4
The Law of Energy

“Our energy is in proportion to the resistance it meets.”

—William Hazlitt, seventeenth-century essayist

A few years ago I was hired by Rick, the director of undergraduate career counseling at a university, to conduct a series of workshops about interviewing skills. At the end of one of the sessions we went back to his office to chat about the immediate student feedback, which had been extremely enthusiastic. A former student who took my workshop the year before had joined me in my presentation to share how he had put the techniques he’d learned into action and landed his first-choice job. Rick and I were both beaming as we discussed how the students seemed to be incorporating the skills we were teaching them.

Then we had to wrap up our conversation because Rick had a one-on-one meeting scheduled with a student. At that point, I observed a distinct change in Rick’s energy. The smile disappeared, his body seemed to tense up, and his demeanor became distracted. I wondered if I had said or done something to upset him, and asked him. It turned out that the meeting he was about to have was with a student who, in his words, drove him crazy.

The student had been scheduling meetings with him practically every week, showing up to their sessions a fuming ball of energy. The student would rapidly detail all the contact he’d had with recruiters since their last session, and whenever he didn’t hear back from a recruiter he would vehemently denounce Rick’s advice. Rick knew that it was his job to help the student, and wanted to do so, but the student’s aggressive, offensive attitude put Rick on the defense. Rick found it difficult to deal with the student in an instructive way. As Rick told me about this situation he got completely worked up, talking more rapidly and sitting forward in his chair in an agitated way.

“I’m dreading the appointment,” he told me. “I always feel so frustrated and useless after meeting with this student, and he walks into my office with such an attitude.”

I listened attentively, indicating that I could empathize with the dread he was feeling about the upcoming meeting. Then I said to him, “Let’s try something. Tell me about a student you really like.” Rick told me about another student he was working with one-on-one, but this student he found to be dynamic, proactive, and engaging. In fact, Rick was able to successfully connect the student with an important recruiter. As he told me this story, his tone of voice became lighter, his body relaxed, and suddenly he was smiling again.

“Okay,” I said, “I want you to keep this second student in mind, the one you really admire, until the problematic student walks in the door. See if you get a different response from him than what you are used to.” He agreed to give it a try.

Later that afternoon, Rick called me. “That was so great!” he said. “It totally worked! I had a completely different kind of interaction, and our meeting was positive and productive.” He couldn’t get the words out fast enough.

Whenever we saw one another, Rick kept me posted about his progress with this student. Future interactions between the two of them continued getting better, and eventually he came to not only understand and more effectively assist the student, but to like him as well.

During any interaction, each person involved transmits energy that affects the dynamic of that relationship. Becoming more conscious of how we are acting and feeling, how the other person is acting and feeling, and what that combination contributes to our encounters is a powerful tool for harnessing likability and building meaningful connections. Often we are not even aware of the energy we ourselves are giving off. Energy impacts our communication, and it can either work for us or against us.

Energy Is Contagious

Think about a recent situation that went well for you. If you had to describe your mood during that moment and your approach to the situation, what would you say? Whatever words you use, describe the vibe you were giving off and the energy you were putting out. Your description should encapsulate the feeling the other person or people were getting from you, perhaps even before you said a word.

Sometimes people might even sum up their natural energy and approach to life as a motto: “Never let them see you sweat,” or “You’re never fully dressed without a smile.” These are their words to live by, and they can encapsulate energy in a distilled, tangible way. Energy is derived from both your natural personality and your actual mood in a moment. You can feel your own energy in your body, your face, your stance, even in the way you are breathing. Other people pick up on these signals and on the words you choose in a given moment. Likewise, you pick up on the energy of others and respond to it in kind.

The kind of energy we bring to a situation impacts the ways our interactions with the world unfold. Energy is contagious—that is the law of energy. Our own output of energy can energize other people or deflate them, contribute to productivity or add to the confusion. Energy affects the course of interactions and facilitates connections.

