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"Lessons" - "Deeper Conversations" with Johnnie Moore - Part of 4

What's wrong with this skier? 

He is trying to ski by thinking. He is thinking so hard that he cannot "hear" the hill or his body. He is thinking so much that he might miss a fallen skier or a tree - for he is thinking so hard that he cannot see. His fear also causes him to miss the key risk and control factor. Fearing falling or going too fast, he leans back instead of down the hill.

He is thinking so much that he cannot have a conversation with his own body or with the world that surrounds him. 

He is thinking so much that he gets exhausted very quickly because he is fighting himself, the hill and the universe. And just thinking so hard uses up so much energy. 

He is not having a "Deep Conversation". He is relying on his rational mind to guide him in a novel and complex situation. This is what most of us do at work and in our personal lives. 

The most important conversation that we need to have is within ourselves. This is the core lesson of having Deeper Conversation. That to have a deeper conversation with others and with the univers, we must be able to have such a conversation inside us. This is the topic of this our last of 4 parts of my 4 part series that synthesizes a longer series of talks I have had with the brilliant Johnnie Moore. (Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3)

It's the classic psych drama. We have got so used to giving our rational mind primacy that we allow it to fill our consciousness with its chatter and worries. Mothers worry about what the book says about their kids. Managers seek control. You wake up in the middle of the night consumed by a fear and if you can surpress it, find another one right behind it. At school this part of our mind is the only part that counts.

Yes the new skier has to "know" the theory of skiing - well maybe not... Adults have a huge problem learning to ski - I did at 40 - but kids know no theory. Their rational mind has not yet taken over. No one told them the theory of walking or language, they just got on with it and did what FELT right.

Kids use their full range of channels. They listen to their body and they feel their way into novelty. They learn to walk and to talk and to stand upright. They learn so much before they go to school!

But we adults, who know better because we have been to school, wait to be told by a higher authority. In this universe, all the other parts of our mind are closed down and the Ego is given precedence.

So how do we get the rest of our mind back. How do we tune into all the channels in our body so that we can feel the hill or our way though a novel and a complex situation? For as all adult ski learners know, we have had this ability whacked out of us at school and at work.

Johnnie reminded me that it's all about habits. We have lost the habits that help us access this power to use our whole mind, so it helps to set up new habits to bring the whole mind back and to put the Ego into his place - a minor character!

Sit as often as you can in a circle. This brings the field into its best quality. Access the Field.

Before you get down to business check in as to how you all are. This might be how you feel - what you are feeling about the task at hand in your body. This type of sharing brings up the common humanity of you all. The leader may be feeling anxious in her stomach about the result. Hearing this, we can all relax more. Any good consultant has such a go around at the beginning of a meeting so that the Field can be awaked. I know to many this may sound very new age - but my question to you is do you want to ski like me or like my son?

Surely no one wants to ski like me? That is what is at stake here. Real results - getting all the wisdom from all the minds into play and in getting more cohesion in the team are what is at stake here.

Beware of "Action" as a demanded result.

You know what has happened here don't you? Trying too hard leads to a failure and then to bad feelings and then a habit of trying too hard and so on. The point of good sex is not the erection but the communication and the shared love. Bringing your rational mind into the bedroom is a disaster. So it is in meetings.

The key result is to have the team both together and open. Then the "Whole Mind of the Team is brought into play. THEN you can start to see your way through the paradoxes that make up any complex situation.

For the issues that confront organizations and us as individuals today are not simple, or even complicated. They are Complex. So by definition are not able to be solved by the rational mind. Your response will be to reinvent your business or you.

Let me give you 2 examples - one a corporate one that Johhnie and I worked on with NPR and 300 stations and the other a new problem that confronts me and all of us in middle age.

This was the complex problem that we used to have a Deeper Conversation inside NPR where all the senior management, the board and over 200 staff participated along with the leadership of 300 stations. At the outset NO ONE could know the answer. That is the definition of a Complex problem - the answer cannot be predicted rationally it can only emerge as a result of lots of trial and error. What we did was to set up many many meetings where the groups "Played" with this problem - we in effect set up a process of iteration that could enable answers over time to emerge.

The challenge was this - We assumed, now rightly, that in 2009, the web would be ubiquitous. NPR and the Stations were then in 2005 at a high point with their listeners on terrestrial radio but at ground zero with the web. How were they going to grow the web side and not lose the listeners? How was NPR to do this and not lose the stations? What were the stations going to do? For one thing was clear, and that was by 2009, the world would be very different. 

To set up the larger field where all could participate - we used "Play". I have found that if you think of complex problems that might involve you losing your current power in role, the job of protecting your status quo is paramount. This is why when we ask the Usual Suspects to think of the future of their field, say health, they act to preserve the status quo. They cannot go beyond this. A rational role based discusion about novelty has to fail. For our ego will force us to lean back and try and protect what we know and our current power.

So we made this exploration into a game. I won't go into the details but to say that to wrestle with complex problems demands that you give up your role. Back to kids again - they learn all the vital lessons of life via play.

The results come through emergence which comes from trial and error. In complex situations you CANNOT know the answer up front. It is impossible. Remembering this is very helpful. No senior NPOR person presumed to know. All were equals in ignorance. This opened up the field. At the end of each session, each group had to put on a play - they had to express what they thought the future would be - and you know they were right - they found it.

