The Power of Story: Change Your Story, Change Your Destiny in Business and in Life - Softcover

Loehr, Jim

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0743294688 ISBN 13: 9780743294683

Publisher: Free Press, 2008

Synopsis

In his groundbreaking new book, Dr. Jim Loehr, New York Times bestselling coauthor of The Power of Full Engagement, examines the way we tell stories about ourselves to ourselves -- and, most important, the way we can change those stories to transform our business and personal lives.

"Your story is your life," says Loehr. As human beings, we continually tell ourselves stories -- of success or failure; of power or victimhood; stories that endure for an hour, or a day, or an entire lifetime. We have stories about our work, our families and relationships, our health; about what we want and what we're capable of achieving. Yet, while our stories profoundly affect how others see us and we see ourselves, too few of us even recognize that we're telling stories, or what they are, or that we can change them -- and, in turn, transform our very destinies.

Telling ourselves stories provides structure and direction as we navigate life's challenges and opportunities, and helps us interpret our goals and skills. Stories make sense of chaos; they organize our many divergent experiences into a coherent thread; they shape our entire reality. And far too many of our stories, says Loehr, are dysfunctional, in need of serious editing. First, he asks you to answer the question, "In which areas of my life is it clear that I cannot achieve my goals with the story I've got?" He then shows you how to create new, reality-based stories that inspire you to action, and take you where you want to go both in your work and personal life.

For decades, at the Human Performance Institute, Loehr has been examining the power of story to increase engagement and productivity, and Fortune 500 companies have paid millions to send employees to his program, in which he applies the principles and methods that he now offers in this book. Global business leaders, world-class athletes, military special forces, and thousands of individuals from every walk of life have sought out and benefited from his life-altering insight and expertise.

Our capacity to tell stories is one of our profoundest gifts. Loehr's approach to creating deeply engaging stories will give you the tools to wield the power of storytelling and forever change your business and personal life.

About this title

About the Author:

Jim Loehr is chairman, CEO, and co-founder of the Human Performance Institute, a training company that has successfully utilized energy management technology to improve the productivity and engagement levels of elite performers from the world of business, sport, medicine, and law enforcement for over 30 years. A world-renowned performance psychologist, Dr. Loehr is the author of thirteen books including the national bestseller The Power of Full Engagement.

 

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

One

That's Your Story?

Slow death.

An uglier two-word phrase it's hard to find. But if you're at all like the people I see in our workshops, then I'm afraid you understand the phrase all too well.

How did it come to this?

What am I doing?

Where am I going?

What do I want?

Is my life working on any meaningful level? Why doesn't it work better?

Am I right now dying, slowly, for something I'm not willing to die for?

WHY AM I WORKING SO HARD, MOVING SO FAST, FEELING SO LOUSY?

One man I heard about was quite literally going through slow death. A senior executive at a big firm, he was home the last few weeks of his life, in the final stage of cancer, in and out of lucidity, medicated so heavily that his tongue loosened and he regularly spewed his unfiltered, apparently truest thoughts. He cursed at his wife as never before, using vile, demeaning language -- all while she was caring for him day and night, knowing these were his last days on earth, the final days of their long marriage. He did the same to his kids when they visited, making an already difficult situation for them nearly intolerable, and certainly bringing them nothing remotely like peaceful closure. Mostly, though, the man's most shocking, blistering commentary was reserved, in absentia, for his boss: vicious, intermittently coherent paroxysms of resentment and contempt for the president of his firm who, it was painfully obvious now, the dying executive blamed for most of the anger, frustration, and general rottenness he'd felt the past two decades.

Slow death. It comes in different forms. Two years ago a heart surgeon came to our institute. The first morning he had his blood work done and took a turn in the BodPod (a chamber inside which one's lean body mass can be measured with exceptional accuracy, through the displacement of air rather than water). His results were borderline alarming -- extremely elevated levels of cholesterol, glucose, blood lipids, triglycerides, C-reactive protein. He was given a copy of the results.

When his turn came to discuss the meaning of the numbers and how to approach them, the surgeon said, "I don't want to talk about it."

"You know what these numbers mean," said Raquel Malo, our director of nutrition and executive training.

"Of course I do," he snapped. "I'm a doctor!"

"What if I was your patient and I got these numbers?"

"I'd be all over you."

"Yet you're telling me -- "

"I said I don't want to talk about it."

"But -- "

"Change the subject or I'm on the next plane home," he said. "Don't bring it up again while I'm here."

Two days later the doctor left, having done nothing to address his perilous health, or even to acknowledge there was anything to address. He returned to his thriving medical practice, where he would continue to caution patients to reduce their risk of cardiovascular disease. (Of all the demographics we see, health care providers as a group hover near the bottom in fitness and physical well-being.)

Slow death: what a harsh phrase. Is that really what's happening to all those people, the ones who start out contented by what is good and pure in life -- a simple cup of coffee, a few seemingly reasonable life goals (a nice salary, say, and one's own home) -- and who, once they've achieved those goals, can't even be satisfied because they've already moved on to life's next-sized latte (six-figure salary, second home, three cars), only to move on to something double-extra grande when that's achieved, a continual supersizing that guarantees one can't ever be fulfilled?

