Written by: Katarzyna Terlecka, 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.
I bet you participate in challenging meetings all the time!
I can imagine HOW YOU FEEL BEFORE a meeting. Is your body tight, your stomach a bit sick sometimes and your mind is coming up wbeith many alternative scenarios of what could go wrong?
Do you PREPARE FOR HOURS sometimes …? Especially if you are involved in some kind of negotiation. No matter how hard you prepare, you still don’t know what the outcome will be.
As a former attorney with over twenty years of experience in negotiating international deals, I know exactly how you feel. I was sitting in conference/board rooms for hours sometimes with a number of different parties involved. I could feel their energy (at that time not knowing that I feel it). I used to come back home feeling totally EXHAUSTED. I used to think that the exhaustion was caused by too much stress.
Now, I know that this was not stress only. I know that there is an EXCHANGE OF ENERGY between people in a room and that other people's energy can affect how we feel. Even if we do not realize that. Especially, if the “difficult” emotions are coming up, there is tension, pushing and even anger. You may feel those emotions and their low frequency in your body but probably think that this is just a difficult situation or a peculiar person.
I want to help you PREPARE for such meetings and also tell you how to behave during and after, so that your ENERGY is PROTECTED, and you don’t feel that exhaustion afterward.
Before the meeting
There are a number of techniques that will help you to prepare yourself energetically to a meeting, I want to share with you three of them that work for me:
Intention
Everything around us is energy, the Universe is just a big quantum field where everything exists, but it is not materialized yet (it has a form of energy). Our focus on something, our specific intention is one of the ways to materialize this, what is already available in a form of energy.
So, make sure that you have a quiet moment before an important meeting.
Take few deep breaths and see yourself coming out of it relaxed, peaceful and satisfied. Visualize how you look like in that moment, how your body feels and most importantly, what EMOTIONS you FEEL. Is it joy? Or maybe it is just this internal peace you have not felt for a long time? Feel them and notice how your body responds. Then just trust and be open for the best result coming.
Grounding
Fear is an emotion of low vibrations. You don’t want to feel fear, especially before an important meeting and especially if you just sat down with your visualization practice/ intentions. It will block the flow of energy.
Fear also affects your first energetic center (so-called root chakra), and you need to feel safe and stable during the meeting.
My favorite practice for that is grounding. If you have a chance and time, go for a WALK, lean on a TREE in a park, feel the stability the tree gives you.
If there is no time for that, imagine that you are standing on the ground or grass and ROOTS are coming out of your feet. Feel and see them going inside the earth, giving you balance and stability. Give yourself some time to really feel and see them. Try it! It works so well!
Also, during a meeting, when someone takes you OUT OF YOUR COMFORT zone, do the roots before you respond. You will see the difference.
Aligned energy
And finally, feel that your energy is aligned. Feel like there is UNIVERSAL ENERGY coming through your body vertically from above, through your head, whole body, and down to your feet. Sense if there are any misalignments and if there are, bring the alignment back.
During the meeting
One thing is to prepare for a meeting and feel good about it, and another is to react to another person’s body language, words, and energy. I know exactly how challenging it is to stay aligned and grounded sometimes!
What works for my clients and me are the following simple rules:
Avoid being “on push”
Are you used to being “on push”? You have a task to complete and you need to get it done asap. Do you think that you need to push things to make them happen?
Being “on push” is not a good strategy. Being on too much push can even make you lose the point, even if you are right.
If you are “on push”, you are acting from your mind’s perspective and this can be limiting. See my article. Also, there is no space for things to happen. Things that you visualized just a few hours before the meeting. You need to LEAVE A SPACE, a space for the Universe to respond to your requests, especially in some kind of a deadlock situation, when you raise one argument after another and nothing changes. The other side just does not want to hear your point. Try to just STEP BACK then and allow things to happen. How to do it? See point below
Your body position matters
Your body should be relaxed. Don’t lean forward in the direction of your counterparty. You are pushing your energy out this way. Lean outward and place your back at the chair.
In a deadlock situation, just lean outward, ALLOW for some SILENCE in the room and let things happen.
People unconsciously (or sometimes consciously) send energetic cords to their counterparties. You definitely don’t want that, as it will be difficult for you to stay balanced and neutral towards that person. So, as much as you can, avoid sitting exactly opposite your counterparty, SIT SIDEWAY.
Come back to your body
In the moment you feel confused, angry or you feel that another challenging emotion is coming up, come back to your body. Ask yourself, WHERE you feel this emotion. You may also do a quick BODY SCANNING or the ROOTS exercise I mentioned in part one above.
It may seem impossible during a meeting when you are active and surrounded by people. But it is just your mind scared of something new, something unusual for you. Do it once and you will see that you will keep coming back to it!
After the meeting
Ok, so you had that meeting and even though it went quite well, you keep coming back to some situations that occurred there or maybe you keep thinking of one of the persons that you had a particularly tough exchange of opinions with?
What can you do about that?
Intend to cut off from another people energy
Take few deep breaths, imagine the relevant person and intend to cut yourself off from her/his energy. You can also do a move with your hand like you would be cutting a cord between yourself and that person. Do it once and check how it feels. Keep coming back to this exercise until you FEEL that you are not connected anymore.
Take a warm bath with salt.
My favorite ritual, after a challenging meeting, is a warm, 20-minute bath with salt. It REMOVES toxins from your body, relaxes you and CLEARS you energetically. The best will be if you go to bed immediately after. You will feel like a newborn the next day!
If this what I wrote resonates with you and you would like to learn more, follow me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and visit my website!
Katarzyna Terlecka, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Katarzyna Terlecka is an Authentic Empowerment Coach for career and entrepreneur women. As a former attorney with over twenty years of experience in mergers and acquisitions and working with the top leaders around the world negotiating complex international transactions, she is able to unite highly practical systems with an intuitive energy approach to inspire and empower women in their personal development. Applying active listening, intuitive, energy and coaching skills, paired with her knowledge of the corporate world and the woman’s role in it, she leads women to discover their unique inner power, activate their intuition and confidence and express the depth of their feminine wisdom.