Does this work? Each of the many independent sessions came to this conclusion - that the power of choice of what to listen too had to shift to the listener. Now we all know this right? No we only know this as lip service. You have to have wrestled with this and seen the alternatives and felt that this is true to accept it. We all "Know" that we have to lean DOWN the hill to get control - BUT this is not what we do as learners for though we know it to be true - we CAN"T do it - it is too scary and too counter our old reality. 

Does this work? Well what media organization is best equipped for dealing with he online world right now? I would say NPR. So what was the result of our work with NPR? It was not the plan that came out of the process. It was that 300 people in NPR had wrestled with the problem and had felt their way into the future, so that when a new leader arrived with the mandate and the attitude to go for it, there was a mass aha! Not the normal resistance that you get when a big change is dropped in the organization from on high.

Meetings that start with a demand for action and results - are often code for a desire to lean up the hill. Let's stay in the rut where I can control what is going on because I feel safe there. When you demand results or action - what do you mean? Most of the time it means a focus on the minutiae - like the skier focusing on thinking his way into the turn - forcing himself to turn rather that letting the hill and his body do it all for him.  When we work on the surface we force the whole team into this posture. It is our fear that keeps us from skiing. It is the fear that stops many still in radio and the media from allowing the gravity of the Hill of the New Web to help them get a new control.

The ongoing result that all teams need in complex times is to be so comfortable with each other that they play intuitively like a basketball team on fire. Look at this player - he is not thinking - he KNOWS where the pass will go. We have to really know each other. We have to bring our Whole Mind into play. 

If you work on the key result being a well functioning team, THEY will do the heavy work. The real ACTION is to get the team using all their whole mind as individuals and as a team. Like a good skier, there is no time to "Think" on the court. You have to be able to sense what is going on.

So let's extend this a bit and look at an issue that affects us all - our health. My task - to find a question that engages anyone. From a personal point of view.

Here is one for me and for you that I hope illustrates this principle. I am looking at the health costs for PEI. An important question but very abstract and with many people with hard views. So how to use a question to break the logjam? This is my starting question that only invites each of us as people into the realm of the question. I start as Johnnie suggest with a question that gets us to react by feeling it out. 

See the red line. That is how men on PEI age and deteriorate. The average age of death is 75. But by 65 the average man is in such bad health as to be helpless and dependent. From this stage more than half his lifetime cost to the health system will be spent. These are real data points.

Now see the black line. This is my goal for my own life. Aging as we know it is not natural. The black line is the natural aging process. In nature aging hits a threshold and then the deterioration stops - if you make 85 and are fit and not demented you will likely stay the same until you die - and that might be 95 - 100 - or 105. You will die - but you wont deteriorate more. There is a ton of evidence and work behind this - just trust on this right now there are books and books to be written and I can only point this out to you in this post. 

The research suggests that I and you can push this point of stability back to 55 or 60 - my current age. I can be at choice. I can choose to change nothing and I will get ill and degrade. Or I can choose to change my life and have a good chance that I will die healthy and a contributor. Now I can choose either one  - newspapers chose degradation - but it is a choice.

But choosing life is not enough. Knowing where to go is not enough. Like NPR I have to find out how to live differently. I will have to learn how to change the habits of a lifetime. This is hard.

How hard? This involves my giving up modern food. All processed food as a start. All grains and all dairy too. It means that I have instead to eat what people did in our hunter gatherer period. I also have to do many other things to get a better fit with my deep biology. Sleep more. Be outside more. Walk more. Have a mission in life that is bigger than me and so on - I will be posting tons on this later.

So here is the point. I know this. You can know it too. You know that when you ski you must lean down the hill. But knowing and doing are 2 different things. Changing the habits of a lifetime is very very very hard. Doing something that NONE of your peers are doing is as hard. This is the landscape of real change - being out of step with the mainstream - not knowing what to do - being pulled back all the time by your old habits.

Like Beowulf and Grendel - you have to have the energy to kill the old inner you.

But if you have asked the right question, we can wrestle with it. You can feel enough to kill off the old you who will fight to keep you stuck.

Thought is not enough. You must have emotional power that comes from how you feel about a situation. Here is my feeling test about my health that is raised by the Question I posed. 

• Do I want to become feeble at 65? What will this mean to my family? No I don't want that - I would feel as if I betrayed them because I know what I know now - that had the choice and chose pizza over them
• Can I afford to be feeble? I worry about my savings and if I will have enough - can I afford to be feeble? I don't have the money and I doubt the state will have it either - I will be fucked if I stay as I am.
• How do I feel now? How do I look? How capable am I now? Would I like to feel, look and be better soon? Of course I want to look and feel beter - I have noticed how weak and inflexible I am and wish I was fitter.
• I know I am weak of will and that changing all these things will be hard - so what feedback and what support can I tap into to help me? I know I cannot do this on my own? In the few times I have made other major changes, it was the support I had that made all the difference - I know that I am weak!
• Are there good tips that I can use to help me? I need reinforcement to get over the early hump - I know that other people's experience will help me

I have a rational argument but my feeling argument has more power over my behaviour - The Rational is the Volts - the Feeling is the Amps. It's the Feedback that encourages us and shows us the path:

• I have lost 15 pounds and most importantly my 6 months pregnant belly is nearly flat - this is very reinforcing
• I am never hungry - and the signal that I get when I am full kicks in immediately - that helps me not overeat.
• When I fall off the wagon and have bread and cheese I feel like shit - not guilty I l feel bloated and sick
• I look forward to my walks with the dogs - I want to do it more than they do now - it helps me think and do better work too
• My wife is completely onside and my friends who have not seen me in some time comment on how well I am - important people are encouraging me

So I could not have a plan from the question but the question gets at the heart of the matter FOR ME.

