Social norms at holiday festivities

As I read both Sway the irresistible pull of irrational behavior and Predictably Irrational this month, I discovered that both books mentioned the contrast between social and market norms. This morning I got to wondering if there we're more than two sets of norms we operate by. I came up with a model of four norms and a way they all tie together. All four apply to what comes to our minds and comes out of our mouths at holiday gatherings.

When we're operating by military norms, we're functioning as a tight commando unit. Family togetherness is efficient and effective to fulfill the assignment. Anybody displaying egotistical selfishness is jeopardizing the mission of a well-executed holiday celebration. The cohesion of the unit is critical to get the logistics handled promptly and the troop movements kept on schedule. Scattered efforts and lazy S.O.B.'s need to be confronted immediately and set straight. Running a tight ship means everyone must demonstrate self discipline, loyalty to the command and attentiveness to changes in the battlefield of parked cars, positions in the kitchen or seats at the table.

When we're operating by market norms, everyone is a potential rival. Anyone who claims to watch your back may stab you when your back is turned. The costly contest may involve who gets the most food, presents, invitations, mail or phone calls. Questions on each marketers mind include "how long is this going to take?", "how much did this set you back?" and "did you get your money's worth when put out for this spread?". Protecting the brand means that all complaining, criticizing and comparing to other events needs to be squelched. Taking advantage of the situation may involve promoting one's own heroics, sacrifice and generous contribution to the event. Others may compete by topping your deal, denigrating yours or introducing a third rival gesture.

When we're operating by community norms, altruism runs the show. It's not about what we got, but how much and how graciously we give. It's time to share compliments, show appreciation and express gratitude. Mutual respect sets the tone and genuine listening makes it real. In this context, people don't care how much we know or what we've done lately until they know how much we care about them and have done with them in mind. We're they for each other and contribute to the good time to be had by all. We join in the festivities to make for more merriment.

When we're operating by unity norms, We're one in spirit and delightfully diverse in appearance. We have enough in common to treasure our differences. We see common ground, shared interests and kindred spirits among different lives being lived. We realize how much better time we have when we stop the clock and be here now. We enter into the moment and become far more aware of the different moods, and changing energies in our presence. It dawns on us what to say to someone that amazes or delights them. We feel so connected to everyone we have no conflicts with what people are saying or where they are coming from.

Happy Holidays everyone!

The wonderful 25th Anniversary Whack

Twenty five years ago, I bought a book with a bright red cover that I've treasured ever since: A Whack on the Side of the Head. Twenty years ago in Grand Rapids Michigan, I met the book's author: Roger von Oech. We were both making presentations on creativity to a corporate headquarters there. Last month Roger asked me to write a review of his revised, 25th Anniversary edition of the book. I recently learned that the previous editions have sold nearly 2 million copies while getting translated into 17 different languages. This week, UPS delivered the new version that is pictured next to my first edition.

Writing reviews of books is well within my area of expertise and my comfort zone. I'm delighted and honored to write of review of this wonderful book -- except that would be acting like I had not read the new A Whack on the Side of the Head this week! So first, I'll reverse the problem of writing a review that's already within my expertise and following the rule established by Roger's request of me.

What-if it's not "in my area" to review a book on creativity? What-if I've not added reviews before to this blog? What-if complying with the "rule to write the review as requested" is a block to my creativity? What-if this challenge is really new to me, very curious indeed and likely to be fun for me (and you)?

That leaves my options extremely wide open. I could write anything about the new book. As Roger has explored more extensively in this new edition, added constraints bring out more creativity. I need to limit my possibilities further and take those previous what-if questions as a steppingstone to another set of more confining questions.

What-if this 25th Anniversary book that arrived this week is not really a book to open, read, bookmark, reread, close and shelve? What-if the book is actually therapy for troublesome inhibitions, hang-ups and blocked talents? What-if the book is practicing what it preaches and setting us up to learn by its worthy example? What-if the new book is actually giving away the secret of its huge sales success with the previous editions? What-if the book embodies paradoxical wisdom like the Tao Te Ching or I Ching that can always be contemplated, but not read for literal meaning in a straightforward manner?

Now I've narrowed my options enough that I can get creative and see it differently in essence!

As therapy for hang-ups: This 25th edition is even more therapeutic for any of those ten blocks to creativity Roger identifies. The early versions tempted the reader to go into either/or thinking about ambiguity, following the rules or right answers. The new edition frames each block as both a good and bad thing. Now it depends on the situation. The new edition is more like the healing tradition among Native Americans who tell medicine stories. There's a "time to deviate and a time to replicate" with each block that is explored. The stories hand over the power to discern and choose when, how much and in which way to play around. We're set up to give ourselves advice with the ambiguity we get from the book. Our hang-ups vanish as we abandon our one-sided preconceptions.

