One of the most impactful things you can do as a leader is to cultivate a high-performance mindset. Why is it important?
As a tech leader, the amount of pressure and information you are asked to absorb and manage can be overwhelming.
Many tech leaders experience an overload of new priorities, information, and deadlines. These reduce productivity and kick off a negative feedback loop: Leadership performance drops, cognitive abilities exhaust, and more energy needs to be invested, only to achieve fewer outcomes.
This happened to me about 10 years ago as I reached a point of mental exhaustion. It was clear I needed more balance. Therefore, I decided to focus more on how I can thrive in a fast-paced environment of constant change, information overload, and many deadlines and priorities.
Through mindfulness training, I started to cultivate more awareness in my life and discovered the power of mindfulness.
This motivated me to study the human body and its system on the cellular level, micronutrients, and epigenetics, as this was the missing puzzle piece toward achieving a high-performance mindset. The process I used is called "biohacking" and I wrote an introduction to biohacking here.
For example, if your brain (the hardware) doesn't have sufficient resources and energy levels, the mind (the software) will not be able to flourish.
I noticed that the mind and body are complex systems at the end of the day. Since they are software systems, they can be hacked, upgraded, and improved.
What are the components of a high-performance mindset?
Thus, these are 3 components of a high-performance mindset:
High Level of Present Awareness (LPA)
Optimized mind, the "software"
Optimized body, the "hardware"
How do these 3 components work together and build a high-performance mindset?
The mind is running as software in the brain. Similar to big and complex software, there are glitches that need to be debugged and rewritten. If you make this a priority and start rewriting your ”mind operating system”, you can think better and clearer - literally.
The third one now is taking proper care of your body and brain to make sure your well-being and your overall health are in an optimal state.
Our body is made up of a community of 37 trillion cells. Then there are your genes. They are the blueprint of how your body is built; they are given to you.
But epigenetics allows you to modify the expressions of those genes!
Think about epigenetics as the software that runs on top of your genes. Since it's software, you can modify it.
Incredible, isn't it?
Now you can see that there's software in the body and the mind. If you start working on both, you will get amazing results!
However, to get those remarkable and transformative results, it is required to have a high level of present awareness (LPA).
Without awareness, nothing is going to work, and nothing will last! A high LPA will keep you alert and provide you with the necessary persistence to generate sustainable results.
Furthermore, accountability and commitment will be supported through a high level of presence. You may fall back into old habits, but presence will hold you accountable and get you back on track.
Awareness is the underlying superpower to ensure that you successfully rewrite the software of your body and mind.
So, always cultivate more awareness in your life through mindfulness. I encourage you to read the blog article on "measurable mindfulness" to find out how to measure your progress using the latest tech and neurofeedback.
Awareness is the driver; therefore, a high LPA is required to upgrade your mind and body.
Rewrite the Software of your Body and Mind
Now, at this point, you might be asking: What is then the programming language to rewrite the software?
The programming language of the mind is rooted in neuroscience. There are many methodologies you can use to rewrite the software and change the patterns in your subconscious mind, eliminating old reactive patterns, limiting beliefs, and stagnant energy that is no longer needed.
For the body, the programming language is the science of Epigenetics.
Epigenetics allows you to make changes to your lifestyle.
I'll give you a high-impact example here: food.
Food is information.
You feed your body with information. When your body breaks down the food, it creates the molecules that are absorbed and distributed in your bloodstream. These molecules are basically the instructions of the programming language that your body understands. Depending on what information you feed the body, here's where you rewrite the software of your body. This is why you should become aware of what you eat!
Conclusion
To summarize, to upgrade your body and mind and achieve a high-performance mindset, you should rewrite the software of your body and mind.
However, it can only work if you have a sufficient level of awareness. I encourage you to start cultivating more awareness in your life and hacking your mind and body to become the best version of yourself.
These three pillars are fundamental, and the art is mixing and combining different methods from each effectively.
Take Action:
I have developed a data-driven 12-week training program, "The High-Performance Mind," leveraging the latest science and technology to assist senior tech leaders in optimizing their mind and brain performance to thrive in high-pressure environments.
There is also a starter edition available, which is a light-weight approach on getting started, taking some action, and actually making some progress toward achieving a state of a high-performance mindset.
You can reach out and contact me for an exploratory (free) get-to-know meeting, where I can outline some strategies based on your unique situation and objectives. This is my gift to you, and I encourage you to take advantage of it!
Take the first step today and be the best version of yourself!