How does the process of Destabilisation work and how can we better manage it?
PART ONE
It’s important at definitive moments to feel that we can say what needs, or has, to be said, and, where possible, in harmony with the pervading culture or established context.
The emperor with no clothes
Playing the Devil’s advocate is the antidote when certain things are not meant to be said. Having the freedom to speak and being able to speak openly is the mark of a healthy world. Is the coaching we do a kind of atom bomb dropped next to a person’s flickering candle only to walk away surprised that the candle remains unlit – or has been snuffed out for good? Or does the candle burn brightly and more strongly?
The Sinclair C5
Sir Clive Sinclair famously used the millions made from the Spectrum computer, to put the world’s first electric car onto the production line. His design team wanted to tell him all that was wrong with it, and why it was doomed to failure – but they didn’t.
The paradox is that people are in positions in reality doing the opposite of what they are meant to do or say they are doing. Is this accidental, or by design, or might it be due to fear or confusion or panic? It may even be that they are part of a destabilisation culture, and have no other option, are trapped; or could it be that they are playing a role, wearing a mask, or are sociopaths?
The corporation
Scary as it seems, as the documentary film, “The Corporation”, by Mark Achbar, ably shows, corporations do indeed have a tendency to develop sociopaths, people who can just “perform” without having a moral base. The society of Skinner’s “Walden 2” may really be quite close… It’s this unsettling paradox and sense of incongruence that leads us to feel out of control – even to question our senses at times – and that language is insufficient to express the reality of our own experience.
People today
In a world where the saturation of information is everywhere, knowing who or what is in authentic or in-authentic mode, is well-nigh impossible, apart from by using one’s gut instinct. Where does the needed subjective support come from? …. Let a flock of sheep go into a field and they will not know where to go, except at first as a collective group. Arguably, in primitive times, Mankind didn’t have a strong idea of self; maybe an ancient trauma led to collective amnesia and divorce from a more ‘innocent’ state, after which came the birth of “self” (the ego), and with it, the externalisation of one’s inner voice and the misunderstanding of what this “voice” is. In other words, we began to feel that we are each alone in this life, in some terrible way.
Narratisation and The Westworld
Lisa Feldman Barrett,
in “How Emotions are Made”, has gone so far as to evidence the fact that our emotions are simply psychological constructs expressed in language and have no a-priori existence in a pre-programmed natural way. As Julian Jaynes theorised in his famous book “The Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind” in 1976, the stories we make up in our heads with ourselves as the main characters, are sometimes without reason or purpose; they just ‘are’ and we don’t know why, or what for, except by creating “reasonable explanations” given by other voices within our heads. Thus the ‘knowledge’ that was the inner ‘instruction from the visible gods or invisible God’ of the Greeks and a
fter them the monotheists, in the form of a muse or command or ‘story to make sense of life’ broke down and required ever-more complex justifications. This has been brilliantly demonstrated to be the theoretical basis for the entire Westworld series.
Today, the bombardment of external voices on our consciousness has even greater impact on subconscious processing than ever, therefore, giving time to the processing stage or any activity, and to enabling a good amount of self-composition and mental and physical rehearsal, is critical! Just ‘showing up for the show’ and letting our inner voices take over, is not enough, as any observer of street mind-hacking, of Derren Brown, or close-up magic, knows!!
Politics, society and the mind
A good illustration of this on the collective level can be found in theories of cultural change, as they were developed and then used in psychological warfare and in subversion tactics (cf Babeuf, Levi, Marcuse, Gramschi etc..) and later – in the C20th – for world warfare. Arguably we are still dealing with this.
The negative ‘stages’ of Demoralisation, Destabilisation, Crisis, and Normalisation (all natural emotions that we are forced to pay no heed to, under the stress-control of peer pressure and collective will) have been theorised, developed and practised, for 200 years or more – way back even to Machiavelli. There is a best-selling manual, by R, Greene, the 48 Laws of Power that shows how these tactics are used; “amoral, cunning, ruthless, and instructive, this New York Times bestseller is the definitive manual for anyone interested in gaining, observing, or defending against ultimate control.”
Crisis and how to manage it
Demoralising equates with softening up and bombarding others with information and criticism, it leads to identity loss via the shaming of non-compliance and often we never know why we feel out of sorts. Acts or words are used that are felt as being violent by dint of introducing sudden changes, silencing and censoring, and there may be false narratives claiming problems exist when to all around it all seemed like ‘business as usual’. This can be combined with setting up mechanisms of control, even by blackmail and the use of easy victims & ‘useful idiots’ or via trusted accomplices.
Demotivating – in a very negative sense – is conscious or subconscious agitation (either from within or without) in an attempt to overthrow what is normal; this can be a planned destabilisation in order to take over control. This very real physical problem (of the problem – reaction – solution type expounded in the Hegelian Dialectic) continues with gradual 
disempowerment and the imposition of new narrative, culture or set of core values. This can of course be presented as a very positive thing (and may indeed be, while still being received as ‘negative’ to those on the ‘receiving end’) and is further reinforced by the appropriation of education and knowledge. Whereas the intention may to to empower and enfranchise others, disenfranchisement may be the outcome. In many senses, the coach’s work begins here to reverse the impending sense of alienation, by working to re-establish truth and objectivity, establishing the principle of free speech and trust, by bridging differences.
Crisis is recognised in confused reactions and more identity confusion, loss of direction, hysteria, blame and so on. There may be internal warfare, both in the collective and in the individual him/herself. The coach here listens and acts to “give responsibility to the other person for their words” and to insist on a clear use of words, and ensures that those that use them, clarify and provide evidence/facts, by then clarify paradoxes, establishing clear 
links, and questioning generalisations and unspecified references, deleted information, universals, or others’ presuppositions or patterns of language..
By Normalising we refer to how the “new régime” establishes order after the revolution of ideas. This is done by persuasion, force and – if necessary – the cleansing of cultural or political opposition and the elimination of useful idiots. In the political arena this game is very dirty, yet, and sad to say, the idea of “normalisation” has crept into our vocabulary in more ways that just that of political history. The coach here has a difficult task in liberating one who is at a stalemate or downward spiral, and challenging those who are perceived as aggressors – whether in fact they are the ‘superior’ or ‘inferior’ person in the dominance hierarchy – to think critically; open speech and the freedom to say what is “unacceptable” is very important if this phase is not to explode in the face of the agents of change, and some conscious opposition towards authoritarianism – or utopian thinking – is necessary.
Cui Bono?
Looking at a “positive” side to this can say that the coach works with PERCEPTIONS in language with the ‘aggressor’ (the one perceived to have caused the de-stabilisation) and the ‘victim’ to establish facts in a neutral way, working openly to the idea that the person in question may indeed intend to be aggressive or might benefit from being perceived as a victim. Are they? To whose benefit is it?
PART TWO
To manage destabilisation we need to work on embodied responses.
Embodied states
Stollie makes his way through the weave poles during the agility portion of the Purina Dog Show Incredible Dog Challenge
Since of course the feeling of destabilisation is very much felt bodily as well as mentally, we can work with embodiment practices to better manage the situation.
The work of coaches such as Paul Linden, Mark Walsh, Integration Training, Strozzi-Heckler, George Leonard, and Wendy Palmer, mention the tools and practices that can make it easier to be a skilful listener, a powerful advocator and an inspirational leader. Dylan Newcomb advocates “a new kind of language” – one that speaks to and engages one’s whole mind and body as one dynamic, integrated process. “It’s an embodied practice for self and life mastery”.
We can consider 5 physical axes that lead to better AGILITY
1) vertical (rootedness, having spine and centre),
2) left to right (occupying space, pivoting and having poise and balance)
3) forward and back (distance or urgency/connection)
4) time (and timeliness, allowing reflexion and processing to happen)
Pitch and Tempo and using the voice to impact performance.
5) voice (entering the space with the right combination of sound, pitch, tempo and rhythm)
Chao-dynamics
Managing crisis implies a radical use of language to oppose the natural tendency to dissipation and destabilisation in complex systems.
Combined with this we may also consider how to mange the language in order to clarify and build bridges, or remove them – as may be necessary for a mutually-beneficial outcome to emerge.
This method is based on a view of human interaction developed from the work of Ilya Prigogine. Viscount Ilya Romanovich Prigogine 25 January 1917 – 28 May 2003) a Belgian physical chemist and Nobel Laureate noted for his work on dissipative structures, complex systems, and irreversibility. Prigogine developed the concept – at the University of Austin in Texas – of “dissipative structures” to describe the coherent space-time structures that form in open systems in which an exchange of matter and energy occurs between a system and its environment. 
The theory of Chaodynamics and Prigogine’s the idea of a what he called a “concentric” approach to nature/communication to reestablish order during a major disruption takes us into the bodily and emotional reactions that infuse the system of both the individual and the environment or collective group.
Work Styles
Stress and the sense that we are opposed in our will, tends to make people revert more and more to a default style, approach or set of rules. Fighting the frame tends to make matters worse! One way out is to provide or explore options; again, it’s often about how these options are framed and what the metaphorical image is.
Everything conspires to structure dissipating over time
Jordan Peterson (somewhat unpopularly at times perhaps) asks us to ‘be hard with ourselves’, and to first be ‘welcome in your own house’. By this he means, remembering that even (or especially) the mundane things we do need to be got right. “Being better verbally doesn’t mean that we are right”, he says, referring to how the relationship between one’s belief system and one’s perceived Dominance Hierarchy Position or Confidence Hierarchy is a source of inner struggle, confusion and concerns about status. Why, then, people “need to defend themselves” – even if they may deep down know they are wrong (or perhaps because of this)! – and this demonstrates how social constructivism and politics can’t be separated from language use and the way we embody it.
Perhaps language is our – maybe futile – attempt to make sense of a meaningless world, as Kierkegaard would say.
Your base line state
When a person is reacting to destabilisation it’s important for them to have an awareness of how to access their natural base-line state. Accessing their comfortable state while trying to understand the new state avoids tit-for-tat and self-defensiveness; it means they can start to make sense of things. Embodying a newly generated state may even mean not liking the ‘new person’ that emerges. What that person is, is not for the coach to choose.
The Coach’s role
“Control the options and you control the power” may be good in theory; oftentimes a person is too far from the source of power to feel in any sense capable of restoring order into the chaos. Their only control may be over their own bodies and words in the immediate conversation.
A coach can help another person to be more agile and lucid by means of providing time, perspective, and the opportunity to process a rapidly-evolving situation, and compose themselves for when they need to perform again.
A good starting point might be, ‘what options would you choose/prefer to have when you re-enter the situation?’
Generative Coaching – with no fixed outcomes – or clearly scaffolded?
We can contrast and Fixed-Outcomes language learning model with the evidence of Natural language acquisition. Stephen Kraschen’s L+1 theory and research show that the time for the acquisition of new models of language (i.e. taking ownership of one’s language given ample processing and self-composition) can be as much as 6 months
ZPD
Another (more scaffolded) approach is that of ZPD. The zone of proximal development, often abbreviated as ZPD, is the difference between what a learner evolving a new skill or prepping a desired outcome, can do without help, and what they can’t do. This concept was introduced (but not fully developed) by psychologist Lev Vygotsky (1896–1934)
The concept of the ZPD is widely used to study children’s development as it relates to education. The ZPD concept is seen as a scaffolding, a structure of “support points” for performing an action, referring to the help or guidance received from an adult or more competent peer to permit the child to work within the ZPD.
The “scaffolding” – of which coaching is perhaps just one part – consists of a variety of supports. These supports may include: resources, such as a compelling task; templates and guides; specific guidance on the development of cognitive and social skills; and finally the use of instructional scaffolding in various contexts when modelling a task and the approach to solving the task, by giving advice and providing coaching.
Since the aim is for the client to reach an embodied state of readiness where he/she is able in the present to “bring forward the emerging future” these supports are gradually removed as students/coachees develop their own autonomous learning strategies. In this way the coach becomes less necessary, thus promoting the client’s own cognitive, affective and – critically – psychomotor learning skills and knowledge.
Just as in the educational taxonomy, where teachers help the students master a task or a concept by providing support, so coaches can provide scaffolding support. The support can take many forms such as outlines, recommended documents, storyboards, or key questions.
Yes, master
In some cases (and cultures) the coach is viewed as a master communicator of language – not specifically one who has all the answers, more one who can empower the client to find them. Scaffolding works as the good coach 
makes themself “progressively less necessary” and the building eventually stands up alone.
Trusting overly in the coach’s input can however lead to further destabilisation.
The key to embodiment (what NLP calls “anchoring states”) is in doing things in a real embodied environment, and not a BOOK environment.
Or, as Alfred Korzybsky said, “the map is not the territory”.
This then is the area of interest between the linguistic insights of language acquisition, and of coaching, and points to how a generative approach can work, to which we will return…..
Types of scaffolding
For scaffolding to be effective, attention can be paid to the following:
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The selection of the task: The task should ensure that learners actually use the developing skills that they want to master. The task should be engaging and interesting to keep them involved!
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The anticipation of errors: After choosing the task, the teacher/coach might anticipate “errors” that are likely to be committed when working on the task. In outcomes-based education, anticipation of errors enables the scaffolder to properly guide the learners away from “ineffective directions”. When the outcome is fluid and unknown, however, “errors” are for the coachee, student or client alone to determine for themselves.
