Archive for December, 2008

Change is inevitable….. (except from a vending machine!)

Tuesday, December 9th, 2008

This captures the feeling that the Universe conspires to shaft us where Change is concerned.  We are ‘tricked’ into a series of changes we never chose and would prefer not to be wrestling with.  I guess there might be a some truth in this, in as much as we never chose some of the macro-events that shape our world, but by-and-large, we get the changes we need for our journey.

So if that great big vending machine in the sky has short-changed you today, perhaps you need to be asking “What can I learn from this?”  I don’t know about you but when I get to the other side of something difficult I usually feel that the race has been worth the candle.

“Life is a process of becoming, a combination of states we have to go through. Where people fail is that they wish to elect a state and remain in it. This is a kind of death.”  Anais Nin

“They say that time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.”  Andy Warhol

Communication is all about what THEY hear…

Monday, December 8th, 2008

I had an interesting business meeting this morning.  Lots of good stuff being tossed around by 3 people with busy brains and loads of ideas.  I floated an idea (a good one as it happens) and it is interesting to examine what happened between my speaking and them ‘hearing’ what I had suggested. 

One of the guys went off on one little journey about the use of metaphors and in fact had inverted my meaning / story.  In fact, he had just picked up the bits that were interesting to him and taken it in a different direction.  The other chap heard the bits that worried him and was busy thinking about what wouldn’t work.  Over the next 20-30 minutes I explained and developed the idea and by the end of that time we all understood & liked my suggestion and agreed to use it as a core to process. 

The key about this little episode was that until further work was done, our ideas and understanding were at sixes & sevens.  There is an NLP precept which says the meaning of any communication is the meaning taken by the other person.

If it is important for you communicate effectively, you have to check that they have heard what you said and what you meant, not something totally different….

“The problem with communication … is the illusion that it has been accomplished.”  George Bernard Shaw

and out the other side

Sunday, December 7th, 2008

The other day was at a networking event and, as one does, met a number of new people.  One of the interesting things about listening to other people’s stories is that sometimes one sees signposts in them that relate to ones own journey.  Listening to a couple of people there, I was transported back in time about 25 years, because their stories took me back to the beginning of mine.

It is in the nature of journeys that one simply puts one foot in front of the other, and sometimes one has clear views of the road, and at other times, one simply walks.  You don’t necessarily notice that you are making progress or moving forwards.  It is a bit like sitting in a motorway traffic jam, and it is only once one reaches its head and see the clear road ahead that you realise that you have got to the other side of it.  This conversation was like that, I realised that I had emerge the other side of this issue.

You emerge into a new space and new possibilities.  So, maybe you are also emerging into a new space, or perhaps you are still a few cars back from the head of the ‘jam’; you really don’t know how much progress you are making till  reach one of these clear places and look back.  If today finds you with a clear view, take your time and enjoy it and the sense of possibilities. If haven’t don’t despair and just keep nudging forwards

“Change does not necessarily assure progress, but progress implacably requires change”  Henry Steele Commager

“As for the future, your task is not to foresee but to enable it.”  Antoine de Saint-Exupery