As an example to imitate: Lots of books are written by hypocrites who cannot walk their talk, but articulate a good game on paper. We don't learn much from quacks because their incompetent actions speak louder than their impressive words. On the other hand, Roger is acting creative as he whacks his son's seventh birthday dinner or the consequences of a month long closing of his swim team's pool. We can follow his example when he starts using metaphors, changing frames of reference or pondering a paradox. We can see how creative the book is, how creative we look to him, and how easy it appears to get creative ourselves. We get the feeling that creativity is something to do and have fun with every day. It's really something that can be learned by osmosis, imitation and example -- once we realize how creative we've suddenly become right now by rereading a few of these pages.

As success secrets revealed: Only a fool would see this book as a guide to riches. So call me "a real whack job" as I reveal its secrets. Roger quotes Heraclitus: "Every walking animal is driven to its purpose by a whack". Like marketeers who "don't sell the steak, sell the sizzle" or "don't sell perfume, sell hope", every edition of Whack has sold us our own purpose. It's a multi-million seller because we're buying access to our own potential and heartfelt aim. It sells because it's creative in attractiveness, it's offer, and it's positioning. It sells the emotional appeal of using it to get walking again. When we've come to a standstill, we get the whack we need from it to get unstuck in our thinking. The whack "dislodges our presuppositions" about the necessity of being practical, avoiding mistakes, acting foolish and following rules. It's a guide to the riches in us that create the gifts for others to utilize themselves; or so this fool believes.

As paradoxical wisdom to contemplate: Is now the time to do the soft thinking of an artist or the hard thinking of a judge? Is this a situation to anticipate more of the same or to expect the unexpected? Does the problem I'm working on call for the mother (necessity) or the father (playfulness) of invention? Will I get unstuck at this point in my process by reversing the problem, morphing into a fool or seeing the obvious issues as metaphors? Will I discern the real problem by the light of day or in the dark of night? Will the clue I need be revealed by the dog that unexpectedly did bark or the dog that surprisingly didn't bark -- last night? What if I take this situation symbolically, like a dream that's showing me something I cannot discern with my literal objectivity? What if A Whack on the Side of the Head is an oracle to consult with questions like these at any given moment?

So things aren't always as they appear: not book reviews, bloggers, the books themselves or you dear reader. Imagine that!

Creating valuable experiences

When we're thinking, we have no sense of creating valuable experiences. What shows up simply happens to us. We don't control how we take it in. It's a fact to face and a reality to deal with. We are hard wired to our circumstances. If things are good, we feel good. If things aren't so good, then we're not so good. We think we cannot change the facts. There's no way to have a positive experience of a negative situation without becoming delusional, unrealistic and subject to scorn.

We get a sense of being able to create our experiences when we begin to reflect on what happens. We get inspirations for other ways to see what is obvious. We get questions we had no considered about what something means to us in particular. We notice how we block out most things and dwell on what troubles us. We realize how there's more than one way to see the facts and let in the situation.

When we become powerful creators of our experience, we suspend our thinking. We reverse several assumptions that legitimize thinking:

1. We were thinking we are not delusional or kidding ourselves when we face the facts. We now realize we really are delusional when we are realistic.
2. We were thinking we have no choice but to react to how good or bad things are. We now realize that choices abound once we stop thinking.
3. We were thinking we know what to make of what appears. We now realize we are making ourselves miserable by what we know and switch to being innocent about what appears.

Once it appears we know nothing about what has appeared, we are free to create a valuable experience. We can make of it what we will and enjoy the fruits of our labors. We can turn the seemingly bad thing into any of a list of options:

• a lesson we are ready to learn
• a change from the same old routine
• a different diagnosis of what the real problem is
• a revelation of what's been overlooked or forgotten
• a sign of a need for more communication and reciprocation
• a gift of freedom from what felt like an impossible burden
• a turnaround from what was being dreaded or avoided
• an answer to a lingering question about what to say "no" to
• a reminder to reconsider our position that was totally in favor or against
• an inspiration to revise our goals or plans
• a better way to consider the big picture that ties everything together
• a disclosure of the opposing point of view and underlying motivations
• a display of the missing half of the whole deal
• a wake up call to develop a more inclusive solution

With so many options for how a bad thing can be good,(and there's many many more) thinking would crash from the overload. The only way to process these options is to go within. The regular use of reflective practice brings clarity to overwhelming options like these. Whichever choice we make, that is our created experience of the moment.

Wholesome solutions

When something is only bad, it becomes a massive problem with no apparent solution. Experts cannot solve it because it looks massive to them on the front side of the problem. They buy-in to the consensus of "it's only bad". The solution is in the back side of the problem, what's missing, hidden or overruled. Often it takes the scapegoat expressing his/her pain, the enemy getting heard or those unwilling to change speaking their minds. The solution incorporates how the something is not only bad, but also good for the bad, good some of the time or good when focused on instead of the bad.