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The application of scaffolds during the learning task: Scaffolds can be organized as simple/discreet skill acquisition – or they may be dynamic and generative.
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The consideration of emotive or affective factors: Scaffolding is not limited to a cognitive skill but also relates to emotive and affect factors. During the task the scaffolder (implied expert) might need to manage and control for frustration and loss of interest that could be experienced by the learner. In this way encouragement is an important scaffolding strategy.
In terms of scaffolding again we can consider:
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conceptual scaffolding: helping students/clients decide what to consider in learning so as to guide them (or for them to guide themselves) towards key concepts
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procedural scaffolding: helping the student or coachee to use appropriate tools and resources effectively
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strategic scaffolding: helping to find alternative strategies and methods to solve complex problems
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metacognitive scaffolding: prompting to think about what is being learnt throughout the process and assisting reflection on what was learnt (self-assessment).
Other approaches and their relevance to our argument.
From Sir John Whitmore’s GROW, to SMART, many models exist; few however, which touch more on communications and language performance or how to embody this. The Transitional Curve lends useful support as a concept, and Hamlin’s HP equation, Ability x Motivation x Environment, adds the idea that our cognition, commitment and communicative credibility are important. The Contracting Matrix show that it is important to be clear, and adapt our behaviour, and I personally find the Jonari window helpful when working through blind spots and the “dark side” or other more public revelations. Of course, having a clear focus, on options and an action plan, and a way of overcoming obstacles, is always valid, along with the insights given by cross-cultural models and people potential profiles.
In communicative method language training the outcomes-based model used, is along the lines of elicitation -> presentation -> controlled practice -> free practice -> testing and assessment (coupled with copious scaffolding). This approach can be useful when working with new language but tends not to develop real acquisition.
In NLP, the iterative problem-solving strategy TOTE (Test Operate Test Exit) as well as Meta-model and Milton-model approaches to change states, presuppose the subconscious mind’s capacity to find resources that will shift perceptions and abilities, and these bring out subconscious discoveries.
In a generative coaching approach this would likely involve conscious distraction and re-framing by relocating the experience within the physical environment in different ways, and accessing the embodied reactions, as well as giving a lot of time to rehearsal and self-composition, treating ourselves meditatively. It would allow for a less-guided style that is open-ended and creative.
North-West artist Matt Wilde has described how he is concerned with capturing the ‘immediacy’ of those surroundings that people become immersed in. “His technique of applying the paint quickly to the canvas in a perhaps more sketch-like manner lends itself to the fast-paced lifestyles of today’s society that Matt is eager to convey. There is often humour and wit in the scenes that Matt reveals to us, but he also captures those moments of human isolation in the contrasting chaos of busy city life.”
Agility
We look for examples of a physical response when using language in performance. We think about what the voice expresses and where in the body that voice emanates from. The “hook” of the downward spiral can be considered as an “inner terrorist” and is a very unpleasant sensation that affects the body seriously; words are powerful and may in some cases suffice to disarm the perceived threat or to change one’s perception of it; more often, an embodied approach (giving more time for rehearsal and self-composition) will help in ensuring that the intended outcome is a genuinely good performance willed by the person in question and congruent with their sense of best interest.
If the outcome is not pre-determined, then it emerges through language which is always new, and actions that feel right. Life is not a constant prepping for a “test”, so the process and composition and creation of new actions and words are both physical phenomena.
Hence to embody the outcome is to have lived it inwardly and mastered it outwardly, in numerous physical ways, first.
Chao-dynamics and going beyond goals
Going beyond Management by Objectives
It has been eloquently argued (Susan David, D Clutterbuck, D Megginson, et al, in Beyond Goals 2013) that the many elaborate virtuous ideas of coaching – often using sophisticated goal-theory models – mask what we should be doing by recognising life and work’s “elegant non-linearity” ie that life’s solutions themselves emerge from within the coaching relationship, and that the track that is followed can have many ups and downs and twists and turns, and may not have a specific destination in the way that linear models and coaching contracts often presume, but rather that the journey itself is the empowering and enriching thing, and the conversation enables this journey to develop.
In the increasingly “normalised” VUCA world in which we live, this dilemma is more and more central to our lives.
No curriculum
I have found the prescriptive models and discrete-point “stages” of coaching certification to be unhelpful as they generally consider processes to be pre-determined; but they are not, every person has their own inner syllabus that they are working out as they go along; there is no “correct syllabus” or “curriculum” that the coach can apply to how this conversation develops.
I work instead with either skills training approaches or learning by acquisition where there are specific desired outcomes, otherwise with a chao-dynamics approach which allows insights to emerge in their own natural way within the available boundaries. Every energy-rich system tends to overload – and to disruption and ultimately to decay – unless the question to be explored, today, is manageable; goal-theory coaching fails to understand that any overload of data can contribute negatively to create yet more destabilisation.
Dynamic systems
Dynamic systems rely on self-regulation and the notion of “emergent goals”, not fixed performance goals but mastery goals. Mastery mindsets are akin to those gained by people acquiring skills in a variety of contexts, whether sport, language, arts, music or cookery. Chao-dynamics when experienced in workshops provide insights into the embodied nature of disruptive actions and policies and allow for a system-wide readjustment of perspective on a personal, team, organisational and even societal level. They allow us to open discussion of what really matters, and escape the misleading fixed- or contracted-goals route which can negatively become a crutch by which to avoid what may be – albeit possibly painfully – a beneficial discovery.
This kind of “mastery mindset” allows us to embrace negatives as useful data and acts towards an emergent opportunity for serendipity. It involves a generative approach, one that leads to self-concordance and congruent adjustments of understanding.
Not chaos theory
“Chaos theory” defines chaos as “low agreement + low predictability”, contrasted with “linear success”, defined as “high agreement + high predictability”. It thus drives people away from a deeper understanding of why systems develop destabilised features, demotivation, confusion, disruption, ill-feeling and crisis, and towards a need for “normalisation” around new linear success ideals, which mask the systemic issues altogether!
Chaodynamics is very different.
New paradigms for complex times
Chaodynamics provides a Metasystemic perspective, a wider horizon with wider boundaries and what has been termed PTC “Perspective-Taking Capacity”. As such it addresses “self-talk” in the system and in the individual. All systems create identities and meanings for their own behaviour, in a cultural and metaphorical sense. There is always a set of values, mission-statements, core beliefs and self-identification which ultimately is the “true identity” of that system. Often, these values are considered sacrosanct and are not open for debate or even gentle exploration….
The self-authoring, self-adaptive mind
In this approach, we move beyond the concept of chaos as involving remedial action around simple/complex performance changes and being either rapid or slow. We move beyond generative dialogues with feedback loops or the vicarious pleasure of a “Gamma brainwave” experience of verge-of-chaos excitement and juggling of tasks; beyond the concept of fuzzy or revisable goals, or “luck readiness” and “strange attractors”. We move beyond the idea of “resistance vs compliance”, or the profiling of elements that carry positive or negative attractors. We move instead to the discovery of the real self and the existence of goals behind goals on a meta-systemic level.
Embodied experience of what is real in the chaodynamics workshop communications environment provides data that tells us what we need to know and shows others what they are missing, in non-disguisable ways. It avoids the view of the world as a bleak, hopeless and difficult place that is veering towards its next crisis in a spiral of seemingly-permanent destabilisation, a world where you “just keep swimming” for your whole life. It shows instead what causes the destabilisation, the sense of rudderlessness or of misunderstanding, the agendas for manipulation, the history of decay or disillusion, and shows how to reverse this.
Embodied chaodynamics
We as coaches may not be by nature performers or communicators but the people we coach are in some way usually involved in performing a role and communicating in important ways. Today few have the luxury of finding a quiet corner to go over significant messages as these are conveyed very much on the move, on the hoof, virtually or by phone, between flights, at the coffee machine, ..
To avoid mistakes, the client needs to have the opportunity to experience in a physical way, get a real “feel” for it on every level. In the embodied workshop I explore with clients an approach that shifts the focus away from models of coaching and towards the embodied process of communication as we can observe it in others in their own busy lives..
“Suit the action to the word, the word to the action, with this
special observance, that you o’erstep not the modesty of nature:
for any thing so o’erdone is from the purpose of playing, whose
end, both at the first and now, was and is, to hold as ’twere the
mirror up to nature: to show virtue her feature, scorn her own
image, and the very age and body of the time his form and
pressure.” HAMLET Act 3, Scene 2, 17-24
Disease and disorientation
It is arguable that in today’s complex and ambiguous world, in many respects humanity is more and more desensitised, some say we are being led back into our chains in a collectivised hive-mind, human 2.0 and that the tribalism we see is designed to operate on our weaknesses.
Hospitals that make you more unwell, lower thresholds that weaken the body and spirit, technology that buys into depression, old diseases returning, a political or technocratic class that seems to do the opposite of what it says it is doing for our benefit. So how to step outside the confusion and unsettled feeling?
And, what if our (coaching or other) conversation is a kind of atom bomb that completely snuffs out the faint candle of hope that still just glimmers? As coaches we see that emotions and situation such as these are deeply physical and frightening, and that words when used to shame or implicate, or that contain presuppositions about what is “real” or “true” can be profoundly shocking at a deep level. This is becoming more worrisome in a world dominated by social media and by ambiguous intentions. How to differentiate between truth and illusion, how to stay healthy in our communications?
In Linguistics this is called the difference between the “Illocutionary Act” and the “Perlocutionary Force”.
Any concept of a “lose-lose” in the contracts we forge or the daily dialogues we have with ourselves and others, can affect our mental and physical health and wellbeing.
Ilya Progogine
Nobel Laureate and professor at the University of Texas (b1917 – 2003), he developed the idea of dissipative structures, i.e. coherent space-time systems that are open to an exchange of energy and matter and that require effort to maintain their function and especially to withstand destabilisation and self-destruction.
Chaodynamics is based around the notion that there is a tendency for all organisms natural and unnatural, to dissipate, dissolve, rot, overgrow, gather dust, and return to a more messy, collapsed, mouldy disintegrated or jungle-like state (we can find many metaphors for these) of untidiness just as if you leave a building or garden for ten years these will become infested – and even infected – until a new state is achieved.
To resist this implies a continual EFFORT of will which is also physical, and will require communication if not with others at the very least with oneself. As mentioned, an organisation has its own inner dialogue that operates within the system to maintain this unsteady equilibrium that can be disrupted at any time. This inner dialogue consists of statements and references to the organisation’s identity and value-system.
Bifurcation
When an energy-rich system reaches a point of unsustainable input, a transformative point is reached where choices are either imposed by circumstance and the efforts of the system to redress its lost balance, or are by selecting sustainable options in order to avoid wasted energy and further disintegration. The more care we put into the framing of this point – importantly, equally so in our embodied states – the better what comes out and how successful the “picnic” that we want to enjoy, will be.
This kind of embodied coaching means maybe not liking the “new person” that emerges!
Life’s not a picnic – Join the picnic!
This paradox implies many things. The approach I use contains many different flexible protocols and possible interchangeable communication phases and sets, and a useful one is in three phases that can be summarised as the Set-up, the Obstacles, and the Options, however I don’t think of this as a model for coaches as much as something to help others to understand. It’s a way of making sense of one-another an of the meta-systems that lie behind our assumptions or presuppositions.
The outcomes-based notion is that – IF we have an ending or goal in mind and that things make sense to us IF we reach that end – our narrative or inner story will be satisfied; however the process-based notion is that the way and its ultimate destination are creative and fluid. The “process” is therefore not a coaching procedure to be followed but a way of “processing” the data that we are currently presented with.
Life is not a constant prepping for a test
Life is not a constant prepping for a test (but a way of sharing a picnic).
Outcomes in life and work are not pre-determined. They emerge through language which can be totally new, actions that feel right, liberating oneself – and the organisation – from the tendency to collapse inwards, or from the “inner terrorist”, or from the pitfalls of hidden narratives and pre-determined “wins”, from inevitable decay or the propping up of an apparatus that is failing because overburdened by data inputs.
Metasystems and our perspective.
Recent presentation for Learnlight
Practical Language Management to achieve outcomes
These are Language Management Resources based on the principles of chao-dynamics and the outcomes-based approach.
One of the key concepts is finding ways of understanding, and then overcoming objections.
This document outlines a series of language management techniques that will result in better shared outcomes.
Three-step responsibility:
1) As you say, it’s important to be clear (open/discreet/truthful/straightforward/find a solution/avoid further misunderstandings)
2) AND, so that we can do that in the best way (in the way you feel comfortable with)
AND in order to reach a good outcome (find a mutually-beneficial solution)
3) What would you propose?
How do you suggest we (you / I)) proceed?
Where do you want to take this next?
How long do you think we (you) may need?
Depending on the exact scenario/context/desired objective:
How much (time/money/effort) do you recommend we spend on this?
Who do you believe is best suited to deal with this?
Which aspect do you think should be tackled first?
What options are you thinking of?
Etc..
Avoidance of WHY? And “Yes, BUT”
Do not use the question “why?”
Refer to why as problematic for all concerned –
1) “the question of why this happened is delicate” etc..