Your energy during an interaction will be picked up on by others and influence the outcome. What you give off is what you get back, so getting your energy to an optimal place before entering a situation can make all the difference. The key is to enable the energy that is going to best serve the situation. When we understand that energy is something we create, we can work on driving the energy rather than having it drive us. In other words, know what energy is most useful to bring to a given situation or when dealing with a specific person, and get yourself to that optimal place so that you can better influence the outcome.

Finding Energy That Works

To be perceived as authentic and sincere, you must be true to yourself and your energy in a situation. The key isn’t to artificially be the peppiest person in the room. It’s far more important to be sincere. But this doesn’t mean letting a bad day ride roughshod over you and the energy you are putting out to others either. We can put forth positive energy that is sincere, even when faced with challenges, difficulties, or distractions. This is a fundamental part of connecting effectively. Learning how to put out the right energy at the right time in the right place—and doing it authentically—is a fundamental part of effectively connecting with others. Authentic positive energy is likable.

To understand how the law of energy works, consider three questions:

1. Where is your energy right now?

2. Where is the other person’s energy?

3. What energy knowledge do you possess about yourself, and about the energy expectations that exist between you and the other person?

You First: Where Is Your Energy Right Now?

To harness our energy to the best effect, we must be in tune with it. That means knowing what vibe we are giving off at any given moment, determining how well it is working, and if necessary, adjusting it.

Rick was completely unaware that he was helping to create unpleasant interactions with his aggressive student. By approaching those meetings with dread—which, as I saw firsthand, he was clearly indicating with his body language and tone of voice—he was transmitting a negative vibe to his student. The fact that their sessions were difficult was a self-fulfilling prophecy. Once Rick adjusted his approach and brought a more open and positive energy to their sessions, he was able to start successfully connecting with the student. The student picked up on Rick’s positive vibe, became less combative, and was able to accomplish some truly productive work.

As Albert Einstein said, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Assess your output of energy in a situation and, if you see that it could be improved, don’t be afraid to change it. If necessary, you can tap into memories of other times you’ve naturally exuded positive energy and harness these recollections to adjust your approach to a new situation or person. Remember, too, that it is sometimes necessary to lead by example. Depending on the energy that other people are bringing to the interaction, it may take them a while to respond to your shift, but by taking action and making adjustments, you are making the first step in bringing around more positive results.

Next, Them: Where Is the Other Person’s Energy?

A connection is something that, by virtue of what it is, requires two people. To impact the energy of a situation in the most positive way, we need to be aware not only of our energy signals, but the other person’s energy signals, too.

There are many times when we already instinctively do this. When we call someone and the person answers with a “Hello,” we immediately interpret the energy on the other end of the line through this single word and the way it was delivered. Was it curt, chipper, or guarded?

Body language, tone of voice, and rate of speech are all indicators of someone’s energy. Someone who is making sweeping arm gestures and talking a mile a minute in a scattered way gives off a completely different vibe than someone who is speaking calmly and reflectively with arms crossed in a manner that indicates careful contemplation.

Be open to the fact that your interpretations of energy signals might need more clarity to be fully accurate. Downcast eyes and crossed arms might indicate that someone is uninterested or bored, but, in a different context, those gestures might just mean that the person is giving the matter further thought. If you are unsure of the messages someone is sending, ask questions to gain clarity. Be aware of your timing and tone when making such inquiries, and use neutral language. You can broach your desire for clarification with such phrases as:

• Would it help to talk through anything?

• What else is on your mind?

• What do you think about that?

• Is everything okay?

Energy Has Power

In addition to harnessing your own energy, understanding the energy that others bring to a situation is vital to impacting the overall shape of the encounter—and its outcome.

The most powerful experience I’ve had, to date, happened while conducting a seminar in conflict resolution at a government agency where employees of many different ethnicities worked. In the morning we focused on the best language to use when addressing workplace conflicts, the different approaches that can be taken to resolve conflicts, and how to improve communication. At the end of the day, I paired off the staff members to discuss and verbalize real workplace conflicts.

