What To Do When You’re in a Low State of Spark

One of the people I coach just reached out to me and said “I feel so tired today and like I am not getting anything done.”

I said “would you say your spark number is somewhere between a 3 and a 5?”

She said “yes.”

I asked “do you feel open right now to me offering you directive suggestions?” She said “I’m open.” At the end of our 12 minute call I noted that I had offered 12 very specific steps. I realized that some of what I shared might be quite useful to others, so I am writing them up here, almost in the order you should take the steps!

1. BREATHE

Any time you have the self-awareness to realize that you are in a low spark state the very first thing you should do is take three slow, deep breaths.

2. PAUSE

Shut your mouth and realize that you are at high risk for making things worse by saying the wrong thing to someone else or to yourself. Try to “wait for the eight.”

3. REMEMBER THAT STORY MATERIAL MATTERS

Go back to sparky basics by reminding yourself that by definition – you are experiencing Story Material right now and your job in that regard is to notice details. Instead of trying to push away or “just get through” difficult feelings/experiences, pay enough attention to whatever comes up that you would be able to identify three specific details of the experience at the end of the week. How do you feel? What is distinctive in this moment? Write down three details. This can sometimes help shift your perspective. You might well, however, NOT be able to find your sense of perspective, let alone humor, so don’t get down on yourself.

4. RE-IGNITE YOUR PILOT LIGHT

Nap if you can, drink water, eat a bite of food and look at your own list of “Pilot Lighters” —  the things you recognize you need just to be able to function properly (these are not “high INGs” or sources of GLEE or anything like that). Might you need a few minutes alone? Maybe you have to pee? Can you step outdoors to feel fresh air on your face for a minute?

5. SPARKBOOST

Find your “SparkBoosters” list of activities that, based on past experience, can often lift your spark 1-3 points in under ten minutes. Hopefully, you keep that list at the ready because I always remind you that should not only make such a list but keep it with you or somewhere you can find it immediately when you need it – as soon as you have the awareness that your spark has dropped below a 7! J Read through it and choose the activity that would be most easily available to you and like something you could actually imagine doing given your state of mind and the circumstances of your moment. This may be out of reach for you, but when you feel a momentary opening like you might be able to do it … try to play. If I can reach my buddy Joel and hit a little blue rubber beach tennis ball with him back and forth 33 times or more, I can almost always get my spark to an eight within five minutes. Do you have something like that?

6. REMEMBER “3 GLEE VISION”

Immediately be gentle on yourself by lowering your expectations of yourself and your day and remembering that to make this – or any — particular day be “enough,” you really just have to find/co-create and write down three sparky moments somewhere in the day.

This might involve being intentional about choosing to prioritize an activity somewhere in the day that would likely give you one of your Fuel Sources, even if you perceive that you “don’t have the time.” There are people who can SparkSurf even when they’re at at a 3. I find that works for me about half the time but the rest of the time, I know I don’t even feel up to trying to do that and I try to forgive myself for that and just accept that this is how it is right now.

7. LOOK AND LISTEN FOR PSTs!

Keep your ears and eyes open for Possible Story Titles—the distinctive words or phrases that cross your path like little gifts. This is still within reach for most people, even when they are in a low spark state.

8. GATHER DATA

See if there is anything you can learn from the experience. Any actionable insights here? For example, you are dragging today after having had three glasses of wine last night?

9. SPARKSURF

Check your Good Life Index and re-aim at the prospect of creating GLEE out of whatever comes but realistically this means figuring out if one, two or maybe three of your Fuel Sources on your GLI might be available to you sometime during the course of your day given what you have planned.

10. SPARKSPEAK

Don’t judge yourself, but if you are able to … try to speak to someone else or record a voice memo about the most recent moment of your day that was good, before you complain or speak about COVID or politics.

11. BEST SELF

See if you can get back to a six and THEN at that point, consider if it might be possible for you to conjure  your Best Self

12. SPARK IT FORWARD

If you can bring yourself to do so, remember that “Sparking it forward each day helps keep the blues away.” That is, try to get outside yourself/out of your own head at least once to try to help someone else grow their spark. For some people this can work when you are at a 2 or 3 but I find it very hard to “open the door” until I am at least at a 4. Sometimes I push myself to do it even when at a 3 (I did so this very morning). I have never regretted trying and usually succeed – when I remember to attempt this!

