Comments on: 3 Stories for Improving Your Thinking, Feeling, and Doing http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/ "Stand on the Shoulders of Giants." ... Insights and Actions for Getting Results Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:49:06 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Dr.Michael http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27973 Dr.Michael Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:00:07 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27973 J.D, I completely agree with the points you make on the potential for a quick re -frame and using emotions as input for the application of the listed techniques to slice and dice the problem from different angles, as well as leverage precision question and answering techniques. It is a great intellectual pleasure to study your blog, learn and try to apply so many neat ideas, insights and techniques that you make us aware with ease and elegance.To me this is a terrific learning experience.Thanks. J.D,
I completely agree with the points you make on the potential for a quick re -frame and using emotions as input for the application of the listed techniques to slice and dice the problem from different angles, as well as leverage precision question and answering techniques. It is a great intellectual pleasure to study your blog, learn and try to apply
so many neat ideas, insights and techniques that you make us aware with ease and elegance.To me this is a terrific learning experience.Thanks.

]]> By: JD http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27959 JD Thu, 05 Nov 2009 09:49:13 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27959 @ Hilary I think a really important question to ask ourselves is, "what do you want your life to be about?" Your story of the author exemplifies this. He chose to write his story forward and focus on opportunity over tragedy. @ Dr. Michael I like your point on attacking problems from multiple angles and perspectives. I think the strength of shifting from victim stories to hero stories is it's a quick way to reframe, become solution focused, and leverage your emotional intelligence. It's really easy to get into fight-or-flight mode and react emotionally to problems. I think the power is using emotions as input, and then using techniques such as Six Thinking Hats to slice and dice the problem from different angles, as well as leverage precision question and answering techniques. Good points on how it's easy to make our minds up and make emotional decisions, ignoring input and data that can help us make more informed decisions. I think just knowing this helps us get more mindful about our decision making and analysis. @ Patricia That sounds like a great use of stories. I think it's especially powerful helping people go from victim to heroes in their stories. The right stories really can set the stage for effective action. @ Hilary

I think a really important question to ask ourselves is, “what do you want your life to be about?” Your story of the author exemplifies this. He chose to write his story forward and focus on opportunity over tragedy.

@ Dr. Michael

I like your point on attacking problems from multiple angles and perspectives.

I think the strength of shifting from victim stories to hero stories is it’s a quick way to reframe, become solution focused, and leverage your emotional intelligence. It’s really easy to get into fight-or-flight mode and react emotionally to problems. I think the power is using emotions as input, and then using techniques such as Six Thinking Hats to slice and dice the problem from different angles, as well as leverage precision question and answering techniques.

Good points on how it’s easy to make our minds up and make emotional decisions, ignoring input and data that can help us make more informed decisions. I think just knowing this helps us get more mindful about our decision making and analysis.

@ Patricia

That sounds like a great use of stories. I think it’s especially powerful helping people go from victim to heroes in their stories. The right stories really can set the stage for effective action.

]]> By: Patricia http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27919 Patricia Wed, 04 Nov 2009 20:26:34 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27919 This is an interesting post and I would like to write it again putting in how stereotypes might effect the perception - In particular I am thinking that in counseling women were expected to tell victim stories most of the time, this was seen as a lack of empowerment...over the years I have come to see the victim story as a huge emotional release that can be turned into the hero's story very quickly and empower the teller into action. Just a thought... This is an interesting post and I would like to write it again putting in how stereotypes might effect the perception – In particular I am thinking that in counseling women were expected to tell victim stories most of the time, this was seen as a lack of empowerment…over the years I have come to see the victim story as a huge emotional release that can be turned into the hero’s story very quickly and empower the teller into action.

