Do you leave difficult tasks to the last minute, or avoid difficult conversations? You may have an avoider saboteur. Your negative, self-sabotaging inner thoughts, referred to as your inner critic, or your saboteurs, hold you back from greater confidence, success and happiness.
I have a strong avoider saboteur, which focuses on positive tasks in an extreme way – this means I have the tendency to avoid tough conversations, which hurts my relationships.
I’m learning to ignore my avoider and to boldly face difficult conversations head-on by following these helpful steps put forward by Susan Scott in her book, Fierce Conversations:
- Name the Issue – “I want to talk about the effect…”
- Select a specific example that illustrated the behavior or situation you want to change – “For example…”
- Describe your emotions about this issue – “I feel…”
- Clarify what is at stake – “I want to share with you what is at stake…”
- Identify your contribution to the problem – “I recognize that my contribution to this issue is that…”
- Indicate your wish to resolve the issue – “I want to resolve this issue…”
- Invite the other person to respond – “I want to learn your perspective on this…”
Does your avoider saboteur show up in the form of procrastination? Putting off those challenging or unpleasant tasks to the last minute and then feeling super stressed as you scramble to get them done on time? Or doing the easy things first and then having no brain power left for the really important items on your to-do list?
Studies show that we only have a limited amount of optimal cognitive power per day, typically first thing in the morning. I know I have a clearer head and get things done way faster after my strict morning routine of waking up early, working out, meditating and drinking coffee, so I always tackle the hard stuff then. When do you have the most brain power?
One of my clients has taken back the control over her life by weakening her avoider and ditching her procrastination habit. Both at work and in her personal life, she is consistently doing the hard stuff first, which has significantly reduced her stress. She even got a big promotion at work recently as her productivity skyrocketed. She credits her success to my 6-week Positive Intelligence Bootcamp that gave her science-backed tools to motivate her to take bold actions and to leave that pesky avoider in the dust.
Interested in learning how my Positive Intelligence program could help you with procrastination or difficult conversations?
Book your free Confidence Booster session with me at https://calendly.com/annagradiecoaching
Take this free 2-minute assessment to find out if The Avoider is one of your top saboteurs: www.positiveintelligence.com