Remember that you get a New Beginning tomorrow. Don’t worry so much!

Spark On!

The Twelve Practices To Thrive In The COVID-19 Moment

Or

THE S.O.S. (Sparking Operating System) Response to the COVID-19 Moment

By Jeff Bercuvitz, CEO The Sparks Center (thesparkscenter.org)

I am sure you have all seen suggestions for self-care that have been circulating. Many of these suggest generic steps that are valuable but absolutely insufficient. For example:

Stay calm and be steady

Wash your hands

Rest and get a good night’s sleep

Eat well

Get exercise and fresh air

Spend quality time with your family

Most of these are inadequate because even if they do say “focus on what you can control,” they don’t give you practices that actually help you do that, don’t do enough to help you effectively manage your energy and mood, and don’t go far enough to help you craft a good life.

I want to share with you an approach you can put into action to not only help you survive or “get through” COVID-19 but use this exceptionally challenging moment to learn how to thrive and move your life to a new level of joy, meaning, connection and impact.

I call this approach the “The S.O.S. – short for The Sparky Operating System. It is the integrated approach I have crafted over 25 years, as I have coached more than 50,000 people around the world to help them manage anxiety, steward and boost their energy, make decisions more effectively, Show Up in their lives more fully and move toward Peak Performance at work.

To make this as simple as possible, I am going to post two versions of this on my blog. The first one is a sort of “cheat sheet for Sparkers.” That is, a step by step guide of the specific practices for those of you who are already familiar with the language and approach of the Sparks Center.

I am also in the process of creating a “translated” version in plain language that could be followed by anyone, even if they are not yet familiar with the S.O.S. method or language. That version involves a bit more explanation and is not quite as snappy but hopefully it will be more broadly accessible.

WHAT TO DO AND NOT DO IN THE COVID-19 MOMENT

The first principle right now is to get clear about what you CAN control and bring yourself back to that again and again as quickly as possible – especially as you may find yourself spinning out to thoughts about the long term future. The latter is not at all helpful right now and can even lead to freak-out. I say more below about being purposeful while staying close to the present and a horizon of the net three months.

The Sparks Center response to the COVID-19 moment begins with doing what works to help you take responsibility for actively managing your own spark – the combination of your energy, happiness and sense of possibility.

The practices for this include the following. I am putting these in the order of what you would consider each day:

“THE TIPS” In the COVID-19 Era – The Twelve Integrated Practices of Sparking in the Dark

1. The “First Thing”

Do a “First Thing” activity each morning before you interact with anyone else, either in person or virtually. The aim here is “8 before 8.” That is, trying to get your Spark Number to an ‘8” before 8 a.m. Ideally, the activity should not just be a “SparkBooster” but something that will also enable you to experience one or more of your GLI Fuel Sources. The First Thing is about taking responsibility for jump starting your own spark. Not n3cessary who generally wake up at an 8 or higher. Remember to arrange a plan for your First Thing the night before. Better still to also have a back-up plan you can do regardless of the weather. You want to make this as close as possible to “automatic pilot” so you will do your First Thing most days, even if you do not feel like it when you get up. NO EMAIL OR TAKING IN OF NEWS IN ANY FORM before your First thing! Got it?

2. SparkSurfing

Remind yourself as early as possible each morning – ideally during or right after your First Thing, what matters most to you — by quickly repeating your Good Life Index Fuel Sources to yourself. Just run through the snappy names once – not a whole long description — while visualizing what you expect might be coming in your day, and then aim at SparkSurfing — creating experiences of one or more of your fuel sources on your Good Life Index out of whatever waves come to you during the course of the day.

3. Sparking It Forward Each Day to Keep The Blues Away

Get outside your own head by doing at least one thing that benefits someone outside your family at least once a day.