Just a thought…

]]> By: Dr.Michael http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27913 Dr.Michael Wed, 04 Nov 2009 18:05:36 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27913 Hi J.D. –I was carefully studying your latest post ,where although some although some NLP, techniques were principally summarized it struck me that it was all about types of problems we tend to run into and problem treatments in particular. In my modest opinion there is no such thing as a marketing, production, financial, personnel, or distribution problem. Such modifiers in front of the world “problem” tell us absolutely nothing about its nature, but they do tell us something –Just be the Hero and things will sort themselves out. Browsing through the table summaries does not seem to tell us what kind of problem was this – medical, economic, emotional, or architectural? Actually maybe none of these. It was just a problem. The adjectives are indicative only of the point of view, the mind-set, of the person looking at the problem. Wherever problems appear they should be looked at from as many different points of view as possible before a way of attacking them is selected. The best place to solve a problem is not necessary where it appears. There are four ways of treating problems: Absolution, resolution, solution, and dissolution. To absolve a problem is to ignore it and hope it will go away or solve itself. To resolve a problem is to do something that yields an outcome that is good enough, that satisfies. Problem resolvers take a clinical approach to problems; they rely heavily on experience, trial and error, qualitative judgments, and common sense. They try to identify the cause of a problem, remove or suppress it, and thereby return to a previous state. To solve a problem is to do something that yields the best possible outcome, that optimizes. Problem solvers take a research approach to problems. They rely heavily on experimentation and quantitative analysis. To dissolve a problem is to eliminate by redesigning the system that has it. Problem dissolvers try to idealize, to approximate an ideal system and thereby do better in the future than the best that can be done now. To problem dissolvers problems are opportunities, not threats. By redesigning the systems with problems, a better performance than the best currently possible can be obtained. This involves creativity also. Everyone would like to be creative, but what is creativity? It is my belief and the school of thought that I represent that it is the ability to identify self-imposed constraints, remove them, and explore the consequences. Unfortunately, knowing what creativity is does not help much in any effort to capture it. The principal difficulty lies in identifying self- imposed constraints; we are generally unaware of them. There are many ways of raising them to consciousness or avoiding them even without raising them to copiousness. Among them are lateral thinking, brain storming, synectics, conceptual block-bursting, and idealized design, the last of which, I believe is the most effective. An idealized redesign is one prepared on the assumption that the system was destroyed last night but its environment remains intact. It is this assumption that removes most self-imposed constraints. The product of idealized redesign is a design of a system with which the designers would now replace the system assumed to have been destroyed; that is, if they were completely free to do so. The only constraints placed on the design are (1) that it be technologically feasible, to preclude science fiction, and (2) that it be operationally viable, capable of surviving the current environment ‘If’ it were brought into existence. However, the design need not be capable of being brought into existence. Nevertheless, the designers are always surprised at how closely their design can be approximated. The reason is that the idealized design process clearly reveals that that many constraints thought to be externally imposed are actually self - imposed. The above reasoning can be easily backed up with many practical examples. To idealize is to think without constraints. To think without constraints is to think creatively. Not all ideas presented to management are good. Defenses against the bad are necessary, but they tend to be applied to the good ones as well. This makes it difficult to innovate in many organizations. I will very briefly identify some of the most commonly used defenses: - Has this idea ever been applied successfully? -The idea is a good one but it doesn’t apply to our kind of business or in our kind of environment. -Have any applications of your idea failed? -This is nothing but… -We tried it a long time ago and it didn’t work then, why should it now? - (Such and such a ) company tried this idea and it didn’t work there. Why should it here? Lastly I would like to cover problematic proclivities. There are too many of these traits to start treating here , so I’ll focus on the seven (covered in detail in the Hunt and Gilovich books and in other scientific literature) that I believe have the greatest adverse effects on our ability to analyze problems: -There is an emotional dimension to almost every thought we have and every decision we make. -Mental shortcuts our unconscious minds take influence our conscious thinking. -We are driven to view the world around us in terms of patterns. -We instinctively rely on, and are susceptible to, biases and assumptions. -We feel the need to find explanations for everything, regardless of whether the explanations are accurate. - humans have a penchant to seek out and put stock in evidence that supports their beliefs and judgments while eschewing and devaluating evidence that does not. - We tend to cling to untrue beliefs in the face of contradictory evidence. The formidable power of the listed mental traits is illuminated by a quotation from a biography of the artist Georgia O’Keeffe. The quotation appears in Bolles’s book A Second Way of Knowing: “Georgia was suddenly struck by the realization that her feelings governed the way she saw the scene. It was a momentum of transformation: the entire visual world, she realized was dependent on the emotional world.” Said Bolles: That day she learned the artist’s secret; what you perceive depends on who you are. Analytical thinkers have generally assumed that we perceive reality as it is; they then use a process of abstract reasoning to interpret the perception. O’Keeffe realized that the perception is the interpretation. It rests on the internal reality that governs the meaning we find in our sensations. The internal reality