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If You’re at Boiling Point Intersection, Which Road to Take for Better Energy?

Writer's picture: Tonya TiggettTonya Tiggett

Why Understanding Our Biology Leads to an Energetic Experience for Others




This is Part 2 of my conversation with Coach Irene O’Neill about the implications of our biology being at the core of the energy we put out, and how we can use tools to shift our responses, thus our emotions and energy, for others. This understanding of our biology impacts our personal relationships and the experiences we create for others at work, as leaders at any level.In our first conversation, Irene educated me on the intersection of biology and the choice point – If our biology is going to take over, where is the choice point to make a different decision or impact or to affect my energy? It’s awareness.

Please enjoy a brief conversation I recorded with Irene, that she will continue during our December 8th, Thankful Thursday program. TT: If there was an intersection between our biology taking over and our intellectual ability to understand the pillars of Emotional Intelligence, and our ability to put into practice some of your tools you’ll recommend to us on the 8th during our program (awareness and breathing as two examples), what would that intersection be? What I hear you saying is that it would be that choice point where everything intersects.IO: It’s that choice point [as the intersection of biology, emotional intelligence, and awareness], because another way of thinking about it is boiling point. Once you reach that boiling point, it’s going to have to ride its course. When we have reached threshold, or when we are in a full stress response, the front of our brain, our prefrontal cortex, literally goes dark, it goes offline and that is the part of our brain that is responsible for our cognitive processing, our emotional intelligence, our relationship skills.


“It's why telling somebody to calm down and in the history of the world, that has never helped them to calm down, especially when we talk about mindset work.”

IO:  If you are in a stressful situation at work, or at home - to switch to a different perspective when you are still fully in that stress response, is sometimes impossible because the part of the brain that’s responsible to think things through and connect and see different perspectives is literally offline. It’s not available. Which means if we want to change our perspective, the choice point is different. We have to start with our biology so that we can get our cognitive processing online.TT: What is the difference then between my biology and my emotional intelligence? I have a natural tendency, and one is a reaction [biology] and one is an awareness and tool [emotional intelligence]- does that sound accurate?IO: It’s essentially how to move from a reaction to a response. So, the difference is, is that if you look at Emotional Intelligence 2.0 of the 5 facets, if you were to quiz leaders, “Can you explain what self-regulation is?” It’s one of the facets. For example, if you were to ask people what it [self-regulation] is, 95% are like, “I don’t know… be good with your emotions?” They don’t understand what self-regulation is. You can’t do self-regulation without self-awareness. You have to have the self-awareness and develop it.


“Self-regulation is understanding the role of biology -- what our nervous system is doing that's impacting our choices.”

TS: Which that’s why it’s [self-awareness] a starting cornerstone of Emotional Intelligence. IO: Yes, that’s what I think. That’s why I think it’s the mastery point.


“You can’t do any of the facets [of Emotional Intelligence] without self-awareness, but you also can’t do any of them without self-regulation.”

IO:  If you are dysregulated and you are over, or even under, your threshold [boiling point / choice point] … say you’ve shut down because of a stressful situation, your internal motivation is going to be really hard to get going. Again, because your biology is at play. If you’re stress response is offline, you won’t be able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and be like, “Oh, I imagine this is what they meant, they didn’t mean to attack me.” You aren’t going to be able to do that – same with social awareness.


“If You’re at Boiling Point Intersection, Which Road Can You Take to Better Lead?Take Self-Awareness Avenue.”

IO:  As we learn to track our biology, we can start to track others’ biology too. It’s called mirror neurons. We begin to sense what’s going on with someone else. Like if you walk into someone’s office and you can feel the tension, that’s because we can sense what’s happening in other’s physiology.TT: In September I went to a sound room and the instructor held up an energy stick and said, “We are energy. We have literal electricity in our body. We have positive or negative energy that we feed out to others.”


“That’s what emotion is: energy in motion.” – Irene O’Neill

TT: It makes so much sense – that visual was so impactful.IO: The other piece to your first question [from Part 1 interview], ‘Am I just beholden to my biology if I’m hacked?’ I feel like understanding our biology and our nervous system is one of our greatest, underutilized tools to be able to shift our own energy and perspective and [that of] others’ [energy and perspective] around us. We just think it’s just all in the head, and that its all cognitive, but we are missing it, we are missing the boat.     Some people call it the “OK zone” or the “resilient zone” – the part where we can experience our emotions and be ok. Some people have a really wide zone; you could practically set them on fire and they’re like, “Whatever.” Other people, you could look at them the wrong way and they are going to jump out. We don’t have any control over this in terms of what our natural set point is; it’s our life experiences, our environment.


“Through understanding our biology and using the tools [awareness] we could actually widen it [set point zone] and things become less activating, or less triggering.”

We look forward to you discovering more about your biology and energy during our program.


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Tonya Tiggett

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