4. Stewarding Your Spark Number

Try to stay aware of your Spark Number throughout the day.

Do “Sandwich Scheduling” when you plan your day so you don’t let your spark drop much below a 7 for more than an hour at a time, two hours max.

Leave spaces in between tasks in your planning. I don’t like to hear anyone I coach say “It was a hard day because I just had meetings back-to-back.” Why did you agree to have meetings scheduled back to back all day long? That is not consistent with the S.O.S. Not the Sparky Way.

Whenever you come back to the awareness that your Spark Number has dropped below an 8 (on a 1-10 scale of your own assessment), no matter what you had thought or planned as your next task, you should immediately move to the top of your to do list the most readily available activity that will get your Spark Number back up to at least an 8. First, try to reach for the next highest ING on your to do list. If there is nothing you HAVE to do that is an 8 or higher, turn instead to the most readily available activity from your pre-prepared SparkBooster list.

If you do not have a current SparkBooster list — perhaps you never had one because I stopped coaching you before I started using this frame in 2018—then please start one right now. Then add to it as more ideas come to mind. Sparkboosters are activities that can reliably move you to an 8 in ten or fewer minutes. Some people have offered their examples of “listening to Pearl Jam,” “throwing something to my dog,” “doing yoga,” “listening to Rachmaninoff.” “Taking a shower,” Some people say they just like to drink coffee, use weed or drink alcohol for SparkBoosting. My preference is to be able to do it on my own without having to rely on a substance and to chooses sparkboosters that have the fewest possible and least serious possible side effects.

5. SparkSpeaking

Remember that the antidote to anxiety is gratitude, not courage. Center and calm yourself repeatedly throughout the day by SparkSpeaking to move yourself back into the Gratitude Attitude. This means that when someone asks you an open-ended question like “how are you?” you should try respond by talking about one or more of your most recent moments of GLEE (joy/meaning). Ideally speak about an experience you have not yet told anyone else about it to keep it fresh and real and present. Speak about GLEE before you talk about some bad feeling you have and absolutely speak about GLEE before you mention COVID!

6. Capping Your COVID Info Intake

Limit your intake of COVID news to no more than an hour a day. Take this info in at a time when you know you can lift your spark back up before speaking with anyone else.  As your primary source of COVID information I highly recommend the blog of my old friend Dr. Bill Rodriguez. I trust Bill a great deal on such matters.  https://covid19-insights.squarespace.com/

Do not check news or emails within TWO hours of bedtime. It is VERY important to de-compress two hours before sleep and YES, all the stuff about “getting a good night’s sleep” is extremely important.

7. Feed Your Spark Journal

Record your GLEE at least once a day. I aim at doing so three times a day. Ideally, record this in your Feed Your Spark Journal where you also keep track of your “Story Material” and your Possible Story Titles (PSTs). Tucking your best moments in your “Good Life Experience Envelope (GLEE) in this way has at least eight benefits:

The process of doing so can itself be a SparkBooster

Doing this can help you remember that you are aiming at “3 GLEE Vision” –the awareness that finding and recording three sparks a day and some story material in your Feed Your Spark Journal and doing at least one thing that benefits someone else outside your family is ENOUGH right now to consider a day a “good day.”

It can be a gratitude catalyst and help you re-orient your neural pathways back to gratitude rather than to a narrative of anxiety or insufficiency.

This practice makes it much easier to remember to engage in SparkSpeaking (see #5, above).

Having these moments listed helps you pick yourself up later in the week from inevitable moments of stress, frustration darkness.

Knowing that you are being invited to share some detail about your moments of joy and meaning can help you become more mindful DURING the moment to deepen your presence.

Having these moments written down serves as a “Blur Buster” so at the end of the week you have a sense of what you really experienced this week instead of just feeling that one week blurs into the next (as so many people tell me is true for them). This helps you move away from the sense of your life as a hamster wheel. This is especially important for those who are working right now AND homeschooling your kid(s). We all had the sense even before COVID that there was “not enough time,” now many people report to me that they feel like they are “ZOOMing through their weeks!” J

Of course recording your GLEE throughout the week also makes it much easier  “SOW it up.”

