Mind your langauge

Nearly everyone who’s been on even the most basic communication course will tell you, if asked, that words only account for 7% in any communication (too see what the other elements are and how they interrelate, click here)

And possibly because of that, we often don’t pay enough attention to words and their impact.

I was talking with a colleague about this recently and remarked how communication skills trainers used to (maybe some still do?) advocate paraphrasing what someone had said so that they’d know that you’d been paying attention and understood. More recently, and particularly those of us schooled in NLP and/or Clean Language, we have moved away from this and use people’s own words back to them. To illustrate, I asked her to imagine I’d just told her I was cross about something and that the conversation that followed had gone thus:

Helen: I’m really cross about that

Colleague: so, you’re feeling angry about that

Helen: no, I’m cross about it

Colleague: so, what is it that’s making you so angry?

Helen: I’m not angry, I’m cross

Colleague: so you’re quite upset about this

Helen (getting angry and upset) too right I am now!

And then to compare it with this approach

Helen: I’m really cross about that

Colleague: Tell me a bit more about what it’s like being really cross about that

The first closes the conversation down because it( erroneously in my case) equates crossness with anger and upset. It assumes that we share the same understanding of the emotion. The second, opens up new possibilities and can help deepen understanding by exploring further and seeking clarification without muddying the waters by substituting any potentially value laden nouns or adjectives.

Another case of less being more.

Being me

Being me, I had- as I usually do – a sense of what I wanted my next blog article to be about and I went online to look for a pithy quote or two to help illustrate the point(s) I wanted to make. And this quote – which wasn't about what I had consciously set out to write about – just leapt out at me.

It’s by Virginia Satir who, as some of you will know, is one of the people Grinder and Bandler modelled when they developed NLP.

‘nuff said!

I am Me. In all the world, there is no one else exactly like me. Everything that comes out of me is authentically mine, because I alone chose it - I own everything about me: my body, my feelings, my mouth, my voice, all my actions, whether they be to others or myself. I own my fantasies, my dreams, my hopes, my fears. I own my triumphs and successes, all my failures and mistakes. Because I own all of me, I can become intimately acquainted with me. By doing so I can love me and be friendly with all my parts. I know there are aspects of myself that puzzle me, and other aspects that I do not know – but as long as I am friendly and loving to myself, I can courageously and hopefully look for solutions to the puzzles and ways to find out more about me. However I look and sound, whatever I say and do, and whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time is authentically me. If later some parts of how I looked, sounded, thought and felt turn out to be unfitting, I can discard that which is unfitting, keep the rest, and invent something new for that which I discarded. I can see, hear, feel, think, say, and do. I have the tools to survive, to be close to others, to be productive, and to make sense and order out of the world of people and things outside of me. I own me, and therefore I can engineer me. I am me, and I am Okay.

Appreciating what’s been there all along

On holiday last month I visited a number of gardens and took, as I always do at this time of year, great delight in the roses and herbaceous borders. The scent of roses and lavender, in particular, always remind me of happy childhood summers with my grandmother.

This year, however, as well as my usual 'must sees’ while visiting gardens, I’ve also taken great interest and delight in visiting kitchen/vegetable gardens – pleased with how much I can now recognise just from the leaves, and noticing different planting options and how, as well as being productive, several kitchen gardens have also been designed to make them visually appealing.

I’m sure these gardens have had kitchen gardens for as long as I’ve been visiting them – I’ve just not noticed them before. Now (and regular readers and those of you who’ve kept up with my various ‘veg talk’ entries will readily understand why) I think they’re every bit as lovely as the roses and borders.

So, what lovely things have been there for you all along that you’ve not been seeing? And how much richer are you now that you do?

One does not see anything until one sees its beauty
~ Oscar Wilde

The simple truth about the power of 3

You can learn a lot from buses.

None come for ages and then three come along at once. So, when they do, you notice them.

It can be the same with ideas or promptings about things we need to pay attention to.

So, if you notice the same or a similar idea coming into your head several times from seemingly unconnected sources- it can be useful to pay attention to them.

Yesterday for instance, at my local Quaker meeting, one of the themes was simplicity – of leading a full life that takes delight in life’s simple – and often priceless- treasures.