Bolles speaks of is, in fact, controlled by the mental traits I and many others have been discussing and talking about. Thus, it is these hidden traits that determine the meaning we find in the information our senses pick up and transmit to the brain. This is an alarming phenomena because we have no direct awareness of, or conscious control over these traits. When we consider these traits and a host of others we haven’t discussed, acting in combination, is it any wonder that we humans, as Alexander Pope observed over two centuries ago, are prone to err? We view the world through a dense veil of burdensome, though – warping emotions, biases, and mind – sets. Through this veil we sometimes perceive cause –and –effect and other “patterns” where there are none. We are prone to grace these nonexistent patterns with self – satisfying explanations into rock hard beliefs that we defend in the face of incontrovertible contradictory evidence. Ladies and gentlemen, sharing the pleasure of your company…….Homo sapiens ! Hi J.D. –I was carefully studying your latest post ,where although some although some NLP,
techniques were principally summarized it struck me that it was all about types of problems we tend to run into and problem treatments in particular. In my modest opinion there is no such thing as a marketing, production, financial, personnel, or distribution problem. Such modifiers in front of the world “problem” tell us absolutely nothing about its nature, but they do tell us something –Just be the Hero and things will sort themselves out. Browsing through the table summaries does not seem to tell us what kind of problem was this – medical, economic, emotional, or architectural? Actually maybe none of these. It was just a problem.
The adjectives are indicative only of the point of view, the mind-set, of the person looking at the problem. Wherever problems appear they should be looked at from as many different points of view as possible before a way of attacking them is selected. The best place to solve a problem is not necessary where it appears.
There are four ways of treating problems: Absolution, resolution, solution, and dissolution. To absolve a problem is to ignore it and hope it will go away or solve itself.
To resolve a problem is to do something that yields an outcome that is good enough, that satisfies. Problem resolvers take a clinical approach to problems; they rely heavily on experience, trial and error, qualitative judgments, and common sense. They try to identify the cause of a problem, remove or suppress it, and thereby return to a previous state. To solve a problem is to do something that yields the best possible outcome, that optimizes. Problem solvers take a research approach to problems. They rely heavily on experimentation and quantitative analysis. To dissolve a problem is to eliminate by redesigning the system that has it. Problem dissolvers try to idealize, to approximate an ideal system and thereby do better in the future than the best that can be done now. To problem dissolvers problems are opportunities, not threats. By redesigning the systems with problems, a better performance than the best currently possible can be obtained. This involves creativity also. Everyone would like to be creative, but what is creativity? It is my belief and the school of thought that I represent that it is the ability to identify self-imposed constraints, remove them, and explore the consequences. Unfortunately, knowing what creativity is does not help much in any effort to capture it. The principal difficulty lies in identifying self- imposed constraints; we are generally unaware of them. There are many ways of raising them to consciousness or avoiding them even without raising them to copiousness. Among them are lateral thinking, brain storming, synectics, conceptual block-bursting, and idealized design, the last of which, I believe is the most effective.
An idealized redesign is one prepared on the assumption that the system was destroyed last night but its environment remains intact. It is this assumption that removes most self-imposed constraints. The product of idealized redesign is a design of a system with which the designers would now replace the system assumed to have been destroyed; that is, if they were completely free to do so. The only constraints placed on the design are (1) that it be technologically feasible, to preclude science fiction, and (2) that it be operationally viable, capable of surviving the current environment ‘If’ it were brought into existence. However, the design need not be capable of being brought into existence. Nevertheless, the designers are always surprised at how closely their design can be approximated. The reason is that the idealized design process clearly reveals that that many constraints thought to be externally imposed are actually self – imposed. The above reasoning can be easily backed up with many practical examples.
To idealize is to think without constraints. To think without constraints is to think creatively.
Not all ideas presented to management are good. Defenses against the bad are necessary, but they tend to be applied to the good ones as well. This makes it difficult to innovate in many organizations. I will very briefly identify some of the most commonly used defenses:
- Has this idea ever been applied successfully?
-The idea is a good one but it doesn’t apply to our kind of business or in our kind of environment.
-Have any applications of your idea failed?
-This is nothing but…
-We tried it a long time ago and it didn’t work then, why should it now?
- (Such and such a ) company tried this idea and it didn’t work there. Why should it here?
Lastly I would like to cover problematic proclivities. There are too many of these traits to start treating here , so I’ll focus on the seven (covered in detail in the Hunt and Gilovich books and in other scientific literature) that I believe have the greatest adverse effects on our ability to analyze problems:
-There is an emotional dimension to almost every thought we have and every decision we make.
-Mental shortcuts our unconscious minds take influence our conscious thinking.
-We are driven to view the world around us in terms of patterns.
-We instinctively rely on, and are susceptible to, biases and assumptions.
-We feel the need to find explanations for everything, regardless of whether the explanations are accurate.
- humans have a penchant to seek out and put stock in evidence that supports their beliefs and judgments while eschewing and devaluating evidence that does not.
- We tend to cling to untrue beliefs in the face of contradictory evidence.

