In contrast, people who use the blaming response covered in Chapter Two assume an incompetent, immoral, or insensitive person lies at the root of their distress, and their irrational, destructive responses erode their reputations and integrity.

When we use the reflexive response, we assume someone else’s characteristics are the cause of our discomfort. We scan their personality, age, ethnicity, gender, occupation, and so on, to pinpoint their responsibility in our frustration. It’s as if we are saying, “WHOSE fault is this? A mindless idiot is making my life miserable!”

This reaction is common when people feel overwhelmed. However, it is paralyzing and destructive. In addition to the health risks covered in Chapter Two, reflexive reactions impair our ability to solve problems in any meaningful way. Because we assume the problem lies within someone else’s characteristics, we feel as if we are powerless victims without solutions. No wonder this thinking pattern causes flooding!

In contrast, when we use the situational-orientation (Figure 8) we search the situation for the source of the problem. “WHAT is causing their behavior? What could be going on?” In this response, we assume that the other person is reasonable, and once we know the whole story, his or her behavior will make sense. We may not agree with the other person’s actions, but we assume that the other party is responding to something in his or her environment that we are unaware of. This assumption shapes the manner in which we approach the individual and our chances for success.

When we engage in reflective thinking we utilize the cortex, the problem-solving center of the brain. Reflective thinking is more rational and less volatile. It considers options and possibilities. Rather than feeling indignant, we become curious about the reasons for the other party’s behavior. This attitude brings us closer to the heart rhythms of appreciation from Chapter One, which is associated with increased creativity and mental clarity.

Instead of attacking the competence and character of others, or withdrawing to avoid confrontation, a reflective stance leads us to seek out the other party, open the dialogue, and ask for his or her assistance in understanding. This reaction has multiple benefits to physical health, effectiveness, mood, and the ability to maintain relationships.

Franklin Roosevelt is a well-known political leader who faced a staggering economic crisis, but approached it with a radically different approach than his nemesis in Europe, Hitler. Roosevelt looked at the situation as a problem with the financial regulations underlying the banking industry and stock market. As a result, he passed more legislation in his first 100 days in office than any president before him.

Roosevelt and Hitler give us a dramatic snapshot of the impact of these two thinking patterns; blaming people versus looking to the situation, structures, pressures, and limitations as the source of problems. (See Figure 9 on page 70).

Let’s return to the true story from Chapter Two about Tony, and his boss’s decision to move the plant to South Carolina. After the surprise announcement, most of Tony’s colleagues went on a “search for stupidity” about whom to blame for the relocation. Their bodies were flooded with cortisol and adrenaline, and their thinking was dominated by self-righteousness. However, this reaction destroys their ability to problem-solve. In addition, as they alienated the people they targeted (engineering, marketing, the owner), their reactions damaged the relationships they needed to regain momentum and address the problem—by beginning their search to find new employment.

Contrast their reflexive, personality-based reactions with Tony’s calm, reflective response. After making the rounds to various departments, Tony went back to his office, closed the door, updated his resume, and wrote several cover letters. About an hour later he went out to chat with his legal assistant and realized his colleagues were still clustered about, complaining angrily about the sudden turn of events. He was dumbfounded that they were wasting precious time, instead of getting down to task.

The contrast of Tony’s reaction to those of his colleagues can be explained by Tony’s thinking. Instead of “awfulizing,” he accepted the corporate closing as an unfortunate, but not catastrophic, event. Instead of blaming the president or other departments, Tony assumed the owner had substantial reasons to move his company to another part of the country.

In fact, within a year of the move, Tony learned that his former boss had died from cancer. Although Tony was unable to confirm it, he suspected that the president returned home in anticipation of his declining health. While many of Tony’s colleagues assumed that the cause of the closing was someone’s fault—engineering, marketing, the boss—Tony assumed there was a reason, albeit, hidden. This assumption allowed him to stay calm, relaxed, and focused on task. It also allowed him to maintain relationships that he otherwise would have lost needlessly.

