Men’s Health Month: Building Mental Muscle for Success
As many of you know, June is Men’s Health Month. This annual recognition is in part to encourage men to be proactive in addressing their health by implementing healthy living choices.
Health has many dimensions – physical, spiritual, emotional, financial. While these are all crucial, let’s focus on mental health. Mental health affects how we think, act, and feel, and impacts how we handle stress, make choices, and interact with one another.
Our brains generate a whopping 75,000 daily thoughts, and 80% can be negative! This negativity can hold us back. Mental fitness is our ability to challenge those negative thoughts and cultivate a positive mindset. Strengthening mental fitness enables us to boost performance, improve our well-being, and fortify relationships.
How can we start to reduce that large number of negative thoughts we all have?
Five immediate approaches to consider:
- Empathize: show appreciation and compassion for yourself and those around you. Give yourself and others grace – let go of the inner critic.
- Explore: be curious, and try to understand a person, problem or situation beyond surface level assumptions. Don’t just find faults.
- Innovate: if exploring is about discovering what is, then innovate is understanding what is not. Ask yourself – what’s a whole new way to approach this situation?
- Navigate: think about how campers use a compass to guide their way. The next time you feel the urge to judge a person, use your values as a compass to guide your response to challenges.
- Activate: take action on your chosen path. When you focus on engagement, it reduces the urge to judge.
Just as we exercise our bodies, we must also train our minds to become the healthiest versions of ourselves.
This Men’s Health Month, check in with the men in your life and encourage them to prioritize mental fitness.
Everyone benefits from a healthier mindset. Which of the five approaches resonates most with you?
Life Is Happening – How Are You Keeping Up?
Life, as my kids would say, is “life-ing!”
The first quarter of the year has flown by. You’ve checked your progress against your Q1 OKRs, wrapped up the earnings call, and now you’re deep into Q2. Perhaps you’re reflecting on your achievements, or maybe you feel you’re not quite where you hoped to be.
Amid the endless cycle of workdays blending into nights and juggling a calendar filled with kids’ birthdays, soccer games, recitals, SAT prep, and lacrosse practices, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.
Are you tired? Exhausted? Perhaps feeling a bit burnt out? You’re not alone.
Many of my clients experience the same, and honestly, I’ve felt it too. But this year, a significant family milestone offered me a much-needed pause. My youngest son graduated from college this past weekend—yes, we have another Ramblin’ Wreck in the family! It was a vivid reminder that to truly be there for life’s big moments, I need to take care of myself first.
At work, it’s harsh but true: we are all 100% replaceable.
At home, it’s quite the opposite: we are 100% irreplaceable.
Yet, despite this knowledge, we often push ourselves to the brink of exhaustion. Why?
It’s crucial to remember to prioritize what truly matters: your health—mental, physical, and spiritual. You don’t just want to be there for your loved ones; you need to be there. Prioritize your well-being to ensure you can share in those moments that matter most.
Life moves quickly. Prioritize what matters most. Balance self-care with productivity.
Try to pause and reflect amidst the hustle of daily life, to reprioritize self-care as the foundation for being able to cherish in milestone events with those closest to us.
Parenting vs. Leading: Surprising Similarities in Success
Have you ever thought about the similarities between parenting and leading a team?
As a fresh empty nester stepping into new beginnings, I’ve been reflecting on the overlaps between parenting and team leadership. As my kids navigate their upcoming professional opportunities, so many thoughts go through my mind:
“I pray we raised them right.”
“I hope they listened to us.”
“I really hope they get a great boss – because a bad one truly sucks.”
“Did we prepare them enough for corporate life?”
Though we don’t manage teams the same way we raise children, the foundational principles surprisingly align.
Here’s how parenting mirrors leadership:
- Inclusion: Just as we ensure no child feels left out at home, effective leaders create workplaces where everyone feels valued and respected.
- Modeling Behaviors: Children learn by imitation, and so do team members. Leaders set the tone through their work ethic, integrity, and behavior.
- Patience: Both parenting and leadership require a long-term view, focusing on growth and development despite challenges and setbacks.
- Active Listening: Success in both roles comes not just from hearing, but truly understanding the needs and sentiments of others, catching what’s said and what’s left unsaid.
- Vision: Just as parents guide their children towards a hopeful future, leaders must sculpt a clear vision for their teams, even when opinions differ.
Parenting is the best job and hardest job you will ever have. Love, discipline, joy, and pain all coexist. Parents determine how that mixture takes shape.
Leadership is not to be taken lightly. Your team will inevitably discuss work at home – with friends, loved ones, even pets. And the tone of that conversation is SIGNIFICANTLY influenced by you as their leader – either because of how you lead, the environment you create, or by what you allow.
The question becomes – what tone do you want that conversation to reflect?
As we excel in these roles, we have a unique chance to refine these skills consistently, whether at home or in the office.
What did I miss? What other principles do you think parenting and leadership share?
How to Rewire Your Brain and Adopt a Growth Mindset
Find Life Coach: Meet Booker Farrior
This in-depth interview offers a compelling look into the world of professional life coach Booker Farrior. It begins by tracing his unique professional journey – from industrial engineering and supply chain management roles to an unexpected passion for applied behavioral science that ultimately led him to obtain certification from the International Coach Federation (ICF).
Coach Booker provides candid insights into how the Covid-19 pandemic disrupted his own family life, requiring them to grieve missed milestones like his son’s senior year events and his daughter’s study abroad experience. However, he shares how these challenges imparted vital lessons around self-care, nurturing relationships, and setting boundaries.
The interview then dives into Farrior’s innovative “Coaching by the Book” approach, which draws upon his diverse career experiences to empower clients with new perspectives. A particular emphasis is his pioneering 7-week mental fitness program that uses mobile apps and group sessions to help participants rewire neural pathways and combat negative thought patterns.
Throughout, Farrior stresses the individualized benefits his coaching provides, from reframing challenges to catalyzing self-discovery. The article paints a holistic picture not just of his methods, but the empathetic, growth-minded philosophy driving them. Ultimately, Farrior hopes to impart profound wisdom – urging focus on life purpose, continual effort, and cultivating empathy as keys to unlocking one’s full potential.
Who is this article written for?
Anyone who wants to remove negative thinking patterns, transform their thoughts, and adopt a growth mindset.
Thriving, Not Surviving: Building Mental Muscles for Resilience and Success
Philanthropic & Alumni Engagement (PAE) Interview With Booker Farrior
The Division of Philanthropic & Alumni Engagement (PAE) cultivates relationships with contributors, alumni, and other constituents on behalf of the University of Pittsburgh and UPMC, generating support for teaching, research, and care. As the hub for development and alumni relations efforts, PAE contributes to a bold, vibrant, and diverse academic community.
Identifying the next steps in your career trajectory can be challenging, but professional career coaches can assist. With the help of professional life coach Booker Farrior, you can envision a life where resilience, positivity, and clarity become your default states, no matter what challenges life throws at you.
- Booker works with clients to consider how their skillsets and experience can prepare them for new career opportunities that they may not have already considered.
- He also helps clients establish and clarify their professional goals and create plans to overcome obstacles.
This video presentation will examine a number of key factors that have a significant impact on both employee well-being and employee productivity as well as the performance of organizations as a whole.