The formidable power of the listed mental traits is illuminated by a quotation from a biography of the artist Georgia O’Keeffe. The quotation appears in Bolles’s book A Second Way of Knowing: “Georgia was suddenly struck by the realization that her feelings governed the way she saw the scene. It was a momentum of transformation: the entire visual world, she realized was dependent on the emotional world.” Said Bolles:
That day she learned the artist’s secret; what you perceive depends on who you are. Analytical thinkers have generally assumed that we perceive reality as it is; they then use a process of abstract reasoning to interpret the perception. O’Keeffe realized that the perception is the interpretation. It rests on the internal reality that governs the meaning we find in our sensations.

The internal reality Bolles speaks of is, in fact, controlled by the mental traits I and many others have been discussing and talking about. Thus, it is these hidden traits that determine the meaning we find in the information our senses pick up and transmit to the brain. This is an alarming phenomena because we have no direct awareness of, or conscious control over these traits.

When we consider these traits and a host of others we haven’t discussed, acting in combination, is it any wonder that we humans, as Alexander Pope observed over two centuries ago, are prone to err? We view the world through a dense veil of burdensome, though – warping emotions, biases, and mind – sets. Through this veil we sometimes perceive cause –and –effect and other “patterns” where there are none. We are prone to grace
these nonexistent patterns with self – satisfying explanations into rock hard beliefs that we defend in the face of incontrovertible contradictory evidence.
Ladies and gentlemen, sharing the pleasure of your company…….Homo sapiens !

]]> By: Hilary http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27885 Hilary Wed, 04 Nov 2009 08:17:54 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27885 Hi JD .. Good comments we all need to look at things from a different point of view - being positive etc. Recently I heard quite a well known author, who had had a pretty difficult life - his mother was murdered when he was a youngster - and other things - and he was asked how he adapted .. he just said he could never look at his life as a disaster or great sorrow, but always looked for an opportunity that would arise from that particular situation. Thanks - Hilary Melton-Butcher Positive Letters Inspirational Stories Hi JD .. Good comments we all need to look at things from a different point of view – being positive etc.

