Setting your state to
resourceful.
This is the first in a series of article designed to help you put yourself into a resourceful state. It uses NLP and some of the principles from the Trousers of Reality books.
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Deliberate Habit
There are many ways to manage
your own internal state but I find that cultivating deliberate habit is the
best. When I started writing my books I
found that I was tempted by so many
distractions. The daily news is an
addictive habit and in many ways it is good
to keep on top of current affairs. However
I rarely found I was in a resourceful state
as a result of reading the paper or
listening to the news.
Here is something that has
really helped me.
Try this exercise
One of the exercises I do with people to
demonstrate a very important principle is
to ask them to look around and notice all
the blue things they can see. Do it
yourself now. Have a look around before
you read on and notice how many blue
things there are around you.
Have you noticed the blue things? If you
cheat you are only cheating yourself.
When I explain later it becomes clear that this is not
a trick. It is a demonstration of how one aspect of consciousness
works. Because it is not a trick I will explain the
logic later on. If you bear with me and you have
not tried this experiment before,
the kick of doing this for the
first time is worth just going along for
a few minutes and really noticing those
blue things.
Alright – I trust you. You have
noticed lots of blue things. Now keep
looking at the screen. How many red
things did you notice? Keep looking at
the screen and think about it and resist
the temptation to have another look
around. Most people find it hard to
remember seeing any red things at all.
Now look around again and notice the red
things. Surprised? I was surprised the
first time somebody demonstrated this to
me.
Expectations
We tend to notice the things we focus on.
That's it. That's the lesson. You may
have heard of confirmation bias where we
only notice things that support our
beliefs. This is all part of the same
mechanism. Stage magicians, salesmen,
psychics politicians and anyone
interested in manipulating you knows all
about priming. They make clever little
suggestions to your unconscious and start
that brain of yours noticing what they
want it to notice and ignoring what they
want it to ignore.
If you are full of negative news,
suspicion, horror stories and focussed on
the unfairness and ugliness that
undeniably exists in the world, you are
primed to notice it. Think of it as the
blue things. This can create and maintain
a very unresourceful state. It is
kryptonite to creativity and
communication. It feeds on itself and
people are very good at living up or down
to your expectations. Yourself included.
Constructive Distinctions
I never really got on with either the
jolly hockey sticks or West Coast
American brand of positivity. It all
seemed a bit to trite and shallow to me.
Too much pretending involved for my
tastes and bordering on denial, which is never
a good thing.
However I did notice that certain things really made me think
differently. I do not mean sentimental feel-good
thought-for-the-day inspirational fluff.
(A well meaning friend once recommended a
site that proports to give you a daily message from
the universe – not only was it
tooth rottingly saccharin but it always
amounted to a message that said
“Barry, your are a unique snowflake
and you deserve to be rich. Be a selfish
shallow megalomaniac. Love, The Universe.
PS buy these products.”). No, I
mean things that have real intellectual
traction as well as appealing to the
finer feelings. This state of head and heart being
totally congruent is a natural high.
Good news in popular culture
A good example is Russell Howard's Good
News. I am not a big fan of his constant
stream of bum jokes but otherwise I do like him. I
particularly like that he ends his shows
with a good news story and usually one
that leaves you feeling “Okay, gave
me a lump in the throat but that guy
climbing Everest with no legs or the guy
that makes solar lights for people in a
shanty-town with old bottles involves
brilliant and creative lateral thinking
and a fearsome helping of guts.
Resourceful Association
Now here is the thing: When I see these
sorts of things I see the red in people
where I had only been seeing the blue. I
see what was there all the time in them
and in me. Because I am primed to
humanity and genius I start to see people
differently.
My best days of writing are when I seek
out something to make me feel that way
and set my state to resourceful. Not only
do I get resourceful but I see the
resourcefulness in other people around
me. When I am coaching a team that is a
tiger in my tank.
Rules
I have some rules
- It must be real.
- It must appeal to my intellect and to
my logic as well as making me feel good.
- It must offer hope even if it
addresses something fearful.
- It must bear some serious scrutiny
- It must acknowledge its converse
– i.e. unicorns and rainbows do not
do it for me.
- It must have the same effect each
time I go to it.
- It must be honest
The Proposal
So what I am going to do is to share
these things with you as I find them and
give a brief explanation for each one as to why I like it, what I find in it how it compliments
the rules. The
purpose is not a lesson for the day but a
more practical one. Its purpose is to set
my state to resourceful and if it helps set
yours too all the better. Some, perhaps
most will be things you have seen or read
before. I have a preference for articles,
videos and talks that make me laugh. I have even more of a preference for things that make me laugh and think at the same time.
The first one I will direct your
attention to is something that impresses
me to hell and back every time I hear it again.
#1 Dictating Hope
In 1940 Charlie Chaplin wrote, produced,
directed and starred in a masterpiece
called The Great Dictator that he had
been planning for years. Europe was at
war and America was still at peace.
Chaplin plays Hynkel the savage
dictator and he also plays a kindly unnamed Jewish
barber. Through some plot twists,
involving temporary amnesia, the barber
is unaware who Hynkel is and, toward the
end of the film, inadvertently swaps
places with him. The speech he makes at
the end of the film as the barber,
now pretending to by Hynkel and in fear for his life, is truly
magnificent. The more I hear it the more
I wonder how it is that this comic actor
puts his finger on so many truths of his
day and truths which still echo like
thunder today.
“In this world there is room for
everyone and the earth is rich and can
provide for everyone. ”
“The misery that is now upon us is
but the passing of greed, the bitterness
of men who fear the way of human
progress: the hate of men will pass
...”
“You the people have the power to
make life free and beautiful, to make
this life a wonderful adventure.”
“Let us fight for a new world, a
decent world that will give men a chance
to work, that will give you the future
and old age and security.”
The cleverness of his casting himself as
both characters is deeper than just the
comic possibilities. I think he is
telling us that this is two versions of
the same man. One has taken one path and
primed himself for power and its rewards,
the other has taken a different path and
primed himself for kindness and its
rewards. In the end he does not resort to
the Shane trick of having the quiet man
being the better fighter beating the bad
guys at their own game. The little barber
is a classic Chaplin character. He is
well meaning, initially myopic and makes
mistakes. Because he has not been
conditioned to fear the storm-troopers he
still believes in fair play and stands up
for what everyone knows is right and in
so doing gives other people courage. His
strength comes from his kindness and his
pathos. He is affecting becasue we can hear that at his core he is a decent
human being willing to stand up to the
powerful despite his personal fear of the
consequences. You never find out what
happens to him because the movie ends on
the speech and the very clear message
that it is up to you to choose
what sort of world you want to live
in.
Click here to watch a clip of the speech on YouTube
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