It won’t surprise you to learn that you’re not one dimensional, but rather made up of many different parts. As it happens, the human brain is made up of no less than seven main areas, each with its own role and purpose. We also know that the blood flows directly to whichever of the seven parts is in use. It’s as if the body hands the reigns to the dominant part of the brain enabling it to take control and perform as well as possible.

Among our seven brains is our emotional brain which as you’d suspect, is in charge of everything we feel. As any charity fundraiser will tell you, much of the role involves using the emotional brain, whilst trying to connect to other peoples emotional brains. Although this is really important (because working with charities needs compassion and feeling) there’s a flipside. Too much emotional brain, or an unregulated emotional brain can result in the less helpful side of emotions, like negative thoughts and disproportionate reactions.

Once caught in the cyclic trap of the emotional brain, it can be difficult to shift back into seeing things in perspective and remain buoyant; something that’s essential to carry on doing the fundraising job well.  

In this fascinating take on psychology, we look at how fundraising performance and enjoyment can be improved by learning to separate our emotional brain and our logical brain.  Our findings are based on the ground-breaking mind model created by professor Steve Peters, in his book ‘The Chimp Paradox - The Mind Management Programme for Confidence Success and Happiness’.

In the book, Steve identifies that, of the seven ‘inner brains’ that make up our larger brain, there are three clear dominant ones that make up our psychological mind.

These three ‘inner brains’ control our personality, behaviours and responses to our lives and situations around us.

The three brains of psychology

• Frontal lobe (the ‘human brain’)

• Limbic brain (the ‘chimp brain’)

• Parietal (the ‘computer brain’)

Whichever brain is in control at any given moment determines our thoughts, behaviour and relationships.

Interestingly, the frontal lobe and limbic develop entirely independently in the womb and only connect to one another later on. So arguably you could say these are two completely separate ‘beings’ within any one person.

 Once we understand that basic concept, we can start to recognise which one might be in charge at any given moment and then we can decide if that’s doing us good or doing us harm.

The human brain

When our frontal lobe or human brain is in charge, it’s usually the us we recognise as being ‘in control’ of ourselves.

When we’re thinking with our human brain we’re keeping things in perspective, we desire to understand things on a deeper level and we make opinions and beliefs based on facts and logic. We can appreciate there are many factors that contribute to being able to make a balanced judgement.

This rational approach considers all the possibilities, while we take other people’s perspectives on board, our decisions are formed after gathering information and only then do we make measured decisions.

In this human frame of mind, we are generally calm.

It’s no surprise then, that the human brain is typically the version of us that we mostly like about ourselves and how we hope we present to others.

The operational features of the human centre are things like honesty, conscience, self-control, purpose and a sense of achievement and satisfaction. Reasonable, law abiding people are often human-brain led and have taught themselves (or have been taught) to control their chimp brain.  

In short, they think before reacting.

Essentially this single feature what separates the human race from the rest of the animal kingdom. We have the ability to self-control. We can actively choose not to act upon impulse. We’re even able to delay rewards for ourselves for better gain later on.

This ability is perfectly demonstrated by anyone that’s ever dieted, studied hard or trained for a marathon. We can refuse temptation and push ourselves to do things (even when we don’t want to) for the purpose of a longer term objective.   

The chimp brain

On the other side is our limbic brain or chimp. This part of our brains entire purpose is about instinct and survival.

It’s worth nothing here that nobody gets to choose who their inner chimp is. Our chimp is a part of our DNA and genetic makeup and therefore is who it is.  

Often there are parts of our chimp that we find entirely disagreeable and unlikeable.

Everybody can relate to a time where they’ve behaved in a way that they later regret. On reflection, outrageous reactions or behaviours may be met with a total disbelief at how they could have let themselves get like that.  

The chimp side of us isn’t aligned with our aspirations about who we want to be. Rather it does whatever it likes.

 Contrary to the human brain, the chimp reacts before thinking.

These chimp reactions are basically our emotional responses. 