Tony’s ability to stay composed and effective was the result of his ability to look at the situation as the source of the problem, not various people. His superb control over his reactions to frustration and his automatic responses allowed him to optimize an unexpected, negative event. Tony maintained his momentum, relationships, and effectiveness during a period that others found debilitating.

Let’s return to another previous example, that of Rhonda, the anxious VP of sales. If she uses a situational-orientation, she will assume the problem lies in the organization’s systems or processes. Rather than starting a rumor about Ted, the VP of operations, and attacking his competence, Rhonda will move in the opposite direction, and approach Ted directly to learn about his constraints. In fact, she will look for ways to help Ted out of his predicament. As you’ll see in Chapter Six, the odds are on our side when we make the assumption that workplace problems really reflect problems in systems, roles, or inadequate information.

This reaction has multiple benefits. By sidestepping the opportunity to promote herself at Ted’s expense, Rhonda won’t get ensnared in a debilitating power struggle with Ted. In addition, by learning about Ted’s constraints and gathering data, she may be able to minimize the impact of the backlog on her group. Helping Ted resolve his productivity issues rather than personally benefiting from his problems—at the expense of their organization’s profitability—will send a significant signal to her peers about her character. If Rhonda and Ted look for problems in the context of work rather than personalities, they will most likely uncover system problems that they then will have the opportunity to resolve.

Ted will be relieved and grateful if Rhonda doesn’t use his department’s crisis as an opportunity to increase her status. Ted will be very likely to reciprocate her professionalism at a later date when Rhonda’s group misses a quota or experiences a shortfall. It is these kinds of positive reactions to a crisis that bond workers to each other, and make work exciting, energizing, and meaningful.

Let’s also return to the true story of the “oblivious driver” and contrast the reflective, or problem-solving, reaction to the blame reactions we used earlier. In the personality-based reactions, you assumed the woman who wasn’t moving after the light changed was too stupid or selfish to care about anyone but herself.

If, instead, you use a reflective, situational-based approach when the woman opens the back door of her vehicle, you’ll assume there’s a reason why she’s focused on the backseat.

If you speculate that the unyielding driver has a legitimate motive for her behavior (in contrast to an inflammatory, personality-based approach) you will be able to avoid flooding with anger and adrenaline. It’s likely you won’t shift into the medulla, the fight-or-flight center of the brain. Instead, you’ll utilize the cortex, the source of creativity and problem-solving.

Thinking reflectively, from the cortex, allows situational possibilities to surface. It’s similar to asking, “Why would a reasonable person have her attention on the back seat rather than driving?” The possibilities are limitless:

During a seminar, when people switch from personality-based thinking to a situational-orientation, they stop ridiculing the driver and joking at her expense. They become more reflective and concerned, and I watch the influence of the cortex on their behavior. Individuals become empathic and start telling stories about similar experiences from their own lives. The energy created in this reflective mood is dramatically different than the self-righteous, aggressive energy of blame. This thinking pattern engenders compassion and a desire to be of assistance, rather than contempt.

As I mentioned earlier, the example of the “oblivious driver” is based on a true story. The driver who was focused on the backseat of her car wrote a letter to the editor of the local paper because she was determined to tell her side of the story

The reason she didn’t move her vehicle when the light changed was because her toddler, who was riding in the backseat, was choking! In her letter she explained the man behind her had flooded and began blowing his horn as she frantically tried to clear her toddler’s throat. Of course she ignored the green light. Any frantic parent would behave in a similar manner.

Her experience is a perfect example of the deficits of a personality-based approach and the kind of emotions and behavior it elicits. When we are flooded with hostility, we are not only useless, we often make the problem worse.

In Chapter Four there are additional stories of hidden realities, similar to this one. I call hidden realities “babies in the backseat.” In the workplace, hidden realities can be materials shortages, lack of information, process problems, budget cuts, union constraints, safety restrictions, and so on.

An easy way to remember the three assumptions is that the reflexive reactions are the stinky twins, B.O. and B.S., and the reflective response is BIBS or “baby in the back seat.” These terms are used as lighthearted, shorthand messages, or code within teams and organizations.

More than once a CEO has told me that he uses the phrase, “baby in the back seat” to avoid flooding or shooting the messenger. The term will help you remember to look for why, rather than who.

