your zombie friend cannot be healed, see the strategies above. Otherwise, here are strategies for helping an office zombie, to be used in sequence:
1. Acknowledge - Acknowledge to the zombie that they are infected and that they need to be redirected.
2. Redirect - Help the zombie view what they have been talking about from a more positive perspective. Instead of negative, defeatist thinking, focus on the positive aspects of work. Have the zombie generate their own set of reasons they like their work or situation.
3. Affirm - Help the zombie realize that they are actually a positive human and not a zombie, and that you are confident that they can move forward with positive, healthy attitudes and actions. You may want to note past times that the zombie has acted and communicated as a positive human as evidence that he or she is not stuck as an office zombie and can be healed.

Related Post: The Toxic Coworker

What If You Are An Office Zombie?
It is highly likely that you will be infected as an office zombie sometime in your career. When you are infected, you will likely find yourself spewing toxic negativity to the people around you. This is not a good thing since this negative, warped view can cause infect others and can inhibit your own potential and growth. If you are infected,

• Use the Acknowledge - Redirect - Affirm strategy (described above) on yourself.
• Flood your mind with positive ideas and motivation. This can be done by listening to motivational speakers, talking with positive coworkers, reading inspiring or sacred literature, or engaging in prayer or meditation.
• Take a vacation! Get away from the toxic environment and allow yourself to release the poison that is infecting you.

This is serious, my friends. office zombies are real, and you must be prepared to deal with them in healthy, positive ways.

How do you identify and deal with an office zombie?

Firecrackers and Learning - Creating the Essential Spark

Fireworks
When I was a kid, I always looked forward to the yearly Independence Day celebration because it meant that we would enjoy an outstanding fireworks show. My young friends and I were thrilled by the Sparklers, Snaps, Flowers, Fountains, and Atomic Whammies, as each firework contributed to a diverse, beautiful display.

However, sometimes the fireworks would not perform their functions and would simply lie dormant. My friends and I called these lifeless firecrackers "duds." Although they contained within them the elements that could produce a brilliant flash of light, the flame never reached the necessary fuel source. These duds, therefore, never contributed to the show.

Fireworks and Education
Like the firework duds that never received their spark, I wonder whether our general approach to education is also missing a crucial component. We seem to spend a lot of time giving our students knowledge and skills that they can use professionally. Like the fuel in the fireworks, these abilities are absolutely vital, but too often it seems that we do not provide our students with the spark-like qualities and characteristics like a positive attitude, honesty, and a strong work ethic. Like a firework dud, we sometimes seem to produce citizens who have some skills and knowledge but lack the excitement and work ethic required to contribute to our society in meaningful ways. Just like an overweight nutritionist, many individuals possess useful knowledge and skills but lack the motivation or work capacity to execute use that knowledge.

We Must Empower Our Students
I assert that if our students do not have foundational characteristics and habits such as hard work, honesty, discipline, positive attitudes, and service, then they they will never be able to achieve personal success and contribute to society in meaningful ways. These characteristics are a foundation upon which all the other skills are built. People can have the skills, but if they choose not to use the skills, then our potential lies dormant.


How do we teach someone to obtain these characteristics? How do we train students to do what is difficult? People ultimately have the power choose how they will act, but I believe that parents, teachers, religious leaders and friends must model and teach the characteristics, guiding their students in acquiring and enacting the characteristics. We must show students how to take responsibility for their lives so that they can live meaningful lives as productive, contributing citizens. We can show our students how to light their own fires, provide light and excitement to people around them, and contribute to society in beautiful, meaningful ways.