Of course this isn’t always a bad thing – we need emotions! ‘Good’ emotions like passion, love, empathy, happiness, loyalty, protectiveness, compassion… all make our lives richer and more meaningful. Our gut feelings which so often can’t be explained away by logic and reason make up some of our most powerful experiences and learnings.

But much as our chimp can absolutely benefit our lives and wellbeing, it often makes our lives considerably harder.

This is because of the other side of the emotional spectrum.

Anger, frustration, despair, doubt, jealousy, revenge, hate, stubbornness, malice, shame and fear can have enormous negative impact on the way we think and feel. In turn this effects our relationships, jobs, lives and sense of purpose.

Almost all of these emotions are about instinct and survival in some way. But although it’s healthy to feel these things too, when they stop us from having healthy interactions or relationships, or from do our jobs properly, or from functioning in every day tasks, we know our chimp has gotten out of control. 

The chimp brain could be described as having a life of its own, since it jumps to conclusions without any consultation with the rest of the brain.

The good news is, it’s pretty easy to spot when our ‘chimp’ has taken over when you realise it’s there. These are the times where we might

• Speculate and judge obsessively with no real evidence;

• Feel paranoid and wary with no real reason;

• Find ourselves overwhelmed with powerful emotions which stop us from getting on and progressing;

• Believe disproportionately negative things about ourselves;

• Have aggressive outbursts;

• Lose control of reasonable behaviour or thoughts

You get the idea.

Basically the chimp is in command any time we’re irrational or thinking only with our emotions and none of our logic.

The chimp and the fight, flight or freeze response

One of the most used and useful responses from our chimp brain is our fight, flight (to run) or freeze response (FFF for short).

The purpose of our FFF response is our instantly triggered to help us survive when we’re in immediate danger. We share this response with the entire animal kingdom.

Unfortunately the problem with the FFF response, is that it hasn’t evolved much since the days where cave men were hunted by predators. Rather than being chased by lions or bears, these days our perceived threats can be comparatively mild, such as going for an interview or giving a speech.

We might experience the same level of panic and anxiety over taking an exam as we would have in the old days whilst being chased by a tiger. Our chimp brain quite simply doesn’t know the difference, responding with the same gusto as ever.

When we don’t responds by fighting, running away or freezing, the chimp responds to the adrenalin with anxiety.

Anxiety is a huge feature of mental health in modern day life based on irrational fear implemented by our chimp brain. Logically we know we shouldn’t be afraid of something that isn’t going to hurt us, but that doesn’t stop us from having a meltdown at something our chimp brain has deciphered as a threat.

The problem with anxiety is how it can escalate. One uncomfortable experience can result in repeated anxiety, even when there is no reason to feel threatened. Our chimp gains momentum and perpetuates the feelings.

For example, imagine Sarah had a bad first experience on getting a train to somewhere new because she arrived at the station late and only just caught her train. Then she wasn’t sure about which stop to get off at which made her feel anxious and on edge. To make it worse, someone else on the train stood on her foot which really hurt and they didn’t even apologise for it. Sarah arrived at her destination flustered, cross, in pain and late.

The next time Sarah attempts a new train journey, her chimp mind gets triggered, reminding Sarah of all the things that went wrong before. Sarah’s inner dialogue is filled with negativity about what might happen. Because of that, the train journey makes her feel uneasy and she’s on guard looking out for all the other things that are wrong. Someone looks at her and she imagines they’ve given her a dirty look. She feels wary and paranoid and can’t wait to get off.

Ongoing, every time Sarah gets on a train, she has feelings of anxiety. Her chimp mind now associates train journeys with stress and unease. With each train journey Sarah’s cortisol levels (stress hormones) rise, her heart rate quickens and her body braces for her flight, fight or freeze response. Her anxiety about train journeys ends up in a panic attack which is completely humiliating.

Eventually Sarah avoids getting trains at all.

This is obviously an extreme example of how the intensity of the emotions can become catastrophic but you can see how when our chimp senses danger and is left unmanaged, it can literally upturn our entire sense of safety.

It’s easy to understand how people can develop severe anxiety that stops them from living a functional and happy life.

The only way to stop it is for the human brain to step in and manage the chimp.  

