Show Notes:
Ever get frustrated by an unexpected traffic jam or a child’s tantrum, only to snap and later regret your reaction? If you’re a busy parent or professional, the daily grind can leave you feeling overwhelmed and prone to reacting without thinking. This episode is the first in a short series on emotional intelligence, where you’ll discover the crucial first step to stop drifting and start living with intention.
In This Episode, You’ll Learn:
- Reacting vs. Responding: The key difference between an autopilot reaction and an intentional, purposeful response.
- The “Pause Button”: How to use a brief pause between a stressful event and your reaction to regain control and lead with intention.
- Mastering Self-Leadership: Why emotional intelligence is the foundation of self-leadership, as taught by John Maxwell.
- Uncovering Your Triggers: How to become more self-aware by identifying the specific events or situations that cause you to feel overwhelmed or frustrated.
- The Link to Your Values: Discover how your emotional triggers can be directly related to your core values, offering a powerful opportunity for growth.
Resources Mentioned:
- The Intentional Choice Guide: A free guide to help you clarify your values and make a plan to live them out. Get your copy at
nickmaizy.com
Your Next Step
- Pay Attention: For the next 24 hours, simply notice when you feel a quick, negative reaction to something unexpected. Don’t judge it; just become aware of what triggers you.
- Rate & Review: If you found value in this episode, please leave a quick rating and review to help more people discover the podcast.
Episode Transcript
Hello, my friend and welcome. Welcome to episode 52, the claim your Day podcast. Glad you’re here and joining in. Hey, before we dive into this episode, just a quick reminder. You can go to nickmazy.com and get your intentional choice guide. That guide is there to help you really clarify what your top values are for you, your life, your family, what’s most important to you and then make a plan to live them out.
It is too easy to get caught up in the day to day grind of just keeping up with everything. And then when we get into that mode, yes, we’re getting things done, but we’re oftentimes not being very intentional to really live out our lives, how we’re called to live them out. So if anything that sounds like something that might resonate with you, go to nicknazy.com, the link’s up top for the intentional choice guide.
Get it there and start making intentional choices in your life so that you can live out your values and lead your life on to today’s episode. Look, if you’re listening to this and there’s, there’s a high likelihood, you know, that, that you’re, you know, a dedicated parent, a busy professional, that you, that you, you want to be intentional as you want to, to live your life on purpose and not just get caught up in, in everything and get swept away, drifting, trying to keep up with all the demands.
And if that’s you and you’re really working hard toward that, then this episode might be right for you. And when you’re just trying to keep up and you’re in the middle of the daily grind, then you’re just really having to respond to things really quickly because of all the things coming at you. And this might be, have you ever seen it where you’re in the middle of a day and actually things are going well, you know, you’re keeping up, you’re moving pretty quick, and then all of a sudden there’s that email that comes across and it’s really frustrating, or you get hit with some unexpected traffic, or maybe things are going well in the household with the family, and then all of a sudden one of your kids comes out of the blue and is outright defiant, or all of a sudden there’s a temper tantrum.
Basically when things are going well and you get sidelined by something out of the blue and it throws you off and then there’s that spike of stress and you snap just a little bit. Maybe you had a colleague, a family member and you react in that moment, saying something that you wish you wouldn’t have said, acting in a way that was maybe kind of mean and pointing at that person to hit their buttons just to get them back.
Or even in the traffic, you say some words that maybe you shouldn’t say. And after the fact, a little bit later, you wonder, why did I do that? That wasn’t like me. That’s not who I want to be. It’s those quick reactions right in the moment when that, when that stress hits us that we question, where’d that come from? That’s not who I am. That’s not who I want to be.
See, we oftentimes this happens when we’re on autopilot a little bit. You know, especially when you’re. When you’re getting caught up with the daily grind, you’re doing all these things, you’re very busy, you’re trying to be productive even when things are going well. And then when something out of the blue happens and we react in a split second without a second thought, that’s not living intentionally. That is reacting to what’s going on in the moment without any intention, simply reaction.
That’s not going to lead to living the life you want. That’s not going to be living out your values when you’re reacting to the stressors that come your way. Because let’s be honest, no matter how well we plan things out, no matter how much we’re on top of everything, something’s going to happen. Some stressor is going to come our way. An unexpected thing is going to happen. So what can we do?
Well, before we can really make a plan to address that and to improve our responses to those situations, we first have to understand a little bit of what’s going on and what’s causing that. And see, all of this that we’re talking about in this episode and the next two to follow is under the umbrella of emotional intelligence. See, emotional intelligence is basically just the ability to be aware of what’s going on and be aware of our emotions and to manage them to recognize when we have that influence coming in that’s going to impact our emotions.
Oh, we see that stressor coming, it hits us. But we’re able to respond intentionally instead of just reacting. That’s when we have emotional intelligence. See, it’s not about being perfect and it’s not even about being emotionless. It’s simply about gaining a little control over how we respond. It’s about responding intentionally to the things that come our way and not just Reacting. Look, if you’re going to claim your day, if you’re going to live intentionally, if you’re going to truly live out your values and lead your life, well, then it’s how you respond to the things that come your way that’s going to be one of the most important things.
