Biological Energy Crisis In Leadership

In the past few years, I have been locking down my understanding of human psychophysiology in order to understand how we can create better Leaders.

I was reading a research paper today that showed some troubling information.

Just so you understand, a large part of the reason Leaders struggle isn't due to a lack of skills or desire, but because their psychophysiology is struggling.

When you get to the roots of the problem, you realize that it's actually an energy problem, as in your body isn't getting the fuel it needs to succeed.

The common technical term for energy in the body that most people use is Adenosine Triphosphate, shortened to ATP.

However, this isn't completely accurate, because truly it should be Mg-ATP that we recognize as our energy.

Mg is the short form for "Magnesium".

When we don't have enough Magnesium, we are unable to create bioavailable (useable for the body) ATP.

Now, here's the "fun" part from the research I read.

Our ancestors would regularly intake over 600 mg of Magnesium per day to help them create energy.

Today, in "developed" countries, the average consumed is around 300 mg of Magnesium.

That is about half the amount!

Do you think that could be part of the struggle?

It absolutely is - however, it gets worse!

Our levels of stress, and stress damage that isn't recovered from, all make it so we become SIGNIFICANTLY less able to create Mg-ATP.

This is because Dis-Stress causes Magnesium loss.

Also, the higher our Dis-Stress, the less efficient our bodies become at making ATP.

In our hyper Dis-Stressed world, with excessively low levels of recovery, most people are lucky to even get a 25% efficiency rate ON TOP of already having low levels of Magnesium intake.

What does this mean for Leaders?

Leaders will always feel like they lack energy.

They may "look" great on the outside, but they don't feel great deep down.

On top of this, the people around the Leader will notice that "something" is wrong, even if they can't physically see it or point to "why" they feel that way.

This is actually a function of our neurocardiology.

This feeling will lead to them not trusting you, EVEN IF you do "everything" correctly to create a safe and trusting environment.

What makes this worse is that Leaders are likely only 1 tiny event away from a complete breakdown - if they aren't already completely burnt out.

The truth becomes worse when you realize that the stats show that 75% to 89% of everyone are already COMPLETELY Burnt Out.

This means for 7-9 out of 10 people, they are already past the breaking point.

Leading anyone under these conditions becomes extremely difficult, and significantly more when you know YOU are one of those 7-9 people.

So, what's the solution here?

Add a lot more Magnesium?

Actually, no!

The human body always works on scales - too little OR too much of anything can become extremely detrimental.

This is true with Magnesium as well.

You can only process so much Magnesium in your body at one time, and if you do TOO MUCH it becomes a Dis-Stress, and actually backfires!

Due to the low efficiency, you wouldn't be able to intake enough Magnesium to meet what your body requires, without causing Dis-Stress.

This means that we do need "some" more Magnesium, BUT perhaps more importantly, we need to reduce our Dis-Stress!

When we reduce our Dis-Stress and recover from the damage we already have our efficiency increases.

With increased efficiency, we can then actually USE more Magnesium to create the energy we are severely lacking right now.

This is the key to both our Biological Energy Crisis and our Leadership Crisis.

If we can begin to fix this in our lives, there may be hope for the future.