For example, when being unproductive is only bad, it becomes a massive problem. The problem takes the form of burnout, stress-induced illnesses and downtime. The need to get back to being productive or to become more productive-- is chronic, never completed and always a problem. There's no way that being unproductive could be the solution while it's only bad. The massive problem goes away when being unproductive is a good thing too. It's good to take time off, to get our perspective back, to take a break to refresh our energy, to spin our wheels while we incubate an innovative alternative. I just shoveled the driveway after last night's snow and the idea for this post dawned on me while I cleared the pavement. Trying to come up with what to write was becoming unproductive.

The reverse is also true. When something is only good it becomes a massive problem. We become haunted by it's dark side that seeks to undo the good its doing. We have hell to pay until we see the something is not only good, but also costly, harmful, one sided or problematic. When we see how the good thing needs to be kept in check, considered in context, balanced with the opposite, the massive problem goes into remission. We realize a wholesome solution.

For example, when a pleasurable pursuit is only good, it becomes an addiction. We cannot get enough of it. Our appetite for it is insatiable. We obsess on getting more of it, taking time for it and doing it as much as possible. We pursue it with a vengeance that takes vengeance on our lives. We function as our own worst enemy and activist for our own ruin. We see no way out because the pleasure is only good. When the walls close in, the solution becomes obvious. The wholesome thing to do involves discipline and pleasure, moderation and indulgence, or control and freedom.

Wholesome solutions incorporate the problem in a different context. The problem in isolation looks formidable. In the context of keeping things in balance, it looks much more useful.

What this wants to be?

The late architect, Louis I. Kahn, developed inspiring designs by asking himself the question: "What does this want to be?". I learned this question when studying to become an architect 35 years ago. I've been asking myself this question every since.

Questioning what something wants to be has been compared to the creative work of stone carvers. Rather than make something out of marble, they envision what is trapped inside the marble, waiting to be released. Sculptors understand their process as cutting away the excess material to reveal the beauty within the block of stone. They serve the material they work with, rather than impose their creativity upon it. This humility and emptiness gives them access to transcendent possibilities.

When we wonder what something wants to be, we're expecting processes to unfold. We're applying metaphors of growth, organisms and ecologies. We are tuning into changes that are in the offing. We're intending to work with what is emerging and transforming naturally. Our head is in a very good place to support what is changing.

"What this wants to be?" cannot be answered logically. Our rational thought processes answer "What is this?" with our analytical objectivity. "What this wants to be?" calls for intuitive subjectivity. We need to switch from left to right brain processes and from linear to discursive thinking. We will then wonder without knowing. We can observe without categorizing. We will open to receive inspirations without overruling unforeseen possibilities.

While I've been blogging for the past year, I've been applying this question to many aspects of our online world:

• What do RSS, subscriptions, blogging, wiki and Google docs want to be?
• What do Second Life and online games want to be?
• What do social networking, folksonomy tagging and shared content want to be?
• What do F2F encounters want to be now that we have networks of conversations online?

One strategy I've been deploying, to answer these questions, is to read far outside the field of relevant expertise. Recently I've read a history of freight trains and the rail networks that expanded with their success. Last week I read a 1000 page novel set in the 12th century (A Pillar of Earth- Ken Follett.) I was immersed in the dynamics of a "long tail" of monasteries, villages with distant monarchs. I'm currently reading an overview of Anasazi culture in the desert southwestern US that disappeared after six centuries of elaborate lifestyles.

This divergent reading renders our familiar technologies as unfamiliar, and unrelated phases of history as amazingly similar. The parallels and contrasts with our circumstances induce new realizations. The sense of "what this wants to be" comes about by seeing the question in a new light.

Effects of excessive convergence

When we're being creative, inventive or expressive, there are two ways to go. We can be convergent and "get it right". We can be divergent and "do our thing". The world is mostly convergent. We are usually pressured to conform to a consensus. We get judged, criticized and set-up to "get it right" by authorities. We find out when we are in trouble, deviating from best practices and getting too weird.

Too much convergence takes it toll on our creativity. We don't lose it, as Sir Ken Robinson repeatedly observes. Our creativity simply becomes stifled, inhibited, and repressed. We censor our inspirations and shoot down possibilities that come to mind. We get writer's block, mental constipation or hung-up on what's expected. Our minds go into vicious cycles, closed circuits and perpetual reactions to the problem we're having. We cannot get creative no matter how hard we try inside the problem of "no creativity coming to mind".

When we've become overly convergent, we have nothing more to say, write or contribute. We drop out of community participation or we stop blogging -- problems that Michele Martin has been pondering this week. We may fall behind schedule on a creative project as Dan Roddy shared with us yesterday.

There are several viable strategies for getting creative again:

• Write the worst thing possible to get your juices flowing again. Express what is certainly disgraceful, unacceptable and sure to ruin everything. Then trash that and start over with a clear mind and lots of fresh energy.
• Disrupt further thinking about it by disengaging the mind. Go for a walk, swim, movie, music break or nap. Call a time out to get the issue to simmer on a back burner. Make no further progress until you receive a "dawning inspiration" in a twilight state of mind between waking and dreaming.
• Switch to innocence and a sense of wonder. Stop knowing what to do and start not-knowing how to proceed as Dan did. Be amazed that no solution has occurred to you. Become fascinated about what you're overlooking, preventing from appearing or filtering out of your awareness.
• Apply a metaphor to the problem. Turn it into something related: broken machines, muddy pigs, endless wars, useless junk food, natural disaster areas, etc. See the similarities, get a different perspective, change the definition of the problem. Then modify the metaphor and see what that says about the problem: fixed machine, clean pig, end of war, gourmet food, disaster relief, etc.

