We know that nothing in the world moves without energy, it’s a physics principle. Interestingly, when we talk about energy in a group, or even one’s body, energy work is sometimes (luckily less and less so) seen as fluff. In my experience there is nothing fluffy about it – it is hard, and it is hard work to shift the energy in a group, a team or oneself.
I learned from my training in Energy Leadership to always have an antenna out for the energy in the room. I look for who brings what kind of energy to the overall feel of being there at that moment. In most groups, larger than 10 to 15, I usually find some people with positive energy and some with negative energy. If the leader of the group has positive energy we are off to a good start. If that person exudes negative energy we have a problem. One can lead for a bit with negative energy, the energy of anger and threat, of intimidation and force, but it’s not sustainable. As soon as threats and fears are removed cooperation stops. Negative (destructive) energy can also be victim energy – a sense of helplessness. If the leader comes in like that, complaining about forces beyond his or her control, accompanied by resignation that there is not much we can do, then the leader can’t possibly hope to lead.
Positive energy is always accompanied by options, an openness to find other ways, listen rather than talk in order to better understand others’ perspectives, ‘stand under’ their reality. As a sometime facilitator and sometime coach, I have to be very aware of my own energy, my own tendency to label and judge (“oh, that person is a problem in this group”). I have to catch myself and try to understand where someone comes from. And the only way to do that is through inquiry, the art of asking good open questions, or, as my teacher Judith E.Glaser, the creator of Conversational Intelligence™, always said: questions for which you have no answers. Such questions open doors, and the more doors are open the more fresh winds can blow through the group: seeing more options, having more creativity as people build on each other’s’ ideas. Instead of expending energy to fight or flee, we can liberate that energy to co-create.
We know that being full of negative energy or being around people with negative energy is stressful. We know that the hormone cortisol is released when we are under stress. We also know that in the complexity of biochemistry, the creation of cortisol takes energy or chemical precursors away from making other hormones that would follow a different pathway, creating biochemical changes that would more protective and health-promoting.
Here is an experiment: in your next meeting try to sense the energy in the room and the energy individuals bring into the mix. Then join those with positive energy and see what you can accomplish. Imagine what would happen if you were to join those with negative energy. Energy, whether positive or negative is infectious. Better contaminate others with your positive energy than your negative energy; it’s the difference between building up and tearing down, nourishing and depleting.