Control is a byproduct of your approach to the system you live within

Systems thinking is a wonderful construct that help us make sense of the world around us. Instead of going through the motions and feeling powerless, we start to see how we influence the very systems that influence us.

Imagine a coworker that drives you crazy. Every interaction is more painful than necessary. Every conversation is strained. The difficulty of every task gets magnified.

If we interview the two of you separately, we will likely notice that each feels the other is to blame. This finger pointing is so common I don’t need a real example. In fact, almost everyone can relate to this but will still preface it with, “but this time it was them, not me.”

But this is us shedding our control over the system. It takes two to create this structure even though we always feel innocent and victimized by their bad behavior.

Now, it could be true that they are difficult to work with. But I’d bet that most situations involve people that get along fine with some but not with others. Why? Because that is human nature. Just about everyone fits this category – we get along with some people but not everyone.

Through the System Lens

Once we dissect this situation using systems thinking, we start to see the interaction creating the friction. We see that one side said or did something that created an emotional response from the other side. That emotional response created another emotional response to the originating offender.

This creates a feedback loop. When one person frustrates or upsets the other, their reaction is more likely negative. This gets both sides hurting each other.

But the system shows us that there are ways to mitigate the feedback loop. It can be stopped by either side changing their reaction. Yet time and time again I hear individuals caught in this frame of mind unable to accept that they can create a better outcome.

Why is this the case? Because it is difficult when someone pisses you off to respond with kindness instead of agitation. It is easier to get defensive. It often means saying something hurtful to them. We certainly don’t find it natural to praise them when they just attacked us.

We say it isn’t our fault, it is their fault. And we have good reason. We even have proof that it is their fault. It is their fault. Unfortunately, it is also your fault. Instead of a judge determining fault in a car accident where one side is guilty and other innocent, most real-world situations contain two guilty parties arguing over who is more guilty.

Two Wrongs

My mom used to always tell us that two wrongs don’t make a right. I hated this saying because I heard it way too often. Having two brothers, we naturally got into sibling tiffs. But now that I am a parent, I find myself using this saying to explain to my daughters why they are both to blame for the argument.

What we all need to understand is that when we start to see the system for what it is (a system) we start to realize where the control lies. There is control within the system. But it isn’t an omnipotent control with dominion over everything.

The control hides. It forms pockets of control within a system that is powerful. But it is there. There are leverage points in the systems that allow us to influence the system.

Note that I said influence the system. I didn’t say we gain the power to fully control the system. Most of the systems we interact with in life, we are participating in, we don’t oversee.

That participation means we don’t experience full control. But it also means we don’t give up all control. When we start to interact with the system, we experience partial control.

Continuum of Control

Now that we can look at control on a continuum and we know we aren’t on the extreme ends of full control or completely controlled by the system, we can choose how we respond to the system. This choosing results in more or less control depending on the decisions we make.

We can find those pockets of control that are available. We can see that if we want a certain response from the system that we may need to take a novel approach. We may need to stop the feedback loop by biting our lip. While that may be challenging, the result can be a system where you have a better output.

Martin Luther King, Jr said, “Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”

This is the essence of systems thinking. He sees that the system perpetuates around itself. Feed it with hate and the system magnifies that hate. If we want love, we can’t hate others to get there. Even when you feel fully justified to hate another person, that isn’t going to create love.

As you can see, the control within the system comes from how we interact with that system. We influence the outcome. We participate in it. We can find leverage and control and grow our ability to create the right systems in our life. Or we can continue to push blame on other parts of the system, for the system that we ignore yet still partake.

Burnout

Most of us have felt the sting of burnout in life. Typically, from work, we feel sluggish and worn out. We find it difficult to be efficient and accurate and settle for getting tasks checked off our to do list, regardless of how well they are tackled.

In a great book by Chris Bailey, How to Calm Your Mind: Finding Presence and Productivity in Anxious Times, the author addresses control. He says about control, “This factor is rooted in several issues, including how much autonomy we have, whether we have the resources to deliver work that we’re proud of, and whether we have the freedom to shape the projects we’re working on. Research shows that the more control we have over our work the higher our job satisfaction and performance, and the more resilient our mental health.”

Control from Within

So, if we want calm and we want to avoid burnout, learn how to find the control within the system. Because as Bailey mentioned, research shows that control has a major impact on our state of mind. I will take it a step further and say control is a byproduct of your approach to the system you live within so if you aren’t getting what you want in the systems of life, tweak your approach.

This all points to our job satisfaction and performance being related to the control we have in life, which isn’t fixed. It is variable. We choose how much control we exhibit in any given situation. So, when we want more control so we gain more satisfaction and better performance, look inward to understand how to acquire that control.