Once we've restored our creativity, we're open to needing both convergence and divergence. We need to get inspired and evaluate the worth of those inspirations. We have uses for going wild and for getting good at what we do. We see the benefits in careful improvements and careless explorations. We keep the two in balance and naturally avoid getting overly convergent.

Expecting the unexpected

Nassim Taleb's The Black Swan gives us a way to expect the unexpected. As Roger von Oech suggests in his book Expect the Unexpected or you won't find it, there are many connections between our creativity and what we expect.

When we expect the unexpected, the unexpected is expected. Nothing is unexpected. We begin to expect what we cannot foresee -- by changing how we formulate expectations.

Conventionally, we expect what we are familiar with. We rely on our past experience to limit what we expect to rational, logical and objective forecasts. We become clear about what is impossible, impractical and ridiculous.

When we formulate expectations this way, we don't realize we have limited ourselves unnecessarily. The restrictions we see are self imposed. We are arguing in favor of limitations and winning the argument. We have it our way of small, confining, inhibited and oppressive options.

When we allow for black swans, find Extremistan and go beyond the Platonic fold of conventional formulas, we change how we formulate expectations. We stop limiting ourselves unnecessarily. We step outside our foregone conclusions, formulaic predictions and accurate assessments of what shows up in the rear view mirror. We expect anything and everything. All imaginable options are possible. Who can verify that the past predicts the future accurately. Why not anticipate breakthroughs, random influences and exponential repercussions?

On the other hand, when we expect the unexpected, nothing is really expected. Everything is unexpected. Life is a mystery and each moment is a surprise. We have no valid reason to confine ourselves to what we expect when the possibilities we're facing are actually so grand, panoramic and infinite.

Being creative, innovative and inventive calls for no expectations while expecting anything and everything.

Technorati tags: Nassim Taleb, The Black Swan, Roger von Oech, creativity

Finding Extremistan

In The Black Swan, Nassim Taleb explores the possibility of improbable occurrences beyond our ordinary world. Our day -to-day existence supports our familiar categories and explanations. There is continuity and stability that gives us (false) reassurances that whatever happens next will fall within our expectations. Taleb characterizes this conformity to limitations as occurring "within the Platonic Fold". We idealize forms, models and formulas and assume the variations will conform to these. We live in Mediocristan with fallacious certainty.

Extremistan is home to Black Swans. Rare occurrences with widespread impacts are the opposite of a typical white swan. When we allow for these unusual and extreme occurrences, we are considering power laws, scalable dynamics, and the recursive propagation of responses. We have abandoned our familiar ways of seeing the familiar evidence. We stop predicting, controlling and applying techniques. We allow for the improbable to take off with a life of its own.

Taleb was trained as a securities analyst. He thinks about the improbable in the contexts of investments and sales figures. He grasps the dynamics of the occasional stock market crash or soaring valuations. He expects the skyrocketing book sales of J.K. Rowling or Dan Brown. Taleb was raised under siege in Lebanon during a 13 year war. He sees the robust ability of humans to take the most extreme occurrences and perceive them as more sensible mediocrity. We explain away the improbable instead of entering into it with open minds.

Finding Extremistan is the same challenge posed by countless stories that start out in the ordinary world. Dorothy realizes "she's not in Kansas anymore" upon her arrival in Oz. Wendy, Michael and John Darling leave Nana behind in Hyde Park to soar to Neverland. Frodo leaves the Shire to hook up with elves and dwarves. Lucy goes through the back of the wardrobe to find Narnia. Harry Potter vanishes through a column on platform nine to board the train to Hogwarts on Track 9-3/4.

Extremistan appears in other worlds besides high finance, blockbuster sales and violent conflicts. The highly improbable occurs in our minds. We we get an ingenious inspiration for what to write, we have left the ordinary world. When we receive a sense of what to do that proves to have occurred with an uncanny sense of timing, we are being a Black Swan. Leaving our ordinary mind requires a change of cognitive processing: from thinking to receiving the extraordinary in our minds. We work with our unconscious mind in appreciation instead of opposing it out of fear.

Technorati tags: creativity, Nassim Taleb, The Black Swan

Escaping narrative fallacies

We can be a sucker for our own stories. We practice bad science and adopt unfounded beliefs. We misconstrue the complexity and assign causality mistakenly. We become trapped in an web of illusions that leave us exposed to the devastation of wild fluctuations in the phenomena we had "scientifically explained and predicted to not expose us to risk".