“that’s a logical objection…”
“I see where you are coming from there…”
2) AND, in order to move forward on this AND to find solutions that will work better in the future (avoid a repetition of this)
3) How do you propose we approach this?
Etc
1) I understand that you have issues with why this happened and are still feeling unconvinced in some respects
2) AND, in order to deal with this effectively AND ensure a better understanding without pointing blame and escalating the problem,
3) Tell me, how do you suggest we analyse this?
Setting the framework (starting a meeting / putting in the picture)
The purpose of this meeting is to…
We’ve been asked to meet so as to find…
In my capacity as (….) I’ve called this meeting to…
The reason we are here is to…
(reminding others of where things last stood)
As you will recall …
Last week you agreed to …
Remember we …
As mentioned (in our last meeting) …
May I remind you of what was said (at our last meeting).
Let me remind you …
Allow me to reiterate the conclusion of our last meeting.
Open questions to encourage openness
When would be a good time for you?
Where would you feel comfortable going through this?
Who would you like to have there?
Where is a good place to start?
Where can we start?
Where did we leave off?
Where do you prefer to begin?
Please carry on if you are comfortable to do so
Please feel free to say what you feel comfortable with
(Clarifying)
What exactly do you mean by?
What are you getting at when you say…?
What you trying to tell me when you say that…?
(Getting to the facts)
When did this issue first present itself?
How long have you been feeling this way?
Since when has this been happening?
When you say “….”
What do you base that on?
What leads you/brings you to say that?
What’s the reason behind your saying that?
What grounds are you basing that on?
What does that mean to you?
How should I interpret that in order to understand you correctly?
(Interpreting or checking meaning)
What are you driving at/getting at ?
What should I read into your reaction?
What exactly are you trying to tell me by reacting in this way ?
Amplifying (Reassuring)
That’s very important.
Thank you for telling me…
What you say is important …
Thank you, I appreciate your frankness.
Rest assured, we take what you say very seriously.
It’s true that … All the more reason to …
Thank you for bringing this to my attention.
Motivating / finding a bridge
To avoid (any) misunderstanding…
In order to clarify the situation…
So as to give the best possible answer to your question,…
In order to ensure we’re talking the same language,..
In order to be sure we’re on the same wavelength,…
So that I can answer your question to the best of my ability,…
In order to find the best solution
So that we can deal with this in the most professional / suitable way
Establishing a link
You’ve said X and you have also stated Y – just to be clear – how do you feel these are related?
In your opinion what is the connection between … and …?
What has … got to do with…?
For you, what is the link between … and …?
So that I can understand you clearly, where is the link exactly?
If the answer is NO link:
In that case, how am I to understand what you’re saying?
Highlighting Paradoxes
I’m puzzled.
On the one hand … on the other hand…
You say that… but at the same time you …
There’s X yet simultaneously there is Y…
In order to be sure we understand each other…
How do you explain that?
How does that work?
What am I missing?
What’s going on ?
Metaphors
We seem to be going round in circles.
It appears that we’ve come up against a brick wall.
It feels as if we’re going nowhere fast.
There seems to be a cloud hanging over this today.
We have been here before, haven’t we.
This sounds like the same point we reached earlier
Re-setting the framework (This can also be used at the start)
If we could step back for a moment …
Sometimes it helps to look at things from a completely different angle
I can see that things are not right for you
I sense that there has been a backward step somewhere along the line
I get the feeling that you are not comfortable right now
I can tell that you are unhappy
I know (because you told me so) that you are struggling over this
So (in order to make a breakthrough / so that we can look for a better way forward)
How else can we look at this?
How would it be best to view this?
What perspective would you like to consider this from?
What other time or place would suit you best?
When would be a better time?
Where would you feel more comfortable?
How would you feel about thinking this through?
Presenting options
We (seem to have) have two options. We can either… or we can…
Two / three options lie before us. Firstly…, and secondly…
Which do you prefer?
It looks like we have three options:
So that we don’t carry on going around in circles …
So that we can make a breakthrough
In order to ensure the best possible outcomes for you/us
Tell me, at this point in time, what do you prefer?
(Many people will opt for the second! – so be sure that “quitting” ia an acceptable option first)
I’d prefer the third option, what about you?
I’d go for the option of looking for something we can all be happy with, how about you?
Getting commitment
Great,
Well, it’s good to hear that
I am delighted to hear that
How would you like to proceed just now?
When would be a good time to come back to this and to take that forward?
Dealing with late objections
3rd party / Devil’s advocate / Using the other person’s words as a stepping stone…
Anyone listening to this might be forgiven for thinking that…
To an outsider this would appear as if …
If you want to just walk away that’s fine, how would that work?
If as you say you want to let things carry on as they have been doing,
It may seem as though you don’t want to find a solution.
How do you feel about that?
it was YOU who said that you…
Didn’t you just say that you… ?
I believe that earlier you made the comment that …
Imagine that you were the one dealing with this…
Put yourself in the other position…
Try looking at this from a higher perspective …
Let’s say you abandoned the project that then…..
Let’s suppose we let things carry on without addressing them, then later…
Supposing you were told X…., how would you react?
Just for the sake of looking at it from all sides…
In the interests of not leaving any stone unturned…
Just so that we have looked at every possibility…
What do you think might happen / would happen if we…?
Working online?
Performance in English works in York, England, and internationally,
With the C-19 lockdown, our courses are being provided
on Skype, Teams, Webex and Zoom
http://tostig.co.uk
info@tostig.co.uk
• Qualified trainers and coaches with more than 30 years’ experience of training and business management:
• Having impactful communication skills is essential to successful outcomes in business – does your team have a level of performance required to lead international projects in English?• All our workshops are tailor-made to each client’s needs with the aim of maximising effectiveness in the complex international workplace.
• Our programmes are hands-on and in English to focus on key aspects of participants’ performance in real contexts.
Skype sessions are proactive, practical and – while using state-of-the-art theory – are geared around key outcomes for each session, however short.
1) Performance Coaching in Leadership Skills
2) Negotiating and Conflict Management
3) Managing and Influencing others
4) Embodied approach to Destabilisation
5) Language Management for better Outcomes
6) Voice Coaching for Public Speaking
7) Bridging Cultural Differences
8) Active Listening Skills
9) Change Management where English is the Lingua Franca
10) Agile use of coaching techniques
What we do and how we do it!
“There is no way around hard work. Embrace it. You have to put in the hours because there’s always something which you can improve.”
– Roger Federer
Measurable outcomes.
• Subjective and objective improvements, every step of the way. Outcomes-based, objectives-oriented.
• Challenging hard edge of language coaching.
• Understanding – Processing – Self-composing pathway.
• Repetitive practice.
• When you have reached your goal, set yourself another.
“Successful people become great leaders when they learn to shift the focus from themselves to others.”
– Marshall Goldsmith
There is leadership theory and there is the performance of leadership, performing as a leader.
• A business leader must perform successfully in a variety of high-pressure, high-profile situations, that we create in performance coaching.
“There are two people alike. No two people who understand the same sentence the same way… So in dealing with people, you try not to ft them to your concept of what they should be.” – Milton Erickson.
• Avoid zero sum negotiations
• Identify a BATNA
• Negotiate with an eye on the future. IBR vs Distributive approaches.
• Bringing issues into evidence
“The mind is not a vessel to be flled but a fre to be kindled.” – Plutarch
So often, meetings fail to energise their participants, due to the way language is used
• Learn how to Inspire!
• The quality of communication shapes the quality of life.
• Power, Rules and Interests. TUPAC approach to influencing.
• Why are people doing the opposite of what they say?
“The irreversibility of time is the mechanism that brings order out of chaos.”
– Ilya Prigogine
What state are you in?
• Is it “business as usual” – are you in the “drone zone” – or the “anxiety zone”, or the “learning zone”?
• Even the best-organised structures tend to dissipate, and negative spirals can take over.
• Convert downwards into upwards spirals
• Language investment that assures a win-win
“A great company is a conspiracy to change the world.” – Peter Thiel, Zero to One
A great thinker once said “The truth is not always beautiful, nor beautiful words, the truth”.
• Another, not so great, said “Do as I say, not as I do”.
• Achieving great things implies wisdom and understanding.
• Walk the talk • Stepping back
• Emotional Intelligence • Neuroplasticity
“The power of sound has always been greater than the power of sense.” – Joseph Conrad
Announcing uplifting news, or a hard message? Showing executive presence? Networking, building rapport, or coaching? Pitching to a client or delivering in the boardroom? Turn-taking in a conf-call? Giving an after-dinner speech, story-telling….?
• Using the voice with confidence
• Overcoming Nervousness
• Using Tempo, Pitch, and Emphasis
• Powerful self-composition and projection
“What unhappy beings men are! They constantly waver between false hopes and silly fears, and instead of relying on reason they create monsters to frighten themselves with, and phantoms which lead them astray.” – Montesquieu, Lettres Persanes
What makes us different? What is culture and how does it manifest? How do we bridge differences?
What core values do we share?
• Avoiding misunderstandings • Using profiling methods • Working styles • Pragmatics and Proxemics • “Discovery” Role-play approach
“The quality of your attention determines the quality of other people’s thinking.”
– Nancy Kline, Listening to Ignite the Human Mind
Appreciative listening, deep on-boarding and respectful focus with critical and self-critical thinking, help to nurture customers and colleagues, overcome negative feedback, are time-effective – – and change how we view the world!
• will benefit everyone • measurable improvements in atmosphere • and the bottom line
• more than a powerful courtesy, a creative act that can transform everything!
“What got you here, won’t take you there.”
– Marshall Goldsmith
We offer same-company (small group) training. Are you involved in culture change?
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– Jim Collins, Good to Great
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Embodied coaching workshop for managing Destabilising Scenarios
This workshop will develop practice around the coach in a facilitator role when helping manage communication and self-awareness problems caused by a destabilising scenario.
I will build on the more theoretical aspects of last year’s session (which explained cross-overs between language teaching, learning and acquisition, with outcomes-based, target-oriented and process-based methods adopted by coaches or trainers) and, using the subject’s own personal experience of destabilising situations, develop an embodied practice, using an entirely flexible approach that allows for feedback and both objective and subjective improvements. This will be mainly a stand-up workshop, where the nature of destabilisation – within organisations and the bodily experience – based on personal experiences and systems and organisational theory, will be examined. The workshop is tabled to last 2 hours but could go on longer. A manageable number for this is around 12 persons max.
The coach develops skills that help the subject to grow in embodied self-awareness and social awareness, embodied self-management and social management while at the same time exploring his/her own levels of linguistic awareness. This process allows for the emergence of new language to better manage destabilised scenarios, that each person is comfortable with, and to observe how this works, making for more congruent behaviours and the internalising of processes by awareness of one’s inner dialogue. In so doing we explore the fascinating connection between our visualisation of situations, the feelings these create, and the language used to explain them and to communicate histories, goals and intentions. This has value for learners of all sorts.
This will be a stand-up workshop built around story-telling and exploring how language is processed and experienced. It will involve reenacting (extemporising or relating, declaring, expressing and manifesting) and then rehearsing and effectuating new approaches in embodied practice to manage and lead others involved in destabilising scenarios. It also means that the linguistic output can be evaluated and learned better.
Make sure you come with a destabilising scenario to recount!
An embodied approach to states of destabilisation
Thank you to all who came to the embodied workshop at YorkStJohn and I greatly enjoyed it! Sadly, though, with any short workshop there wasn’t the time needed to show how the protocols work in a coaching environment based n real situations and embodied principles.
I plan to give a half-day demonstration in the York Coaching week in 2019, this will permit the development of personal protocols in language and take further the 3-step protocols I introduced briefly on Tuesday.
Embodied practice is anything but theoretical. Having an awareness of the links to semantics and semiotics, chao-dynamics and not to mention the social sciences, mental, emotional and physical health; or systems analysis, helps in seeing the mutual effects of communication; in a way these theoretical points are fairly insignificant once the embodied practice is experienced.
This works far better in small groups of no more than 6 (using video recording of performance too); presenting it to large groups leaves little time for the peer observation and discovery.
Embodied practice of the chao-dynamics of destabilisation is an antidote to the (in my opinion) over-mentation and left-brained-ness that comes with so much theory – it rehearses in essential ways how to carry out on our feet the things that we read about in books and that in the heat of the moment are forgotten. As with any actor on stage, “turning up for the show” and wondering about a ‘toxic’ reaction, is not enough, considerable rehearsal and language review will go a long way.
It examines the fundamental links to language and specifically the difference between an “Illocutionary Act” and its “Perlocutionary Force” and allows for a graceful and impactful style that reverses destabilisation, it converts the downward spiral that is systemic in all organisations, into an upward one, using protocols that are rehearsed in changing scenarios based on real experience, with the coach, in an embodied way.
Chao-dynamics workshopYork Coaching Group – Managing Destabilisation 4th December 2018
YORK COACHING GROUP – MANAGING DESTABILISATION 4TH DECEMBER 2018
Tuesday, 4 December 2018 from 18:30 to 20:45 (GMT)
York St John University
Skell Building, room 037
Lord Mayors Walk
YO31 7EW York
United Kingdom
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Attend Event
Our last event of the year Managing destabilisation – or an “embodied” approach to Chao-dynamics will be on Tuesday 4th December with Peter Zoeftig
The feeling of not being at one with one’s words and actions – a state of incongruence as it is known as – is a common thing, where, in work and in life, people are wearing more than one “hat” as they go about their tasks. Having the agility in today’s hectic, and rapidly changing world, to juggle numerous stresses, is a very tricky thing. To manage destabilisation we need to work on embodied responses as well as on the mind. This workshop will look at the question of how the process of Destabilisation works and how can we better manage it.
