If you’re a foodie or Francophile, then you need to follow David Leibovitz, author of My Paris Kitchen. His Instagram posts are a virtual tour of luscious bites in Paris and beyond, but he’s also been detailing the ups and downs of his apartment remodel. Long story short, the update that would have taken a few months when he lived in San Francisco has dragged on for over a year. To add to his frustration, his contractors haven’t appreciated his home-grown advice about how the project should be falling into place.
At this point, Lebovitz has swapped anxiety for philosophy. He summed it up this way: “Americans go into situations expecting things to go right, then have meltdowns when things go wrong, whereas the French are more skeptical right off the bat. As far as I know, there’s no French equivalent of, “I told you so!” which was a relief, but I learned it on my own.”
Can you relate to David’s story? Have you ever been so sure about how a situation should go that you couldn’t help yourself from driving home that point? And answer this question for final Jeopardy: Did that conversation go as planned, or did it backfire like a cranky contractor? Whoops!
No one starts conversations thinking their perspective might feel like a tsunami to others. But without using soft skills, self-confidence can quickly turn into a raging whirlpool. (Or, in David’s case, a colorful lecture in French!) That’s why we’ve been talking about how to use soft skills to manage your emotions in the March series, Use Soft Skills to Watch Your Wake. The idea is just like the boating rule to “watch your wake”—meaning be aware of how you are affecting people around you.
Watching your wake is easy on a lake because you have visual cues like too much speed or white water. However, emotional wakes are much tougher to spot. How do you know they’re building? Try this: Notice when you begin to force or feel anxious about making your point. That’s your chance to apply soft skills. Without them, the conversation could capsize, and you might end up thinking:
* I didn’t mean to blurt it out
* That sharp or cutting tone was an accident
* I didn’t want to overlook someone’s feelings
* Ugh—I lost my temper and now I’ll have to live down that story for the next 6 months!
Soft skills aren’t tricky or complicated—they’re as easy as 1, 2, 3! So, use these three ways to watch your wake so your passion, depth of knowledge, or eye for detail don’t cause a mishap. Here’s the recap along with the breakdown of soft skills working as a What and How:
We’ve all found ourselves in the wreckage of someone else’s wake, scrambling to pick up the pieces. But you don’t have to be that character. The next time emotions swell, don’t let them take you overboard—manage your response through soft skills.