8. SOW It Up (Story Of the Week)

REMEMBER TO CELEBRATE THE BEST EACH WEEK AND MAKE THE MOST OF THE REST.

Craft a Story Of the Week –at least for yourself– to create a sense of coherence in your week. To do this take some notes throughout the week on the events in your own life.  Pay attention to and keep a running list — written down and easily findable — of the peculiar phrases, funny remarks, lyrical bits of language that cross your path during the course of the week.

Do the simple version SOWing by connecting a few of the Significant Developments of your week through a distinctive “Possible Story Title (PST) title that came to you during the course of your week like a whisper or a gift – like a Sign and a Wonder –All this towards the end of trying to REMEMBER TO CELEBRATE THE BEST AND MAKE the most of the rest Keep that in mind all week, if you can be that mindful.

For those of you who are NOT familiar with my SOWing process, you can find instructions and examples of How To SOW it Up elsewhere at feedyourspark.org.

9. Best Self

Note your best self when you do show up close to how you want to be so you can get better and better at bringing your best self into conversation with yourself when you are about to make a decision of consequence. Remember “If I were my Best Self, what would I be saying to myself right now and if I were saying that to myself, what small step would I take?”

10. The Big Give

Follow the Seven Steps Decision-Making Process (see below)

11. Three Year Think BIG Vision of Success and A.C.E. Challenge

As important as it is to keep your perspective close to the present through the practices I have shared so far, it is vital to still “Think Big and Start Small” (as I have coached people since 1986). While staying close to the present through all the above, it is also good to keep track of your “Three Year Think BIG Vision of Success” – at least those things you know you want in your life for sure three years from now.

Of course this needs to inform your A.C.E. Challenge and your other top priorities for the coming quarter. These two time frames still really matter. You can’t know what the world will look like in three years but you can and should get clear now what you hope will be true of your life three years from now because that vision should inform your immediate decisions-at least partially. It is possible and important to find ways to move closer toward what you are aiming at for your life and your work. This means your primary relationship, your family, your business or organizations, your community and our world. I want you to aim at coming out on the “other side” of this moment with even more clarity about your life, with your work in even better shape, and your key relationships stronger than ever.

At least four days a week, try to take at least one step a day toward your Big Picture Vision of Success via you’re A.C.E. Challenge for this quarter.

12. What Is Enough?

    Remember that if you are noting three sparks a day (3-GLEE Vision), tracking Story material, doing at least one useful thing a day for someone outside your family, trying to come back to your best self and taking at least a few steps each week toward your top priority for the quarter, that is enough. Remind yourself of this repeatedly so you don’t get too thrown by all the noise and all the things that do not work out the way you might want.

So much more is possible.

Copyright. The Sparks Center. 2020. All rights reserved.

THE SEVEN STEPS FOR MAKING GOOD DECISIONS

1.What’s Your Sign? Learn your own signs that tell you when you are about to make a decision. This might be as simple as “when someone is standing in front of me asking me a question,” “when I feel my neck tightening,” “when I feel my face getting flushed.” “When I hear myself saying ‘I don’t know what to do!’ or ‘I can’t decide!’” Those are some recent examples people have offered.

Becoming aware that you are about to make a decision before you make it – and this includes the decision to part your lips and allow air to pass through them in the form of speech to another person J  is absolutely foundational to effective decision-making and to thriving. Please note that choosing to talk to yourself harshly is also a decision, even if speech is not involved.

Please fill in the blank “Some of the signs I can watch for this week that I think will help me notice when I am about to make a decision are ____________________ and ______________________________.

2. Any time you become aware that you are being called (externally or internally) to make a decision,PAUSE. That means do not speak if you have the option to say nothing. If someone else is asking you something, say something like “I really appreciate your asking me that; may I get back to you with my thoughts later today?”
3. Check your spark number.
4. If your spark number is below an 8, reach for the most readily available SparkBooster.
5. When your spark number is back up to an 8 or higher — hopefully within one hour as you practice the S.O.S. (Sparky Operating System) — assess if the decision at hand might well be a “Decision Of Consequence.” That is, if it might well have consequence for your life for more than a week. If you conclude that it is NOT a decision of consequence, just make the decision quickly in any way you want; do not squander energy agonizing over it.