Since the feeling of destabilisation is very much felt bodily as well as mentally, we can work with embodiment practices to better manage the situation. Emotions themselves are a physical as well as mental state.
The work of coaches such as Paul Linden, Mark Walsh, Strozzi-Heckler, George Leonard, and Wendy Palmer, mention the tools and practices that can make it easier to be a skilful listener, a powerful advocator and an inspirational leader.
Such embodied techniques are undoubtedly useful in allowing people to be better balanced and more in tune with their realities, however they focus on feeling – not on words – which is where so much destabilisation originates.
The workshop will be mainly practical, throwing out some “destabilising” scenarios and considering what kind of language and bodily response work, through some fun interactive role-playing (‘thinking on our feet’ as it were). This can be either as a means to coach others in their communications (which Peter does as a communications and language coach) or as something to use when – as coaches assisting others in a variety of ways – we need to manage our language judiciously. Combined with this we may also consider how to clarify misunderstandings, build bridges, or remove obstacles.
Peter Zoeftig is an experienced communications coach and runs Performance in English, which offers tailor-made coaching, using performance skills and embodied leadership, in the areas of change management coaching where English is the lingua franca.
With 35 years’ experience of education and training, Peter has been designing, writing and delivering hundreds of successful courses in prestigious centres to professionals from all around the world over some 20 years. He holds a Degree and Post-graduate teaching qualification, as well as diplomas in NLP, Life Coaching, Hypnotherapy and Kinesics, and has worked variously as a language teacher, sports coach, coach and trainer.
As ever please book your place and we look forward to seeing you there
York Coaching Group
The perceptions and scaffolds of emotional intelligence
It’s interesting to consider if we can separate words and communicating them, from feelings and experiences and their environment.
At a recent coaching session at The Hawkhills, outside Easingwold, I considered with my client how emotional intelligence is related to our perceptions and the distance we take from them.
Stepping back
It can be good to step away and view things by letting the mind roll into new spaces, having a pleasant environment for that to happen.
Susan David suggests “successfully happy people are unstuck, they are agile.”
Agility is a physical state. The mind has a tendency to stuckness; nature has a tendency to become rotten, petrified, to gather dust and cobwebs; organisations and all structures have a tendency to dissipate and collapse over time; communication tends towards misunderstanding. By stepping away as at the session with my client, it was possible to consider how language can work creatively to oppose this – as a gardener manages a garden – and how various perceptual positions assist.
Seeing the wood for the trees
Seeing the whole
Where relationships are affected by so-called “negative somatic markers” we are aware of hot, warm and cold energy as time goes by from the initial disruption, and how the time and effort needed to “clean” the thoughts that become solidified out of the original emotions, multiply accordingly. Emotion turns to reasoned thought after time and creates the reality we perceive as normal.
Hot, warm or cold?
In the coaching context, we connect the various channels for experience: what are the images when the client thinks of the problem and its outcomes for themselves, what are the words associated with these evoked images, what are the emotions they feel and where do they feel them?
The gap between envisioning something and the action itself and feeling the best way towards doing it … is filled by our voices, by our conversations with others and ourselves.
Co-active and more ….
So, the induction process of closing one’s eyes, listening, then thinking of a place and being in that, experiencing what is associated with that image, is about how to catalyse or uncover, from different levels, the rules or games of the activity that is under observation and the paradoxical language, incongruent behaviour and cognitive dissonance that are evoked along with it.
Conference comfort
In amongst the awareness of how language works internally and when used with others, and the elements of coaching that cover change psychology and theories – where the framing and reframing of experience, and the embedded presuppositions and beliefs of the other person are concerned, the co-active measures coaches employ as effective – we discussed how to cool off or park the emotions: by writing and re-reading our thoughts, later; by considering emotions as bodyguards; by realising that “the other is not me”; by understanding that taking more than 21 days to process the emotions leads to them becoming stuck; by remembering that when we sleep we cannot make mistakes, and that we cannot just “give” happy solutions, success, etc; then by considering our options for addressing the obstacle that may be felt to be preventing or blocking a good outcome, using various kinds of scaffold to reach those goals.
Layers of scaffolding
Managing Destabilisation – or an “embodied” approach to Chao-dynamics
How does the process of Destabilisation work and how can we better manage it?
PART ONE
It’s important at definitive moments to feel that we can say what needs, or has, to be said, and, where possible, in harmony with the pervading culture or established context.
The emperor with no clothes
Playing the Devil’s advocate is the antidote when certain things are not meant to be said. Having the freedom to speak and being able to speak openly is the mark of a healthy world. Is the coaching we do a kind of atom bomb dropped next to a person’s flickering candle only to walk away surprised that the candle remains unlit – or has been snuffed out for good? Or does the candle burn brightly and more strongly?
The Sinclair C5
Sir Clive Sinclair famously used the millions made from the Spectrum computer, to put the world’s first electric car onto the production line. His design team wanted to tell him all that was wrong with it, and why it was doomed to failure – but they didn’t.
The paradox is that people are in positions in reality doing the opposite of what they are meant to do or say they are doing. Is this accidental, or by design, or might it be due to fear or confusion or panic? It may even be that they are part of a destabilisation culture, and have no other option, are trapped; or could it be that they are playing a role, wearing a mask, or are sociopaths?
The corporation
Scary as it seems, as the documentary film, “The Corporation”, by Mark Achbar, ably shows, corporations do indeed have a tendency to develop sociopaths, people who can just “perform” without having a moral base. The society of Skinner’s “Walden 2” may really be quite close… It’s this unsettling paradox and sense of incongruence that leads us to feel out of control – even to question our senses at times – and that language is insufficient to express the reality of our own experience.
People today
In a world where the saturation of information is everywhere, knowing who or what is in authentic or in-authentic mode, is well-nigh impossible, apart from by using one’s gut instinct. Where does the needed subjective support come from? …. Let a flock of sheep go into a field and they will not know where to go, except at first as a collective group. Arguably, in primitive times, Mankind didn’t have a strong idea of self; maybe an ancient trauma led to collective amnesia and divorce from a more ‘innocent’ state, after which came the birth of “self” (the ego), and with it, the externalisation of one’s inner voice and the misunderstanding of what this “voice” is. In other words, we began to feel that we are each alone in this life, in some terrible way.
Narratisation and The Westworld
Lisa Feldman Barrett,
fter them the monotheists, in the form of a muse or command or ‘story to make sense of life’ broke down and required ever-more complex justifications. This has been brilliantly demonstrated to be the theoretical basis for the entire Westworld series.
in “How Emotions are Made”, has gone so far as to evidence the fact that our emotions are simply psychological constructs expressed in language and have no a-priori existence in a pre-programmed natural way. As Julian Jaynes theorised in his famous book “The Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind” in 1976, the stories we make up in our heads with ourselves as the main characters, are sometimes without reason or purpose; they just ‘are’ and we don’t know why, or what for, except by creating “reasonable explanations” given by other voices within our heads. Thus the ‘knowledge’ that was the inner ‘instruction from the visible gods or invisible God’ of the Greeks and a
Today, the bombardment of external voices on our consciousness has even greater impact on subconscious processing than ever, therefore, giving time to the processing stage or any activity, and to enabling a good amount of self-composition and mental and physical rehearsal, is critical! Just ‘showing up for the show’ and letting our inner voices take over, is not enough, as any observer of street mind-hacking, of Derren Brown, or close-up magic, knows!!
Politics, society and the mind
A good illustration of this on the collective level can be found in theories of cultural change, as they were developed and then used in psychological warfare and in subversion tactics (cf Babeuf, Levi, Marcuse, Gramschi etc..) and later – in the C20th – for world warfare. Arguably we are still dealing with this.
The negative ‘stages’ of Demoralisation, Destabilisation, Crisis, and Normalisation (all natural emotions that we are forced to pay no heed to, under the stress-control of peer pressure and collective will) have been theorised, developed and practised, for 200 years or more – way back even to Machiavelli. There is a best-selling manual, by R, Greene, the 48 Laws of Power that shows how these tactics are used; “amoral, cunning, ruthless, and instructive, this New York Times bestseller is the definitive manual for anyone interested in gaining, observing, or defending against ultimate control.”
Crisis and how to manage it
Demoralising equates with softening up and bombarding others with information and criticism, it leads to identity loss via the shaming of non-compliance and often we never know why we feel out of sorts. Acts or words are used that are felt as being violent by dint of introducing sudden changes, silencing and censoring, and there may be false narratives claiming problems exist when to all around it all seemed like ‘business as usual’. This can be combined with setting up mechanisms of control, even by blackmail and the use of easy victims & ‘useful idiots’ or via trusted accomplices.
Demotivating – in a very negative sense – is conscious or subconscious agitation (either from within or without) in an attempt to overthrow what is normal; this can be a planned destabilisation in order to take over control. This very real physical problem (of the problem – reaction – solution type expounded in the Hegelian Dialectic) continues with gradual
disempowerment and the imposition of new narrative, culture or set of core values. This can of course be presented as a very positive thing (and may indeed be, while still being received as ‘negative’ to those on the ‘receiving end’) and is further reinforced by the appropriation of education and knowledge. Whereas the intention may to to empower and enfranchise others, disenfranchisement may be the outcome. In many senses, the coach’s work begins here to reverse the impending sense of alienation, by working to re-establish truth and objectivity, establishing the principle of free speech and trust, by bridging differences.
Crisis is recognised in confused reactions and more identity confusion, loss of direction, hysteria, blame and so on. There may be internal warfare, both in the collective and in the individual him/herself. The coach here listens and acts to “give responsibility to the other person for their words” and to insist on a clear use of words, and ensures that those that use them, clarify and provide evidence/facts, by then clarify paradoxes, establishing clear
links, and questioning generalisations and unspecified references, deleted information, universals, or others’ presuppositions or patterns of language..
By Normalising we refer to how the “new régime” establishes order after the revolution of ideas. This is done by persuasion, force and – if necessary – the cleansing of cultural or political opposition and the elimination of useful idiots. In the political arena this game is very dirty, yet, and sad to say, the idea of “normalisation” has crept into our vocabulary in more ways that just that of political history. The coach here has a difficult task in liberating one who is at a stalemate or downward spiral, and challenging those who are perceived as aggressors – whether in fact they are the ‘superior’ or ‘inferior’ person in the dominance hierarchy – to think critically; open speech and the freedom to say what is “unacceptable” is very important if this phase is not to explode in the face of the agents of change, and some conscious opposition towards authoritarianism – or utopian thinking – is necessary.
Cui Bono?
Looking at a “positive” side to this can say that the coach works with PERCEPTIONS in language with the ‘aggressor’ (the one perceived to have caused the de-stabilisation) and the ‘victim’ to establish facts in a neutral way, working openly to the idea that the person in question may indeed intend to be aggressive or might benefit from being perceived as a victim. Are they? To whose benefit is it?
PART TWO
To manage destabilisation we need to work on embodied responses.
Embodied states
Stollie makes his way through the weave poles during the agility portion of the Purina Dog Show Incredible Dog Challenge
Since of course the feeling of destabilisation is very much felt bodily as well as mentally, we can work with embodiment practices to better manage the situation.
The work of coaches such as Paul Linden, Mark Walsh, Integration Training, Strozzi-Heckler, George Leonard, and Wendy Palmer, mention the tools and practices that can make it easier to be a skilful listener, a powerful advocator and an inspirational leader. Dylan Newcomb advocates “a new kind of language” – one that speaks to and engages one’s whole mind and body as one dynamic, integrated process. “It’s an embodied practice for self and life mastery”.
We can consider 5 physical axes that lead to better AGILITY
1) vertical (rootedness, having spine and centre),
2) left to right (occupying space, pivoting and having poise and balance)
3) forward and back (distance or urgency/connection)
4) time (and timeliness, allowing reflexion and processing to happen)
Pitch and Tempo and using the voice to impact performance.
5) voice (entering the space with the right combination of sound, pitch, tempo and rhythm)
Chao-dynamics
Managing crisis implies a radical use of language to oppose the natural tendency to dissipation and destabilisation in complex systems.
Combined with this we may also consider how to mange the language in order to clarify and build bridges, or remove them – as may be necessary for a mutually-beneficial outcome to emerge.
This method is based on a view of human interaction developed from the work of Ilya Prigogine. Viscount Ilya Romanovich Prigogine 25 January 1917 – 28 May 2003) a Belgian physical chemist and Nobel Laureate noted for his work on dissipative structures, complex systems, and irreversibility. Prigogine developed the concept – at the University of Austin in Texas – of “dissipative structures” to describe the coherent space-time structures that form in open systems in which an exchange of matter and energy occurs between a system and its environment.
The theory of Chaodynamics and Prigogine’s the idea of a what he called a “concentric” approach to nature/communication to reestablish order during a major disruption takes us into the bodily and emotional reactions that infuse the system of both the individual and the environment or collective group.