The bottom line about the chimp is that we aren’t responsible for the nature of our chimp, but we are responsible for managing it. 

The computer brain

The final piece of the psychological jigsaw is the computer (or parietal) brain.

This is where we store all our beliefs and behaviours which is sourced from either the chimp or the human brains.

Whilst the human brain and the chimp brain are working things out as they go, the computer brain is your library of all past experiences.

These past experiences equate to our values and belief systems, gathered along the whole journey of your life.

The computer brain doesn’t create original thoughts like the human or chimp brain. It is only able to automatically act upon stored information.

The computer brain is infinitely faster at reacting than either the human or the chimp because it already has the information to hand rather than having to process and work things out.

So the more helpful the information we can put into our inner computer, the better our automated responses to situations becomes.

If we continually feed the computer logical, rational and truthful information, we maximise the potential for the computer to guide us constructively when called upon.

How the chimp affects face to face fundraising

By now you may be recognising when your chimp has been in charge in your personal life, but how about at work?

Let’s look at the charity fundraiser.

Anyone with a fundraising job knows it can be especially hard because of three main things:

•  The amount of energy it takes to continually approach complete strangers in a positive and friendly manner to solicit donations

• The physical aspect of walking or standing all day, and carrying and lifting equipment to build charity stands

• The constant rejection

For every 80 conversation a new door to door fundraiser has, they might deliver an average of one charity donor. That’s a lot of ‘no’s for anyone to deal with, especially when that’s happening day after day. 

Read more about how fundraisers can handle objections

It’s easy to see how emotional buoyancy can be seriously affected with this statistic alone, regardless of skillset and work ethic.

Add in a bit of bad weather or stuff going on in their personal lives, it’s no wonder that many charity fundraisers begin to spiral into negative thought patterns and beliefs.

Seeing opportunities and remaining positive is ever harder when a fundraiser feels like this which leads to yet more perceived failure – because positivity is essential if you’re going to encourage and persuade anybody to give away their money.

This is a key reason why at Charity Link we created a performance framework to measure all manner of different reasons success might be not happening, rather than just a simple case of how many donors a fundraiser gets.

Who’s in charge of you?

The first step forward is to recognise who’s in charge; your chimp or your human brain?

Luckily to identify this is fairly easy.

Any time you’re having feelings, thoughts and behaviours that you don’t want and that aren’t serving you, you’re being controlled by your chimp.

Anxiety or worrying obsessively, being angry when things aren’t going your way, despairing that you’re not good at your job, feeling depressed about the results. Any type of emotion that is stopping your progress is chimp driven.

Often the chimp will give us excuses about why we shouldn’t or can’t do something.

For fundraisers that might look like ‘I feel demotivated so I can’t do it’ or ‘It’s never going to work so what’s the point in trying?’ or ‘it’s rubbish weather today, nobody is going to be out’.

If those feelings are logical, the human brain might agree with the chimp brain and you have a clear direction in which to go in.
But if the feelings are just emotional input from the chimp set to de-rail our long term plans and intentions, we know we have a problem. 

In terms of fundraising, a bad day can easily turn into a complete narrative based around failure and negative emotions. It’s here that we need our human brain to really step up.  

Some inner conversations you might try to have with your chimp.

Chimp: I just can’t do it

Human: I know I can do it really, because I’ve done it before! I need to remember that all fundraisers have bad days - My fundraiser training and my team managers said to expect days like this… So what was it that I learned? Can I do anything differently to try to improve my donor rate?

Chimp: This fundraising job is rubbish

Human: This job is hard, but I knew it would be. I know from my mentors that with perseverance and ongoing learning I’ll get better. Imagine how great it will feel when hit my targets and have made a real difference to my charity!

Chimp: People are never going to stop and donate in this weather, what’s the point

Human: I see this weather is bad but I’m going to check the weather report and see if there are any dry patches where I can try and make up any losses. Tomorrow looks dry – I’ll work a bit harder then and cut my losses during this rainy bit. 

Your chimp and other people

Of course, it’s not all about you.

Like with real chimps, we work best when we’re part of a troop or pack. In our personal lives these are our families and chosen friendships. At work, these are the companies we are part of.