If you think that the decision at hand even might be a “Decision Of Consequence” and you are at an eight or higher, the key step at that point is to “Clarify The Question.” Ask yourself “If I want to make this decision, is there actually another (smaller) decision I might want or even have to make first? Do that as many times as necessary until you are clear you have identified THE question that you need to attend to next.

6. When you are clear about what question you need to attend to next and your spark number is still (or again back) at an eight or higher, you are NOW ready for “The Big Give”to yourself by running your Four Frames decision-making process. The “Big Give” is the mnemonic B-G-I-V for Best Self, Good Life Index, INGs and Vision of Success.

When you have clarified the question (and are still at an 8 or higher) ask yourself: “If I were already my Best Self of ____ (Confident, mindful, free, supportive, unlocked etc.) what would I be SAYING to myself about this situation? If I were saying that to myself, what SMALL step would I take?

This might give you clarity on the decision at hand right away. If so, great. If not, you then ask, “what decision could I make regarding the clarified question in front of me that would make it MOST LIKELY for me to experience 9 out of 10 or 10 out of 10 of the Fuel Sources on my Good Life Index as many times as I have decided I need to in order to feel like it a month is “enough” and I am on track – each of the next three months?”

If that still does not give you clarity, then you ask yourself “what decision could I make regarding the clarified question in front of me that would make it MOST LIKELY for me to get to the level of spending 50% or more of my working hours on INGs that are 8’s, 9’s or 10’s within six months?

You should also consider: “If I say ‘yes’ to the decision in front of me, will I be more likely or less likely to achieve my A.C.E. Challenge, my top juicy priority for the coming quarter that I have decided is the most important part of my “work in the world” to advance this quarter in order to realize my three-year BIG picture vision of success?”

Copyright. The Sparks Center. 2018-2020. All rights reserved.

Photo credit: Astrid Jirka

NINETY DAYS TO SPARK IN THE DARK

My doctor thinks I have COVID-19.  I have not been tested and I don’t think I have it. I’m social distancing just in case, and I will share a few details on my symptoms below, since I know some of you will likely be concerned, but the consideration of having Covid-19 has reminded me, what it means to really live, and has given me a new incentive to share the Sparky Operating System with a broader audience.

If you are in my Inner Sparks Circle, the odds are good that you’ve heard me say “You can’t really “live each day as if it might be your last” or you would spend all your time having sex and weeping, but you can and – as much as I don’t like the word — SHOULD live at least half of each day as if it might well be one of your last ninety.”

If you think about what would be really important to you during your last ninety days, it is not about a bucket list. By the time you are in your final ninety days it makes no sense to try to go climb Mount Everest!  What is required is becoming really clear about what matters most to you, or as I say “what is truly important and what is enough?”

About 20 years ago someone asked me for a magazine article to “say something about the ‘Art of Living.” I said “I would not be so presumptuous as to claim some expertise in the Art Of Living but I can tell you one thing that comes to mind: “at least one part of the Art Of Living is knowing how to courageously and gracefully negotiate the paradox that at once life is short and life is long. Sometimes you need to remember that life is long and you do not have to fix everything right now. At other times, it is important to remember that life is short, and you need to stop messing around, acting as if you were going to live forever.

I really am planning to live the next ninety days – about the amount of time most of us will likely be in lockdown—as if they are going to be my last. If they turn out to be my last, I will know I did everything within my control to live my life fully. If they turn out NOT to be my last ninety, I expect that by living my S.O.S. (Sparky Operating System) I will be on my way to crafting a life with as much joy, meaning, connection, impact, gratitude, mindfulness and lyricism as possible. Along the way, I suspect that I will also be able to make my marriage even stronger, my relationship with my daughter better, have a bunch of fun, and have a little bit of positive impact. That would not be a bad legacy to come out of the COVID-19 moment, eh?