Work Styles
Stress and the sense that we are opposed in our will, tends to make people revert more and more to a default style, approach or set of rules. Fighting the frame tends to make matters worse! One way out is to provide or explore options; again, it’s often about how these options are framed and what the metaphorical image is.
Everything conspires to structure dissipating over time
Jordan Peterson (somewhat unpopularly at times perhaps) asks us to ‘be hard with ourselves’, and to first be ‘welcome in your own house’. By this he means, remembering that even (or especially) the mundane things we do need to be got right. “Being better verbally doesn’t mean that we are right”, he says, referring to how the relationship between one’s belief system and one’s perceived Dominance Hierarchy Position or Confidence Hierarchy is a source of inner struggle, confusion and concerns about status. Why, then, people “need to defend themselves” – even if they may deep down know they are wrong (or perhaps because of this)! – and this demonstrates how social constructivism and politics can’t be separated from language use and the way we embody it.
Perhaps language is our – maybe futile – attempt to make sense of a meaningless world, as Kierkegaard would say.
Your base line state
When a person is reacting to destabilisation it’s important for them to have an awareness of how to access their natural base-line state. Accessing their comfortable state while trying to understand the new state avoids tit-for-tat and self-defensiveness; it means they can start to make sense of things. Embodying a newly generated state may even mean not liking the ‘new person’ that emerges. What that person is, is not for the coach to choose.
The Coach’s role
“Control the options and you control the power” may be good in theory; oftentimes a person is too far from the source of power to feel in any sense capable of restoring order into the chaos. Their only control may be over their own bodies and words in the immediate conversation.
A coach can help another person to be more agile and lucid by means of providing time, perspective, and the opportunity to process a rapidly-evolving situation, and compose themselves for when they need to perform again.
A good starting point might be, ‘what options would you choose/prefer to have when you re-enter the situation?’
Generative Coaching – with no fixed outcomes – or clearly scaffolded?
ZPD
Another (more scaffolded) approach is that of ZPD. The zone of proximal development, often abbreviated as ZPD, is the difference between what a learner evolving a new skill or prepping a desired outcome, can do without help, and what they can’t do. This concept was introduced (but not fully developed) by psychologist Lev Vygotsky (1896–1934)
The concept of the ZPD is widely used to study children’s development as it relates to education. The ZPD concept is seen as a scaffolding, a structure of “support points” for performing an action, referring to the help or guidance received from an adult or more competent peer to permit the child to work within the ZPD.
Since the aim is for the client to reach an embodied state of readiness where he/she is able in the present to “bring forward the emerging future” these supports are gradually removed as students/coachees develop their own autonomous learning strategies. In this way the coach becomes less necessary, thus promoting the client’s own cognitive, affective and – critically – psychomotor learning skills and knowledge.
Just as in the educational taxonomy, where teachers help the students master a task or a concept by providing support, so coaches can provide scaffolding support. The support can take many forms such as outlines, recommended documents, storyboards, or key questions.
Yes, master
In some cases (and cultures) the coach is viewed as a master communicator of language – not specifically one who has all the answers, more one who can empower the client to find them. Scaffolding works as the good coach
Trusting overly in the coach’s input can however lead to further destabilisation.
The key to embodiment (what NLP calls “anchoring states”) is in doing things in a real embodied environment, and not a BOOK environment.
Or, as Alfred Korzybsky said, “the map is not the territory”.
This then is the area of interest between the linguistic insights of language acquisition, and of coaching, and points to how a generative approach can work, to which we will return…..
Types of scaffolding
For scaffolding to be effective, attention can be paid to the following:
The selection of the task: The task should ensure that learners actually use the developing skills that they want to master. The task should be engaging and interesting to keep them involved!
The anticipation of errors: After choosing the task, the teacher/coach might anticipate “errors” that are likely to be committed when working on the task. In outcomes-based education, anticipation of errors enables the scaffolder to properly guide the learners away from “ineffective directions”. When the outcome is fluid and unknown, however, “errors” are for the coachee, student or client alone to determine for themselves.
The application of scaffolds during the learning task: Scaffolds can be organized as simple/discreet skill acquisition – or they may be dynamic and generative.
The consideration of emotive or affective factors: Scaffolding is not limited to a cognitive skill but also relates to emotive and affect factors. During the task the scaffolder (implied expert) might need to manage and control for frustration and loss of interest that could be experienced by the learner. In this way encouragement is an important scaffolding strategy.
In terms of scaffolding again we can consider:
conceptual scaffolding: helping students/clients decide what to consider in learning so as to guide them (or for them to guide themselves) towards key concepts
procedural scaffolding: helping the student or coachee to use appropriate tools and resources effectively
strategic scaffolding: helping to find alternative strategies and methods to solve complex problems
metacognitive scaffolding: prompting to think about what is being learnt throughout the process and assisting reflection on what was learnt (self-assessment).
Other approaches and their relevance to our argument.
From Sir John Whitmore’s GROW, to SMART, many models exist; few however, which touch more on communications and language performance or how to embody this. The Transitional Curve lends useful support as a concept, and Hamlin’s HP equation, Ability x Motivation x Environment, adds the idea that our cognition, commitment and communicative credibility are important. The Contracting Matrix show that it is important to be clear, and adapt our behaviour, and I personally find the Jonari window helpful when working through blind spots and the “dark side” or other more public revelations. Of course, having a clear focus, on options and an action plan, and a way of overcoming obstacles, is always valid, along with the insights given by cross-cultural models and people potential profiles.
In communicative method language training the outcomes-based model used, is along the lines of elicitation -> presentation -> controlled practice -> free practice -> testing and assessment (coupled with copious scaffolding). This approach can be useful when working with new language but tends not to develop real acquisition.
In NLP, the iterative problem-solving strategy TOTE (Test Operate Test Exit) as well as Meta-model and Milton-model approaches to change states, presuppose the subconscious mind’s capacity to find resources that will shift perceptions and abilities, and these bring out subconscious discoveries.
In a generative coaching approach this would likely involve conscious distraction and re-framing by relocating the experience within the physical environment in different ways, and accessing the embodied reactions, as well as giving a lot of time to rehearsal and self-composition, treating ourselves meditatively. It would allow for a less-guided style that is open-ended and creative.
North-West artist Matt Wilde has described how he is concerned with capturing the ‘immediacy’ of those surroundings that people become immersed in. “His technique of applying the paint quickly to the canvas in a perhaps more sketch-like manner lends itself to the fast-paced lifestyles of today’s society that Matt is eager to convey. There is often humour and wit in the scenes that Matt reveals to us, but he also captures those moments of human isolation in the contrasting chaos of busy city life.”
Agility
We look for examples of a physical response when using language in performance. We think about what the voice expresses and where in the body that voice emanates from. The “hook” of the downward spiral can be considered as an “inner terrorist” and is a very unpleasant sensation that affects the body seriously; words are powerful and may in some cases suffice to disarm the perceived threat or to change one’s perception of it; more often, an embodied approach (giving more time for rehearsal and self-composition) will help in ensuring that the intended outcome is a genuinely good performance willed by the person in question and congruent with their sense of best interest.
If the outcome is not pre-determined, then it emerges through language which is always new, and actions that feel right. Life is not a constant prepping for a “test”, so the process and composition and creation of new actions and words are both physical phenomena.
Hence to embody the outcome is to have lived it inwardly and mastered it outwardly, in numerous physical ways, first.
What state are we in?
What state are you in?
Do you feel that everything is “normal” and steady – “business as usual”, or in a constant state of flux and uncertainty, giving you an uneasy even scary feeling in the pit of your stomach?
Coaching in York is in a great state!
After a great week at the International Coaching Week in York, during which so many interesting and important things were discussed, and meeting really great coaches, we left feeling inspired and full of ideas. I met or renewed contact with many great and inspiring coaches and language trainers, and we learnt how to be more agile in our work. How though can we help others to be agile?
So many different states to be in!
There were many great themes – how to impact in people’s lives and work, helping them to reach their chosen goals; the in-company experience and culture; the importance of cultural understanding that is seen not as a block to communication but a means to greater discovery of our shared humanity; the immense width and depth of the coaching profession from the volunteer sector here in York and as far away as Sub-Saharan Africa, to how organisational coaching models and profiling techniques and questionnaires are so penetrating, helpful and enlightening; how also to harness the energy of the group or team; about the default working styles we tend to fall back into, and how to intervene even very briefly, in powerful ways, emphasising the importance of basing the conversation on verifiable facts. And these sessions were run in very different settings, in modern office suites, old historic buildings, in a field with horses, online, walking in gardens….
The state of our language
My main interest was how to link the insights of language acquisition science with the framing or contracting of goals or outcomes so that creative solutions may emerge and without adding to any implied sense of failure if the exact original targets or goals are not met. Having a “backwash of expectancy” (as this has been embedded in our thinking from childhood and with the added pressure of schooling and workplace expectations) is a fundamental stress of life, and the coach ought not to reinforce this; so, how to overcome the inevitable sense of destabilisation that impinges on the very coaching conversation itself whether we like it or not?
The state of the world
We know that new language is acquired by “taking ownership” of the words and phrases that we identify with, not merely by mimicking parrot-fashion or in the died-in-the-wool Pavlovian “rewards” or carrot-and-stick style. In the words “new language” I include the “new language” of our Inner Talk and self-talk that we find ourselves echoing – in the chamber of our heads – that results from the constant bombardments of the external world and the plethora of conflicting voices and messages, seemingly and confusingly ever-changing and at odds with one-another. As the conversation moved from psychology to culture to political science to art and music, so we entered new states.
The limitations of language
And one state we commented on is that when one has a different native language, the way the words are processed and “felt” is different, and so is the ability of the language itself to handle notions and experience – some things literally cannot be put into words in the same way or at all.
Our state of awareness
One thing I discussed with more than one person was the now ubiquitous assumption of the existence of “levels of skill” where performing tasks, whether as managers, teachers, sports people, in-company coaches working on goal-oriented matters, or counsellors or therapists helping unfortunates towards a better life, or indeed as coaches working towards a qualification, to become a coach!! And as we moved from place to place, building to building and room to room or person to person, so out awareness, and naturally, our states, changed..
Stating the rules
Needless to say, it is in human nature in many ways to want to apply sets of rules – at the least, mutually-agreed ground rules or group cohesion rules – where a collective endeavour is concerned, and yet, when even we (as experienced coaches) were asked to abide by one-minute or 4-sentence-long self-imposed rules, or to move from table to table at a round-robin event every 15 minutes – and in one session, humorously, on pain of receiving a red card if we did not – we rarely abided by them completely, and conversations in groups could become slightly unevenly balanced and dare I say it, tending towards a more creative even chaotic sort!! This didn’t make them in any sense less enjoyable, in my opinion at least.
Destabilisation is an embodied state
Then I am someone who quite likes the idea of the occasional spanner in the works that throws “the expected” into disarray. Not everyone is the same in this regard, and the “destabilisation” felt by one as a curious intellectual problem dissociated from themselves, may be felt as another as threatening – as it does to me too of course at times. The so-called “frame games” (conscious or unconscious) that people experience (or play) can be equally confusing or disruptive, “are you addressing me as a coach, a mentor/master, follower/leader, or as a fellow human being here?”
Commenting upon one’s state of mind or of body
Specific comments can be disruptive in this way; if a colleague inexplicably comments “is there something wrong, you don’t look you normal self today?” it can be taken as real concern or as a clever game; the brilliant 1920s books by Stephen Potter on “Gamesmanship” and “One-upmanship” perfectly encapsulated the deliberate attempt to broadside a rival or social inferior using a variety of funny ploys that nowadays seem unkind yet are still embedded in the psyche, in ways that Freud’s work on the neurotic shed so much light on.
You know the words but do you know the music?
When we include reference to our embodied state, it can help to clarify the meaning of our words (and where those words come into our heads from). Since we can get in a “real state” due to people’s words and just as easily “tread on someone’s toes” and “put them out of kilter” inadvertently, I will hopefully be able to explain more in York’s coaching Circle, how I work with clients in embodied ways to overcome this.
Pitch and Tempo and using the voice to impact performance.
Changes to where the coaching is carried out are important – taking clients away from their busy schedule and environment to peaceful and beautiful settings, walking in nature – role-playing similar but more impersonal scenarios with a more neutral position; stepping out of or away from the experience in real, physical as well as metaphorical ways; and working with the voice to show how the range of tonality, tempo and rhythm – working with the music of language, is truly the embodied link between what we can imagine and what we can actually do.
Dancing a dance comes from within: no amount of book-learning or talking about it, can take the place of the real feeling of movement. What we know about language acquisition reveals that prepping for a required outcome performance does not equate in any way to real acquisition – and this will be the same where shifting for changes in the coaching environment are concerned, or indeed any aspect of life.
What if it rains on the picnic?
If we organise a picnic, it’s not simply about deciding we want a picnic and then just having one. We first need to like the idea as well as find others who do, unpack the elements we and they choose and prefer, start to locate what else we need and think of where and when to do these things, before even attempting to actually go ahead. What if it rains on our picnic?
What’s the Objective – and subjective ?
Of equal importance arguably to getting the objective evaluations and validation of the outcomes-based goal – if it is in fact ever attained in quite the ways laid down by syllabuses and discourse models – is to get a subjective feeling of enjoyment and pleasure from everything we do, as in that way we do start to become masters of our own, entering the experience of life, whole and not disrupted, in tune with the reality we help to create.
