Chapter 7: Don t Work Against Yourself


Ironically enough, in the same way that fear brings to pass
what one is afraid of, likewise a forced intention
makes impossible what one forcibly wishes. [ 1]

Have you ever worked so hard at something that the more you tried the harder the task became and the farther away it seemed you got from your goal? In other words, one step forward, two steps backward? I know I ve experienced this kind of situation in my life, including my work life. Let me share a quick example that took place when, as a full-time professor , I was directing a graduate degree program in public administration at a university in the United States.

Among my duties as director of the academic program, I was charged with the challenge of obtaining accreditation from one of the discipline s professional associations. By getting the university on the roster of accredited programs, which was viewed by those in the field as a prestigious distinction and competitive advantage, my program stood to gain through increases in student enrollment, faculty recruitment, research funding, and other embellishments to its resource base.

At the time, I was also a new member of the faculty, so I took on the responsibility of seeking this accreditation milestone as a way of making my mark. I moved full- steam ahead, demonstrating to all that I was totally committed and highly passionate ; I was fully convinced that the objective would be reached in short order. The fact that I had been through this same accreditation process before at other institutions, I felt, was sufficient evidence that I knew what I was doing, and my experience would carry me through to another victory.

Alas, this did not turn out to be the case. I found pockets of resistance everywhere I looked, and the more I looked the more resistance I would find. My expertise in this process, I learned later, proved to be a liability. In this regard, because I knew what to do ”and knew how to do it best ”all of my colleagues were doing it wrong! I became fixated on every detail of the program, and I assured myself that I would be able, single-handedly, to correct any and all imperfections that might jeopardize the objective of gaining full accreditation.

To be sure, I had good intentions, and most of my university colleagues, in hindsight, would probably agree with me. Unfortunately , my fixation on outcome backfired and I was unable to fulfill my ultimate goal; in fact, I never was able to obtain accreditation during my tenure as program head.

Of course, I could easily blame the situation on everyone else or, at least, shift to others the bulk of responsibility for failing to reach my objective. I choose not to do so, however, for I now see how my own actions worked against me. I tried too hard to get everything done my way and, as a result, estranged myself from the very colleagues upon whom I depended for success. My fixation on the right way to do things, I have since learned, also had the effect of marginalizing their contributions to the process and, in some cases, even invited forms of subtle ”if not overt ” sabotage . Paradoxically, I had become my own worst enemy and at the time didn t even know it!

The meaning of life is meaning. The meaning of life at work is meaning. When we look for meaning, there is meaning in the looking. It s right here all around us, within us, and beyond us. But if we try too hard to create meaning, it can often backfire, especially at work. Like our personal lives, our jobs come complete with their own dynamics. But, unlike in our personal relationships, unfortunately we can t always encounter our co-workers with emotional honesty and vulnerability. We think we have to be professional, we have to have professional goals and accountability. We have to perform.

Work usually represents the area in which the individual s uniqueness stands in relation to society and thus acquires meaning and value. This meaning and value, however, is attached to the person s work as a contribution to society, not to the actual occupation as such. [ 2 ]

Sometimes our performance is measurable; what we produce might be immediately tangible ”be it in making sales or products, meeting a certain quota in a month, driving a certain distance in a day, meeting a deadline, baking bread, fixing a car, or serving a customer. Other professional responsibilities are less tangible , involving long- term planning and projects that require creative involvement, teamwork, complex expectations, and more subjective goal-setting . They all require performance and most often evaluation as well. In our jobs, most of us are accountable to others. We want to please , to perform well, and to be effective at what we do. And it s often when we want to impress others the most that we undermine ourselves . Our thoughts go out beyond our situation; they get obsessed with results and we overlook the very success we are searching for.

Our jobs are always more than our jobs. They represent relationships ”to ourselves and to others, to our customers and consumers, to the products we are designing, creating, and selling, to the services we offer, to the environment, and to the way in which what we do has an impact on the world. These relationships weave together through our work, they have meaning individually and collectively. When we focus too intently on outcome, these relationships suffer. The harder we work for success, the more elusive it can become.

The job at which one works is not what counts, but rather the manner in which one does the work. [ 3 ]

Having just graduated from college with a degree in business administration, Angela was especially excited when she was promoted to a supervisory position at the drugstore where she worked. It was her first stab at being a manager and she envisioned this promotion as her initial step up the corporate ladder. Of course, she wanted more than anything to do her very best in her new job and prove to her bosses that they had made the right decision to promote her.