Over the course of the past 25 years I have had the incredible honor of being able to serve as a life coach, leadership coach and executive coach to more than 50,000 people around the globe. This has meant that I was also able to share my approach with a lot of people and I kept the parts that worked for almost everyone and got rid of the rest.

I teach people about what I call “getting it together.” How you can integrate self-care with social impact. How you can feed your spark in order to make more possible with and for others. What I have to share is how to “Spark in The Dark.” How to move through anxiety and various kinds of darkness to craft a life of joy, meaning, connection and impact.

Through the COVID-19 crisis over the past month and a half, I have been helping a lot of people understand that now more than ever, it is clear that each of us can choose – in a series of moments – how we want to Show Up in the world and – if we are part of an organization – how we want our organization to Show Up in this moment. I have been inviting all the people I coach to move (way) beyond aiming at “figuring out how to get through this” or even, “looking for the silver linings.” I have been saying: “move from survive, to thrive, to fully alive!”

You may find yourself working from home. Perhaps you had to cancel plans that you were really looking forward to. Maybe – like half the people I am coaching right now and like myself– you are working longer hours than ever, while also home schooling your kid(s).

While everyone and their mother likes to talk about gratitude, “sparking joy,” and the power of narrative, I can lay out for you a specific step-by-step method, in bite-sized morsels to help you actually DO this. Starting today. The whole practice takes five minutes a day – 15 minutes on Friday afternoons. J

My aim is to share a series of short, digestible, actionable, soothing, inspiring posts to help you

make choices over the next 90 days, so that by the time you begin your next chapter your life will have much more joy, meaning, connection and impact than it does today.

What are you going to do to make the most of the next 90 days? Want to join me in my experiment?

Spark On!

* Notwithstanding the tickle I am experiencing at the bottom of my throat, that maybe results in a dry cough a few times a day. Yes, I feel fatigued, but with the combination of homeschooling Tsdia three hours a day, coaching more people around the world than I have ever tried to coach at one time, I think I’m just fighting a normal virus and it’s unfortunate timing that I’ve caught something innocuous in the midst of a pandemic.  But it just means I need to practice the same self-care that I teach.

In the coming days I am going to share with you:

My Good Life Index tool, and learning how to “SparkSurf” daily.

Articulating your own “These Are a Few of My Favorite INGs” collection of the activities that energize you the most, and then spending at least two hours every day engaged in one of your “Top 40.”

Trying out my Story Of the Week practice, which one of my coachees described as “meaning-gratitude-mindfulness-boosting practice meets party game.”

Finding and acting from your own “Sweet Spot For Sparking Change”

The S.O.S. Quiz

Three-GLEE Vision

This is as good a time as any for me to come out of the closet as a person who lives with a lot of darkness. Whether I was born this way or became this way in my childhood I don’t know. I have had to do a lot of exploring as an adult to try to figure out the most efficient way to create a life full of joy and meaning, even though the Black Cloud comes to visit me pretty regularly. Sometimes I feel ashamed about this. A part of me believes that by this point – having been thinking about these matters for something between thirty-five and forty years and coaching others towards peak performance for more than 25 years — I should be able to EASILY be Sparky all the time! That is not my experience, however. If the approach I harangue you all about regularly 🙂 is anything, it is my own practice to worry less about the fact that I am not “Living on the Nine Line” all the time (thanks to Elly Wood and Sebastian Gaertner for that wonderful phrase), and focus more on how best to move relatively QUICKLY from anxiety/fear and other forms of low sparkedness, towards something better. In terms of my “Spark Number” – my sense of happiness, energy and possibility — I do still see “2” and “3” multiple times a week. It is unusual, however, for me to go much more than an hour without being able to get back to an “8.” I will note that I am writing these words informed by seven consecutive weeks that have been among the most challenging I can remember. To be honest, I don’t really “Wait for the Eight.” I AIM at the eight. And I do it very intentionally, step by step. I am going to start sharing my own thoughts about “Sparking By Number” here this weekend. If you would like to know precisely what steps I suggest for different spark numbers, feel free to write me here with questions or at jeff@thesparkscenter.org.

Spark On!