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Desiderata

GO PLACIDLY amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.

Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.

And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

By Max Ehrmann © 1927 Original text

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Maintaining Resilient Relationships And Social Distancing!

By now many of us will be getting used to spending much more time with our loved ones than is normal.  We have also just had four days of the Easter Holiday, during which time many of the things that we would normally anticipate doing have not been available to us. This can create stress and frustration for everyone, especially but not exclusively for children.

Being thrown together 24/7 can stir up lots of unwanted feelings, for some people these will need to be managed with care and understanding. No matter how much you love those you live with, this situation is not something that we are familiar with. For many people there are also important working relationships to be taken into consideration.

Here are some simple tips which have helped others to develop and maintain stronger, tolerant relationships in challenging situations

Try to negotiate agreed, regular amounts of ‘You Time’ — that is time on your own. Time for whatever you want and or need to do to in order to preserve your well being. In this way you will know that at certain, agreed times each day, you will have time to do exactly what you want, whether that is to just sit and stare into space or to talk to a friend. Encourage your loved ones to do the same and ask that everyone respect each other’s ‘You Time’.

Have regular, agreed, check-ins to find how things are going with each other. You can even extend this to family and friends who don’t actually live with you too. 

Use the check-in by enquiring for example, who needs any help? Who is in most need just at this moment in time? What can be done to help?

Be honest and genuine with each other, do not hold onto or save up resentments. If you have something that is bothering you, talk about it calmly, before your feelings become overwhelming and you run the risk of over reacting.

See your check-ins as an opportunity to evaluate the way you are managing routines which are new to everyone, and if appropriate to recalibrate these to everyone’s benefit. 

Building strong relationships with your work colleagues is vitally important at this time. Ensure that you have appropriate, regular conversations and make sure you ask each other how things are going. Of course the work task is important but the person in charge of the specific task is more important, the task cannot get done effectively if the person feels unimportant and disconnected.

For leaders it is vital to acknowledge that some of the people you lead may be finding working from their home environment extremely difficult and challenging. For example they may be missing face to face interactions with colleagues and workmates. It may surprise you to learn that for many people the main reason for going to work is the benefit they derive from the relationships and friendships they have. For some this may even be the primary reason they go to work.

See this time as an opportunity to build trust. Work relationships which are built on trust are by far the most successful and the most productive for all concerned. Not only that, it is nigh on impossible to work effectively with people you do not trust; or with people who do not trust you!  Trusting that they are capable of being successful is one form of trust, but trusting their ethics, values and understanding who they are at a deeper level also creates trust. 

During this period it can be all to easy to fall into being grumpy with others. Choose instead to see this as an opportunity to cement your relationships, making them stronger and more fulfilling for everyone.

Remember to step back and take a breath before you react.

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All Behaviour Is Driven By Self Esteem

Will Schutz

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Developing Inner Resilience.

Emotional Resilience.

Resilience is the capacity to recover from the unexpected. The ability to experience sudden, unplanned changes, and still function well. The capacity to adapt well in the face of adverse circumstances. The ability to stay positive when things are not going as we expect.

Here is a basic tool kit I use with people I coach, and the coaches whom I train in my methods, it is adapted slightly to reflect our current social distancing situation.

(1)  Supporting others to develop their resilience, in the first instance is about listening to and allowing them to express their fears. It is likely that they are feeling anxious because they are projecting themselves into the future and imagining negative outcomes.

(2) It’s important to remind people that the pandemic is something that we have never experienced before, feelings of uncertainty and anxiety are absolutely normal, it is also natural that this may stimulate our internal fight flight system.

(3) Therefore ask people to remember times in their lives when they have been resilient. We have all experienced difficult times before this and yet have managed to come through them. Reconnecting with the feeling of overcoming a difficulty, will help them to connect to their previous state of resilience and help to them to anchor this. Positive anchoring will also help to boost their immune system.

(4) Talk to them about keeping their thoughts in the present — here and now — reality. Help them to understand that they can choose their thoughts, and that is is more healthy to remain positive and not to focus unnecessarily on imagined negative outcomes which may not occur.

(5) Suggest that talking [and listening] to supportive family members, friends and colleagues about how they feel is really valuable and important. This will help them to become aware of when their thoughts and feelings are turning towards catastrophising and ‘brain on fire’ kind of thoughts, and will enable them to return to ‘here and now’ thinking.

(6) Encourage them to create a personal mindfulness mantra along the lines of  … ‘Right now I am healthy and well’ … ‘Right now I am taking one step at a time’ … ‘Right now I am staying focussed on what is important to me right now’.  

(7) Suggest they make use of this unexpected change to all of our routines to make some simple plans and routines for each day, perhaps think about projects they have put on hold, jobs/tasks they have been meaning to do. Developing an exercise routine to stay flexible. Learning a new skill.

(8) Limit the amount of time spent listening to continuous, non stop news. Every time we hear the same piece of news, even if nothing in it has changed, it adds to our levels of stress. Decide which news outlet you prefer and trust, then limit the amount of time you listen, so that you can maintain a healthy distance and perspective. 