Let's take an example: Andrew tells a story about "how people learn". His story claims that people learn from authoritative knowledge delivered as formal instruction. When people fail to learn the right answers, methods and explanations, his story asserts that they have learned informally, freely ranging among unqualified sources. Any unqualified source of information provides self confirming evidence that his story holds up. Any indications that people are failing to "get it right" confirm the problems with learner directed, generated and motivated educations.

There appears to be no escape when we have fallen for our self-protective story. We are inclined to be right at all cost. We think we are being objective while our perceptions are filtered by our narrative fallacy.

Nassim Taleb hopes we can escape these fallacies by becoming skeptical of our knowledge. If we consider the possibility of our using flawed reasoning, distorted perceptions and mistaken convictions, perhaps we can escape our self perpetuating stories. In The Black Swan, he offers many different self-delusions to call into question before we assume we are right about what to expect.

I've not had much success with the strategy Taleb proposes. I encounter narrative fallacies every week as I mentor entrepreneurs. Rather than catch the narrative in use, I have more success with "choose your story" interventions. The taxonomies I've shared in this blog are choices between stories. My email address uses the moniker: "storychanging" for this reason.

When we are choosing between stories, we can get down the level of "where did that come from?" or "what's that about?". We deal at the level of story, below the levels of what happened?, what's wrong with that?, who's at fault? or how could they be so stupid? We see the situation as a reflection of how it's perceived and given meaning. The same setback can be seen from the perspective of four different stories. Change the meaning and the situation gets resolved. Escape the narrative fallacy and a different story accesses an unforeseen creative alternative.

Technorati tags: Nassim Taleb, The Black Swan

Degrees of freedom

There are different degrees of freedom in what comes to mind. Creative freedom is not available from every premise we stand upon. One of the significant incentives for changing where we are coming from -- is to experience more freedom right now from a higher ground.

On dangerous ground, we are stuck with no degrees of freedom. We are grounded in denials, victim stories and past history. We cannot change our history and thus cannot move in any direction. We are up a against a wall facing what happened to us that haunts us still. We are disoriented by progress, accomplishments and goals that others demonstrate. They make no sense because they defy the absence of freedom. If we slip off this ground, we experience a disoriented, psychotic break from physical reality.

On battlegrounds, we are free to move in one direction. We can move forward in time and take time to do it. This one degree of freedom creates oscillations in our minds. We have trouble making up our minds because we are free to decide between past and future, persisting or changing, antagonizing and accepting. We are grounded in a tunnel making progress, making things happen, and moving toward our goals. If we lose sight of the destination, get off track or distract ourselves with detours, we're back on dangerous ground. With this one degree of freedom, we are disoriented by meaning, individualized interpretations and self expression. They make no sense because we cannot go there by our freedom to move forward.

On common ground, we are free to move above and below our forwards and backwards oscillations. With two degrees of freedom, we can detach from our conduct, reactions and  interaction patterns. We have access to an overview that sees our big picture, destiny and panoramic options.  We get grounded in a depth of insight that shows us "where that came from" or "what's that about". We can reframe the evidence with a different metaphor or definition of the problem. If we make up our mind to fixate on one right answer, pure objectivity or "the facts mean what they say", we are back on a battleground with only one way to move around. With two degrees of freedom, we are disoriented by unlimited freedom and undifferentiated ground. We cannot go there without going out of our minds.

On infinite ground, we are free to move around in the space where all is possible. With three degrees of movement, we can transcend our subjective interpretations, meanings and differences from others to create any experience we choose. We have access to the source of all convincing appearances to experience ourselves in any way that serves us. We are oriented by all the previous grounds and lesser degrees of freedom because "we've been there -- done that!".

Technorati tags: creativity, cognitive neuroscience

Calls for creativity

When diversity is in decline as Roger von Oech expressed concern about last week, creativity is getting replaced by fear. Likewise when conversations become superficial, gratuitous and meaningless as Timothy Johnson playfully portrayed recently, creativity is getting weeded out by uninspired reactions to evidence.

We always have a range for tolerable deviance in our minds. Sometimes we define acceptable deviance broadly. We can handle all kinds of deviations from the norm. We experience fascination with variety and acceptance of others' experimentation. Other times we stick our own kind and shoot the messenger of our commonality. We freak out at weird hairdos, clothing and speech mannerisms. We "catastrophize, demonize and awfulize" qualities that are unlike us. How many people we consider "us" shrinks while the number of "them" increases dramatically.

How much tolerance we exhibit varies with our anxiety level, perceptions of danger and recent experiences with antagonism. It makes sense to me that our collective tolerance for diversity would have shrunk dramatically following the Columbine massacre, bursting of the Internet bubble, 9/11, and the invasion of Iraq. The news media keeps danger on our minds: "if it bleeds it leads". It naturally follows that we'd be on the lookout for disguised enemies, stranger danger, and signs of someone being "not our kind".