We all have to feel our way into change. The mind is not enough. The body has to power us into the new. We have to be able to hear what our body says. We have to be like kids again and play our way into the future.

So what is the biggest lesson of all?

We come back to Johnnie's key lesson. We have to calm the mind so that we can hear the rest of the conversation in our body. Our mind can show the way but the getting there is all bout the rest of us. This goes for teams too. If we can create enough personal trust we can access the Whole Mind of the group. THEN we can win any game set for us. 

Your work and mine is to put him in his place - shut him up - so that we can hear the full you and me.

The Sleeper must awake

 

 

 

 

"The Energetic Field" - "Deeper Conversations" with Johnnie Moore Part 3 of 4

If you are to see deeper beneath the Logjam of difference. If you are to ask the question that unlocks the Unspoken. Then you have to sense the hidden meaning. You have to have all your listening faculties available. Your ears are only a tiny part of these faculties. You have to be able to listen to all the channels in the Field.

A reason why we seem to fail both as individuals and as organizations to make any headway right now is that we have cut ourselves off from the innate tools we need to guide us through the social complexity that is all about being human. We rely almost completely on our rational mind that uses only the surface to see and to process and so miss the meaning that is always there. We are like the 3 Apes who miss it all. Would you like to see more? If so read on..

For words and the surface literal observations are only a small part of how we communicate. Look at the couple below. Do they need to talk? Words fail this couple. Most of what is being communicated is within the "Field". Each of them is filled with feelings so powerful that they hurt. The air between them crackles. Words are in fact useless. I hope that you have felt this.

How about this? How can you console with words? Words are useless in these situations. 

Love and grief demand Deeper Conversations - they rely on us reactivating the tuner deep within us that connects us to the "Field".

In this the third part of our 4 part series on Deeper Conversations, where I synthesize our conversation about Deeper Conversation. (Part 1 here - Part 2 here), we talk about the larger context for a conversation - the Energy Field that embodies us and that is where we find the truth for ourselves in the surface and rational world.

The Field is real.

Have you ever fallen in love at first sight? Have you met a person and felt revulsion? Have you been in a situation where on the surface it looked OK but you just "Knew" that you must leave immediately? Have you been in a meeting and felt something in your body that told you that this was bullshit or that the other person was lying? Have you entered a room where your parents were arguing and felt the tension. Have you been in a theatre and felt swept up by the performance? Have you been in a mob and done things that you would never have done alone?

If you had shown the iPhone to someone 100 years ago they would have thought it was magic. You know it is not. It is based on our growing understanding of the electro magnetic field. We live in one too. This field is real and is no more a New Age Fantasy that say the field that runs this device. 

 

Like the iPhone, The Field, connects us to many things and also even over long distance. Like the iPhone it has things that you need to know how to tune into. If you don't have a tuner, all you get is noise or nothing. But you have a tuner and deep down you know how to use it. You just may have had the kind of habits that have switched it off. So let us remind you of the amazing tools that you have to tap into this field. "This is an innate ability that we all have in us".

Here is Johnnie facilitating an Open Space meeting in DC back in 2006 for NPR and the leaders of Pub Radio. The structure of the room is designed to tune the people into the group energy. For all of human existence, we have communicated best in a circle. It surely came from our early use of fire. We all face each other. The power moves to the centre. The maximum bandwidth is available.

Eye contact is very important. We are able to look many people in the eye. In open space eye contact is a hugely powerful tool for opening. You recall the picture of Johnnie staring at a participant. He also scans the room to find out who is staring at him - they have energy to use. A sign that even the most shut down of us can read well is when the person we are talking with averts their eyes.

One of the powerful tools that Johnnie also uses to bring the energy into being is SILENCE! Yes silence speaks volumes. As we move into an topic, Johnnie will sometimes just stop. Seconds, minutes go by. Each later minute can feel like an hour. It hurts after a while until someone speaks and what they say tends to be real - it has come from the energy in the room. Some one has been compelled to speak. They speak from the feeling they have and not as a skilled retort in an argument. Because they speak from the heart, others can then follow up the same way- the room tunes into the channel.

For in most meetings - even between just 2 people - we are more focused on the point that we want to make. We are so focused on our next sally that we are not listening. Not listening to the words or to the energy of the other. We are stuck in us alone. Masturbating in public! It's all about me and not about us. There is very little conversation. Talking too much is as much of a sign as averting the eye. Too much talk is hiding something important.

Talking about silence, Johnnie mentioned how nice it was to sit in a room on Sunday with a few pals and just read the papers. Done that? Stuff is going on all the time. Feels very cosy. Small grunts can say a lot. Look across a restaurant and a couple that have been with each other a long time. They are tuned in so much that most of what gets said is in the silence. 

What makes up this field? Well some of it is pure electrical energy. 

If you had no electrical field, you would be dead. Try this. Hold your hand up in front of another person. Gradually push them closer. You will feel the field kick in. Try this with your body. When you feel odd - you have found the boundaries of your personal space - your field at rest. What happens when you make love? Part of it is physical, but it is also a blending of two fields - two fields become one especially at orgasm when the conscious mind shuts off completely.

