Reappraisal

One of the most powerful techniques helping you to stay ‘on track’ is what psychologist call reappraisal.

For most of us it happens fairly often that something happens and we tend to feel attacked, unfairly treated or we just don’t like a particular new experience. These dislikes can contribute, that our mind narrows down, does see only one, often unfavourable, option. Emotions take over. The result could be anger, sulking, fight or flight mood, unhappiness.

Well, very often our brain takes a short cut when making decisions and our initial judgment maybe wrong. Therefore, it is always a good exercise to reappraise, meaning judging the situation one more time, evaluate if there are other ways to look at it. And often there are. These different views will then help you to deal with the situation better.

There are a few ways of reappraising.

Firstly, reappraise by normalizing – Tell yourself that it is normal to have this particular feeling under this circumstance. Just the thought makes you feel better. Some examples:

- Being nervous when holding a presentation is normal. It is fine.

- Being a bit scared when meeting the CEO of the company is normal. Then, he is just a human being like everybody else.

- When you feel a bit uneasy when entering a room with strangers only, is normal. Anyway, move in and talk. A good starter is ‘Did you read this ... in the newspaper this morning?”

Secondly, reappraise by looking at the upside. Some examples.

- You can think I don’t like this extra work or tell yourself that you will be able to learn something new.

- You may not like all these changes required at work or you can also think that these changes will keep your mind fresh.

- You may dislike flying but it gives you a chance to meet different people and experience different cultures.

Thirdly, reappraise by looking at the situation from another person’s point of view. Some examples:

- The boss is checking on your work progress. You may think she doesn’t trust you. Though, maybe the boss is just doing her job, ensuring proper supervision or just touching base with you to find out if you need any help.

- Somebody criticises you. You may feel attacked. Maybe the other person just wanted to be helpful.

- Somebody makes fun of you. You may feel hurt. Maybe the other person has such a low self-esteem that he needs to make jokes about others so that he feels better about himself. Poor guy. Why should it bother you?