Narrow ranges of tolerable deviance are structured to be self maintaining in social situations. Once some traumatic incident becomes an obsession, the treatment of others demonstrates the intolerance that is a sure sign of danger. Intolerance manufactures the evidence to keep defenses strong, walls high and tolerance narrowed. Isolation seems preferable to exposure. Collusion inside a walled garden seems safer than open communities.

The way out of self-perpetuating intolerance is creativity. We must see the familiar evidence as unfamiliar: in a new light, with more insight, on the basis of different premises. We must also see the unfamiliar as familiar: in the same boat, facing the same pressures, just as human. Rather than play by the rules that qualifies an "us" from a "them, we play with the rules. We rule that people like us have two nipples and a nose. We play around instead of playing for keeps.

When we are on common ground, creative inspirations come to mind. We receive what to give others that will put their minds at ease, explore a different perspective, or give them a way to join in an reciprocal arrangement. Diversity seems better than collusion and significant conversations seem more valuable than chatter.

Technorati tags: creativity, communication

What comes to mind

What comes to mind depends on where we stand and where we are coming from. To have different things come to mind, we simply change our ground. While staying on the same premises, basis or epistemological frame, the same kinds of things will come to mind. It's possible there are four grounds to choose between.

Two grounds are based on fear. They operate on the premise that fears will come true in our experience, because the dangers are so believable and strongly felt. They present life as a struggle that calls for acts of defense and desperation.

Two other grounds are based on love. They function with the premise that one good thing after another will come into our experience because we are open to all possibilities. They present life as the freedom to explore and enjoy each moment.

The first fearful ground is littered with dangers. It presumes we are powerless to change, helpless in the face of what confronts us, and victimized by how we get treated. On this ground, irrational urges, cravings, and emotions come to mind.

The second is a battleground also based on fear. It presumes when can win at other's expense, succeed at all cost, make changes happen and control other people. On this ground, vendettas, conquest strategies and ways to fix others all come to mind.

The third is common ground, based on love. It presumes we are in this together, floating all the boats,  and exploring mutual interests. On this ground, it occurs to us how to get creative about caring for and serving us together.

The fourth is undifferentiated ground, also based on love. It presumes we are free to label it as we choose, make it into whatever we want, and subject it to our subjective whims. On this ground, it dawns on us how everything that happens is perfectly useful and reflective of which ground is being stood upon.

Choose your ground.

Technorati tags: epistemic frames, post-modernism

The laptop and the server farm

Our minds function with a small, rechargeable conscious and a vast, 24/7 unconscious. The conscious mind is a a laptop with Internet connectivity. It recharges when it sleeps and burns up lots of glucose when functioning. The unconscious mind is like the server farm for google.com, yahoo.com or microsoft.com. The unconscious operates nonstop with access to huge amounts of useful, accessible information.

Most conscious minds rarely access the unconscious mind for solutions, inspirations, and intuitions. They are like laptops that search their hard drive, but do not go online to search the Web. The unconscious mind can guide us into perfect timing so we are in the right place with the right idea in mind to make the right difference. If we ask, we can receive what we need to know, learn what we need to do next and change what we need to upgrade.

Our conscious minds have a protocol for logging into the unconscious, just like a laptop has protocols for dial-up, LAN and Wifi connectivity. Our minds remain offline when they are thinking. The CPU is preoccupied and cannot access the internal web. We connect to our vast unconsciousness when we get to the point where there is "no more thinking required".

Here's some login protocols to access your unconscious and initiate an online search in your mind:

• I know this much about each alternative but I don't know which to choose
• I understand the constraints I'm facing but I don't see the creative freedom within them
• I have identified the problem in detail and need to come up with an inspired solution
• I see the issue's complexity and intend to receive a satisfying resolution from within
• I've thought through the difficulties and have no idea where to go from here
• I've anticipated every possible objection and let go of controlling the outcome
• I've realized the limits of my thinking and allow for better ideas to come to mind

Technorati tags: inspiration, intution, creativity

Creating clients

Successful freelancers are usually highly networked. Additional work comes their way through their numerous professional and personal connections. Their reputation precedes them and sells new clients on their value before they ever meet the freelancer. They already understand how marketing is really about conversations and relationships. When incoming work slows down, there's no obvious way to "try harder" because so much has come about through their network. It's not clear how to get more aggressive with marketing, sales or strategy efforts.

Most marketing books I've read are written by ego maniacs. They recommend pushing the features and benefits of the freelancer's services on the world. A few recommend a "soft sell" approach but then do a hard sell of their own services. The advice to "push" assumes this tactic will overcome ignorance, hesitation and resistance in the marketplace. Sales pitches and promotional materials are presumed to be effective at correcting the misconceptions of the sales leads and potential buyers. The marketing gurus dismiss the freelancers' misgivings, call reluctance and avoidance of these tactics as:

• a lack of commitment to success
• a pattern of self sabotage, squeamishness or failure
• a lack of intent to overcome resistance and conquer the market
• a lack of self esteem, confidence or courage

Ego maniacs cannot connect the dots between buyer remorse and sales pressure. They fail to see how their "overcome the resistance" approach does more harm than good to repeat business, customer loyalty and referrals. They assume they are right and free lancers are wrong. 