When we travel in a confined space like a plane or a bus with a lot of people - it is tiring. Part of the experience is Field Overload. In defence, we often shut down our tuner. The more we do that the less good our tuner gets at picking up faint signals. We miss important meaning because we have broken the aerial. This is a reason why I live in a small community. 

I suspect that much of the field is electrical. But there are other parts to the field and several ways of tuning in.

A lot of it is smell! Most of our partner selection comes down to finding the right smell in your partner. This is not just about smelling nice but smelling RIGHT.

Huge amounts of information are transmitted by smells we can't consciously smell.  Makes me question deodorants. We might be picking the wrong partner! Smell also tells us about fear and nerves. A lot of what is below the surface is discovered in smell. This is not a channel that is connected to our conscious brain at all. But it helps to know it is there. For you will react to the unknown smell. You will sense Attraction; Repulsion; Fear; Lying; Truth. If you tune into how you are feeling - you will be processing this channel.

Eye dilation sends equally powerful signals. What is on her mind?

Police use eyes a lot in their work. Is he going to pull a gun? Is she lying? Good cops get good at this. Blink. Will she sleep with me? Again, like smell, this channel does not access your conscious mind. But it will activate a feeling in your body. You will sense real danger. Lying. Attraction. Love even. Not understanding. The information is there is you can be sensitive to feeling it. 

Ever wondered why babies sleep so much? One of the reasons is that they are learning so much. Our wiring for life is set in the first 3 years. This uses a huge amount of energy and also the brain needs to proces what is going on. Ever gone to bed with a problem and woke up the next day with the solution? Our unconscious mind is able to process vast amounts of meaning and is much better at coping with complexity that our conscious brain. But of course this is heresy to the Corporate Mind that is overwhelmingly rational.

But to use this tool you need to sleep a lot. How much sleep do you get? The average is very small. Remember when you were a teen and you slept a lot? Remember that place between sleep and awake? Find it again - it is where so much shit gets worked out. 

If you have tough problems, sleep on them. If you have an idea that you can't see though, sleep on it.

Touch is a modern no no. But touch is one of the most powerful channels that we have in the field. I don't exaggerate. You surely know the story about the Romanian Orphanages? Babies that had been fed and cleaned but not touched enough died from lack of touch. We don't use touch enough as adults.

Touch is the best way to tune into another person. They can tell so much. When a friend is dying what can you say? But if you hold their hand, all will be said. But in the corporate world we don't touch. And we NEVER touch at school! We have sexualized touch too much and so cut ourselves off from its power to communicate. Its power to help us tune into an other person. 

Want to know where a person is in themselves when they are with you? Touch them. Have a tough thing to say to another - touch them and see if that is enough.

"I never said that!" is something we all hear spoken back when we get angry at another. What we are reacting to is usually their tone of voice.

Tone says so much more than the words. Here is Marie Therese Keller singing the Pie Jesu from Duruffle's Requiem - It's all about tone - she is more that performing she lets us into her soul and the deep grief of loss - you don't have to know Latin to get the meaning.

Tone says everything really in interpersonal terms. Ever been with people who don't speak your language? I have found if alcohol is present, that after an hour or so, it is possible to make a connection - by tone!

Most of us in the corporate world have a Corporate Tone Voice. can you hear it? If you can't it is because you are so in it that you can't. I assure you that it is real and distinct.

It's a voice that has most emotion stripped out of it. It's that "I'm clever, on the ball, in charge, confident" Voice that has no doubt and so invites no attraction. It pushes away. It prevents listening. It's usually lying too because deep inside we are all filled with doubt and fear. The lie is embedded in the Corporate Voice and so it cannot be trusted. This is why when I first started blogging I wrote crap - because I only knew that voice. This is the lie of so many so called social media experts. The only way to be heard is to get rid of that tone. Many now use this voice all the time - even with their mates and kids.

What might that mean?

Try your office voice on your dog! He won't be able to hear you. For him it's all tone and touch and smell. He is real, you may not be.

This dog is doing it all - using his sense of smell, taste, touch and eyes. 

Industrial Man is Emotionless - Literal - Fact Based - Surface Confined. When we are this way we are Zombies.

Slow - stupid - focused only on brains - unaware - easy to kill.

I say all of this having been a Zombie myself for most of my adult life. The great news is that you can come back to life - if you want to.

In the last post Johnnie and I will share some exercises that we have used on ourselves to help us come back to life.

We will also talk about a few personal and organizational situations that will help you see some practical steps you can take to change your habits so that the tuner that you have can be switched back on again and you as a human can tap into the field again. 

In the meantime "Brains... Brains...."

Part 4 here

 

 

 

Breaking the Logjam - "Deeper Conversations" with Johnnie Moore part 1 of 4 parts

Source: (Backspace)

Much of America seems locked in a polarized anger. Defense, Immigration, Energy, Unemployment - pick any topic and we are gridlocked. While we fight the other side, the nation is ignored in the noise of the conflict. 

The media are not helping either. The polarized groups have their own tribal media megaphones such as Fox or MSNBC. And those that claim to be reasonable and fact based, such as NPR or PBS, are locked into the Voice from Nowhere that has no chance of showing a way to a solution.

So are we stuck or is there a way forward? Is there a way of asking better questions maybe that may enable progress? 

Can we help media that is not entrenched in the polarization to help the nation? Can we help each other live better by going Deeper?

I called on my old pal Johnnie Moore, who is one of the world's best Open Space facilitators, to talk this problem through.

We began with no idea of the "answer" but as we talked more, we began to see some hopeful ideas.