One woman told her partner that she’d overheard one of their coworkers, an Irish-American woman, say about a client, “My word, why can’t people just speak English?” The comment had really hurt the woman who was relating the anecdote. She herself was Latina and she’d taken the comment as a personal affront. She told her partner that after this happened, she found it difficult to work next to the woman or even speak to her, and in truth hadn’t spoken one word to her since the incident.

I asked this woman if we could share the conflict with the group. She agreed, and so I asked her to relay the story to everyone. As she did so, her words, tone of voice, and body language all expressed the very strong anger she felt about the situation. Immediately I could feel the rest of the group picking up on it. “You’re kidding me!” one woman shouted. “That’s completely unacceptable!” a man barked from the back of the room. With what felt like the flick of a switch, the group energy had become aggressive and hostile, and it just kept intensifying. It felt as if a mob mentality had suddenly taken over the room.

“Okay, hold on for a second,” I said. “Is it possible that this comment was taken out of context? Do you know the full extent of the client case history? Or what the exact exchange between the client and the worker was?” The group appeared willing to listen, so I continued. “Let’s think for a moment about what else may have motivated this coworker’s comment.” As the group began to discuss the different possibilities, the vibe in the room changed. Someone suggested that maybe the woman was frustrated by her inability to do her job. Another person suggested that perhaps the woman was afraid of losing her job because she was not bilingual. The Latina woman who’d originally related the anecdote even ventured that by not trying to understand the full context of the situation before taking offense at it, perhaps she had helped perpetuate the hostile work environment that she was complaining about. By the end of the session, the aggressive energy had dissipated and evolved into curiosity and even sympathy. By probing the situation and relinquishing fixed, rigid assumptions, the group was able to change its energy from negative to at least neutral and open, clearing the way to resolve the conflict in the most constructive way.

Understanding the energy of a person or a group of people enables us to more productively connect with them. In the end, it is not about isolated individuals, but about how those individuals share their energies to interact, understand one another, and connect.

Let’s imagine one scenario with three possible outcomes. Let’s say there is a couple, Sheila and Charles, on their way to an event. Sheila is driving and she’s gotten rather lost, which makes her anxious that they’ll be late. As she gets more and more turned around she gets more and more upset, frantically expressing that she doesn’t know what to do. She hates being late.

Charles, sitting in the passenger seat, knows Sheila hates to be late. In the first possible outcome, he meets Sheila’s panic with anger and shouting. Now, not only are they lost and running late, but they’re also in a fight. Charles exacerbated Sheila’s panic by reacting to the moment’s negative energy with more negative energy, feeding it back to Sheila until the situation is spinning out of control.

In the second possible outcome, Charles responds to Sheila’s panic with a casual “Calm down, it’s no big deal. Who cares if we’re late?” Clearly Sheila cares if they’re late, even if Charles doesn’t, and she interprets Charles’s nonchalance as him not listening to and understanding what she is saying. She may even read more into it, hearing the unspoken message in his words that her reaction is unreasonable and irrational. She gets even more upset.

In the third possible outcome, Charles says to Sheila, in a concerned tone, “I know you hate being late.” Then, in a slightly more relaxed tone, but still sounding attentive, he says, “Okay, we have about fifteen minutes to get there. Should we call and let them know we’re lost? Maybe they can give us directions.” Now he’s trying to meet Sheila close to where she is and help her shift away from her panic to a mindset that is better for her and the situation. Charles is demonstrating that he is concerned, interested, and understands Sheila’s problem, and his energy matches hers in seriousness but is several notches more calm. He is not flat-out taking control in a way that would further set her off, but rather posing a question to create constructive energy so that they can both participate in solving the problem.

