Written by: Katie Stoddart, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Peak performance is that ideal balance between reaching your goals and having balance in all the areas of your life. When it comes to high performance, you can have a yang approach or a yin approach. In this article, I will highlight the difference between these two approaches.
1. Peak Performance
The main idea behind peak performance is to maintain high levels of performance in the different areas of your life. The concept is to tie together: productivity & well-being to ensure that you are constantly progressing in a direction that is meaningful to you.
Essentially, it comes down to understanding your goals and aspirations so that you can effectively use your energy and attention. By working and living with intention, you will lead a more fulfilled life.
2. Yang Peak Performance
What I have noticed from working in this field is that a lot of the peak performance literature, podcasts, articles have a ‘yang’ approach.
This is a forceful, pushing way to move forwards. Behind this way of working, there lies a feeling of ‘never enough’, and a lack of self-compassion.
These goals and achievements are sought for only as a remedy to an inner lack. From this place, there is no self-acceptance and an ongoing search for self-worthiness.
Often this is correlated with the saboteur ‘hyper achiever’ (from positive intelligence). You hope that if you reach any of the goals you are after, you will finally be worthy. Worthy of what? Love, success, life…
Unfortunately, with this saboteur, there is no rest. It is a vicious cycle of ‘more, more, more’, a hunger that is never satisfied. An emptiness that is never filled.
Yes, with these thoughts and mindset, you might achieve wonderful results. Yet, there will always be a part of you that is dissatisfied and discontented despite all the fantastic achievements you have reached.
3. Yin Peak Performance
The yin approach is a very different one. Instead of having a lack of self-worth as a primary driver, the main source of motivation comes from self-acceptance.
Instead of always pushing and never believing you are enough, you start with the premise that you are whole and you accept yourself fully. From there, you create and achieve for the sake of contribution, impact, joy, etc.
The achievements are no longer sought for, and you focus on the process itself. Sometimes even only for the joy of the process!
What a radically different way of reaching goals! No longer fuelled and motivated by a sense of lack, you feel complete, and you create already feeling aligned and accepting of yourself.
4. Yang vs Yin
What are the trade-offs of changing from yang to yin? There is an underlying fear that if you change from yang to yin, you will not strive as high!
How ironic, that in fact, the most sustainable high performance is fuelled through self-acceptance. High achievers remain high achievers, even if they flip to yin. The drive does not vanish. Yet, the motivation behind the drive changes.
So much energy is saved from not having to endure the mini dictator that was governing your mind. The ongoing criticizing, rejecting, the not-good-enough voice that echoed like a broken record in the back of your thoughts!
Once you have let these thoughts go and worked on your hyper achiever mindset, you have so much more room for peace, creativity, flow, innovation. The work becomes easier and more satisfying.
You are no longer desperate for the self-validation you never received because you already have it within you.
Will the hyper achiever still show up from time to time to criticize you? Probably. Yet, through overcoming many of these thought patterns and attached emotions, you will have to deal with this inner critical voice less and less – and still achieve your goals!
It is a mindful and aware approach to self-discipline, as Giovanni Dienstmann explains in his book: Mindful Self-discipline. What a game-changer that is!
5. Transform from yang to yin
Once you have seen the wisdom of yin peak performance and want to implement it in your life, here are a few simple strategies that can help:
Be your best supporter and cheerleader. Instead of criticizing and judging yourself, start to appreciate your hard work and efforts. Sure, you can tweak and learn from your mistakes but be kind when you formulate the message! As Mel Robbins explains, giving yourself a high five daily – boosts performance and joy in your life.
Remove shame and guilt and replace them with compassion. Every time, you feel shame or guilt, understand the source of it. Aim to change/ improve your behavior in the future but from a place of compassion and not frustration.
Increase your meditation and mindfulness practices. Both meditation and mindfulness contribute to self-awareness. Thanks to these practices, you will be able to notice your thoughts and reformulate them.
Pause during the day. Pause regularly to observe your mind chatter. What are you saying to yourself? How is it making you feel? How else could you say this?
Start a journaling practice. Journaling and self-reflection will help you to see more clearly what is getting in your way and to better understand the patterns that you go through in your mind.
You can reach and sustain peak performance more easily without the yang forceful approach. The kinder, more compassionate, and self-accepting yin way will not only boost your performance but also add lightness and peace to your daily life and work!
Thank you for reading,
Katie
Katie Stoddart, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Katie Stoddart, founder of ‘The Focus Bee’ is an award-winning, international, high-performance coach, speaker and podcast host. Katie supports leaders and business owners to reach & sustain peak performance in their business.
For her weekly podcast ‘The Focus Bee Show’, Katie interviews leading experts in high performance. Passionate about living intentionally; Katie challenges each and every person she works with to re-focus on what matters most. Katie works primarily with entrepreneurs & executives through 1-1 coaching & workshops on: Focus, Leadership & Performance.