Right away, Angela proclaimed her intentions for building better teamwork, sharing responsibilities, and improving performance with all of the employees on her shift. Her enthusiasm appeared to be contagious and it looked as if she would be able to make some major improvements immediately. Since the drugstore was in my neighborhood and I was a regular customer, I had a chance to learn first-hand about the changes that were happening, directly from Angela.

My co-workers are unbelievably lazy and don t carry their weight around here no matter what I say or do, she openly complained to me one day. I listened and left, assuming that she was just having a bad day. However, this proved not to be the end of the matter. From then on, every time I saw Angela, even if she wasn t complaining directly to me, I would overhear her complain to other customers about her various problems at work. Indeed, she displayed an extremely negative attitude about work and was quick to point out the failings of other employees. In my view, her work situation had become dysfunctional and, from what I could tell, for reasons that were largely her own doing.

You see Angela had been exhibiting two behavioral traits or tendencies ” hyperintention and hyperreflection ”that are central to Viktor Frankl s teachings. Let me explain these concepts by using Angela as a case in point. Unbeknownst to her, Angela had begun to micro-manage her employees, with good intentions, in order to attain her goal of demonstrating that she was a good manager and could achieve her stated performance objectives. Unfortunately, she became so fixated on ”or obsessed with ”accomplishing her mission (i.e., she was hyper intending) that she could only see problems (i.e., she was hyper reflecting), not solutions to her escalating management dilemma. Paradoxically, the more she complained and called for increased team-work, job sharing, and improved performance the less she was witnessing among her co-workers.

Moreover, Angela had become so consumed with her intended outcome, a form of anticipatory anxiety, that she began to observe herself failing to achieve it, which was evident in her negative attitude about work. In effect, she had created, as so many of us unconsciously do, a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy . Sadly, she was unaware at the time that by letting go of her intentions, she probably would have found ways to resolve the situation and fulfill her original work objectives.

Meaning is found in awareness of the moment, and when we get too far from the moment we start to lose our effectiveness. Even when the stakes are high and our success essential, focusing on the results rather than the process can actually get in the way of a successful outcome. We all know how it works: our nervousness and anxiety about getting it right keeps us from getting it right. The higher our expectations about something, the more disconnected we are from the actual accomplishment of it all and the less able we are to participate in its successful unfolding.

Frankl calls this paradoxical intention . Our good intentions actually become the cause of our failure. When a specific success is so fervently sought that we overlook and neglect the relationships that are an integral part of the process, we lay the seeds for something to go wrong. We fly in the face of our own success. We neglect our own meaning, the meaning of others, and the meaning of the process.

My boss is a jerk. My boss hates me. My boss steals all the credit. How many times have you made or heard statements like these? Time out. Think about what you are saying, what it really means, and how it may be affecting you or your co-workers. True enough, bosses have flaws and many of them are significant. On the other hand, most bosses are not the pointy-haired characters portrayed in Dilbert cartoons. More often than not, they have moved up in the company for some good reason. So, if you dismiss your boss because of flaws, you may actually be cheating yourself out of a chance to learn and grow.

Again, think about it: What is your boss good at? What can you learn from him or her? What kind of workers get along best with your boss? Are you doing anything that brings out the worst in your boss? From the perspective of Frankl s paradoxical intention, are you encouraging your boss, no matter how abusive he or she may be, to be a micro-manager by asking questions every few minutes rather than by doing your job well? And then ask yourself, is that what you really want? If it s not, then it sounds like you are working against yourself!

We are all intuitive; we are all affected by the moods of those around us; we all know feelings of trust and mistrust ; we all know when something just doesn t feel right. We all know when we are being treated badly , or superficially, or carelessly, or dishonestly, whether in our personal life or our professional life. It is the measure of these things that create our relationships, our incentives and motivations to do our best and be our best no matter what the circumstance.

At work, we know when we are being used as part of someone else s agenda. We sense when our intrinsic meaning as a human being is being overlooked in the wake of somebody else s ambition . This is true whether we are a top level CEO or the new kid in the corner cubicle . When someone is so desperate to be recognized at work by a promotion or a raise, there is a sense of artificial behavior at-large. It doesn t feel quite real. Something is missing, and it s usually meaning.

Consider the case of Neal, a software engineer at a major high-tech firm. Newly married, Neal had just completed an MBA degree from a prestigious university and was determined to be promoted to a management position as quickly as possible. Indeed, he was so fixated on showing off his newly acquired management knowledge and skills ”primarily as a way to propel himself up the corporate ladder ”that he went out of his way to get noticed by his supervisors. Even if it meant ignoring or irritating his co-workers. Although Neal was recognized for his technical skills as a software engineer, this was not the case for his people skills. In fact, his coworkers did not consider him a team player, let alone a supervisor or leader, and they voiced their disdain for him whenever possible. At team meetings, during performance reviews, and around the water cooler , Neal, the aspiring manager, was targeted for being out of touch with and disliked by the very colleagues that he had hoped to supervise.