Recently I heard quite a well known author, who had had a pretty difficult life – his mother was murdered when he was a youngster – and other things – and he was asked how he adapted .. he just said he could never look at his life as a disaster or great sorrow, but always looked for an opportunity that would arise from that particular situation.

Thanks – Hilary Melton-Butcher
Positive Letters Inspirational Stories

]]> By: JD http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27882 JD Wed, 04 Nov 2009 08:10:46 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27882 @ JB King I think the key is the focus on the positive and empathy. The hero doesn't focus on the villain as a villain ... instead, it's empathy and understanding. Turning your mistakes into learning opportunities and stories is a healthy practice. @ Jannie You stumbled on an important secret in life ... action often precedes motivation (yet so many people wait for their inspiration.) @ Walter So true, and inspiring stories can help you find your motivation and dedication for change. @ Juliet I like the metaphor of life-long patterns and stories. I think it's compelling to write our life stories a chapter or page or a paragraph at a time. It's a great way to zoom in and out and see the forest from the trees. @ JB King

I think the key is the focus on the positive and empathy. The hero doesn’t focus on the villain as a villain … instead, it’s empathy and understanding.

Turning your mistakes into learning opportunities and stories is a healthy practice.

@ Jannie

You stumbled on an important secret in life … action often precedes motivation (yet so many people wait for their inspiration.)

@ Walter

So true, and inspiring stories can help you find your motivation and dedication for change.

@ Juliet

I like the metaphor of life-long patterns and stories. I think it’s compelling to write our life stories a chapter or page or a paragraph at a time. It’s a great way to zoom in and out and see the forest from the trees.

]]> By: JD http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27881 JD Wed, 04 Nov 2009 08:10:33 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27881 @ positively present Thank you. The book was a fun read - simple and pragmatic. @ Alik I think it becomes increasingly effective as you fill your head with examples and models of different heros for different situations. It gives you more to draw from. @ Fred You put it well ... it's a refocus. @ Melissa Storytelling really is a skill and I like that we can improve our stories through deliberate practice. @ positively present

Thank you. The book was a fun read – simple and pragmatic.

@ Alik

I think it becomes increasingly effective as you fill your head with examples and models of different heros for different situations. It gives you more to draw from.

@ Fred

You put it well … it’s a refocus.

@ Melissa

Storytelling really is a skill and I like that we can improve our stories through deliberate practice.

]]> By: Juliet http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27874 Juliet Wed, 04 Nov 2009 06:06:09 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27874 Hi JD That's very useful. Thank you. One could extend it to life-long patterns and stories too. Juliet Hi JD

That’s very useful. Thank you.
One could extend it to life-long patterns and stories too.

Juliet

]]> By: Walter http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27864 Walter Wed, 04 Nov 2009 01:43:38 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27864 What you have presented here is important for our growth. However, people must know their stories and acknowledge it as such, only then they can make a change. It will take time and effort if one is to really dedicate himself to materialize a new framework of mind. :-) What you have presented here is important for our growth. However, people must know their stories and acknowledge it as such, only then they can make a change. It will take time and effort if one is to really dedicate himself to materialize a new framework of mind. :-)

]]> By: Jannie Funster http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/comment-page-1/#comment-27859 Jannie Funster Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:31:02 +0000 http://sourcesofinsight.com/2009/11/02/3-stories-for-improving-your-thinking-feeling-and-doing/#comment-27859 My mind is of often fully aware of needing a mindset / focus change, but my heart sometimes needs a little more encouragement to make the switch. That's why the hero in me enjoys going for a brisk walk or doing some other vigorous physical activity, and before I know it my heart is right where it needs to be too! My mind is of often fully aware of needing a mindset / focus change, but my heart sometimes needs a little more encouragement to make the switch. That’s why the hero in me enjoys going for a brisk walk or doing some other vigorous physical activity, and before I know it my heart is right where it needs to be too!

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