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Self regulation skills are essential for great performance at work. When your sense of self-efficacy guides you to meet challenges, you can promote better health, productivity and creativity in yourself.
Effective self regulation skills enable you to perform the most important tasks on time and produce quality results, regardless of what you do or who you're doing it with.
Self regulation skills allow you to have a healthy balance between controlling your emotions and expressing them effectively, enabling you to be assertive without being aggressive.
Research shows that the more self-control you have, the better your relationships and interpersonal skills will be.
It also shows that people who are good at self-regulating statistically have higher grade point averages, better self-esteem, and more optimal emotional responses than those who don’t.
I’ve picked up a few self-regulating techniques in my journey for entrepreneur motivation rise, which I’ll share with you in this article.
Read on to find out more about self regulation, its meaning, and how it can help you become a mindful leader.
What Is Self-Regulation?
What is self regulation? It is the ability to control your behavior, emotions, and thoughts. It’s a critical component of emotional intelligence and a valuable tool to advance in life.
In order to be successful, we have to be willing to adjust to what life throws at us. We all go through times when we want to lash out, doubt ourselves, or give into the temptation to quit altogether.
But the hallmark of a successful person is knowing how to self-regulate our complex emotions so that we can push through them.
Why Self-Regulation Is Important
Self regulation and self-improvement are vital to your success in all areas of life. It helps you grow professionally as well as your personal life, making it a valuable tool for anyone to learn.
When you learn how to self-regulate, you’ll gain:
- Self-confidence
When you lack confidence, it's easy to lose hope when confronted with obstacles.
If you learn to control your emotions, stay calm in stressful situations and stand up for your beliefs you’ll see just how strong you really are.
Pushing through communication barriers and overcoming obstacles is a powerful way to increase self-confidence.
- Self-esteem
We can gain esteem by doing things that are valuable and useful for other people.
The only way we can act in a way that aligns with our values, however, is if we learn to manage our emotions through self-reflection.
Fear and anger can make us act in ways we normally wouldn’t, damaging our relationships and self-esteem.
Regulating our emotions helps us get benefits and have productive conflict, learning to turn disappointments into new opportunities for growth.
- The ability to handle stress
Handling stress well is a skill many people lack, and if you are able to perform well under pressure, your composure can inspire others.
Self-regulation allows you to handle stress in a way that makes you appear confident and composed.
- The ability to handle frustration
We can all feel frustrated when things don’t go our way. But when you know how to self-regulate, you don’t let frustration derail your goals.
When we self-regulate, we accept and let go of our frustrations so that we can focus on what we do have control over.
- The ability to adapt
Rigidity can hinder even the most talented leaders.
A good leader knows that life is a series of unexpected twists and turns, but instead of complaining about adversity, they adapt to their surroundings as a master of conflict avoidance.
Self-regulation skills are vital to enable us to manage our disappointment and adjust to our new reality.
Techniques To Develop Your Self Regulation Skills
Developing self regulation skills is a matter of practicing a few simple techniques on a regular basis.
These techniques will help you manage your emotions and behavior so that you can succeed both in and out of the workplace.
- Become aware of your emotions
In order to deal with your emotions, you must first be aware of them. Self regulation doesn’t mean ignoring how you feel, but accepting it and moving past it.
To be free from the tyranny of your emotions, you must first become aware of what you’re feeling and accept it.
It’s how you pay attention in the present moment—without judgement—that brings about this awareness.
Once you’ve given yourself that space, you can then make a decision knowing that you’re not simply reacting with blind emotion.
- Monitor your body
Our emotions often manifest themselves in our physical body. When you feel a strong emotion, take a moment to monitor what’s happening in your body.
Are your palms sweaty? Heart racing? Teeth clenched? Notice what’s going on and then take steps to calm yourself down.
Practice deep breathing and use a stress ball if you find yourself needing a way to release tension.
- Meditate
Meditation is an excellent practice that helps you stay focused on the present moment. Even if you start small with only five minutes a day, you’ll train yourself to become more mindful.
You can then turn to meditation in the moment you feel strong emotions to calm yourself and encourage self-awareness.
- Exercise
Our physical health plays a huge role in determining our mood.
If you incorporate regular exercise into your life, you strengthen your body and your mind. Self-regulation is much easier when our physical and mental health is at its strongest.
Self Regulation Skills In The Workplace
While self-regulation skills can help you in every area of life, many of these skills are especially useful in the workplace. These include:
- Communication
We communicate poorly when we let emotions cloud our judgment. By practicing self regulation, we can avoid listening barriers and improve communication skills with others without lashing out or shutting down.
- Conflict resolution
Self regulation helps us to deal with conflicts in a constructive way. Instead of sticking to our guns out of spite or resentment, we will listen with an open mind to opinions that differ from our own.
- Civil discourse
It's only possible to have civil discourse when we're able to regulate our emotions and respect the people we're speaking with, which means refraining from judgmental comments, not interrupting other people, showing respect to other opinions, and listening fully before formulating our own response.
- Problem-solving
Negative emotions often keep us from making the best choices for ourselves.
When you are able to self-regulate, you’re better able to adapt and consider all your options when tackling problems.
- Time Management
It can be tough to manage our time well when we cut and run at the first sign of trouble.
Self-regulation combined with time management enable you to push through obstacles and show up for your commitments and deadlines.
It is only through mastering self regulation skills at work that you can thrive in the workplace and make sure that you are making the best use of your time and energy.
If you aim to improve yourself, you will find it much more fulfilling than trying to improve other people.
Using these strategies outlined here, take a few minutes each day to reflect on your goals and values and ways that your behavior needs to change, and then make an effort to put your plan into effect.
In time, you’ll find that mastering the art of self regulation will make you a better leader, partner, and friend.