Unfortunately, because Neal was so busy looking up at his prospects for promotion, he failed to see that the water was beginning to boil all around him! So, no matter how competent he depicted himself to be as a manager, and no matter how hard he tried to convince his bosses to promote him, he was unable to do so. In fact, he was so fixated on the promotion outcome that the more he tried to get it, the farther out of reach it became! And because Neal was unaware of the meaning moments that seriously begged his attention, he was unable to adjust his course. All things considered , he was working against himself!

Whenever we overlook the opportunity to have respectful and meaningful moments with others at work, we undermine our chances of long-term success. And when we do take the time to nurture our relationships, the definition of success expands exponentially. Our day-to-day, minute-to-minute lives become success in and of themselves ; our specific goal-oriented successes become more accessible.

In this regard, it is important to recognize that business issues and personal issues are frequently tied together. Smart companies know that the individual s ability to create relationships is the engine that drives value. [ 4] Trusting each other s motives is also critically important to success, both in the moment and over the long haul. Indeed, if there isn t trust, you get caught up not only in figuring out how others are trying to undermine you but also in calculating how best to respond to their motivations. As a result, the search for meaning at work suffers and the engine that drives value sputters or stalls.

The tendency to hold others, such your co-workers, as prisoners of your thoughts can also work in paradoxical fashion to your intentions. For example, in their article entitled, The Set-Up-To-Fail Syndrome, Jean Francois Manzoni and Jean-Louis Barsoux describe how bosses often consign weaker performers to an out- group because they assume that these employees are less willing to go the extra mile, are more passive, and less innovative. [ 5] As it turns out, this management approach, and the assumptions upon which it is based, become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Because they have been typecast as weak performers and management has low expectations of them, these employees tend to allow their performance to erode to meet expectations. So, even though the bosses sought to get the best performance possible through the out-group assignment, their personal attitudes and business decisions eventually worked against them.

How many of us have been terrorized by a micro-manager? Someone who doesn t have any trust in our ability to be responsible and productive? It is so disconcerting to be treated with such condescension. Often we lower ourselves to the occasion, fulfilling the negative expectations to the absolute best of our ability. Micro-managers, who think their way is the only way, are on a par with missing managers who stay so out of the picture they have no idea what went on to make anything possible. Or how about those managers who profess to practice Managing By Wandering Around (MBWA) in the following way: Keep up the good work, whatever it is, whoever you are! If the micro-manager, the missing manager, and the pseudo-MBWA manager can just stop long enough to honor the fact that the job means something to us; that we mean something to them and to ourselves; and that we mean well , then progress is possible. If not, we are likely to hover in insecurity and indecision, which doesn t serve us, the manager, or the job.

These three different kinds of managers are seriously intent on success. But they all overlook the human being right in front of them. In doing so, they reduce their effectiveness on the job and ultimately limit, instead of develop, their success.

For the dignity of man forbids his being himself a means, his becoming a mere instrument of the labor process, being degraded to a means of production. The capacity to work is not everything; it is neither a sufficient nor essential basis for a meaningful life. A man can be capable of working and nevertheless not lead a meaningful life; and another can be incapable of working and nevertheless give his life meaning. [ 6 ]

When hyperintentions get in the way of progress, we sidestep meaning. When we sidestep meaning, we undermine relationships. When we undermine relationships, we put respect at risk. When there s not enough respect, there s not enough creativity and productivity. This tendency to set our sights well out beyond our situation, can certainly establish a worthy goal initially. In the process of getting there, however, we have to let meaning lead the way.

And, along the way, we have to trust in our own meaning. Few of us get through our lives unscathed. We get divorced; we lose our jobs, sometimes after many years of dedicated service; our health fails us in some way; our kids fail us; we fail one another. Life can be as full of failures as it is of successes. Yet in our failures we can find tremendous meaning, and only in meaning do our failures have a useful legacy. When our failures become useful we triumph over them. Instead of leading with our disappointment and bitterness over a job loss or a lost relationship, we lead with our ability to have compassion and understanding ”for ourselves and for others. Then, in our search for our next job, our next friend, we project wisdom and experience. Our appeal is heightened and our possibilities increase.

