Every Day Drills to Maintain Physical and Mental Wellness During Times of Stress A message of hope and encouragement to help us make it through these hard times.
By Randy Garn •
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Market ups and downs, emotional ups and downs, working from home, and a recession has caused many companies and individuals to have feelings of uncertainty, fear, and doubt. This is a natural reaction. But how do we overcome these feelings and move forward?
Brigham Tomco is the CEO of Emmersion Learning. He shared with me some keen insights on how to overcome these recent challenges.
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"I learned many life lessons growing up as a competitive athlete," Tomco said. "A recurring message from my coaches that I heard through the years when my teams were struggling, in a slump or overmatched was 'stick to the fundamentals' or 'get back to the basics.' Uncertainty and turmoil often cause us to forget or abandon what brought us success in the first place. At the time when we need stability the most, our inclination is to try something new instead of sticking to what we know works."
Brigham played football college. On day one of his "two-a-days," the defensive coordinator introduced him to EDDs -- also known as Every Day Drills. He explained that after warmups each day, the team would divide into their position groups and work on the same set of drills every day so that they would master and maintain the fundamentals. And wouldn't you know it? The team got really good at those fundamentals. They became part of each player's subconscious and helped the entire team through adversity.
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I think of the EDDs in my life that give me strength and stability.
- Adequate sleep
- Daily physical activity
- Meditation/prayer
- Serving To Others
- Setting and achieving daily goals/priorities
- Showing gratitude
- Getting outside in nature
When life gets busy and stressful, I forget to do these things. In reality, our EDDs must be done every day and need to take priority.
I believe that my EDDs for my personal life are also essential to my success as an entrepreneur and CEO. If I don't stick to my fundamentals in my personal life, it has a negative impact on my ability to thrive as a leader. In business, there is an additional set of EDDs that I think is important to success.
- Have genuine interactions. Smile, ask people about their day, family, and activities.
- Be present. Be focused on the person, meeting, task, or objective at hand.
- Think about employees and customers, and reach out to those who you feel could benefit.
- Review strategic objectives, and keep priorities streamlined on a daily basis.
- Reserve time on calendars to fulfill prioritized tasks.
- Make sure meetings start and end on time and fulfill their objectives.
- Be flexible. Priorities can change throughout the day.
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I find that as the inevitable peaks and valleys of life come, I find strength, peace, and success by sticking to the fundamentals.
Brigham reminds us that in these challenging times, the basics of both our personal and business lives are essential to keeping us grounded and successful. Let's not allow COVID-19 to break us down, but rather see it as an opportunity to recenter, refocus and recommit to the simple EDD's that brought us to where we are today and can take us where we want to go.
