GO WITH THE FLOW

Stress levels are at an all-time high. For adults, this shows up in the high rates of burnout. A recent Deloitte study found that 77 percent of people have experienced burnout at their current job, and 91 percent say that unmanageable stress or frustration impacts the quality of their work. For younger people, this high-stress level is demonstrated by the 80 percent of teens who report feeling stressed or overwhelmed daily.

In short, many people live in the psychological Red Zone, which adversely impacts their ability to function optimally.

As I share in my most recent book, Get Out of the Red Zone: Transform Your Stress to Optimize True Success, the psychological Red Zone happens when we experience high levels of distress, which is the negative aspect of stress. If you consider distress (any emotion you don’t want) as existing on a continuum from 0 (“no distress at all”) to 10 (“the most distressed you have ever been”), the Red Zone takes place at a 7/10 or higher. And in the Red Zone, we don’t always think rationally or perform to our highest potential.

This makes sense biologically. At lower levels of stress, what I call the Green Zone, we use more of our frontal lobe, the part of our brain the differentiates us from other animals. The frontal lobe allows for thinking that can see the good and the not-so-good, keeping things in perspective and solving problems effectively. In the Green Zone, our thinking tends to be more positive and helpful. What’s more, in the Green Zone, we can apply the skills we already have. For our children, this translates to being better able to excel, whether in academics or their sport.

Things change, however, as we go up on the stress scale. Our attention tends to narrow with higher levels of distress so that when we get into the Red Zone, we focus almost exclusively on what is wrong, failing to see different perspectives.

Biologically, what is happening (in a very simplified version) is that the limbic system, the part of the brain responsible for fight-or-flight, basically hijacks our minds. Elevated levels of distress and negative thinking abound. And this impacts not only how you think and feel, but also how you act. In the Red Zone, our subconscious essentially feels like it is drowning. This is not the time when we can learn or perform to our best abilities. Even if we know certain facts or have specific skills, we cannot always apply them in the Red Zone.

Let’s look at a specific example of how being in the Red Zone can impede functioning. An athlete makes a mistake. If they are in the Red Zone, they may feel anxious and worried. If you stuck a microphone in their brain to hear their thoughts, we might hear something like “I am a failure. I will never get recruited.” And, this type of negative thinking can then lead to making more mistakes, having trouble executing even the most elementary skills, and focusing on what is wrong instead of what they want to experience.

In contrast, if an athlete is out of the Red Zone after making the same error, they are more likely to move past the transgression and feel empowered to be successful in their next plays. Thinking is focused on the present, as opposed to beating themselves up for the past error. The result will be the ability to perform to their peak potential.

There is another “zone” that people talk about when it comes to sports. Playing “in the zone” refers to what psychologists call being in a state of flow. Here, an athlete is fully present to the game and able to play at their highest athletic abilities.

If an athlete is in the Red Zone, they cannot get into the Flow Zone. In the Red Zone, the skills they have developed from their endless training and practice cannot be optimally implemented. Getting out of the Red Zone is the key to getting into the Flow Zone.

How can your athletes get out of the Red Zone?

At EleVive, we use a process I created called Neuro- Regenerative Training (NRT) to help people leave and even avoid the Red Zone so they can get into the Flow Zone. Clients learn skills to apply in their daily lives to control distress better so they can excel.

Want to learn more? Please visit us at EleVive.com.