These are the people that we (and our chimps) feel most comfortable, accepted and safe with. That’s not to say we don’t argue and clash, but overall we know it’s good to belong.

In terms of fundraising, we need to accept that everybody else is also walking around with their chimps and they’re just as complicated and reactional as you are!

When approaching strangers to ask for something, as professional fundraisers do, we are entering completely unknown territory. Others may feel defensive and on alert even just by being approached.

Fundraisers can give themselves the best chance of a good response by being open, friendly and positive, but sometimes nothing they do will get the response they want. Assess body language and facial expression carefully and if it’s not good, simply put it down to their chimp, not your abilities.

Communication is vital for success in any relationship whether transactional or intimate. Sometimes it’s about timing, being in the right place, having the right tone and speak with the right person. But there are obviously the human / chimp brains to consider too.

In the chimp paradox, Professor Steve Peters talks about the Square of Communication which is a great fundraiser tip to bear in mind. This is where we consider who’s being a chimp and who’s being a human and how the communication might go.

Chimp to chimp

Basically this is the most risky type of interaction as both parties are prone to ‘throwing their weight around’ – interrupting each other, showing hostility, emotionally charged, argumentative, anger etc.

Human to human

Usually the most constructive type of communication, where both parties are applying logic, reason, calm and can debate and converse reasonably 

Human fundraiser to chimp donor

The agendas are different here. Whilst the human agenda is to explain and create a foundation of positivity and trust, the chimp is defensive, dismissive and even angry that they’re being interrupted or held up from being somewhere. They may have mistrust and even go so far as to make angry accusations about charities or the fundraising profession. 

Read what donors really think of charity fundraisers

Chimp fundraiser to human donor

Arguably the worst approach as a fundraiser. This is when their chimp is approaching the exchange emotionally charged, often with a win or lose mentality. They may come across as dominating, intimidating and are not listening. The human brained donor will apply logic and simply block the interaction without engaging, or worse look for things to make a complaint about to the charity. It goes without saying that fundraisers should always take a break or speak to a team manager immediately if they’re feeling this way. Charities reputations must be protected at all costs!   

How to tame the inner chimp

The truth is, none of us are ever going to tame our chimp; it’s an intrinsic part of who we are. The aim should always be to manage it rather than try to control it!

How to manage your chimp

It’s important to remember that there will always be a power struggle between our human and our chimp and it’s our challenge to use these struggles as a way to learn about ourselves and grow.

Notice your chimp

A great starting point is to be aware of your chimp and start to notice when it’s doing the inner talking and the outer behaving. Once we are aware, we can choose different ways to manage it.

The chimp interprets a situation and then offers the human an emotion.

It’s up to the human whether they take it or not.

Sometimes the human will agree that the emotion is appropriate and peace is achieved as we go with the chosen emotion.

If the human can see the emotion on offer isn’t going to help, they can try to override it with a more appropriate response based on logic, reasoning and calm.

This may result in some inner turmoil, where the chimp starts a dialogue about how outrageously they’ve been treated and this other person shouldn’t be allowed to get away with it and how revenge or shouting or self-sabotage is definitely the way we should react.

Give your chimp some release

If your chimp is agitated and has had an emotional reaction, that emotion or opinion needs a release. Once the chimp has had an outlet, it can feel much calmer and will then respond to reason.

Don’t try to debate or argue with your chimp and don’t expect it to be rational: The chimp is irrational so just let it be wild until it runs out of energy. Emotional thinking is never a one size fits all type of situation and we must be prepared for our chimp to be unpredictable.

It might take several rounds of the chimp moaning and ranting on about any one problem before the human brain can attempt to contain the situation.

Obviously, this release should be in a thought-out way if possible and not in the middle of the high street or at a friend’s wedding. Choose the appropriate time to let your chimp have its release. Once we’ve calmed the chimp down, we can start to apply reason, logic and facts.

Reward your chimp

It is possible to distract the chimp with rewards too.

This is where your chimp might really not want to do something based on the emotional thinking that it will be too hard / cause you pain / be awkward.