I call this third response suggestive or probing questioning. The key is to remember that you might not get the answer you are hoping for, and you have to be all right with that. Otherwise, you are not truly asking a question but rather issuing a statement with a question mark attached to it, and this doesn’t keep the situation open to mutual resolution. If you don’t get the answer you hoped you would, consider what else might be useful for the situation and try another tack.

The previous example is a social situation, but the same principles hold true in the business world. Mood and energy levels can shift positively or negatively depending on the actions and reactions of colleagues. A young colleague of mine, who was a few weeks into her new job, became upset that certain recruiting promises weren’t being kept. She expressed her displeasure to an equally junior coworker, and he responded with a shock and outrage that matched her own. Feeding on that energy being reflected directly back at her, the woman marched over to HR and complained.

As it turns out, the recruiting promises were going to be kept, but the woman was so new on the job that she didn’t yet understand the company’s procedures. Luckily the situation blew over, though she of course deeply regretted filing the complaint, and even more deeply regretted having shared her dismay with that particular coworker. It immediately altered the course of their relationship, based on the woman’s newly gathered energy knowledge.

Building Context: What Energy Knowledge Do You Possess?

Energy knowledge is what you know about your own energy, and what you know about the energy that exists between you and another person, based on past experiences. Being aware of our energy knowledge is key. This awareness allows us to project the energy we want others to see, communicate effectively in day-to-day situations, and adjust our energy under special circumstances to affect the most positive outcomes. Knowledge is power, and energy knowledge is no exception.

Your Energy Knowledge of You

We all have an energy persona. This persona is driven by our natural personality and general outlook on life—how we tend to view and react to different situations. What do you already know about your own energy? And are you aware of how other people read it? Even when the energy we are transmitting is good, it is important to understand what it is, and to adjust it at times to achieve varying results. “Good” energy doesn’t necessarily mean “happy.” Rather, it means whatever is productive and authentic for the situation and for you in that situation.

My friend Mary is a reporter by profession and naturally inquisitive, often asking lots of questions about what’s going on in her friends’ lives when they get together. But she noticed that frequently her friends didn’t ask questions of her in return. Her energy persona was one of natural, perhaps constant, curiosity, and it was apparent to her friends, but to build the friendships in a way that opened up avenues for more give-and-take, Mary had to consciously adjust her natural tendency to ask questions and insert her own experiences at the right moments during these conversations. Sure, there were one or two friends who were too self-absorbed to pick up on Mary’s effort to adjust her energy, but most of her friends, whether consciously or not, noticed and began talking to Mary about what was going on in her own life.

One of my clients, a woman named Carrie, has a gregarious personality and radiates a “you can lean on me” vibe. She is proud of being there for her friends when they are going through something difficult, and she is often the one to call and check in on them when the chips are down. Then she went through her own difficult time and was deeply dismayed to find that her phone didn’t ring. People weren’t checking in on her the way she did with them. She approached her closest friends to find out why and was shocked by their responses. “It doesn’t seem like you want help,” one of them said to her, and another said, “You seem so strong, you never seem to need anyone’s help.” Her competent, tough-girl energy made her friends think that she didn’t want or need help, when exactly the opposite was true. By letting down her guard and toning down her ultra-strong vibe, shifting her energy to become more vulnerable with friends, she was able to get the support she needed and that her friends actually wanted to give her.

Understanding our own energy lets us know when it’s working for us and when it’s working against us. Adjustments to that energy at critical times can alter the energy of a given situation, making it more productive and fulfilling for all involved, increasing likability and the opportunities for connections.

Your Energy Knowledge of Others

As soon as we meet people for the first time, we begin building our energy knowledge about them. If you have an established relationship with someone, ask yourself: What energy knowledge exists between us? When dealing with the energy between two people, it is important to manage expectations. I call these “energy expectations.” Why does someone seek you out in a particular situation, and what makes you turn to certain other people? These choices are based on the energy knowledge we have of one another, so they are our energy expectations. Who do you approach when trying to figure out how to handle a situation with a coworker? Who is the first person you turn to when you want help solving a problem in an out-of-the-box way? Who do you seek out when you need to take a break and are looking for some fun or casual banter?