This then is the first of 4 posts that will describe, as best as I can, some conclusions that we came to.

Part 1 - In this post we will talk mainly about "Breaking the Logjam" - finding a way though the polarization in public life. We will look not at compromise - that suggests each side give up something important but how by going deeper we may find something in common. A very different experience. By the way, the Logjam also exists in many families too. How often do we end up hating our spouse or sister and find in them the focus of our problem? Our hate for another person close to us gets us as stuck as politics has America stuck. Johnnie will explore how we can find the deeper common ground that can exist way down beneath the surface.

Part 2 - In the next post we will explore "The Unspoken" - You boss is driving you crazy with his demands and insensitivity - Your husband is still a boy - Your 30 year old daughter can't get her life together and so on - we all know these set ups. But we don't confront them. We are too polite. We use manipulation. We are too scared to point out the "Elephant" that we can all see but dare not discuss. The great barrier here is fear - If I confront the Unspoken Secret - Will I get punished? So most of the time we don't confront the Unspoken Secret. Instead we ignore it, manipulate around it or complain with others in a futile conspiracy that usually leads to further frustration and angst. Johnnie will explore how we can use Confrontation in a healthy way to open up the infectious boil that is the Unspoken Secret and let the poison out.

Part 3 - In the third post we will look at the "Energetic Field" or maybe the "Pond" For no answer is available on the surface. No answer is to be found in the words. No answer is to be found in the literal. For we don't listen in a full enough way to what people really mean. We forget that we live in a social field and are connected in many ways that we normally don't "see". Body language, smell, the pupils of our eyes and energy itself - we feel emotions like a cell phone picks up signals. Going deeper demands that we tune into this other array of connections. Not just listen to others but more importantly to listen to ourselves! Here Johnnie will offer some help on practical does and don'ts. Not the Top 5 Best Ways etc but some practices that he has found that have helped him be more "Tuned In" to himself and then to others.

Part 4 - In this last post we will look at "Lessons" - What can those of us in media, business, government and well just "us" take from this? How can we listen better? Notice more? Ask the kind of questions that open people's hearts?

So let's begin. I offer up not the transcript of our conversation but a synthesis of what we discovered together and what has come to me later after a few sleeps. 

Breaking the Logjam - Two angry camps throw insult and blame at each other in America. By now the two sides have become entrenched in their anger. Their anger has become morally based as well. "Gott Mitt Uns" I am right - you are wrong. I am good - you are bad. God is on my side - You are Godforsaken.

If we stay here nothing can be resolved. 

Lincoln in the middle of a civil war could see that there must be a something deeper - that God could not be on both sides or maybe even on either side:

"Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes."

You cannot seek a compromise in such a conflict. The choice is either Armageddon, 600,000 dead and the South destroyed or to seek to find out what is so important below the surface and expose that in the hope that some compassion may arise, as it did in the heart of Lincoln.

Johnnie key insight is that "Anger means that something important is at stake." But it's source is not to be found on the surface. 

Let's explore Johnnie's thinking by looking at our own personal lives as a test. 

The angry couple enter therapy spitting and hissing at each other. Both blame the other. The kids are used as weapons and as pawns in the fight. Blame is central. It's all about the current and so surface hurt. But the good therapist knows a few things that the couple have forgotten. That the roots of this conflict often lie deeper than the surface of "He betrayed me with my best friend" or  "She never appreciates what I do for her". As serious as these surface issues are, they tend to be symptoms of deeper hurts. This is why it is so hard to help couples if the therapist stays on the surface and tries a surface compromise or peace treaty.

In this context, a promise to never be unfaithful again is a band aid. So is a promise to be nice to my husband. For the wound that causes this behaviour is still infected with an older deeper fear. A deeper fear that is usually part of a pattern of hurt that began many years before the couple ever met. Unless this fear is surfaced by persistent questioning aimed at exposing this deeper infection, then the promises or the peace treaty will fail. Each time, the promise is broken or the treaty fails, the trust is eroded further and the chance of a reconciliation dissipates. 

"Anger means that something important is at stake." The good therapist works to expose what this is. If the therapist pushes hard enough below the surface, a context for the surface behaviour can emerge.

Now the husband's infidelity can be understood not solely as an act of betrayal but as the action of a man who never felt loved as a child. His work now becomes to understand this and see his actions in this deeper context. His deep need is for love. A love that he did not have when he should have had it. Not being clear on this, he may have confused this hunger for sex. His wife's deep need is for an intimacy that cannot be shared. Her need is also for love. In this deeper context, she might be able to see that his betrayal of her was driven by a powerful need that had little to do with her. So the hurt remains but her ability to understand makes the wound more bearable.

Both of them need love. The deep need is that. A good therapist can help them find this. 

Such a course is not a guarantee of a return to happiness. But it has a chance. And it has a chance of reducing the anger and the walls. It gives each party a chance to work on their part. Can he resolve his barren childhood is a less destructive way. Can she judge him less. Can both make the marriage and their kids the goal? 

Johnnie's point is that there is a vulnerability that is waiting to be recognized. Once each of us in a partnership can see the wound in ourselves, then we can have compassion for the wound in the other.

So what is the "Something that is at Stake" in America today that motivates this great anger that divides and paralyses the nation? What is the underlying vulnerability?

Quite frankly I don't know the specifics of the question. Nor does Johnnie. But know this, that there is a deeper cause that can be found and there is is a style for asking the question that we know.