Managing your Language for better Embodied Results, York International Coaching Week
In May 2018 I was proud to be involved in the York International Coaching week.
I spoke* at Peasholme House, the home of – and courtesy of Bob Dignen, Director of – York Associates. The ICW (full listings below**) is organised by Mr Peter Lumley, Chartered Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), and whose tireless work with Coaching York is putting this beautiful city well and truly on the map where coaching is concerned. *My workshop explored the importance of language mastery, and the cross-overs between language coaching and awareness, with topic/problem-based or situational-based coaching and mentoring, around personal and company goals and culture. It covered how more effectively to understand one’s physical response to a range of scenarios and thence embody purposeful and harmonious behaviour that is also conveyed in language. It thus focuses on how we understand and perform. There was also some analysis of personal and corporate “culture” as well as of the theory of chao-dynamics, looking at how outcomes emerge by dint of the mastery of language and the skilful ways in which communication is embodied. Please email me via info@tostig.co.uk There is a question in the back of my mind, preparing this, namely, what makes us want to listen and want to be involved; why do we sometimes “switch off” and why, at others, sit up in readiness? Embodied leadership states and how to access them, is a perennial aim for organisations wanting to avoid costly mistakes and get the best possible outcomes.
What would inspire me?
We confront the inevitable paradox: people are in positions who are in reality doing the opposite of what they are meant to do, or say that they are doing. The question arises, is this by mistake, by design, does it perhaps emerge from a sense of confusion? Is there even a perceived destabilisation culture, where we find ourselves having no other option, trapped, playing a role, wearing a mask that doesn’t fit too well?…. Consumer Strategic Insights (CSI) Director Jorge Rubio’s ‘Brain Spa’ was a kind of “creative space” designed to allow its participants to”set themselves free” of the numerous affective filters that prevent us from – as Jack Welsh was forever asking us to do – “reaching our full potential”, and removing barriers within the meritocracy.
How does this make you feel?
Language management, dealing with destabilisation in particular, is a way of delivering clear outcomes-based learning, incorporating a creative emergence of solutions at the same time. Outcomes-based notions are programmed into us from an early age; suffice it to say that the idea is pre-programmed into most children, as they grow up understanding that they need to learn (and often only learn) what is “in the test”. Cramming what I need to know “to get the answer right” is present in schooling and culture. It is there in the idea of the happy ending, of the end justifying the means, the ever-present teliological story format, the Tick-Tock that famously Professor Sir Frank Kermode referred to in his book, “The Sense of an Ending”. We live – according to this great critic – “In the Middest” and, this “Middle Time” – the age in which we now live – is characterised by a sense of permanent change, where what was “good” has declined and is in need of renovation. A process of painful purging needs to be undergone, which allows us to explain the chaos and ‘crisis’ we see unfolding around us. (Has some ancient trauma led to a state of amnesia in our deep collective unconscious perhaps re-emerging at troubling moments that we struggle to comprehend?)
A recent film based around Julian Barnes’ reading of Professor Kermode’s theory
I read Kermode’s work when preparing my thesis in 1980 on Racine’s “Phèdre” and the idea that we already think we know the “ending” before it happens. Accordingly, in education, as in life and fiction, we feel the need to evaluate and be evaluated according to the “backwash” of expectancy, from the presupposed best or expected outcome – whether imposed by the parents, religion, traditions, the school system and its preparation for a career, or in work, the perceived company culture. Outcomes-based learning is a theory developed by John Biggs, using “constructive alignment”: we start with the outcomes we intend students to learn, and align teaching and assessment to those outcomes. Managerialism is explicitly eschewed within this theory, however.
How though, do we promote creativity, if participants believe there is a fixed outcome to be reached? As I shall outline in my talk, the way to bring about the emergence of creative solutions lies in how language is managed and in how we embody the process of change. Unfamiliar to many will be the work of Iyla Prigogine and Chaodynamics – that change is everywhere and in everything, that language is an attempt to make sense of natural state of flux, and culture is a way to fix and control or standardise the inevitable sense of destabilisation that comes from change. I have worked with this previously for many years and know it from political mechanisms of change as seen also in the works of Marcuse and Gramschi (I am not a proponent of these ideas) as well as in NLP.
Viscount Ilya Romanovich Prigogine 25 January 1917 – 28 May 2003) a Belgian physical chemist and Nobel Laureate
As Frank Kermode also pointed out, what happens is irreversible because of the inevitability of the ticking clock of time, and that what is said cannot be unsaid; actions, when carried through, are complete. A view of human interaction is also developed from the work of Ilya Prigogine, noted for his work on dissipative structures, complex systems and irreversibility.
Managing one’s language implies a use of language to oppose the natural tendency to dissipation and destabilisation in complex systems, a kind of NLP for empowering – and to de-programme the mind and set it free. Prigogine developed the concept – at the University of Austin in Texas – of “dissipative structures” to describe the coherent space-time structures that form in open systems in which an exchange of matter and energy occurs between a system and its environment. This led to the theory of Chaodynamics and the idea of what he called a “concentric” approach to nature/communication to reestablish order after a major disruption. A good illustration of this can be found in theories of cultural change, and also, more negatively, as it is used in psychological warfare and in subversion tactics. In a demotivation stage, people worryingly and understandably feel bombarded with information and criticism, this leads to identity loss, and sometimes deliberately to the shaming of non-compliance. Acts or words that are violent or introduce sudden changes are used, silencing and censoring, and – in the most negative scenarios – setting up mechanisms of control through trusted accomplices and so-called useful idiots, or a sense of “us and them”. The coach’s work begins here to reverse this and re-establish truth and objectivity, establishing the principles of free speech and trust. Using language skilfully, the good leader or manager manages to bridge differences and overcome agitation from within, where the sense of disempowerment and imposition of a new narrative is often felt as being disenfranchising and as a real physical problem.
During a period of intense crisis, confused reactions and more identity confusion, loss of direction, even hysteria or blame are felt as a kind of internal warfare. The coach here listens and acts to encourage a clear and responsible use of words. By clarifying paradoxes, generalisations and unspecified references, deleted information, universals, or other presuppositions or patterns of language, that we note in NLP, we can bring about a creative outcome that is desired but not known or imposed from the outset.
How, if a person is feeling intense demoralisation, can there be a change towards an empowered use of language that is at the same time elegant, powerful and poised? How do we bring gracefulness into an obviously stagnant sense of discomfort, or damaged stalemate?
In what might be considered a “normalisation” phase, the coach or other responsible actor – whatever their position – has a difficult task in liberating one who is at a stalemate or downward spiral, and challenging those who are perceived as aggressors, to reform their patterns of behaviour via critical thinking, open speech and by opposing authoritarianism or utopian thinking. So, looking at the “positive” side to this…. The coach works with perceptions in language with those perceived to have caused a de-stabilisation and and in order to establish facts in a neutral way and restore grace, poise and meaning to what is otherwise seen as desperate. This is then embodied in a physical way, turning defeat into victory and bringing about healthier, more mutually-beneficial outcomes.
** For the full listings and details please read here: ICW Events Listings2018 (1)
Being Here – or There?
Our words and actions – even the smallest ones – affect our state of mind.
A research paper recently published, conducting a textual analysis of 63 Internet forums (over 6,400 members) used linguistic inquiry and word count software to examine “absolutism” at the linguistic level. Its results provide clinical evidence of how several features reflect meaningfully the state of mind of the speaker or writer.
This will not come as a surprise to language teachers, to counsellors, or to coaches who pay attention to the words their clients use. Some years ago, James Pennebaker’s excellent and provocative book “the Secret Life of Pronouns” engaged us in this topic, and – long before – the founder of Hypnotic therapy, Milton Erickson wisely stated “The map is not the territory” – in other words, the way I see the world is not necessarily the world itself, only my personal version of it filtered by my words and images and feelings (and those handed to me).
Nowadays there is a lot of faith put in positive thinking, and this is not so new…
“On how one orients himself to the moment depends the failure or fruitfulness of it,” Henry Miller asserted in his beautiful meditation on the art of living, “The Wisdom of the Heart”. This is not to be confused with coaching that tries to impose a glamorous target-oriented “successful” way of fitting in, viewing unhappy people as self-sabotaging, and as Susan Scott has asserted, toxic to the organisation that they work in. While not disagreeing with the importance of “Mastering the courage to interrogate reality” and the emphasis on truthfulness to oneself, I find the insistence that being unproductive is something to be confronted with brutal non-compromise to be disconcerting where creative solutions are concerned.
Our constant escapism from our own lives is our greatest source of unhappiness.
Today’s Millennial generation – anxious to impress and to succeed at the expense of the deeper more fulfilling aspects of life – might think of the advice given by the famous Danish philosopher, Kierkegaard, who was only thirty at the time he wrote them. He began a chapter of his altogether indispensable 1843 treatise “Either/Or – a Fragment of Life” with a powerful observation – so relevant today, amidst our culture which considers being busy and forever dwelling on the mistakes of the past and the high goals of the future to be a badge of honour:
“Of all ridiculous things the most ridiculous seems to me, to be busy — to be a man who is brisk about his food and his work.”
In the chapter “The Unhappiest Man” he wrote “One is absent when living in the past or living in the future.”
We should not be, as the great Alan W Watts described “The working inhabitants of a modern city … people who live inside a machine to be batted around by its wheels.”
We live today with such anxieties, reflected in our depressive language and sometimes futile attempts to reverse our sadness with New Age collective thinking and coaching “success” that we never find our true balance. Watts, in his book “Wisdom Of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety” continued: “If we are to continue to live for the future, and to make the chief work of the mind prediction and calculation, man must eventually become a parasitic appendage to a mass of clockwork.”
Amusingly, in the film “Being There” the chief protagonist’s simple and naive words and childish world-view are taken as great wisdom, when they are merely misunderstandings. Yet Erickson reminds us that the truth emerges from the unconscious and not the frantic analysis of the rational mind. Neuroscience reinforce this message, since the over active mind racing in Gamma Wave exultant “highs” soon crashes down to the comatose state of burn-out and despondency.
States of Mind
Every so often new “models” appear incorporating the latest acronyms and buzz-phrases, and without doubt, from the groundbreaking 1979 “Inner Game” of Tim Gallwey, Sir John Whitmore’s 1992 GROW to the many more being designed in the present day, many present key words and phrases that help focus the conscious mind – even to the exclusion of all else. However we should strive as coaches not to crowd the mind with ever more models, but to enable new and creative forms of words; not to constrict by imposing models that others have determined that may work for some – but not for the person in front of us.
In my article in the latest edition of iCN (International Coaching News) I make the case for a truly embodied approach to listening, thinking, communicating and acting.
Performance in English coaching at The Hawkhills
The Best Restaurant in the World
As Performance in English heads north to Yorkshire and to facilities being hired at the impressive Hawkhills conference centre, and close to the beautiful historic cities of York, Ripon, and the world-famous Spa town of Harrogate, our thoughts turn to food and the great culinary traditions – so little appreciated outside these small islands – of England.
Traditional foods…
A modern touch
It will surprise many that Yorkshire is proud to have been voted the best restaurant in the world, The Black Swan, in Oldstead, beating Heston Blumenthal’s The Fat Duck in Buckinghamshire and Raymond Blanc’s Le Manoir near Oxford.
Wonderful surroundings
Ox tongue
In fact, England currently has the top two restaurants worldwide; while Maison Lameloise, in Chagny, France, came in third, and L’Auberge de l’Ill, Illhaeusern, France was voted fourth and Martin Berasategui, Lasarte, Spain, fifth.
York Minster
The beautiful county of North Yorkshire has an amazing array of attractions and natural beauty, and – as a coaching client with us at The Hawkhills – you can also enjoy shopping in York or Harrogate, visits to places of tremendous interest, and the benefit of all sorts of entertainment.
From world-class World-famous theatre, to world-class shooting, and world-class tea rooms.…
World-famous
Anyone for tea?
…to world-class coaching…
Conference comfort
Manage your words well
Using English well in an international context is as important for native speakers of the language as it is for non-native students and other international users of English.
Whether this is because English happens to be the lingua franca of the organisation, company, corporation or community, or because those involved in any meeting have chosen to use English themselves, there is every chance that there will be people with differing ranges of experience and ability in the language, just as this would also be the case with people speaking French, Hungarian, Russian, Spanish, Mandarin, Turkish, Arabic, Swahili or Gaelic!
Who of us can say we would be confident to attempt to do all that we do in our own language in any other language? We can perhaps learn how to order a prawn sandwich or a taxi, or to greet someone at the airport, wish them a good journey or thank them for their help. This does not take long and is a sensitive and polite thing to do when doing business with others. It shows that we have made a little effort to learn about their ways.
Just as we can learn a few words, we can also learn about the cultures we interact with.
This process works both ways, because – though there is common ground within cultures for anything that we may need to discuss, and certainly room for exploration in a number of areas (or business would never happen or have been going on for thousands of years!) – there are also certain highly sensitive areas of “sacred ground” where discussion may be very difficult or even impossible.
Encroaching on these sensitive spots is risky and potentially rude. This is as true of the English-speaking culture as it is of any other.