When teams and individuals face a crisis, it’s not the amount of external stress that distinguishes healthy organizations from toxic ones. It’s not the business climate, profitability, the competition, or the severity of the predicament. I’ve consulted in organizations that were enjoying tremendous profits but were unable to retain their people because their climates were riddled with blame. I’ve also been in organizations where they were literally closing facilities, and yet former employees had nothing but good things to say about the way they were treated and the reasons their facility closed.

The pivotal difference lies in the organization’s cultural response to frustration. If your organization or team is able to face aggravations without blaming others, you’ll pull together during stressful times and optimize your opportunities.

If you or your team resort to reflexive, inflammatory responses, and assume that every inconvenience is proof of another party’s incompetence, then even minor events will trigger blame and mistrust, and generate competing, negative factions. You will alienate other departments, and waste valuable assets on power struggles and mistrust.

Later we’ll look at these responses in more detail, but I want to return to the discussion about emotions and health. If hostility and depression have negative impacts on health, does appreciation have a positive effect? If it does, organizations would be wise to promote it.

As we saw in Chapter Two, hostility gives us a “sugar high” of energy, but it comes with a hefty price tag of diminished health. Anger is a significant risk factor for heart disease. Blame leads to social isolation, which often results in depression. We also know that isolation and depression carry health risks. Fortunately, at the positive end of the continuum where we placed feelings of affection or love, the data about impact on health is extremely heartening. Larry Dossey, M.D., puts it succinctly, “Love is intimately related to health.”

Dr. Gregory Berns, a psychiatrist at Emory University in Atlanta, conducted research by using magnetic resonance imaging and found that when participants cooperated while playing a laboratory game, the mental circuitry normally associated with reward-seeking behavior became active. In other words, cooperation feels good.

Feelings of affection occur when we are part of a tightly knit group, bonded by loyalty and fun. This end of the continuum includes the joy of accomplishment; love for family members; faith and spiritual practices; and respect and appreciation for colleagues, mentors, and supervisors. Additionally, satisfaction from a customer, the joy of recognition, feelings of camaraderie, and the satisfaction of helping others achieve their goals also fall into this end of the spectrum.

You probably know individuals who are energized by love. Their faces become more beautiful, even as their bodies age. It lends another interpretation to Coco Chanel’s phrase, “By the time you’re 50 you have the face you deserve.” Her observation is true not only for people whose lives are consumed by hostility and cynicism, but also for people who thrive on love and appreciation.

Although there is less research in the area of health and love than in the field of health and hostility, interesting data is accumulating. For instance, researchers scanning emergency room data discovered that heart attack victims who arrived at the hospital with family or friends were three times more likely to survive than people who came in alone.

In a study by Stanford University psychiatrist David Spiegel (reported in May, 1989, at the American Psychiatric Association meeting), women with terminal breast cancer were divided into two groups. One of the groups met twice a week to talk about their fears, and receive support from other patients. In the final stages of the disease, they developed into a tightly knit community and their friendships extended beyond their scheduled meetings.

Spiegel waited two years to analyze his final data and said, “I almost fell off my chair when I read the study’s outcomes.” The group that developed an intense connection lived twice as long as the group without support. A small, nonchemical intervention had significantly prolonged the lives of the women in the support groups. Being in community not only elevates our mood, it has a measurable impact on our bodies.

Another surprise finding occurred when researchers were testing rabbits for the potency of arteriosclerosis drugs. Although all the rabbits were subjected to high-fat diets, the ones that received daily petting from a kindhearted laboratory technician had significantly lower levels of the disease.

Remember the experiment from Chapter Two, where hostility negatively affected immune systems? The same researchers also asked students to focus for five minutes on someone they loved, or a peak experience. Their immune systems functioned at a higher level for six hours after five minutes of relaxing into the energy of appreciation. If this dramatic impact on the immune system is found with people who are just remembering a hostile or positive experience, imagine the impact when we are experiencing these events in real life!