This morning –less than 24 hours after this reminder of the joy and benefits of simplicity, I had promised myself an early start in the study but my computer had other ideas. It refused to power up. The red eye of the answerphone had dimmed and it was clear that I had no power – at least in that part of the house. So, I began my usual check of other electrical points/lights (my house has what seems to me a rather arcane arrangement as far as wiring/the fuse box goes) and narrowed the problem down to the fuse box. Aha! Just as I thought, one of the switches had tripped. I reset it and went enthusiastically back to my study and tried again. Nothing. My computer still appeared lifeless. Back to the fuse box and more fruitless fiddling around. Nothing doing. I am now beginning to get rather twitchy – imagining electricians, large bills and delays to my work schedule. I’m wondering whether I can make do temporarily with an extension lead or two .

And it’s when I’m crawling around under my desk working out which lead goes with what that I notice that the red light on my power surge protector is not glowing – not because of any electrical fault, but because it has been switched to the ‘off’ position – presumably by one the cats when they had their mad half hour last night and were scampering round for all they were worth. Problem solved – and life happily restored to my computer and my day is back on track.

So, by now I’m beginning to think – aha, maybe there’s message here for me about not making things more complicated than they need to be. About not overlooking the common place, the everyday, the simple solution.

And eventually (modem problems aside – but let’s not go there) when I finally got into my email I found this

If something is simple,
...it is more likely to be practical
If it is practical,
...it is more likely to be used
If it is used,
...it is more likely to make a difference

So look at things you want to do, changes
you want to make. From the perspective
of those who need to do it, is it simple?

Hint: you might need to ask them :-)

This came to me via Paul Matthews at www.peoplealchemy.co.uk though Paul’s accompanying note said that the idea came courtesy of a chat he had recently with Peter Honey

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.
Albert Einstein

Simple, really !

Equine Dentistry

Last week I had 5 tonnes of pebbles delivered. My brilliant gardener had said she would help shift them – and volunteered the help of her teenage son. She suggested I might ask other friends to help with the task of moving this mountain (actually, it’s more akin to a beach) from the front garden to the back. But I was reluctant to do so (lots of potential lessons there, to be explored another time) and so the task fell to the three of us. And, to be truthful, mainly to the two of them.



As they set to work one sunny afternoon, an 18 year old lad passed by, paused and offered his help.
He was unknown to all of us and quite simply asked, ‘Would you like a hand with that?’. Now, my gardener had three main choices here, she could

• Accept graciously and gratefully
• Simper (well, maybe she couldn’t; in my experience, that’s not her style !) and say something like ‘oh, that’s very kind but I couldn’t possibly put you to so much trouble’
• Wonder about his motives and either quiz him on them relentlessly or refuse point blank on the grounds that he was probably on the make somehow.

My gardener is a down to earth soul (if you’re reading this, that’s a compliment btw !) and rather than looking this gift horse in the mouth she went for option 1. Result? 50% less time needed to shift the pebbles and an 18 year old (who explained, along the way, that it was a nice day, he enjoyed being outside and that it beat revising for his ‘A’ levels) has left a bigger mark in the minds and hearts of others than perhaps he’s conscious of. All by a simple gift of helping. My hope for him is that his gift is repaid many times over – that the sunshine and exercise will have re-energised him and enabled him to tackle his revision with renewed vigour.

Power is the ability to do good things for others.

E. W. Howe

All power to his (mental) elbow ! We, after all, benefitted from the physical one.

Veg Talk 3

It’s been a funny few weeks in the veg patch.

Some plants – grown from seed and tended lovingly in my shed-cum-greenhouse, are doing really well. I harvested my first salad crop today, have the promise of more to come and a number of other, slower growing , veg have clearly taken root and are developing well.

Others again grown from seed, are looking pretty sorry for themselves (can you look pretty, and sorry for yourself?) and I’m wondering whether to let them have a bit more time/space or whether to give up on them now and replace them with something that may be more suited to the soil/my talents/the weather. I’m reluctant to give up on them – but they’re taking up valuable space that could be put to better use.

Ideas must be put to the test. That's why we make things, otherwise they would be no more than ideas. There is often a huge difference between an idea and its realisation.

Andy Goldsworthy

And then there are the young plants bought from a garden centre – I chose perfectly good looking specimens, followed the instructions to the letter. And within just a few days of planting out (again, following the instructions to the letter) they shrivelled and died.

Do not follow the ideas of others, but learn to listen to the voice within yourself. Your body and mind will become clear.

Dogen

And there are others, variously grown by me, shop bought or donated by friends – for which it’s too soon to call. So I’ll continue to nurture them and watch with interest.