The style must seek to break through the surface.

I chose the picture of Johnnie with great care. He is hosting a meeting of 300 pub radio folks in DC back in 2006. A very senior person has made an angry claim and Johnnie is grappling directly with him and is asking him what he really means. Johnnie is is not accepting the statement at face value and is asking the person to explain what he really means.

He is confronting the other person. "For the only way past the block is through it."

Lincoln confronted America in the second inaugural address. He is clear - that a terrible sin has been committed by all Americans

He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came... From now on the civil war would have to end in some redemptive way. For if it did not it would never end.

Anger is the sign and the doorway to what is below. 

So who is angry now? What is the anger that is energizing American Politics? Is it not embodied in the Tea Party? Who does this group represent? What has happened to them as a group?

What is on the surface of their anger? Ask yourself what may be beneath this surface? What is the deep hurt that motivates them? Motivates you?

Ask yourself also how this energy affects the mainstream parties?

Deep down is their part in all of this too. Their anger also has deep roots. What might they be? Might they be related to what ails the people who make up the Tea Party?

So the big question might be "What ails America?" Not who hurt us? Not what happened? This question is at the heart of the Grail Legend helps us get away from fault or blame.

Time for us to go deeper. Next Post here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Pursuit of Happiness

HT Viv 

Euan Semple - When I grow up I want to be like him

 

Reinventing Public TV?

 

Nearly all in public TV and Radio know that we still have to do a lot more to find out what will be a more vital model. There are all sorts of experiments going on. Such as at KCET that is stepping aside from PBS - Here is a post by Doc Searls on this and a good series of comments that follow.

This promo is about what KETC in St Louis is trying. 

But it is no flash in the pan but the result of 4 years of hard slogging by Jack Galmiche, his team and his trusty "get it done", Amy Shaw. They have crawled, tottered, and now are walking toward a model for public TV that has both the old - great content as TV and also the new - a trusted space where the community can work together to do important things.

Crawling - It all started in 2006 with a simple enough test - we used the showing of the then new series The War by Ken Burns - to see if we could use this show as a Social Object that would teach us how to attract people in the community to tell their stories. Here Bill Ives tells the story of this first chapter of our story. 

Tottering - Our next project was to see if we could find a way to create a safe enough space for the community to get together to help each other get through the Mortgage Crisis. We first tried this at home in St Louis and then were given the chance by CPB to include 60 other stations across the nation. Here Bill tell the story.

Walking - We are now about half way through the next project on Immigration that the promo describes above. Here we have taken a topic that few can agree on and we are trying to find out if we can create a space where people can hear each other and so we hope find a way forward. This is not just about using new media - it is about using new media to have a better social outcome. Bill tells more about us here.  He adds more about how I am using a novel search engine, Darwin Awareness, to find a way though the noise of the web and here about how I hope to use it to see what impact we finally make ourselves. 

When we started we knew that while we had to master the new tools - this was not really about the tools - but about if we could shift our culture. This has been more challenging and painful than I ever imagined. Change is easy on paper and when it involves some one else. But I and the the folks at KETC have found that the work demands that we all have to give up a lot of whom we were and that hardly a day passes when we are not wracked by doubt.

We have a lot still to do. A metaphor that we use is Columbus. We know that land lies to the west. We know that it should be close. We have seen the odd gull and floating logs. But we have not seen land yet and have no idea what it will be like when we get there. Will it be the Indies? Will there be a pot of gold there? Meanwhile, we keep sailing on our course and have to put our hope in the big idea.

Of course when we get to land, that is only the beginning! Then we have to find out how to live there.

Like Columbus, even if we get there and it is fine, we can't stay there alone. We need people who are up for a New World to join us.

Do you want to find a better future of Public TV? If you do, you can help us by joining in and being part of this.

 

Raj on the Value of Nothing - Brilliance in 3 Minutes

 HT Charles Frith

This is the pathway to our future - we go this way or we go nowhere - and you only have to invest 3 minutes to hear the ultimate in coherence - a masterpiece of compression and story telling - I am aghast at how thoughtful he is.

Boingo - The Power of Strong Ties

What would it be like if your business had a sales, marketing and support force that was 1.3 million strong that you did not have to pay for? What if you could source this leverage with a tiny central force? Sounds impossible? Do you have any idea of how this could work?

Now that everyone is using Social Media – what I am seeing mainly are people who using the new tool in the old way – trying to shout above the noise – “Look at ME!” “Aren’t I cool!” “Aren’t we good!”. I am seeing a Dilbert approach – “Let’s have a Facebook site” “Let’s get on Twitter”.

Most do what most do when a new technology arrives – they apply it in the old way and so get nothing in response.

So what then is the power and leverage that you can harness by using social media well?

Boingo are on their way to finding out how to do this. Oh yes and I am one of the people that are part of this and oh yes I am not being paid and nor do I in any way work for them. I am living the theory.

So how might this work and so how might you do this too?

Boingo have a class of people that are deeply committed to the enterprise that Baochi calls her “Super fans”. They and why they are connected to Boingo and each other is the core of the leverage potential. We will meet 4 of them in this post who agreed enthusiastically to be interviewed by me. As you will see, these Super Fans are attracted first of all to Boingo by the obvious:

• The service – easy one stop access to Wifi in Airports and Hotels – is now no longer a nice to have for travellers but an essential
• The support for the service is outstanding – got a problem – you get instant personal help

But a great product is not enough. Nor is good service. What is the differentiator for Boingo is the human nature of the relationship that Boingo has with its customers. Most organizations do not allow their people to be human. Service people are often ciphers working from a script. Boingo have set up an environment where their key point of contact is a real person who is allowed to be herself.

