How to Keep Your Cool with the Siberian North Railroad!

Other than it being extremely cold, I know absolutely nothing about Siberia. Zero, zip, zilch, nada!  So, when my mentor and Prime Your Pump co-blogger Howie recently told me about a technique that you can use to keep your cool, I wasn’t sure if he was high or if he was messing with me.

Or both!

Shockingly, it turns out it was neither!

The reason for my skepticism was because the technique he told me about regarding how to help you keep your cool is called the Siberian North Railroad.

Wait, what?

According to My Esteemed Mentor…

The Siberian North Railroad is a technique that you can use to deal with various triggers in your life. We have all been there! Something seemingly small and insignificant happens, yet for whatever reasons it causes a disproportionately big emotional response in us.

For example, someone makes what they think is a harmless comment about something we have done, and we blow our stack. Triggers almost always have a history and bring us back to the past, we say to ourselves., “so and so is doing that again!”  Triggers can also be a source of pain for us as they are often linked to a perceived shortcoming of ours. You can think of it as someone hitting a nerve when they say something.

By using the Siberian North Railroad technique, you can not only handle those types of triggers but also other situations where you need to deal with negative or distressing emotions.

“Tell Me More!”

I inquired of my own personal Yoda with the strong New York accent! “And what the hell does it have to do with the Siberian North Railroad?”

Seeing that he now had my full attention, he went on to explain that…

The Siberian North Railroad

Is a technique that originated in Google’s Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute and is explained in the mindfulness meditation book Search Inside Yourself, written by Google employee Chade-Meng Tan.

This technique that will help you keep your cool consists of 5 steps:

(1)  Stop
(2)  Breathe
(3)  Notice
(4)  Reflect
(5)  Respond

The phrase Siberian North Railroad comes from the mnemonic SBNRR which consists of the first letter of each step. It makes the technique easier to remember.

Part of the reason it makes it easier to remember is that when you want to know how to keep your cool, just think of taking a ride on the frigid Siberian North Railroad – SBNRR!

He then went on to explain in a bit more detail…

The 5 Steps for How to Keep Your Cool Using SBNRR!

Which go like this:

(1)  Stop: Not only is this the first step but it is the most important! When something triggers you the first thing you need to do is stop. Take what is known as “the sacred pause” and do not react. According to Tan, “If you only remember one step in this practice, remember this one. In almost every instance, this one step is enough to make a big difference.” ¹

(2)  Breathe: The next step in SBNRR is to simply breathe. It helps accentuate the sacred pause while conscious deep breaths also help calm your body and mind.

(3)  Notice: After you have taken some deep breaths, the next step is to notice how you feel. Bring your attention back to your body and observe changes in your physiology in terms of tension and temperature. For example, if you are pissed off, your observation won’t be “I’m pissed off” but rather, “I am experiencing pissed-off-ness in my body”

(4)  Reflect: Once you have noticed, it is time to reflect on what is causing the emotion. Do you feel attacked or threatened? Is there some type of story or history behind it? If someone else is involved, think about their perspective. The key is to bring perspective without necessarily judging it to be correct or incorrect.

(5)  Respond: Lastly, it is time to respond. Think of ways you can respond that will bring a positive outcome to the situation. You don’t even have to do it, you just need to imagine the kindest and most positive response there is to put you in the right frame of mind.

After he walked me through the steps, I started to understand!

I then asked him if he could provide a real-life example of how he has used SBNRR to keep his cool.

Without Missing a Beat!

He told me about how he used it several days ago when he was dealing with a co-worker who kept messing up.  Apparently, the person made the same mistake several times, and it was really frustrating to Howie as he wanted to finish up, so he could go home and take a nap.

After the 4^th screwup, he was on the verge of blowing up at his incompetent colleague, so he decided to utilize SBNRR to keep his cool.

Before saying anything he simply stopped, took a few deep breaths, and noticed there was a little tension in his body. He then reflected that the person wasn’t usually this much of an idiot, the odd time sure, but not all that often.

By that time, the other person could tell something was up and asked him if everything was ok and Howie simply smiled and said, “no it’s all good, I was just reminiscing about a trip I took a long time ago to Siberia.”

It Wasn’t Until I Was Driving Home…

That I put two and two together!

You see, a few days prior to him telling me about the SBNRR technique, Howie and I met in his office to shoot some videos for Prime Your Pump.

For whatever reason, I kept screwing up the videos. Either I’d forget to ‘hit play’ on the camera or I’d accidentally hit stop halfway through. Anyway, we had to do 4 or 5 takes when usually we do it in 1 or 2.

After the 4^th time, I thought to myself, “Geez he must be getting frustrated” and apologized for my ineptness to which he didn’t say anything.

After several seconds I asked if everything was ok to which he replied, “no it’s all good, I was just reminiscing about a trip I took a long time ago to Siberia.”

Considering the fact that I was so slow on the uptake and suffering from brain freeze you would think I was the one that was in Siberia!!!

Until next time keep your cool by taking a ride on the Siberian North Railroad and as always…PYMFP!
–Rick

Use It or Lose It

The 5 steps in the Siberian North Railroad technique are as follows:

(1)  Stop
(2)  Breathe
(3)  Notice
(4)  Reflect
(5)  Respond

When to Use It:

When you want to handle triggers and know how to keep your cool.

What Do You Think?

Have you used the SBNRR for how to keep your cool or handle various triggers? Do you have another go-to technique for how to keep your cool? Please share in the comments below!

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References

Search Inside Yourself by Chade-Meng Tan