It is interesting to note that the power of failure has received an increasing amount of attention in the world of business, both in the literature [ 7] and among motivational speakers . Management guru Tom Peters, for instance, said recently that Only with failure can you verify wrong ways of doing things and discard those practices that hinder success. [ 8] Tales of failure that offer lessons of recovery and fighting back are being used by a new breed of speakers who are turning to the drama of defeat to inspire .

Paradoxical intention is more than a concept; it is a technique that Frankl developed and incorporated into his system of Logotherapy. In brief, the technique of paradoxical intention was used by Frankl as early as 1939 to help patients deal with a broad range of irrational fears and anxieties, as well as obsessive-compulsive behaviors. For example, by asking a patient who suffered from a phobia to intend , even if only for a moment, precisely that which he or she feared, Frankl observed dramatic results in reducing the phobia or eliminating it all together. In his words, when used effectively this technique takes the wind out of the sails of the anxiety by reversing one s attitude and replacing a fear with a paradoxical wish. [ 9] Indeed, instead of fighting the fear, the person is encouraged to welcome it, even to exaggerate it. In so doing, the person deflates the anxiety associated with the situation by no longer resisting it. Thus, ...while anxiety creates the symptoms over and over, paradoxical intention strangles them, over and over. [ 10]

Let me now describe some situations in which paradoxical intention either was used or may be appropriate. In Frankl s writing, of course, there are many instances in which he used the technique with his patients. Two in particular stand out because they involve a work- related or workplace situation. In one case, the patient was a bookkeeper who was in extreme despair, confessing that he was close to suicide. For some years, he had suffered from writer s cramp, which had become so severe that he was in danger of losing his job. Previous treatments had been of no avail and the patient was now desperate. Frankl recommended to the patient that he do exactly the opposite of what he usually had done; namely, instead of trying to write as neatly and legibly as possible (remember, this is before computers), to write with the worst possible scrawl. He was advised to say to himself, Now I will show people what a good scribbler I am! And at the moment that he tried to scribble, he was unable to do so. Instead, his handwriting was actually legible. Within forty-eight hours he had freed himself from his writer s cramp, was a happy man again, and was fully able to work. [ 11]

Another case involved a young physician who consulted Frankl because of his fear of perspiring. In fact, one day he had met his boss on the street and, as he extended his hand in greeting noticed that he was sweating more than usual. This situation was aggravated as the physician s anticipatory anxiety increased with each new encounter. In order to break this vicious cycle, Frankl advised him, in the event that sweating should recur, to resolve deliberately to show people how much he could sweat. A week later he returned to report that whenever he met anyone who triggered his anxiety, he said to himself, I only sweated out a quart before, but now I m going to pour at least ten quarts! The result was, writes Frankl, that the young physician was able, after a single session, to free himself permanently of the phobia from which he had been suffering for four years. [ 12] And he no longer sweated abnormally when he encountered other people. One could imagine Albert Brooks, in his role as a newscaster in the movie Network News, employing paradoxical intention in the memorable scene where he also is plagued with profuse and embarrassing sweating!

In his autobiography, Frankl recalled once using paradoxical intention to get out of a traffic ticket. He had driven through a yellow light and was pulled over by a police officer. As this officer menacingly approached him, Frankl greeted him with a flood of self-accusations : You re right, officer. How could I do such a thing? I have no excuse . I am sure I will never do it again, and this will be a lesson for me. This is certainly a crime that deserves punishment . As the story goes, the officer did his best to calm Frankl; he reassured him that he need not worry ”that such a thing could happen to anyone, and that he was sure he would never do it again. The technique worked, and Frankl was saved from getting a ticket! [ 13]

So how might you use the technique of paradoxical intention in your own work and life situations? Basically, you first must be able and willing to shift your attitude about your situation (recall the discussion and exercises covered in Chapter 4). This requires that you lighten up (i.e., tap into and rely on your sense of humor) and let go in order to see the situation from a different perspective. In short, you need to be ready and able to plan for the fear or anxiety to happen rather than fight or ignore it. One exercise you can use to help you with this process, called the Trash Can Exercise, is to first write down and then place your worries, fears, obsessive-compulsive, and/or negative thoughts, into a real trash can or box. By doing this simple exercise, you will find that you have not only effectively identified your worst fears but also have decided to hold them consciously at bay by letting go of them. You can also design, as did Dr. Frankl with his patients, a conscious plan that invites ”and exaggerates ” your worst-case scenarios into your personal life or work life, as the case may be. Without necessarily implementing your plan, what does it suggest about your situation? What can you learn from it? What might you do with or about it?