She has a name and a face and we are all in awe and a bit in love with her. We all feel her presence watching over us. It is way more than getting her help when we can’t sign on. She watches out for us. Have a problem – A quick tweet. In minutes she is there. She is like the guy who runs the old corner store who holds your keys when you go away, keeps an eye on your kids in the street, helps you find a new roommate.

As Nuno Montegro, a customer in Portugal says – It is not what she says but how she says things that is the difference.

Nuno is like me, a customer who actively refers others to the service.

Most of Social media is all about Weak Ties – They are very useful but Weak Ties don’t get people to do much – or risk much – or commit much – that is why they are Weak – they are easy.

If you want to do something – Civil Rights in the US – you need Strong Ties. (Nice new piece by Malcolm Gladwell that explores Weak and Strong Ties in depth)

The key to attracting Strong Ties is being human. It is NOT PIMPING your product. It is instead to show that you really do care about ME. It is instead to show that you can indeed be trusted.

How do you show this? Nuno makes the point that every service and product fails at times. The key is to offer the best possible response to the inevitability of a problem. The best possible response is to know from experience that if there is a problem, you can reach a real person quickly and that they will go the distance to help you get it fixed. “I felt as if I was the only customer in the entire world when she was helping me” Bruno told me. I had the same experience.

Attracting Strong Ties is all about “Giving”.

Aaron Strout is the CMO at social media agency, Powered Inc. and is also Super Fan. “Boingo is proactive and they don’t expect a direct return – they are not selling all day – so if they want an inch, I go the mile back. It’s Karmic! I know if I have a problem that they will look after me. If people are good and do good, then good comes back. Not necessarily directly but good gets attracted back. We talk about a wide range of things that affect me not just the product – which is great too – have to have that – they listen.”

What Aaron is talking about here is a very old model for an economy that was the centre of all tribal economies – the Gift Economy. In the Gift Economy, the Big Guy is not the man who has the most stuff but the person who gives the most.

This is the power in networks – this is how Open Source Works too.

Cliff Bremmer is a programmer who works for a company called Carley Corporation that bids on government contracts to develop instructional CD base/computer based training for the US military.  ”In my spare time I help companies understand and navigate the social media spectrum in a professional yet interactive way.  The company I’m currently helping is the one my father works for called the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel“.

The Gift?

Not only is he a fan but in interacting with Boingo he has learned a lot about how to use SM media well. “If there is anything I’m proud of lately it’s that I helped the Pegasus Hotel promote their brand with the help and support of @Boingo and other companies to become one of the most popular brands in Jamaica.” Boingo is  not only helping him with his travel and Wifi but is talking with him and helping him help his dad in his business with advice and Tweet Up prizes such as free access and bag tags. The Gift in action!

He can see the flaws of how most use SM – “They are stuck in self promotion versus communication. I can see through it all – it’s all about them.”

In the Gift Economy that drives Trust and so Strong Ties, the starting point is YOU. In the non network economy the starting point is ME. No small difference!

Shelby Rogers is a flight attendant, a serving soldier (in the active reserve) and the wife of a serving soldier. Travel is her life. When she is not working, she travels. Access to Wifi has made her travel better – “I now know more than the Gate Agent does about my flights!” and it has taken away much of the loneliness that travel brings with it. Who has not been alone eating room service and watching TV in our room? “I can stay in touch with my husband on Skype and every city seems to have a friend in it.”

For Shelby, Boingo is a service that truly meets her needs. But it is how Boingo is connected to her that has transformed a pleased customer into a Super fan.

How often has your service provider taken you out to dinner? “We have even had dinner recently. I am now a walking billboard for Boingo with winking bag tags!”

So what does this mean? What are the lesson for both Boingo and for you?

• Baochi is no accident – the Boingo senior leadership have created the role and given it the space to enable someone who is naturally humane to be herself inside it. This new way of using Strong Ties to be the centre of a network is all about culture. In most cases senior leadership is too scared to let go. But if you do let go and create this safe place then the power of the network effect can be yours
• A really powerful network has to have an inner core bound by Strong Ties. This is where the leverage is. One staff person like Baochi can without too much trouble have close ties with 34 people. That gives her an outer network of 1.3 million. If she can handle the Dunbar limit of 144 that creates an opportunity of 400 million! You can see that with the right person, you can have a vast reach – provided you realize that your goal is not to have thousands of relationships but a few Strong Ones
• The secret is the math of social leverage. Many of you know about the “Dunbar Number”. Some of you know about “Magic numbers – the hierarchy of trust in human groups. If you don’t here is a quick primer.

So what now?

I think that the next stage would be this:

• At the moment all the Super Fans have a strong relationship with Baochi – I think that the best next step might be to find a way to connect them to each other
• At the  moment most of the dialogue is still about the obvious and excellent service that Boingo provides – I think that some of the work that the Super Fans could do might be to deepen the conversation – Shelby touched on this in her interview with me – What is it that being easily connected while travelling does? In her case it helped her deal with isolation and loneliness – it helped her do her job better – it kept her in touch with her husband – these are deep issues that I think connect all of us who travel a lot

As I think about networks, I think about the laws of physics. All systems have order and attractors. Some force is needed to keep systems coherent.