Here, the human brain can do a ‘yes but’ scenario where there is a reward at the end of the supposed hardship. 

So as a fundraiser you might wake up one morning and see that the weather is terrible and say to yourself;

‘Eugh, that weather is going to be horrible to stand around in. I’m never going to meet my donor target today, it’s stupid even trying to fundraise today’.

But your human brain might think

‘Well, it is pretty wet.. But I do have my rainproof coat and weatherproof boots so I know I’ll be well equipped. And actually, the venue I’m at has a really nice café around the corner. I’ll treat myself to a nice fry up in my lunch hour and call my Team Manager for some encouragement too’. 

Nurture your chimp

Sometimes we need to offer support and a bit of TLC to our chimp.

For times when the chimp is insecure and full of self doubt, the human brain can apply lots of reassurance.

Evidence and facts contrary to the insecurities will help no end to calm the chimp down. Like if you’re feeling like everyone hates you, you could remind yourself of all the people that actually don’t hate you and show you that you’re liked and supported.

It may be worth recruiting some help from others who can also reassure your chimp about whatever it is it’s feeling insecure about.

If the chimp is angry about something, then something like a walk or some deep breathing exercises will almost always help to dissipate that.

Whatever the negative emotion, there will always be a counter action to nurture the chimp and soothe away its worries.

Reason with your chimp

At every juncture, you have a choice to try to tap into your human brain. There is a very simple way to start off.

Ask yourself if your reactions are serving you.

Ask if this reaction or behaviour is really what you want and who you want to be.

Even if the answer’s no, you have already begun the process of human brain takeover just by acknowledging the above.

From there you can begin to ask follow on questions:  

• What would be a better way to react?

• How do I want to behave?

• Who do I want to be?

These mental reminders are essentially your human brain talking your chimp down. Then you can start to apply logic and reason, or possibly distract or even reward your chimp.

‘You’re angry because that person looked and spoke to you in a way that you didn’t like. But maybe they’re having a really bad time of it. You conducted yourself well and should be proud that you didn’t react. You probably won’t ever see them again. Why don’t you have five minutes and text your best friend to say you’re looking forward to seeing them next’. 

Define success

What does success look like to you?

The chimp way of thinking is usually to be better than others, having tons of money and smashing targets. Anything less is failure.

But the human might have other views:

‘I’ve done my best and that’s all I can really do’.

‘I feel happy with the work I’ve done and I know I’ve made a difference in my work’

‘I’m going to get better if I keep being open to trying new ways of working and listening to the experience of my team manager and coaches’

‘I’ve learned something new about what works well (or what doesn’t work well!) so I’m counting that as a win’.

Success is rarely black and white!

The chimp will often see something as a win/lose situation, but the human brain understands that there are different levels of success. There are many various stages and shades of grey that count towards an ultimate goal.

Fundraisers should always try to recognise where they’ve done well and enjoy it – even if what you set out to do wasn’t quite achieved.

Inner chimps and wellness

Good overall health and self-care is the foundation of good mental health and wellness. Good natural energy and feeling well will always set you up for handling life and work in the best way.

Paying attention to your nutrition, physical health, mental health and quality of sleep all helps and luckily there are thousands of resources available to work on improving health.

Make sure you get plenty of active rest too – beyond just sleeping or slouching in front of the TV! Mindful rest means a quiet task that you can immerse yourself in, such as reading, meditation, crochet or whatever helps you unwind and relax.

At Charity Link, all our employees are fully supported with a 24/7 GP access, free healthcare from physio to medications and a free app which has an abundance of wellness aids. 

By looking after yourself properly, you’ll not only maintain a good level of immunity, energy and function, you’ll have the best chance of being your best self.

We hope you’ve enjoyed reading about your inner chimp and have gained some good ideas about how you can manage it more effectively in the future!

If you’re looking to join a forward thinking, award winning charity fundraising company who invest in every team member, then how about a fundraising career at Charity Link?

We are always looking for enthusiastic, passionate people who love to communicate and enjoy the many rewards of a fulfilling fundraising career. Check out our fundraising jobs page with the button below and get in touch!