I’m grateful to have had a powerful teacher when I was just 17 years old. He was my first training instructor after I enlisted in the Air Force. About two weeks into basic training, I was exhausted, homesick, and fed up with being yelled at. I requested permission to see the training instructor, whose assignment, incidentally, was the yelling I mentioned above. I went into his office, stood at attention, told him I was not suited for the military life, and I that I wanted out. He took me by surprise when he asked me to sit down and in the kindest voice possible he said, “Rausch, this is the easy part. Going through these next eight weeks will be nothing compared to what you will experience for the rest of your life. You can’t run away because it feels hard. If you run from this you’ll never learn to face the tough things in the future.”

His words hit me hard. I knew he was right. If I couldn’t face and overcome some of life’s challenges that create resistance, I would never learn their value. By the way, that was the first and last time he spoke to me in a kind voice.

Let me share my definition.

“Energy is the internal fuel you possess that drives your mental, emotional and physical behaviors to maximize performance.”

Personal energy is the fuel for all your behaviors. It’s like the gasoline you put in your car. Turning on the ignition causes gas to flow out of the tank, through the carburetor into the engine. Whether your engine runs smoothly or it needs a tune-up, the gasoline still moves through it. If you don’t keep your car in good running order, it won’t use fuel economically resulting in poor mileage. When you do the proper maintenance, the engine uses fuel efficiently which means you get more miles per gallon.

Diamonds don’t start out as shiny, valuable gems. They start out as chunks of coal. Only after they experience years of extreme pressure do they become diamonds. No pressure, no diamond! I believe the resistances you experience serve the same purpose, to develop maturity and wisdom in your life. There is no escape from the difficulties you will experience in this life. They will make you stronger or wear you down, depending on your reaction to them. When you are determined to use personal energy to find the benefits in struggles, you will also find that life becomes less stressful.

In 2004, my wife and I decided we wanted to move to a more progressive community, so  we selected Atlanta as our destination. Neither Jinger nor I had any idea of the amount of energy it would take to move. Talk about resistance! It was absolutely the right thing for us to do, and we feel extremely good about the above, looking back. But, while the move was going on we ran into all kinds of resistance that wore us down. If you have ever moved across country you know exactly what we experienced. We were moving almost 700 miles from family and we didn’t know a soul in Atlanta. All our furniture was in storage and for three months we made the drive from Texas to Atlanta looking for a house. I know every mile marker from Texarkana, Texas to the city limits of Atlanta. During these house-hunts we lived in extended-stay motels along with our dog, Francesca.

About mid-way through our three-month journey, Jinger asked me if we were crazy for doing this. After all, we were both in our 50’s, leaving family, and moving to a new city we knew nothing about. Kind of makes you wonder, doesn’t it? We had to find a way to keep our energy up and the stress down. One way we handled it was to constantly communicate with one another about the positive things this move would mean for us. Did Jinger and I grow stronger as a result of the move? Absolutely. Would we have grown stronger had we stayed in Texas? Not a chance. We knew the resistance would come as a result of the move to Atlanta. We also accepted it to create the growth that we desired. Even though it required our energy to meet the challenges, we also knew that persistance with resistance would make us stronger individuals and a stronger couple.

It’s all about what you tell yourself

Your boss just declared that you made a huge mistake on an important project. What you say to yourself afterward makes a world of difference in your attitude, performance, and energy. Every thought you think and every emotion you feel requires energy. Cars use gasoline. Light bulbs use electricity. Your body uses an unlimited supply of the energy we are all provided. How you choose to use your energy is up to you. The truth is that you drain more energy on mental and emotional issues than on physical ones. Here are seven rules to help you maintain higher mental and emotional energy.

1. Practice the Universal One-Third Rule. Psychologists have stated that no matter what you do there is a One-Third Rule. One-third of the people like what you do, one-third of the people don’t like what you do, and one-third of the people don’t care what you do. Just remember that, “People do things for their own reasons, not for yours.”

2. Define the Focus of Importance. When you are working with others get your focus very clear. It’s easy to spend too much energy worrying about what someone thinks of you. Keep the focus where it needs to be, on the other person. One way to achieve focus is to recite this statement: “It’s more important what I think of you than what you think of me.”

3. Depersonalize disappointments. This is about business, not your self-esteem. Life is not always fair, so love and help people, but do not allow them to define who you are or your level of success.

4. Reframe Energy Drains. People can’t affect the outcome of your experience unless you let them. Nothing that is pushing against you takes effect unless you push back. Reframe the situation. “When you have an uncomfortable situation ask, ‘Is there something I can learn from this.”

5. Evaluate the Energy Drain. Did you hear something negative or take something negatively? Your level of energy will determine how you hear information. When you are low on energy you are more vulnerable to feeling defensive.

6. Delete clutter. Develop a behavioral trash bin. If a behavior doesn’t teach or offer you something, delete it and send it to your behavioral trash bin.

7. Celebrate your successes. Don’t be modest. When you do well admit it to yourself. Celebrations are energy refuelers.

1. Normal performance level– We all want to perform at our best, however, when you are low on energy, as strange as it sounds, you will move from “wanting” to perform (or be responsible) to “needing” to perform, which results in doing too much or hyper responsibility.
2. Whose responsibility is it anyway? – You have to ask yourself; am I doing something for someone that he or she could do on their own?
3. Check your guilt level – Most of hyper-responsibility is the result of feeling guilty. “I’m not doing enough for the family so I’ll make up for it by…” or “I let my associate down so I’ll make up for it by taking their responsibility.” Do not let guilt drive you into taking responsibility for someone else.
4. Allow people to learn and grow – Hyper-responsibility robs the other person of their opportunity to develop. There’s no problem in over-seeing a task or project as long as you allow the person to do it.
5. Even when you know better – Sometimes you will know how to do something better. Even if the person doesn’t know how to do the task perfectly let them be responsible for it. We grow by the mistakes we make.

For more information on Hyper-Responsbility, or to pick up a copy of my book, The Secret Power in Stress – Unleash your Energy Potential, visit my website: www.energydrivenleader.com.

1. Check your energy level – Anxiety can be caused from low energy – Your biological adrenal system kicks in when you are low on personal fuel. If you have been dealing with stress non-stop and/or not taking time to refuel your energy you are an anxiety attack waiting to happen.
2. No one dies from anxiety – Although you may feel like it. The feeling will pass.
3. Do NOT fight it – The more you fight anxiety the worse it gets. Think about it, if you fight the feeling you are using more energy and increasing the very thing you want to stop.
4. Find a quiet place, sit still, and let it pass – Close your eyes and breathe slowly and deeply.

For more information, please visit www.energydrivenleader.com and sign up for my weekly newsletter for invaluable resources on how to maximum your potential through your own personal energy!