Ever since I learned about this research finding, I’ve adopted a ritual. In the morning, before I get out of bed, and at night, before I fall asleep, I consciously think of someone I love, or things for which I am grateful. These two, five-minute periods in combination boost my immune system for a total of 12 hours! It feels wonderful, and during a Minnesota winter, generating feelings of appreciation is as easy as thinking about the thermostat for the furnace that automatically turns up the heat before I get out of bed. I also gained an unexpected return. I began to feel the energy of appreciation throughout the day. I used to struggle with frequent head colds that lasted for months, but since I adopted this practice six or seven years ago I’ve only had two colds and they disappeared within a few days. I attribute my increased immunity to this simple practice.

This assumption was confirmed by an experiment conducted at the University of Pittsburg. Volunteers allowed the researchers to place a cold virus in their nostrils. Individuals who described themselves as “happy and relaxed” came down with colds at one-third the rate of people who were the least likely to use those words.

Allan Luks, the director of Big Brothers Big Sisters of New York, teamed up with Howard Andrews, a biopsychologist, to investigate the effect of volunteer work on health. They found that people who volunteer on a regular basis experienced an increase in endorphins, the body’s pleasure chemical. Luks dubbed this the “helper’s high.” It’s very similar to the runner’s high, except with an additional advantage. At the end of a long run, endorphins drop rapidly, resulting in a slide toward fatigue. However, with the helper’s high, according to Luks, there are “long-lasting feelings of euphoria, followed by relief from symptoms like lupus and arthritis.”

Luks also found that although people have the biggest endorphin reaction when they do volunteer work, he also found health is positively affected by simple acts of kindness, such as pitching in to help a colleague meet a deadline. I think about this physiological reaction as nature’s message: do more of this. It enhances survival, feelings of well-being, and health. Our bodies are “wired” to feel the best when we are in positive energy.

The following short story, written by Elaine Gale of The Minneapolis Star Tribune, beautifully portrays how a small act of kindness has the power to change our mood.

The following story about John D. Rockefeller, Sr., is another vivid example of the impact of positive and negative energy on health.

Our most elevated moods occur in relationships of affection and emotional safety, and we are intrinsically motivated to seek out feelings of well-being through acts of kindness. Consequently, I have found the most miserable people in the workplace are those who are cut off from the feelings of camaraderie through conflict or isolation.

Once you train your mind to generate feelings of appreciation, it will affect your relationships, mood, and effectiveness, regardless of your circumstances. You can generate these feelings on a crowded airplane, during a tense meeting with a vendor, or backed up in traffic. As you’ll see in Chapter Nine, it won’t make you less effective; it will make you more so. Once you “wire” your brain to avoid flooding and hostility, and see the world through the lens of abundance, the benefits will spill over to strangers, colleagues, and customers.

I call the ability to do this, “riding the wave of appreciation.” Like Bruce, the Vietnam Veteran at the beginning of Chapter Two, you will be able to create feelings of serenity at will.

While I was consulting at a metropolitan law firm I’d stop at a snack shop for my morning cup of coffee. The little shop was always jammed with workers grabbing their morning beverage and racing to beat the clock. The gaunt, tattooed man behind the counter handled each customer with military efficiency, but without making the briefest eye contact or displaying the smallest gesture of warmth. As I waited in line I’d always try to notice something about him on which I could give him a positive comment as he rang up my purchase.

One morning he said to me gruffly, “You’re always in a good mood. What’s wrong with you?”

I laughed, but I feel what he noticed—I’m almost always in a good mood, and I understand how this can be puzzling and slightly annoying to others. Like Bruce, I learned to generate feelings of well-being. Learning the tools in this book and shifting my focus to what I appreciate about any given moment have helped me develop a more rewarding, healthy, and effective outlook.

There are many reasons to become skilled at creating feelings of appreciation, altruistic behavior, and reflective reactions to frustration. The outcomes of your responses to frustration accumulate over your lifetime. Your reactions have an enormous impact on your mood, and the viability of your relationships. They not only affect your success at work, but also the quality of personal life, and whether or not individuals are available to support you during a personal or professional crisis. In combination, these factors can be a significant asset, or a serious impediment, to your career.