Because we can’t always choose and determine what comes our way, the stressors, the unexpected things, but we can choose how we respond to them. Now here’s a great little tip. We talk about emotional intelligence really, to get it going in the right direction and to make it kind of almost like a super easy win. Instead of making emotional intelligence something really complicated, what if we view emotional intelligence as just a little pause button so that we don’t react?
Instead we respond. So when you start to feel a little bit frustrated when that stressor kicks in, when the kid goes crazy, throws a tip or tantrum, or is outright defiant, instead of reacting immediately, pause just for a second. Just for a brief second. See, in that pause, that’s where your intentional living begins. It’s in that brief pause. Because if you don’t pause long enough to just have a single thought, that reaction, my friend, it’s probably not going to be that good.
Or at least it’s not for me. And you know, and, and I know this happens often when something happens, when we react, when something negative or stressful happens and we react instantly, that reaction is not our best response. Instead, that pause. Pause for a moment and think about how you want to respond. You know, John Maxwell talks a little bit about this and it’s about, he says that the hardest person for him to lead is the person in the mirror.
See, if you want to lead your family, if you want to lead at work, you’ve got to start with that self leadership. See, leadership starts with leading yourself. When you start to lead yourself well. Well, that leadership is going to come through in your actions and it’s going to impact people around you very quickly. Before you know it, you’re going to be a highly skilled leader because you’re leading that most difficult person to lead that person in the mirror.
And I’m not saying that for you, I’m saying that for me, it’s for all of us. So you can’t lead a project well, you can’t lead your family well, and you can’t lead your life well if you’re constantly being led by your emotions and your reactions to the things that come your way. Instead, we’re going to bring intentionality to how we act. How we respond and ultimately how we lead.
See being a little bit self. Aware, what’s going on, how you’re responding to things so that you can be intentional. That’s the foundation of this emotional intelligence. And to be able to plan out our responses, to be able to respond better, it’s good to get an idea of what our individual emotional triggers are. This is how you’re going to become more intentional. This is how you’re going to develop your emotional intelligence by first finding out about yourself, where your triggers are, what makes you feel overwhelmed or frustrated.
You know, what’s that, that almost always gets that negative response from you. What, what are those things? See what for you might be a little bit different than for me, but that awareness around those triggers is really one of the crucial first steps to becoming more intentional, to living that intentional life, to developing that emotional intelligence. It’s what triggers you, what gets that really strong quick reaction from you, little tidbit that also could be related to some of your values.
You know that, that really strong reaction, negative or positive, resonates with something deep in your core and that’s probably related to some of your values. We talked about that in the previous series, all on values, and I definitely talk about that too in that intentional choice guide, helping you to zero in on your values so that you can live them out again. You can go to nickmazy.com
and get that guide. But here, it’s also related to those things that trigger you. That’s what you’re going to have to focus on to be able to choose to respond intentionally and develop that emotional intelligence. And it’s important to figure out where your exact triggers are because that’s what’s going to help you to stop drifting. If you’re not paying attention to your triggers, then you’re just going to be reacting.
But you can make that intentional choice to act differently because you know what is going to trigger you a little bit more. You know where that harsh reaction is going to come from because you’ve taken a little bit of time, become a little bit self aware and you began to become intentional with how you respond to these things that used to, they used to cause that quick reaction.
So this was, this is pretty simple. This first episode in this series, I just wanted to highlight the importance of developing emotional intelligence, or you might hear it just called eq, Developing a little bit of EQ by becoming a little bit self aware to where those quick reactions typically come from for you. What nerve or what cord do they strike when something comes up unexpectedly and you react in a negative way.
Get a little bit self aware of that. You know, figure out what those are for you. Because developing that self awareness is what’s going to help you to ultimately become more intentional with how you respond to situations. That intentionality is what’s going to allow yourself to lead yourself and your life well, to ultimately be able to lead others too. So what I want you to do for this week is pay attention to an emotional trigger.
Pay attention. Now, this is not about judging it, condemning yourself for reacting in a negative way. It’s simply about noticing. Notice that quick reaction, where it comes from, what trigger, what chord was struck, how did that get you? Do this for the next 24 hours. Whenever you’re listening to this episode, just do it for the next 24 hours. Really focus on that. And then over the next week, pay attention, pay attention, but just for a little bit hyper focus on where those reactions come from.
Because that’s going to be, that’s going to be your little trick, finding out where it comes from so then you can address it and respond intentionally the next time. There’s a little bit of a. Just a short glimpse into this emotional awareness that’s going to help you to develop emotional intelligence. It’s going to help you to be more intentional. So within the next episode, we’re going to talk about how you can use this skill of paying attention to your reactions and how you can use that skill that you’re developing and you’re responding intentionally.
And we’re going to explore how that can really transform your day. And those days add up to your weeks and your months and your life. But this is just a little bit of a glimpse of how important it is. So for now, just begin to pay attention to where those responses come from or as reactions come from. And then in the next episode, we’ll dive into actually bringing it from just awareness to action.
Look, my friend, I want you to live your values and lead your life because it’s that intentional life that really can have an impact and make the difference and, and have that significance that I imagine that you want for your life. Thank you for listening to the Claim your day podcast. Take action on these things, my friend. Go ahead. And if you got any value out of this, I appreciate it.
If you just rate and review this podcast, it helps more people to find it. So the message of being intentional and living our lives well, we can share that. I thank you for listening. Take care. I can’t wait to talk to you again in the next episode.