The things that affect our identity are hard to define and having a well-researched book to refer to is essential; I recommend Richard Lewis’ excellent work for a clear and intelligent model when entering new ground in any culture.
Where the deeply-embedded elements of a culture’s specific core value system and the individual’s own modus operandi can have multiple layers that are not open to scrutiny, the language itself can give us the clues we need to how a people think.
We should take care with our words whether with other native speakers or with non-native speakers.
The Ratners Jewellery store in Regent Street, London, part of the chain owned by Gerald Ratner, which made a 112 million profit in 1990.
Careless language can be very costly.
A famous story is that of successful businessman Gerald Ratner who in 1991 wiped £500m off his share value with one speech, when talking of his own high-street jewellery, he inadvisedly announced it was “cheaper than an M&S prawn sandwich and probably wouldn’t last as long”.
Another story is that of the Topman clothing chain and the firm’s brand director, David Shepherd, asked in an interview in 2001 to clarify the target market for his clothes, he replied: “Hooligans or whatever.” He went on: “Very few of our customers have to wear suits for work. They’ll be for his first interview or first court case.”
The company later suggested that the word “hooligan” would not be seen as an insult among its customers.
Such careless words may seem amusing or tough but they have consequences. In 2006, John Pluthero, the UK chairman of Cable & Wireless, sent a memo to staff, which said: “Congratulations, we work for an underperforming business in a crappy industry and it’s going to be hell for the next 12 months.” He warned of job losses and added: “If you are worried that it all sounds very hard, it’s time for you to step off the bus.” Many did just that and found work elsewhere.
Another pitfall is translation and translation devices. They are not capable of understanding cultural and linguistic nuance. The ambiguity of translation is well summed-up with the example of a biblical quote, meant to express the struggle facing the industry at that time and to motivate the employees to make an extra effort, and that was used in an after-dinner speech translated into German
“The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak”.
This came out as “The schnapps is strong but the meat is rotten”
Language is not a set of conditioned responses triggered by previous words, because we can change these patterns at will. This allows us creativity and individualism. Chomsky’s “poverty of the input” hypothesis tells us that what a child can produce in language is MORE than the input they have received via their parents or peers. This “new potential language” has come from within the child as he/she has acquired the deeper syntax. Somehow, the child knows that the structure “Daddy what did you bring that book that I don’t want to be read to out of, up for?” is the only right use of syntax for English, for this question.
Pace is a deciding factor. People are more inclined to get excited and emotional speaking their own language than speaking English, this is hard to lose in a foreign language, suggesting that the control of output and having to pace themselves, will affect themselves and others
Impact
There are several negative and positive associations: native speakers are imagined to have more sensitivity but often they have less. Consequently natives can benefit from observing how a non-native speaks, or try to compose themselves in FL to see how it feels.
Having a slower pace enables better listening and more self-composure. However the emotions inside the L2 speaker are likely to be very high and for the L1 speaker, having to modify their language to obtain better results may at times feel frustrating, too.
At P.i.E. we can help you develop sensitivity to language that leads you to better outcomes. As a non-native we can show you how English works and how to use it effectively, in your own specific situation, according to different scenarios and your personal choices, understanding norms and idiosyncrasies.
Equally important, as a native speaker we can show you how good language management will lead you to better relationships, deeper awareness of communication and the avoidance of costly mistakes, and to a level of self-composure that is not over-confident but mature and manifested in a spirit of mutual respect.
U or non-U
English as spoken in Britain is a confusing thing at times.
U and non-U English usage (the “U” standing for “upper class”, and “non-U” representing the aspiring middle classes) was a curious debate that began in the 1950s.
During this debate, it was shown that the upper classes in Britain tended at times to use words that were more common with the working classes than they were with the middle classes.
Since the middle classes were keen to use “fancy words” (neologisms that made them seem fashionable and up-to-date) the upper classes sought to distance themselves from this by using ordinary (“common”) words instead!
Being “posh” was one thing, but sounding “posher than posh” was altogether “Non-U”.
The expression “U or non-U” was coined by the British linguist Alan S. C. Ross, professor of linguistics at the University of Birmingham, and soon afterwards, popularised, in an article and also her books, by the authoress, Nancy Mitford, from the famous family of socialites. Nancy Mitford was one of the renowned Mitford sisters and one of the “Bright Young People“ on the London social scene in the inter-war years, and wrote novels about upper-class life in England and France.
What the upper-class were doing was showing that they were, above all, not middle-class!
The complexities of a meal…
For example, when issuing an invitation, it should be written on writing-paper rather than note-paper (a decidedly middle-class word!).
And what about the correct term for the meal itself? Is dinner taken at midday or in the evening? What about lunch and supper? Lunch (or even luncheon) is in the middle of the day and dinner in the evening. To refer to lunch as dinner, or to use the term “evening meal” is to betray your non-U origins!
If a dinner guest praises the supper, then the implication is that the meal was insubstantial and unsatisfying. Never issue an invitation to high-tea, as this is an exclusively non-U invention. When stating the dress code, don’t use the terms dress-suit or evening-dress, but state simply: ‘We will be changing for dinner’.
On arrival, ensure that you praise your host’s lovely house rather than home. When introduced to strangers, the correct response to ‘How do you do?’ is to repeat the phrase. Giving an answer, such as ‘Fine thanks’, is a major faux pas!
During the meal
Linguistic etiquette during the meal is crucial. If you need to wipe your mouth, use your napkin, not your serviette. Never ask for the toilet; U speakers refer directly to the lavatory or the loo. Saying pardon me or sorry is frightfully non-U. Say jam, not preserve; vegetables, not greens; eat rather than dine; have a drink, not a refreshment. Have pudding, not dessert.
Partly this was due to the middle-class believing that French-origin words and expressions were more fashionable; but the established upper-classes decided to set themselves further apart by resolutely using the Anglo-Saxon vernacular.
Since the 60s
In the last few decades, much has changed and it’s far more likely that eating together will be a relaxed and fun event, and not so “strait-laced” as it used to be; and the language we use is far more laid-back. The main thing is just to “be yourself” rather than conforming to a stereotype.
As most know, English is a mix mainly of Anglo-Saxon and French words, linked back to Latin. The latter are more elaborate, mannerly and intellectual in sound; the former, more direct and down-to-earth, “calling a spade a spade”. Whereas the common man might say “look into what’s been going on” or “get back to me when you can”, the more erudite person would say “explore recent events” and “please respond as soon as you are able”.
In this we can see the tremendous importance in spoken English of verb forms as contrasted with the use of nouns and adjectives in ordinary language. The peculiarity of U and non-U was to allow the upper classes to get away with sounding common!
The sometimes hilarious elements of the so-called “British class system” are well illustrated by the much-loved TV comedy series “Keeping up Appearances“; it makes good listening practice too!
These quizzes provide a bit of fun if you want to test yourself!
Let’s get physical
The environment matters
It’s important to get a sense of real involvement and hands-on connection in what we do.
People begin by accessing the questions of time and space relating to when they do things and where they do them.
At P.i.E. we use many techniques, some of them borrowed from voice training and from coaching acting skills, to anchor goals in really deep ways.
Most people have a common perception of time and space, although it is coloured by cultural distinctions and expectations. The key area where people and peoples differ is in how they do something, and this comes down to core values and their sense of identity.
Some clients like to get active and stretch and move around – but the training room, with lines of chairs and lack of access to the outside – may not allow that; others feel secure by making written notes of everything, and feel nervous in performance. As part of the coaching experience, we offer plenty of opportunity to explore whatever interests you!
In today’s world there is a tendency towards burnout and apathy, dissatisfaction and even depression (with all the medical issues this involves) due to organisations not connecting, but overloading staff in unnecessary ways. Getting the right pathway to the best performance relies entirely on knowing those you deal with and caring about their comfort and ability to express themselves creatively.
Eureka
I recall a client whose own preferred approach was to check his notes before making any kind of utterance. He referred back to them no matter what, he preferred not to speak unless what he had to say was perfect. He reached the limit of this approach one day when he jumped out of his seat and made a true breakthrough!
Getting physical, means providing space and time for deep-level expression. At P.i.E. we choose the best possible environment and allow the exploration of every aspect of growth.
How you do something, according to your own belief system, refers to language in particular, since how we use language depends entirely on which language we are using. The question of “how?” is therefore a more complex question; and, by extension, the question of why we do that is more complex still and depends entirely on who we are, our identity, our sense of self, our cultural persona.
As coaches, understanding this in a sensitive way and listening to the gradually changing processes of language in each of our clients, we get to know who we are dealing with. It’s important to get the chance to experience that in a physical way and get a real feel for it. The more enjoyable and deep this experience, the better the outcome.
Processed-based and Outcomes-based coaching, learning and skills acquisition
What should I do?
Don’t tell me what to do! – help me find it.
We sometimes feel we know what the other person means to say, or is trying to get across, and so advise them consciously or unconsciously towards solutions that we think work for us, and therefore would like to work for them. When we don’t understand, our first question is “why?” – but does this really help?
The author and coach, Nancy Kline, provides a good list of what not to do, when another person is speaking, which is quite useful in helping us eliminate bad habits. These include:
These seem like good general rules, but bad habits die hard! When helping someone to reach their goals, our own goal of “good helper” might take priority. Putting it more positively:
Questions
If we want to really know what the best solution is, and to help someone reach it, the more time spent knowing what they feel and how they see the world, the better. One does not climb a mountain without a map of the terrain. What if there is a smoother path, a quicker one, or a more picturesque one? How do I know what you prefer if I don’t take the trouble to ask? And how do I know what you are willing to change, unless you tell me?
I work regularly with managers and leaders who need to overcome difficulties of miscommunication – frequent where English is the lingua franca for business and negotiating. Finding ground for exploration working up from stable common perceptions is a very important skill, and one that, in the emotional heat of the moment, can be lost.
For this reason it is important to choose questions carefully and – often – to avoid the question “why?” until we have collected a lot more information first.
Where are we?
Where do we want to go?
How long do we have?
How long have we already spent?
Who are the best people to have involved?
What common ground do we have?
What makes the other person say what they do?
What are they not saying?
What is their aim?
What do they want to avoid?
What are they willing to consider changing?
What will they never change?
How can we proceed?
Being able to step back in one’s mind and having the firmly-anchored physical resources for doing so, are equally important (and very distinct). What may seem like a mountain to climb may be anything but.
Confidence in English
One of my clients not long ago was the kind of person you’d look at and immediately think they were totally in control and confident.
The Financial Director of a multi national company is usually bursting with inner confidence, yet, after finding out that he had to start using English for his board-level presentations, he had discovered that he was extremely nervous about doing this (especially in larger groups or more than about 4 people ) – something he’d never have thought would happen! So how did we help him?
He understood that it is an important thing to be able to communicate internationally; he knew that because we live in this increasingly interconnected world, using English enables you nowadays to be more successful by accessing more opportunities and connections, and that this was in any case necessary for him to retain his position….
He recognised the importance, in our rapidly-changing world, not only of “connecting” with other people who live in different countries, even with their culture and their way of thinking, but also shared with others the feeling of how tremendously enriching to life this can be. He realised how valuable the new “global” aspect within his organisation, was and is.
But this was not exactly the problem. If anything, knowing all this and being reminded of it, as his company underwent significant and far-reaching changes internally and externally, was adding to the problem even more!
This hard-working man loved fishing; his English was relatively low-level but adequate for the task of reporting to his Board; and he was terribly blocked; afraid; sweating in front of his audience; his voice shaking, he was very red-faced.
He had been very quiet on arrival, it all came out when I took him out for a meal and he explained that all the English language teaching and correction and instruction in cross-cultural communication that he had received in other places; the do’s and don’t’s; all the sentences and key phrases to repeat; all the reams of photocopied vocabulary – that he sort of knew anyway passively – the “enforced scenarios” he had to prepare for the next lesson, all the things we tend to find in schools were useless to him.
He told me how all the “cross-culture” training was making it worse; the endless corrections, more pressure, more theory; more “do’s and don’t’s and so on…. he needed to get over that, but he didn’t know how.
I found the way with him, by judicious use of NLP visualisation and anchoring techniques, shifting his associated problems by dint of changing his emotional associations, dissociating him away from the issues, and putting new thoughts and connections in their place.
It worked, overnight, after a short “out-of-context” chat in a restaurant, eating fish together and talking about fishing – in a certain way.
Sadly some may have had the experience after previous training and learning, of feeling worse than when they arrived – both on paper tests, and in real life – and therefore very dissatisfied. Poorly-devised training or blanket solutions (one-size-fits-all) can indeed make things worse.
As a proviso here, language schools do have their place but often cannot offer that specialised coaching which meets each individual’s needs….and being with clients of other nationalities does not always offer the right combination of guided acquisition and pleasant immersion in the language and culture which makes for more effective and rapid acquisition.
That is why at PIE we use many different techniques and according to the specific needs of the client. We use absolute discretion, go wherever needed, and spare nothing in terms of flexibility and total listening to the client, to ensure that the outcome is good.
Accents and register
How to be a Brit
The Hungarian journalist and BBC reporter, George (György) Mikes – pronounced / ɱ ‘i: ke ʃ / – commented wryly in his book “How To Be An Alien“ (1946), a classic of “British humour”, when – as a foreigner in England – he realised the importance of having a “suitable” accent:
“My dear, you really speak a most wonderful accent, without the slightest English!”
