Just Be Vulnerable and Dig Out the Old Books

I confess that I am an ardent lover of self-help books. My bookshelf brims with books about “Daring Greatly”, “Winning Friends and Influence”, and “Tidying Up.” Page by page, I trusted that I was putting myself one step closer to living a perfect life. Yet, with each book completed, I still felt light years away from transforming into the ideal person I wanted to be. How could I become that person?

We’ve all met them. Those ethereal people who handle whatever life throws at them with unmatched serenity. Who aren’t defensive in the face of criticism. Whose reactions are even-keeled at all times. Nothing, not even what other people say to them, seems to impact them.

We watch in awe as they exude this quiet, yet powerful, energy and ask ourselves: “How can I be like them?”

And so, when Sarah Deane, Founder of EffectUX and creator of the Energy Management Quotient (EMQ), described the path to reaching this nirvana, I took notice — for many reasons. Not only because tons of research and science backed the EMQ approach. Not only because she herself seemed to exude this palpable energy. The main reason was that her approach was the polar opposite of my own. Instead of accumulating books, she proposed “digging out the old books.”

Your brain basically has a library in your head… It comes down to the information you have stored. If the information in your library is wrong, you’re seeing things inaccurately.

Unlike those on my bookshelf, however, these were not literal books. Rather, these referred to the stories we accumulate throughout our entire life that form our beliefs and determine how we view things. As Sarah described it, “Your brain basically has a library in your head… It comes down to the information you have stored. If the information in your library is wrong, you’re seeing things inaccurately.”

For example, if someone feels like a failure, why? Do they feel the need to be a perfectionist? What are the origins of these feelings? No one comes out of the womb feeling like a failure, so where did the story come from? The stories and books that we hold in our library arise from our unique experiences, childhood, culture, and society. These stories, as incomplete or inaccurate as they may be, are the lens through which we parse everything that we see, hear, and experience. As such, to improve our lives and achieve excellence, we must remove the stories — “dig out the old books” — that no longer serve us and, in doing so, remove the mindsets and behaviors that block us.

No one comes out of the womb feeling like a failure, so where did the story come from?

This was revolutionary to me. All these self-help books I had come to love appealed to me because I felt that I shared a common problem with the authors. Further, they not only had solved the problem for themselves, but also had shared “universal” solutions that, if followed, were supposed to solve the issue for others as well. Now, I realize that, while our problems may have been the same, the underlying causes were undoubtedly different. I had different childhood and adult experiences and grew up in a different culture than they did. As a result, the stories and books in my library would be different as well.

If their solutions were sledgehammers, the EMQ approach with its personalized roadmap was a chisel, bespoke for me and me alone. I will need to tailor the solutions to my problems to my specific stories and books that I held in my library. Doing so will require me to be vulnerable and dig deep to understand my own stories.

I am just beginning my EMQ development plan, focusing first on the capacity competency of “Internalization.” There are eight such capacity competencies; I list the 12 factors of the model below and encourage everyone to read about them in greater detail on the EMQ website. To know which ones are blocking or energizing you the most strongly, you’ll need to take the EMQ evaluation.

• Purpose and Meaning
• Solution Focused
• Achievement
• Awareness
• Authenticity
• Basic Wellbeing and Self Care
• Positive Outlook
• Accountability
• Mindful Practice
• Support
• Alignment (Time and Task Control)
• Relationships

I do not believe that this EMQ evaluation will lead me to a perfect life — in reality, such a belief is unreasonable. Rather, I am optimistic that this endeavor will take me many steps closer to living an optimal life. I am excited to do so alongside fellow friends and classmates, all on our respective individual journeys together.