How to reach your ideal clients without ignoring the political elephant in the room

They say fear shouts louder than love.

If so, how do you deal with the marauding political elephant in the room at the moment? Coming up in discussions time and again recently, is the problem of how to deal with the fallout and fear being created by public shows of poor behaviour but without further antagonism. How do you reach your ideal clients without the drama of political polarisation?

What my clients really want to do is to get in with their stretcher and save the injured without having to go into battle themselves. Being compassionate people they care deeply about what’s going on and want to make a difference but equally don’t want to add to the negative energy by wading in.

What do you do?

Pause

Put on your own oxygen mask first. Twee but true. One of the best ways I’ve found of doing this is through meditation. I’ve had a few bits of feedback about this suggestion from people who find it difficult to clear the mind. So I here are a few alternatives to sitting in silence:

• Moving meditation – Stand feet apart somewhere where you’re safe to move and allow this track by Sonic Yogi to flow through you and move you as it will.

• Visualisation – I love Wake Up To The Joy Of You by Agapi Stassinopoulos. With a little commentary and then an invitation to journey into your imagination, it’s the perfect way to engage with rather than fight against the creative mind.

• Flow – set aside some time to mindfully complete a task. I love gardening and baking but it can be anything like DIY or changing the bed. Prepare yourself, your tools and your materials. Immerse yourself in the task and then dedicate time to clear up and make good.

Observe

I’m halfway through Let Them by Mel Robbins. The notion of ‘let them’ acknowledges that we cannot control the behaviours, actions and words of others. The other half of the equation ‘let me’ hands us back the cards to choose what we want to do with our own reactions and emotions. It doesn’t mean that we don’t care about others' welfare or let people get away with appalling behaviour but it does lead to greater self-intention

We can detach ourselves from the drama unfolding in a LinkedIn thread, for example, or a heated discussion between colleagues. ‘Let them’ allows us to observe while ‘let me’ gives us the space to decide if we need to intervene or walk away.

Pick up a copy of the book, it’s an excellent read.

Try

Leverage the curiosity you already have about human behaviour to alleviate suffering. In her book Happy Days Gabrielle Bernstein talks about how we can use displays of fear as a signpost to growth.

• What can you pull from your toolkit to help ease the situation and redirect people to love?

• How can you use patterns you observe around you to guide your content strategy

• How can you help people to help themselves?

And what do to with the elephant?

Well, he’s going to be there: big and round and grey. Whilst the elephant is (for now) immovable you are in an invaluable position to help balance shaken nervous systems. Make your ideas on love, justice, equality, cohesion, compassion and connection clear and put them centre stage.

In effect, reach your ideal clients by amplifying love, so that it's louder than fear.

And remember that all elephants are grey. They may be big but we can make them boring.