Accents are of course connected to our origins and culture. There are national, regional and individual accents and these can link a person to social class, educational background, and character.
Who am I?
As many academics have shown over many years, the whole concept of one’s identity as a person cannot be separated from language. Languages express emotions, facts, notions of time, space and morality, in different ways, and arise as the communication surface structure built on generations of history, tradition, law, belief and education. How we perform depends on first how we understand, process and compose language.
Outcomes-based coaching and learning
There is the larger question of how English, as an international language, can serve to perform acts of identity that are specific to one’s own language. As linguists have tried to show, all languages share some deeper, innate, structure or else how could the same human being, theoretically, be born anywhere on the planet?
Mikes started his famous book with the words “In England, everything is the other way round”.
Culture itself cannot be entirely systematised, despite the efforts of anthropologists, psychologists and sociologists. Along with dress and other customs and habits, language is the outside sign of what a person deems themself to be. Actors, who play the part of another culturally different person, in the theatre, see this very clearly.
Consequently, as soon as we open our mouth, we “give away” something about who we are and how we wish to be perceived by others. The process of “acculturation” – the process of internalising the implied rules of a “discourse community” – is something that anyone who lives or works with other language groups or nations, understands from day one. Culture “shock” can be one outcome of this difficult process. Bridging differences effectively, means using language very skilfully and being sensitive to culture.
Isn’t it?
For the learner of a second language, there results from this the thorny question of how to “sound right“. In some ways this leaves one free to choose the model one prefers, to “sound” correct in whatever circles that person happens to frequent.
It’s quite well-known that the use of question “tags” is a feature of spoken English:
“It’s a lovely day, today, isn’t it?”
“Oh yes, they said it was going to rain, didn’t they.”
“It’s so nice when it’s hot, isn’t it.”
“Yes I love it, don’t you?”
As George Mikes observed, “In England, you must never contradict anybody when discussing the weather.”
Similarly, the words Yes and No – straightforward as these may seem – are loaded with difficulty, and cultural overtones, when we say “Yes” but mean “Maybe”; or when we say “No, I don’t mind at all” – and mean “That’s absolutely fine!”
In addition to the vexed question of “British understatement”, there is the related issue of the “proxemics” of a given culture and the register of particular words and phrases. How should we “act”? How close should we stand to another person? How soon is it appropriate to ask a personal question? How direct or indirect is it appropriate to be? The exact combination of phonetic training, listening to sounds, using the voice and breathing in order to “come across” with confidence and fluency, is something that requires a thorough analysis and discussion.
Contact us to find out more!
Walk the talk
“You can talk the talk but can you walk the walk?”
Introducing “embodied language skills“
As far back as we can trace, notions of proper conduct have been shaped by individuals, rather than by committees. Their starting point has been behaviour – often at mealtimes or during the public “stroll” – which has been seen as a reliable indication of how people are likely to behave elsewhere and of their character.
In a culture where civility, integrity and respect are given high status, the words that we use and the way we behave cannot be separated.
From the film “Kingsman”
When we speak, we also act. There is an inescapable link between our choice of words and their specific intent.
If it is cold in the room, we could say “It’s cold in here, can someone close the window please?”; or we could say; “Who left the window open?”; “Does anybody mind if I close the window?” even “It’s a bit chilly isn’t it, does anyone feel the same as me?” or “Why don’t you close that window for me?”
Whether we like it or not, how we are viewed by others is a combination of how we choose to dress, groom ourselves, eat, stand, walk, and move, and how we speak.
Some say “Manners maketh Man”.
In learning a language, well, and making strong positive impressions on others, this is not simply a matter of learning certain cultural “rules” or “customs” – thought these are certainly useful to know – but in identifying how we wish to fit into a situation and what our own values and sense of identity are.
The “embodied” skills that surround leadership and other powerful roles, come with a range of language registers and techniques.
We provide Personal Action Plans to bring to bear the latest tried and tested ideas of Neuroplasiticity, Integration training, Somatic coaching, Leonard Energy Training and the very important U-Theory, incorporating ‘the Blind spot of leadership’ and ‘Leading from the emerging future’.
You never listen!
“You never listen!”
How often a frustrated teenager might say that, and, in business too, how often people might be thinking this, but they do not say it – and barriers are building up, unseen?
How do we “get” people to listen?
Are we “really listening“?
A child might have listened a hundred times to the being told he/she should clean their teeth every night. But do they do it?
As the saying goes, it takes patience to listen but it takes real skill to pretend that you are. And while this is not something we recommend at all, many people are good at pretending! All the outward signals are there to convince the other person ……
In today’s busy world, where time is always pressurised, arguably there is a lack of true care for others in society. We “listen”, but is there any inner processing going on?
Plus, what works with talking to children doesn’t not necessarily work the same way when dealing with business associates etc.. If we are not listening, what alternative does that give to our colleagues?
Good listening matters at every level.
Everyone likes to think they know best, so, listening to what another person needs to say, attentively, is not just a real skill, it is also potentially a means for powerful change. How do we do it, when our own heads are so full of stuff we are desperate to get done, and get said?
It is important to remember that not everyone wants to be the one “up there” doing the spotlight work and receiving the credits. There is equal importance in what we do to help people achieve their own personal goals, wherever they work.
That goal might be to speak and understand English fluently and effectively, whether they are the Managing Director, in the back office, or at the front of house in a retail role. Having the right skills to really hear what is being said, can change the way an entire organisation works.
Actually, when there is good listening, all sides listen and benefit.
How do you resolve your “issue”?
So you’re a top actor and suddenly you’ve got stage fright and it’s becoming an issue. You know you need to address it but you feel you should try to just get on with it.
But it becomes more of an issue.
Or you’re a business leader who suddenly seizes up in a presentation and this now plays on your mind!
You can’t stop thinking about it and the problem gets worse.
Both these scenarios happen often. Sometimes people get through on their own but if they can’t that is where we come in.
If the person is trying to communicate in another language then this adds another dimension.
Confidence may need rebuilding or temporary nerves addressing.
By a skilful combination of working through the issues, and along the pathways of understanding – processing – self-composition – performing we help you to:
Like the new actions and goals you are engaging in and working towards
Unpack the elements and get them in order, seeing them clearly
Locate the best means – for you – of working through them successfully
Use the best techniques and approaches to ensure great outcomes
Contact us today!
How do we measure success?
What is success?
Certainly, from a coaching perspective, it is reaching one’s goals.
The famous holder of the world land speed record (and on water too), Malcolm Campbell, famously said:
“When you have reached your goal, set yourself another“.
His son, Donald, continued the proud tradition of tempting fate and taking speed to the limit.
On that fateful day, on Coniston Water, England, on the 4th of January 1967, Donald Campbell had broken the water world speed record, and he wanted to do even better. He turned the Bluebird, and, fearing a change in the weather, sped across the water once more. Onlookers were horrified to see the boat flying up into the air and crashing down on its back, into the waves. These waves were the remnant of the wash that Campbell himself had created on his earlier and successful attempt.
Some might justifiably say, it’s important to know when you have done enough!
We have met and worked with hundreds of people, some who needed to go “just that little bit further” and others who had a “mountain to climb” or who “made huge improvements in no time at all”!
Our job is, that by giving prompts and tools the client is empowered to make inner changes themselves; the coach is a facilitator, not some kind of guru!
Everyone is a kind of expert who can tell you how to do things and what to do. But actually the only expert on you is YOU.
Just as only YOU can interpret the messages in your dream, 20 people can give the same presentation but it will be different in each case. Some will connect with their audience but others will not? Why is this?
This is where a great coach can make a world of difference.
Acting when the time is right, making the critical decision, knowing when to act and when not to, and acting swiftly and decisively, or taking one’s time to think things through.
The difference between winning that business contract or not; the difference between being successful in something or not; between becoming excellent at something, and going far enough to know what success feels like.
“Hurry boys, hurry, we have to make a quick change or the hour will be up.” – Donald Campbell
What are you thinking about?
Cherubs with bumble bee (after Michelangelo)
As visitors to this site and blog may know, Peter is a painter, and enjoys the rare times he finds to paint.
Painting offers an opportunity to reflect on life and to decide how we derive pleasure from the many things we see, do and experience.
The whole process of thinking opens up doors that sometimes prefer to remain shut!
There are many things said nowadays about how our thoughts influence our feelings, actions and experience of life.
From the idea that we should train our mind to see good in every situation and the idea that positive thinking creates energy, initiative and happiness, comes the opposite one – which follows from the first – that “the discontent and frustration you feel is entirely your own creation”.
This, however, is not at all fair to the person whose thoughts are sometimes a jumble of conflicting voices.
From an NLP perspective, the words we hear inside our head are not our own but often borrowed from what we have heard, seen and felt, from others.
What’s important is to clear up the ones that we have borrowed from elsewhere and have become ‘stuck’ – and those that reflect our deeper and lasting goals.
This is so important when we are coaching.
Learning a language can provide an opening to a whole new way of experiencing the world.
Things suddenly become very clear when we see them in new ways!
We cannot stop thinking – though as the Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu believed: Stop thinking, and end your problems!
Certainly it helps to be able to switch off one’s wandering thoughts and focus on the discipline that being with a coach, provides…. at P.I.E. above all, we focus on a relaxing and thought-provoking approach that enriches the experience the learner is having, whilst helping them to avoid the pitfalls of over-thinking, which can be confusing and counter-productive!
It’s about doing inspiring things that will always be remembered, not trying to force learning!
As another great thinker – Plutarch – said,
The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled.
What makes a good blog about “confidence”?
Julia, our expert in voice coaching and performance skills in acting, says:
“I guess the basic thing for attracting people to a blog is – if someone has a lack of confidence – they’ll be looking, not a t blogs which talk about “acupuncture”, but at blogs that talk about “confidence“!!
“Talking about methods is useless without a ‘hook’ of a problem people want to address, such as confidence tools, communicating with confidence, the projection of confidence…”
She continues: “…..people think acting is different, but it can help with meetings and business in fantastic ways!”
“There’s the issue of confidence… when feeling nervous, the actual confidence which comes from knowing you can handle a meeting does not imply that the methods a person uses will create total confidence without nerves, but that the adrenaline or nerves are controlled – like a trained animal!”
“I’m thinking of acting as an example… and I did give talks too as a child – it was scary but I did it, the English Speaking Board; you had a prepared talk then the examiner would discuss other things you were interested in and define ONE. It was quite something really! there were other people there too, an audience of family…”
For her – whatever the age – being stuck in front of a load of people and an examiner was daunting… and at PIE we use NLP and hypnotherapy too, to overcome issues.
“The prepared talk was fine, then the impromptu talk was shorter and I recall I had a few minutes to ‘create’ a structure in my head… I was young! I remember my mum in the audience all red faced but proud! I think that elocution helped because it gave a focus too regarding HOW I was to convey the talk.”
There were the background tools of emphasis and pacing and how to make the voice carry to the back of the room, and the breathing also to control nerves… picking a subject and making it interesting; picking out main points… That is what people identify with!”
“Otherwise a blog is a professional ‘paper’ and detached from their own experience; it is about connecting so they see their own problem in it and see how you’ve addressed it.”
In “the Third Tribe”, Chris Brogan is quoted as saying that the heart of good blogging is addressing people’s pain. Most of us are familiar with the saying “People don’t google ‘aspirin’; they google ‘headache’.”
As coaches, we’re solving the problems that people would google!
New blogs!
Beginning a new series of blogs this Spring, we’d like to welcome those who visit this page via our new association with RussianUK magazine!
Watch this space for blogs on all manner of subjects:
And much, much more!
Performance in English is on Hot Courses
Merry Yuletide 2016
Performance in English portfolio pages.
Details of our Coaching work, Business Communications, other Services, including Personalised Action Plans, Resourcefulness, Impact and “modelling” techniques including Embodiment skills and much more, now for Actors as well as all Business communicators.
www.performanceinenglish.com
Performance In English announces PIE for Actors!
https://www.performanceinenglish.com/pie-for-actors/
New events in the area!
Hi everyone,
We have added a calendar of some local events of interest including what’s on at the theatre at the Mill at Sonning and also at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford upon Avon..
Please click the link to our calendar page..
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On the same page you’ll find a widget with the latest weather forecasts for the area!
We hope to share this with you in person, when you come to England for performance coaching in English!
Performance in English in RussianUK magazine
Performance in English in RussianUK magazine
We are delighted to appear in the new edition of RussianUK magazine (edition 36) along with an article about our work, please take a look!
Мы рады появляться в статье, опубликованной в российском журнале Великобритании в этом месяце. Пожалуйста, обратите внимание на эту прекрасную издание!
RussianUK magazine
Peter has just completed a new painting
I have just finished my latest painting, several days’ work!
I have just finished my latest painting, several days’ work!
Click here to view my paintings and to ask about commissions, contact me!
Watch the intro video to Performance in English
New Calendar for 2016!
New calendar for 2016 featuring original fine art oil, watercolour and gouache paintings by Peter…
Happy Yule 2015 – 2016!
Welcome to Performance in English – designed by tostig.
We look forward to seeing you soon…
Happy Yule and a very prosperous 2016!