Are You Sure That What You're Experiencing is Real?
That familiar phrase, “I’ll believe it when I see it,” is being seriously questioned. The latest in brain science confirms that “brain blindness,” a condition we write about in our book Thriving in Business and Life and explore in our upcoming on-line learning game, is real. If we don’t believe something exists, we’re statistically less likely to be able to see it. Where this really hurts is in our relationships, both personal and professional. Over time we develop attitudes
How Our Brains Create False Facts
Henry Ford famously said, “Whether you think it’s true or not, you’re right.” Our personal mindset determines which filters we use to parse the billions of information bits that assail us every second, choosing the four million or so we can actually process. But what determines our mindset? According to a Psychology Today blog, “With this onslaught of input, how do we manage to not go completely insane? The key is that we pay attention to only a small portion of that informat
Which is Better -- Motivation or Inspiration?
“What’s the secret to success? That’s what a student is said to have asked his teacher, Socrates, centuries ago. Socrates guided his charge down to a nearby river and they waded in together. When the water reached their necks, Socrates pushed his student’s head down and held him underwater. The student struggled frantically. He finally broke free and emerged, gasping for air. “When you want success as much as you wanted air,” Socrates said, “you will achieve it.” That’s one f
What Myth Are You Living?
Carl Jung, the father of analytical psychology, wrote that the most important question anyone can ask is “What myth am I living?” Notice that he doesn’t suggest we may be living a myth; his comment infers that we already are. We wrote about that in our book Thriving in Business and Life, in fact our first chapter is entitled The Power of Story. And we’ve refined this further in the on-line course we are developing into 12 thriving practices. We call the first practice Owning
9 Principles of Empowerment We're Seldom Taught
We wrote about empowerment last post and hopefully cleared up some of the confusion about what empowerment is and isn’t. This week, we’d like to continue exploring empowerment by presenting 9 principles well worth remembering. 1. While empowerment is a personal decision and cannot be bestowed on others, we can encourage, stimulate, provide adequate support, and model empowerment within a culture of accountability. 2. As we presented in our post last week, the three key elemen
How to Implement Empowerment Effectively
In our experience, the word “empowerment” is widely misunderstood in both corporate, political, and public life. To get a better understanding of this well-intended term, let’s first talk about what empowerment is not. For example, someone in a news conference or corporate meeting may utter the phrase, “I empower you to . . .” and then they’ll list the job or initiative they want carried out. What exactly do they mean when they say, "I empower you?" When we’ve interviewed a v
Waking Up From the Trance of Disempowerment
Dr. Milton Erickson said, “Most people walk through the world in a trance of disempowerment.” Erickson, considered to be the father of clinical hypnotherapy, succinctly stated the obvious. Personal disempowerment is chronic, with legions of individuals feeling they simply aren’t in control of their lives. If they’re not, their logic tells them, someone else is. That leads to what we call “The Blame Game.” I (Chris) recall creating a comedic game show pilot by that name in an
When Good Intentions Are Not Enough
You may remember the story about a rich man and a robber sharing a train compartment. As the rich man slept, the robber searched for the money he knew was hidden nearby. Come morning, he confessed his failed plan and the rich man chuckled. “I knew you were a robber,” he said, “so I hid my money in the one place I knew you would never look… under your own pillow!” The robber didn’t think to look close to home and neither do we. In fact, we often miss out on the incredible valu
How to Gain Perspective When Challenges Arise
In our book on Thriving in Business and Life we mention the story about villagers discovering a baby floating by. They rescued her… then noticed another, and another. The villagers were caring folk so they took care of these babies. More came. Eventually, they had to build a school and new homes to house them. Finally, someone asked, “I wonder where all these babies are coming from?” And one wise community member said, “Let’s look upstream.” This introduces a powerful strateg
How Slowing Down, Can Actually Makes Things Go Faster
Sometimes following that adage: “Don’t just sit there, do something.” is the right strategy. At other times, we’d be better off reversing the advice and following the Zen saying: “Don’t just do something, sit there.” In our book Thriving in Business and Life we reference the Titanic disaster and detail five practical strategies for avoiding disasters in life and at work. First, slow down. Yes, there are times when we need to act fast. But, overall, most of our decision making