(9) Use this opportunity to connect and re-connect. If you have not already done so create a social media contact list of family, friends, neighbours, associates, and then make contact with at least one person from the list every day, check in with how they are doing, even if it’s only for a few minutes — longer if you like ( suggest spending only a few minutes talking about what the media says is happening ) focus on what you are feeling and share what you are doing to keep yourself positive.  Connection to other people is what makes us human.

I’ve been coaching people for 35+ years and training others to be coaches for almost as long.  Before the virus I worked with individuals, groups, teams and entire organisations. My coaching is based on Humanistic Psychology which is about helping and supporting others to live into and fulfil their potential and also to understand the ways in which they trip themselves up. 

Stay Safe. Stay Well. Stay Fit.

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“In a gentle way you can shake the world”

“In a gentle way you can shake the world” Ghandi.

Your remit, your job, your vocation, is to enable, or facilitate, the personal or professional development of others. But what exactly does that mean?

Can you think of a better image to describe what a facilitator does than that of a Golf Caddy?

The professional golf caddy has a large, visible toolkit, and will suggest to the professional they support, the appropriate tool from a range of tools, which the professional might consider, for a particular set of circumstances [in golf this is known as ‘the shot’]. 

Professional caddies must have a deep understanding of the game, of the golf courses and tournaments, of tactics and of strategies, which they will suggest and offer as appropriate, to the professional they support. 

Professional Caddies are sought after and earn large sums of money in exchange for the support and expertise which they share with the professionals whom they develop and support. 

A good Caddy is also expected to be resilient, supportive, reliable, protective, proactive, challenging and honest; they often establish very long term working relationships with the professionals they support and develop.

The professional caddy in the business world would most likely be called a coach, or a mentor, a developer of leaders, a mediator, an educator, a teacher, a human resources or an organisational development professional, a trainer, or even an enlightened leader.

People in all these roles deploy skill in facilitating others. It’s what they do best!

I have been teaching people to be professional facilitators for over thirty years using a well established, systemic method, which I call 'The Art Of Facilitation'. My next professional training programme begins in April 2019. Places are available.

You ca read more here:  http://www.edgecon.co.uk/the-art-of-facilitation

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The Point of My Story. You will I am sure remember the recent and much reported cardiac arrest of the young footballer Fabrice Muamba. The 23 year old highly regarded professional footballer, suffered a Cardiac Arrest in front of approximately 80,000 football fans at a Bolton v Tottenham match on the 17th of March. Cardiac Arrest in not the same as a heart attack, which although extremely serious and potentially life threatening, comes in degrees of severity. These days a great many are survivable; my own dad survived two, several years apart, before the last one got him. In the UK those who are unfortunate enough to experience Cardiac Arrest - dropping dead - have an 8% chance of survival, or to put it another way, a 92% chance of staying dead… but that's not the point of my story. Fabrice had a huge amount of extremely good fortune. Qualified, competent medical personnel directly on hand to administer resuscitation. A very assertive consultant cardiac surgeon who was spectating in the crowd and who was able to get directly involved in Fabrice's emergency treatment. The same consultant also managed to get the ambulance containing Fabrice diverted to the specialist London Chest Hospital where he continued to receive the best possible care. He is now in recovery, though his career as a professional footballer must be in considerable doubt… but that's not the point of my story. Question...Do you think as Fabrice prepared for this significant football match just before the game he imagined for a single moment that he might drop dead on the football pitch? Recently I became aware that the popular singing artiste James Morrison had released his 'latest single' it is called 'One Life' and as the title suggests, he is reminding us that we do indeed only have one life. On a personal side note, a good friend of mine in the European FIRO Network, became so impressed with this obvious truth and all its ramifications, that after completing her FIRO Training she re-named her consultancy 'One Life' to remind herself and her clients of this simple, powerful fact…but that's not the point of my story. You signed up to the FIRO Phase I Programme because you wanted to change some aspect of yourself—whether you knew this at the time or not. My question to you, now that we are just over one month on from the completion of the programme is, what have you done about it? · Have you completed your exploration of your own personal Bottom Line Theory? · Have you fully reflected on your life’s purpose, your essence, your vision? · Have you paid attention to nurturing, protecting and healing your most precious asset, your self concept? · Have you remembered to ‘Keep Telling The Truth’ and have you put this into practice? · Have you looked at and reflected on the daily ten fold out I sent you, every day? · If not—why not? The point of my story can be summed up in the following quote… “None of us is promised tomorrow. Today, in all its beauty, is all we have.” [unknown] No one is promised tomorrow, not you, not me, no one! Of course we all [probably] expect to have our tomorrows and days thereafter and I sincerely hope we all do. But the real point of this story is, the changes you wish to achieve in yourself and your life, the You that you wish to become, is within your grasp and only your grasp, no one else can do it for you. And the time to start is right now, this very moment, not tomorrow… “You only get one life, so make sure you live it right” James Morrison

Pat Young.

Learning Edge Consulting, April 2012.

www.edgecon.co.uk

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"I would rather be sorry for something I done... than for something I didn't do..."

Kris Kristofferson.