Paradoxical intention is the exact opposite of persuasion, since it is not suggested that the patient simply suppress his fears (by the rational conviction that they are groundless) but, rather, that he overcome them by exaggerating them! [ 14 ]

Meaning rests in appreciation of the moment, in gratitude, in awareness, and in relationship. When our awareness is only focused on the future, we lose all connection to now, where we are, where others are, and where the meaning is. When we don t appreciate the present, we aren t appreciating the process. When we aren t grateful for the meaning in our life, right now, we aren t honoring ourselves or others.

Our lives are inherent with meaning, no matter how we measure our success. And even when we do reach the pinnacle of professional success in some endeavor, the feelings that come with such success are fleeting. The goal is reached, now what? Suddenly there is a sinking feeling, emptiness settles in, and we wonder what it all really means.

Is this all there is? If we have forsaken the means for the end, then the end really is the end!

Anybody who has accomplished a task at great cost to themselves in time, money, or energy will nearly always feel letdown to some degree when it is over. The engagement of our whole being in making something happen gives immediate purpose to our lives, and then it is over. But the more meaning there is in the process, the more deeply satisfied we will feel, no matter what the outcome.

When we treasure the process, the end becomes a new beginning. At work, when we pay attention to those around us, to the integrity of the process, we experience immeasurable success, no matter what the outcome. It is by sustaining the awareness of meaning in our work lives that we sustain the deeper feelings of success. And it is from this relatedness that the other, more specific and intended goal, has the best chance of success.

When we stay true to our personal values in our professional lives, we lay a foundation of meaning. When we work in awareness of the moment, we stay connected to meaning. Our existence, and the existence of all life, is meaning. It is simply waiting to be discovered , whether we work at a construction site, a bakery, a high school, a movie theater, a multinational corporation, a landfill, a restaurant, a home office, or the White House. By not being a prisoner of our thoughts, and by not working against ourselves, we bring meaning to work.

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Meaning Moment

Recall a situation in your work life in which the harder you worked to achieve an outcome the farther away you seemed to be from your goal (this may even be your situation today). You know, the one step forward, two steps back, kind of situation. Perhaps you were seeking a promotion or were trying to get a creative idea or project approved by your boss. Or perhaps you were trying to finish a project that seemed to have no end. How did you first come to recognize that you were not making progress? How did you rationalize or justify your dilemma? To what extent, if any, did you think or feel that you were partly to blame? To what extent, if any, did you think or feel that you were working against yourself? What, if anything, did you actually do about it? As you think about the situation now, what did you learn from it? In hindsight, what would you have done differently in this situation?

Meaning Question: How do you ensure that you don t work against yourself?

For Further Reflection: Think about what it means for you to be aware of the connections that you have with your co-workers, including their feelings, and what it means for them to be aware of their connection to you and your feelings. In what way(s) might you strengthen and show that you treasure these connections?

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[ 1] Viktor E. Frankl, Man s Search for Meaning: An Introduction to Logotherapy (Boston: Beacon Press, 4th Edition, 1992), p. 125.

[ 2 ] Viktor E. Frankl, The Doctor and the Soul: From Psychotherapy to Logotherapy (New York: Random House, 1986), p. 118.

[ 3 ] Frankl, The Doctor and the Soul, p. 118.

[ 4] See: Ronna Lichtenberg, It s Not Business, It s Personal: The 9 Relationship Principles That Power Career (New York: Hyperion, 2002).

[ 5] Jean Francois Manzoni and Jean-Louis Barsoux, The Set-Up-To-Fail Syndrome, Harvard Business Review, March-April 1998, pp. 101 “113.

[ 6 ] Frankl, The Doctor and the Soul, p. 126.

[ 7] See, for example: Charles C. Manz, The Power of Failure (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2002).

[ 8] Robert Johnson, Speakers Use Failure to Succeed, The Globe and Mail, January 30, 2001, p. B16A.

[ 9] Frankl, The Doctor and the Soul, p. 224.

[ 10] Haddon Klingberg, When Life Calls Out to Us: The Love and Lifework of Viktor and Elly Frankl (New York: Doubleday, 2001), p. 67; See also: Frankl, The Doctor and the Soul, p. 232.

[ 11] Frankl, Man s Search for Meaning, p. 128.

[ 12] Frankl, Man s Search for Meaning, p. 127.

[ 13] Frankl, Viktor Frankl Recollections: An Autobiography, pp. 67 “68.

[ 14 ] Frankl, The Doctor and the Soul, p. 224.




Prisoners of Our Thoughts
Prisoners of Our Thoughts: Viktor Frankls Principles for Discovering Meaning in Life and Work
ISBN: 1605095249
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2004
Pages: 35

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