I recommend trusting your misgivings about marketing books, gurus and their advice. Estimate that most of what they point out as lacking in free lancers is what they lack themselves. Start looking for a different approach to get more aggressive. Here are some ideas to get more creative:

• What if prospective clients are detectives looking for clues? How easy is to find out where you are, what good you do, how it applies to their situations?
• What if prospective clients are consumer watchdogs? How do your attempts at self promotion come across to others: hypocritical/authentic? hype/truth-in-advertising? over-promise/deliver as promised?
• What if prospective clients are disaster relief services? How can they help you, contribute new ideas to what you deliver, restore full functionality of your offerings?
• What if prospective clients are students learning from you? How are they making sense of what you've given them, figuring out what difference you make and identifying how you fit into their situation?
• What if prospective clients are wandering in a forest where you are guiding them to their destination. Where are they getting lost, confused, misled -- as they try to find what they are really looking for?
• What if prospective clients are cat lovers and you care for dogs? How can you translate what you do to be of service to feline kinds of  leads?
• What if prospective clients are playing hide and seek with you? Where might they hide where they expect you to never investigate? Where do you always look that they know to avoid?

When free lancers get this creative about their marketing, they say "our product is customers". They see the thing they create is not products and services, it's the clients. The trust, buy-in, loyalty, referrals, and repeat business are the creation of how the leads get treated, informed, guided and encouraged.

Technorati tags: marketing, sales, lead generation, freelancers

The dream of your customer

As I mentioned in Learning from what happens, every customer has an unfulfilled  dream. When that dream is understood by the seller, the customer feels powerful and can act decisively. The value the customers experience runs deep and overrides their hesitation. They are sold on the purchase in ways they cannot explain.

Henry Ford didn't ask "what do you want?" because people would have said "faster horses". Customers cannot want what has not yet been invented. Their options preclude innovative, futuristic and breakthrough possibilities.

We also get into trouble "asking for the dream of our customers" because we all harbor conflicting desires. We say we want things that get us approval, appease our critics and justify our preferences. We really want experiences that contradict those desires and come from a deeper place. We don't really know who we are, where we come from or what our destiny might be. We really want things on that unknown basis. We cannot be deeply satisfied with what will "keep up appearances of respectability".

Some real estate brokers operate on the premise that "buyers are liars". These brokers have learned the hard way from dissatisfied home buyers. What the clients say they want is not what they really want. Selling works with both the conscious reasoning and unconscious mind of the customers. They ask the clients what kind of house and which kind of neighborhood they want. They then tour houses that are the same as those desires, the complete opposite and several in-between options.

Usually the customers show no interest in the kind of house they said they want. Their conscious mind does not know it's own unconscious desires. (That's what "unconscious" means) The opposite house to their stated desires thrills the customer on inspection. The home and neighborhood provides decades of satisfaction if they have the wisdom to trust their feelings and buy it.

Asking learners what they want poses this same challenge.  What they say they want is very misleading. Their actions speak louder than words. Their true desires are revealed through their outbursts, objections, reactions and initiatives. When learners are obviously unhappy with what or how they are being taught, they are experiencing some deep seated satisfaction. When learners are complaining and reacting to instruction, they really want the battle game they are playing. When learners are filled with curiosity and gratitude, their conscious desires and deep ambitions are congruent.

When we learn to read the signs, we can stop taking customers at their word. Instead of pandering to their stated preferences, we can see what they really want as it's revealed in their actions. We can serve the deeper dream of the customer  and create enduring value.

Technorati tags: selling, customer satisfaction, value creation

Providing clean structure

In a comment on Good coercion, constraints & focus, Stephen Downes said:

Education needs something like a Hippocratic Oath. Some sort of equivalent to the 'no harm' principle. As in, "First of all, do no harm..."
Coercion can sometimes produce good results. But just as often, and often concurrently, it produces harm. People who are coerced lose their sense of autonomy, lose their sense of self-value, begin to live in fear of consequences.

I totally agree with what Stephen says here. For coercion to be good, it needs to be harmless. This has been a big issue for one the entrepreneurs I'm mentoring. We have wrestled with how to create initial expectations for customers, employees and temps. We've sought to steer away from manipulation, domination and insensitivity. As we discussed this issue in depth, we came to rely on a distinction between "dirty and clean structure".

Dirty structure sends a message that "you don't have a choice here". It sets up controlling the other people as if they are trapped, caged or kept on a short leash. It works against the others as if "buyers are liars", "give an inch and they'll take a mile" or "no act of kindness will go unpunished". Dirty structure puts distance into the relationship as if there is no common ground, mutual respect or future cooperation to cultivate. It delivers an ultimatum: "follow these orders or else". The implicit threat in dirty structure escalates the adversarial context, raises their defenses and produces chronic anxiety.