Okay. Not everyone I see or hear about is dying slowly. But to judge from the responses we get, workshop after workshop, year after year -- and each year it gets worse -- whatever it is they're doing sure doesn't sound fun. It doesn't even sound like getting by. I read the frustration and disappointment in their self-evaluations and hear it in their own voices, if and when they're comfortable enough to read aloud from their current dysfunctional story, the autobiographical narrative they attempt to write the first day at HPI, but usually don't finish until the night before our last day together.

"Life is hard and getting harder," read one senior VP, with a very big house, a very big salary, and dozens of direct reports. "My current life story is stagnant...On a scale of 1 [worst] to 5 [best], I'd give my health and family each a 2...My biggest feeling about myself is complete disappointment...I have virtually no energy...I'm completely addicted to cell phones and PDAs."

"The tone of my story is cynical, sarcastic, and ironic," read a forty-three-year-old woman who runs a successful telecom business in the Southwest. "I'm driven to achieve solely for the purpose of being able to point to the accomplishment, and the recognition I receive...I need a more positive view of my future...I do NOT embrace the idea that the story I tell about what happens is more important than what actually happens...My current life story is sad and depressing...My health is a 2, work a 3, happiness and friendship each a 2..."

"I'm deeply disappointed in myself and always extremely self-critical," wrote a managing director in a financial services firm. "My happiness is a 1; I'm as unhappy as can be. I'm getting divorced after thirty-three years of marriage...My greatest weakness is that I don't trust anyone anymore. The dominant theme in my life is distrust."

I hardly think it's overstating to call these tragic stories.

As the workshop progresses and people's defenses start to melt away, we hear more and more of these stories. By almost any reasonable standard, these stories exemplify failure; in many cases, disaster. There is no joy to be found in them, and even precious little forward movement. In every workshop, nearly everyone has a dysfunctional story that is not working in at least one important part of his or her life: stories about how they do not interact often or well with their families; about how unfulfilling the other significant relationships in their lives are; about how -- despite all that extracurricular failure -- they're not even performing particularly well at work (!), or, if they are, about how little pleasure they gain from it; about how they don't feel very good physically and their energy is depleted.

On top of all that (isn't that enough?), they feel guilty about their predicaments. They know, on some almost buried level, that their life is in crisis and that the crisis will not simply go away. Their company is not going to make it go away. The government is not going to make it go away. God is not going to make it go away.

And so they wake up one morning to the realization that the bad story they for so long only feared has become finally their life, their story. Not that this development is their fault. No. Nor is there a heck of a lot to be done about it.

It's a competitive, cutthroat world out there.

God knows, I want to change but I simply can't. I'll get eaten up and beaten by someone who's willing to sacrifice everything.

The world moves faster today than it did a generation ago.

Hey, at least I see my family some weekends. At least we've got a roof over our heads. At least I exercise twice a week.

What am I supposed to do -- quit my job?

These are the facts of my life. There's nothing I can do about them.

My life is a known quantity, so why mess with it even if it's killing me?

Let me repeat that one:...even if it's killing me.

As corporate consultant Annette Simmons says in her book, The Story Factor, "People don't need new facts -- they need a new story."

Recently I conducted a seminar with thirty-two engineers from a profitable company who'd been sent to us not of their own desire -- if it was up to them, it soon enough became obvious, they'd have preferred to undergo a colonoscopy and root canal simultaneously -- but because the head of their division, a recent and enthusiastic attendee of the program, felt it would be useful for them and thus for the company. I could tell that the brainpower in the room, judged on sheer intellectual payload, was staggering. Each engineer had a position of considerable authority, each had several direct reports, each was veteran enough at the company to feel part of the fabric that made it what it was. Early in the session, I asked what might be done to improve their situations at work. Not a single hand went up. When I asked what they thought about their latest job evaluations, the few who spoke expressed the same general idea: They were doing about as well as they expected; there wasn't much that would make things worse or better. It was what it was.

Over the next half hour, though, I was able to start eliciting some details. Many of them said they couldn't pay much attention to their health because, well, there was obviously no time to exercise before or after work, and to exercise in the middle of the afternoon would feel, as one said, "almost like you're irresponsible."

"Is there an actual rule against it?" I asked.

"It's unwritten," he said. "Everyone can feel it."

So there it was. The corporate culture was at fault. Nothing to be done about it. It was what it was.

I asked for a new show of hands: How many did get regular exercise? Four engineers out of thirty-two responded.

"They're single," said one of the others. Everyone laughed.

"Really?" I said. I turned to the Exercising Four. "How many of you have spouses and children?"

Three of the four raised their hands.

"You're married with kids, yet you work out," I said to them. "How is this possible?" I asked the three if they thought that the time they spent exercising was jeopardizing their careers, in the long term, or making it more difficult to get work done, in the short.

No, said each. "It makes me more productive," said one.

I then asked the whole group of thirty-two how many had dinner with their family at least three nights a week. Only five did...and -- what do we have here? -- three of the five were the Exercisers Married with Children.

Some people just figure it out. Why them and not others?

About this edition

• Publisher: Free Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0743294688
• ISBN 13: 9780743294683
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288