"Emotionally agile people are dynamic… able to tolerate high levels of stress and to endure setbacks… to act according to their most cherished values and pursue big, long-term goals."

“Courage is not an absence of fear; courage is fear walking.”

“The ultimate goal of emotional agility is to keep a sense of challenge and growth alive and well throughout your life.”

“The most effective way to transform your life, therefore, is not by quitting your job and moving to an ashram, but, to paraphrase Teddy Roosevelt, by doing what you can, with what you have, where you are.”

It means being aware and accepting of all your emotions, even learning from the most difficult ones. It also means getting beyond conditioned or preprogrammed cognitive and emotional responses to live in the moment with a clear reading of present circumstances, respond appropriately, and then act in alignment with your deepest values.

Emotional agility

Forced optimism can’t be sustained, which means it’s only a temporary solution to a permanent problem.That’s because even negative emotions can have positive consequences, as long as you face them directly and draw the right conclusions. So don’t smile when you don’t feel like it.

Show up to your emotions, even the bad ones

<ul><li>Bottlers ignore, push aside, and avoid—sometimes getting repaid with unexpected outbursts. </li><li>Brooders complain, wearing out their friends, spouses, or themselves as they rehearse what might have been or what will be—but never moving on.</li></ul>

Bottling and brooding

<ul><li>Have-to goals are goals set for you by others in the form of pressure, for example, your doctor telling you you must lose weight. </li><li>Want-to goals are those you set out of conviction and after careful reflection of your true values. </li></ul>

Set want-to goals, not have-to ones

The ultimate social influence, it’s what causes us to pursue certain behaviors merely because we’re close to someone doing the same. This can be physical proximity or psychological relatedness through the media, for example.

Behavioral contagion

Mentally create distance by imagining going above or far away from the thought you are having.

Values are what helps you make the small, conscious decisions that add up to a life well-lived.To help you identify your values, each day habitually ask yourself, “As I look back at today, what did I do that was actually worth my time?”

Your values will lead the way

#1 Wall Street Journal Best Seller USA Today Best Seller Amazon Best Book of the Year TED Talk sensation - over 3 million views! The counterintuitive approach to achieving your true potential, heralded by the Harvard Business Review as a groundbreaking idea of the year. The path to personal and professional fulfillment is rarely straight. Ask anyone who has achieved his or her biggest goals or whose relationships thrive and you’ll hear stories of many unexpected detours along the way. What separates those who master these challenges and those who get derailed? The answer is agility—emotional agility. Emotional agility is a revolutionary, science-based approach that allows us to navigate life’s twists and turns with self-acceptance, clear-sightedness, and an open mind. Renowned psychologist Susan David developed this concept after studying emotions, happiness, and achievement for more than twenty years. She found that no matter how intelligent or creative people are, or what type of personality they have, it is how they navigate their inner world—their thoughts, feelings, and self-talk—that ultimately determines how successful they will become. The way we respond to these internal experiences drives our actions, careers, relationships, happiness, health—everything that matters in our lives. As humans, we are all prone to common hooks—things like self-doubt, shame, sadness, fear, or anger—that can too easily steer us in the wrong direction. Emotionally agile people are not immune to stresses and setbacks. The key difference is that they know how to adapt, aligning their actions with their values and making small but powerful changes that lead to a lifetime of growth. Emotional agility is not about ignoring difficult emotions and thoughts; it’s about holding them loosely, facing them courageously and compassionately, and then moving past them to bring the best of yourself forward. Drawing on her deep research, decades of international consulting, and her own experience overcoming adversity after losing her father at a young age, David shows how anyone can thrive in an uncertain world by becoming more emotionally agile. To guide us, she shares four key concepts that allow us to acknowledge uncomfortable experiences while simultaneously detaching from them, thereby allowing us to embrace our core values and adjust our actions so they can move us where we truly want to go. Written with authority, wit, and empathy, Emotional Agility serves as a road map for real behavioral change—a new way of acting that will help you reach your full potential, whoever you are and whatever you face.

Stashed ideas

Emotional Agility

Effective leaders don’t buy into or try to suppress their inner experiences. Instead, they approach them in a mindful, values-driven, and productive way—developing what we call emotional agility. 
In our complex, fast-changing knowledge economy, this ability to manage one’s thoughts and feelings is essential to business success.

The first step in developing emotional agility is to notice when you’ve been hooked by your thoughts and feelings. That’s hard to do, but there are certain telltale signs. One is that your thinking becomes rigid and repetitive. Leaders stumble when they are paying too much attention to their internal chatter and allowing it to sap important cognitive resources that could be put to better use.

Recognize your patterns

When you’re hooked, the attention you give your thoughts and feelings crowds your mind; there’s no room to examine them. One strategy that may help you consider your situation more objectively is the simple act of labeling.
Labeling allows you to see your thoughts and feelings for what they are: transient sources of data that may or may not prove helpful.

Label your thoughts and emotions

The opposite of control is acceptance—not acting on every thought or resigning yourself to negativity but responding to your ideas and emotions with an open attitude, paying attention to them, and letting yourself experience them. Take 10 deep breaths and notice what’s happening in the moment. This can bring relief, but it won’t necessarily make you feel good. In fact, you may realize just how upset you really are. The important thing is to show yourself (and others) some compassion and examine the reality of the situation.

Accept your thoughts and emotions

When you unhook yourself from your difficult thoughts and emotions, you expand your choices. You can decide to act in a way that aligns with your values.
Is your response going to serve you and your organization in the long term as well as the short term? Will it help you steer others in a direction that furthers your collective purpose? Are you taking a step toward being the leader you most want to be and living the life you most want to live?
The mind’s thought stream flows endlessly, and emotions change like the weather, but values can be called on at any time, in any situation.

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