By understanding our energy expectations of other people, we can be clear about what we are looking for and communicate our need to them. Energy knowledge reduces miscommunications and frustrations. Although energy knowledge and energy expectations are valuable tools in deepening connections and attaining positive results, understand that there is always the possibility our expectations in a given situation won’t be met. Don’t use those moments to discard the energy knowledge you’ve accrued, but adjust your thinking so that you can determine if there is someone else you can approach to achieve your desired results. Stay open, too, to the possibility that your energy expectations may at times miss the mark and need to be reassessed.

Likewise, it is extremely useful to be aware of other people’s energy expectations of us. This helps us more effectively accomplish what is expected of us. This knowledge can also help us decide when to consciously not fulfill those expectations if doing so would be detrimental.

As an example, a good friend of mine, Bryan, shared this story about an encounter with his coworker, Jay, who came to him complaining about their boss. Jay groused about how the boss wouldn’t sign off on a project, even though Jay had reworked it what seemed countless times. In the past, Jay had sought Bryan’s support and wanted him to take his side when he butted heads with the boss. Bryan knew that this was Jay’s energy expectation of him, but he also knew that it wasn’t going to help the situation any to fulfill that expectation. Bryan simply asked him, “Do you just want to vent, or do you want my advice?” He gave Jay those two options, essentially asking Jay how he wanted to proceed, but without giving any indication that he’d join Jay in bad-mouthing the boss.

When faced with only those options, Jay asked for Bryan’s advice. Bryan told him that he understood how frustrating the situation must be, but that maybe what Jay needed instead was a debriefing about the project with the boss, to cohesively assess trouble spots, rather than reflexively responding to criticism in increments. Jay did eventually complete the project, and Bryan had helped him by not fulfilling the immediate energy expectations.

What we want—that is, our energy expectations—may not be what gets us a desired result. In other words, people are not always looking for productive energy. There is no sure-fire way to deal with this possibility. Ask yourself, what would help at that moment? And what would help in the long run? If it would help, ask the other person these questions too. Seek to strike a balance between what they want and what might actually serve them best. If you give in to unproductive or destructive energy expectations, could it possibly harm the relationship or adversely affect the situation?

Our authentic energy is generally a consistent thing, but there are always moments when it may be adversely influenced by internal or external forces. This doesn’t negate the energy knowledge we’ve accumulated, but rather reminds us how to harness what we know about energy to create positive outcomes even in challenging situations.

The Networking Application: Another Kind of Energy

Some people have a visceral negative response to the word networking. Others relish it, and some of us, well, our reaction depends on our energy at that moment and what we anticipate of the situation.

Use your energy knowledge of yourself to determine your networking energy. Under what circumstances does your best authentic energy come through? For instance, do you have the most natural positive energy during lunch or dinner situations, where you talk in a focused way with one or two people at your table? Or is your natural energy best at events such as cocktail receptions, where there is the opportunity to have brief interactions with many different people? Do you connect most positively with others at daytime events, or at those that happen after working hours?

Our energy ebbs and flows with different situations, locations, atmospheres, and times of day. Once we understand our networking energy, we can use it to create opportunities that align most fruitfully with how we naturally are. When you choose situations in which you are most comfortable—in other words, those that match your networking energy—your authentic self emerges.

Remember, though, that it’s important to stretch yourself. This doesn’t mean pretending to be comfortable when you’re not, but rather actively shifting your energy in certain situations to broaden the scope and depth of your interactions. If your energy persona is naturally boisterous and you find that you are often at the center of conversations in networking situations, you may want to show that you can also be a good listener. If you more naturally assume a thoughtful, measured approach, look for opportunities to display how you can drive conversations too. By expanding the limits of when and how we can emit our authentic energy, we increase our potential for making and building meaningful connections.