Think of the Sun in our own local system. It has mass that provides a gravity that holds all the planets and asteroids and stuff in a pattern. It has energy that creates life in the system. I think that any healthy human social system has to have gravity and light.

At the very centre is the “Right Space” a Trusted Space created by the leadership. In this Space, the Right Person – Right being a person who as part of her natural persona truly cares about others. Connected to her is the fuel and the mass that makes up the Sun – the Super Fans. The closer they are to the centre and the closer they are to each other – the more mass and the more energy. The more mass and energy, the larger and more healthy the network of Weak Ties that form up around the Sun.

What gets in the way is our fear about losing control.

At Disney the surface of the Brand Icon never changes but inside the mask is a person who changes all the time and so is never allowed to speak.

But in the new world we have to take off the costume and let the person inside have conversations with the public – HARD to do.

via fastforwardblog.com

Posted via email from Rob's posterous

Georgia farmer sued for growing too many vegetables | Grist

This puppy doesn’t think it’s possible to have too many vegetables. Photo: snugglepup via Flickr

In these times of economic crisis, rising poverty, and diet-related health problems, you'd think local governments would have bigger priorities than counting the number of squash and broccoli plants on people's lawns. Unfortunately that's not the case for Georgia resident Steve Miller, a landscaper by profession and organic farmer by heart, who's been caught tomato-red-handed growing a downright offensive number of vegetable plants on his property outside of Atlanta. (The exact number of criminal plants unknown.)

Dubbed "Cabbage-Gate" by friends and neighbors of Miller, officials in Dekalb County, Georgia, are suing him for $5,000 in fines for not having his land properly zoned to grow such an apparently ridiculous number of vegetables -- even after he stopped growing them and got rezoned.

If the county is suing this long-time hobby farmer for growing too many vegetables, how many are "acceptable" anyway? Twenty? Eleven? As many as you want as long as that doesn't include cabbage?

via grist.org

Just when I thought life could not get more silly - this!

This weekend I will be talking more about our disconnect with food and the natural world.

My context - Jane Jacobs said that Dark Ages arrive when people forget. When they forget because of a cultural bias how to do important things.

Such as today - how to raise a child - what an education is - how to grow and cook food. All of these things are of course connected in one meta thing that we have forgotten - that we are part of nature and how nature herself works.

We have disconnected from nature and so we have got completely lost.

This weekend I will offer up a few stories of how others are finding their way home - stories that any of us can emulate. For the way home is available - we can remember.

Posted via email from Rob's posterous

Getting Old - what are we going to do about it?

This is Whisperwood Villa a seniors home on PEI where my mother lives and where she has been lovingly and professionally cared for for more than 10 years. 

I am 60 now and a topic that comes up a lot between me and my contemporaries is what will we do when we are 80+. We all say that we hope we do not end up in an institution but the truth is after 80, we do become very frail. Until now we might expect to end up in a place like this.

But is this expectation realistic today?

In 20 years there are going to be a lot of us. More than there have ever been aged 80 or older. What is on the cards for us?

Money will be an issue. Few of us will have much of a pension. Many of us will hope to sell our homes  - but if we are all selling? By 2020 it is likely that Peak Oil will have hit hard and it will be hard to look ahead and imagine that the world will be as it is today - there may not be any retirement homes? There may not be much of even social security. Our kids will be the ones who pay all the taxes and will still be paying off our debts. Can we rely on them?

20 years ago I could have no doubts that my mum could go to a place like Whisperwood and that her pension could pay the bills. She would have no doubts that I would be there and that so would her pension and the state. But when I look ahead 20 years for myself - I have no such confidence. I also know that at my age, 20 years goes by in a flash. So what to do?

Well first of all I think it is worth a lot of us talking about this. With enough debate - better ideas may emerge for we are talking about a future that is unknowable.

No answers yet for me but here are some initial thoughts:

• Current expectation is to rely on medicine to extend our lives as far as possible. But, is hanging onto to life at all costs going to be such a great idea?  Will it be good for me or my kids for me to hang on in challenging times? This opens up an "interesting choice". If I get pneumonia now I would not hesitate to get treated. But is this the best response?  I don't know if I have the courage to make that choice today but it is an option.

• Current expectation is that we are all very independent. My close family all live in our separate homes. We are all used to having a lot of control over our place. What about us planning to co-locate in our 70's? Reduce our direct costs - help each other - lighten the load. Sounds good on paper but would we all go crazy?

• Some of our close friends are thinking of co-locating - same issues of our cultural norms getting in the way - will we resent each other about who did more or less - or who put in more or less - we don't know how to do this.

• Like many people we live far away from our kids. Is this smart? Should we move closer to the critical mass of friends and close family - not in the same house but close enough to drop by and lend a hand? This might be a workable start and may teach us how to share better - less of a leap into a culture that we don't know much about

• Like most of us I don't do enough to make my community more resilient. I don't think that this is a good thing. For no one person and no one family will be able to cope with the kind of changes that are coming outside of a larger more resilient community. It is in my best interests to work hard to help where I live be a more resilient place.

• The worst option though seems to be to ignore all of the above and hope for the best

It seems that the window of opportunity is the next 5 years for us Boomers. We have to have a valid plan that has a reasonable chance of working. We may not get much done by then but we will have laid the ground work I think. By then how the next 15 years will really turn out may be more clear.

So what about you? How do you see 2020? Where do fit into your vision of 2020?

Love to know more - I am just starting to worry