Clean structure creates the space of the others to make up their own minds. It supports other people's decision-making as if they are intelligent, solving their own problems and capable of meeting their own objectives. It works with others as if "buyers spread good reputations", "caring comes back around" and "people soften when they feel understood". Clean structure establishes common ground, mutual respect and future cooperation. It provides permission to "say no", "take their time" and "do what they think is best". The implicit cooperation in clean structure de-escalates the adversarial context, lowers their defenses and puts their minds at ease.

When clean structure is being provided, people are told things like:

• This is how this situation is handled routinely and why it's approached this way
  
• These are the stages we will go through at first before you will be expected to take charge of this responsibility
  
• We have a few questions to help you sort out your options to pick what's best for you
  
• Here are the choices you need to make before we begin and some things to consider before you decide

Our experiences with providing clean structure have discovered that it does work. It affects people like we intended and seems to be a form of harmless coercion.

Technorati tags: design methodology, coercion

Good coercion, constraints & focus

Yesterday, my sister described to me several people in her life as "bringing out the best or worst in her". Michelle Martin then added to this thinking about "bringing out the best in others" with her: More People Isn't Always the Answer -- which linked to her Can Limitations Actually Free Your Organization. That brought to mind a comment Roger von Oech added to my post Home Free at Last about design constraints several months back:

Typically, when we play with an idea we allow ourselves to try a lot of different approaches. Often, that means eliminating constraints. However, I think that a very liberating form of play is to add a constraint or two to the situation. As Frank Lloyd Wright repeatedly told his students: "Limits are an artist's best friend."

I then wrote a follow up post: Playing with the problem which further expanded on the value of design constraints. This week, I explored valuable constraints in the context of the arduous transitions facing digital immigrants who are left out of our changing culture: Baptism by fire. Being trapped in a psychological crucible with no exits induces unconscious learning at a deep level. The solution is found in the problem. The freedom is discovered within the prison of constraints.

After exploring with dark side of coercion with Tony Karrer in the comments section of his recent post: PLE-PWLE discussion continues, yesterday I began to see ways that coercion is not all bad. It's possible for coercion to bring out the best in learners, as well as the worst. Coercion can work like the constraints that fuel creativity and personal transformation.

In the ongoing comments on Empowered Entrepreneurs, Adele Lim recently asked me about:

the role(s) of 'focus' and/or control in this instance, for they can either be barriers or allies (again opposite ends)

Like coercion and constraints, focus can be dysfunctional. In those instances it's called premature convergence, thinking inside the box, tunnel vision, over-limiting oneself and passing up opportunities. However, focus can also be very beneficial. In those situations, it's called shutting out distractions, staying on-task, concentrating one's efforts and gaining momentum in the chosen direction.

All this raises a new question in my mind: When coercion, constraints and focus are dysfunctional, is it enough to see the potentially functional use of each? Does seeing it can be good induce it become good? Is it enought to "be the change"? Can we transform bad situations into good with our outlook -- as I suggested yesterday with my use of recursive epistemologies and quantum theory's observer-dependence principle in Experts are telling us lies?

Technorati tags: design methodology, constraints, coercion, PLE

Playing with the problem

In his comment on Home Free at Last, Roger von Oech said:

Typically, when we play with an idea we allow ourselves to try a lot of different approaches. Often, that means eliminating constraints. However, I think that a very liberating form of play is to add a constraint or two to the situation. As Frank Lloyd Wright repeatedly told his students: "Limits are an artist's best friend."

I think it can be argued that the product of almost every activity can be made more creative by adding constraints. If you're a photographer, you're only allowed to take photos between 3:15 and 3:30 PM for the next week. What does that do to your eye? If you're a cook, you can't use more than 20 grams of any ingredient, etc.

Roger reveals how constraints are valuable in the creative process. In this context, there's a breakdown when there is too much freedom, eliminated constraints or unbounded possibilities. The freedom overwhelms the creativity. Unconstrained freedom is the opposite of overwhelming constraints that I implied in the phrase "massive machine for the manufacture of controlled content" and I explained in Getting Creative.

When we are too constrained, we want too much freedom. That's the problematic nature of finding an exit and getting out of the box that Roger is wisely alerting us to consider. It's seeking freedom from constraints, rather than freedom within constraints. Yet, going to the opposite extreme is one of the ways that changes come about.

When we are too free, we want constraints. By going to an extreme, we are provoked to seek the middle ground where we experience the best of both: freedom and constraints. In this center, it feels like we are playing with the problem. The seriousness of overwhelming constraints is gone as well as the lunacy of an unfettered imagination. As Roger notes, constraints have a wonderful effect on creativity. It brings out the best of possibilities, quickens the mind, hastens the inspiration and heightens the synthesis of the opposing interests.

The early development (1966-75) of artificial intelligence (AI) dealt with too many possibilities to consider. Programming a computer to play chess involved too many options for "the bishop's third move". Ways were developed to "organize a tour of the solution space". Heuristics are reliable shortcuts that reliably consider a limited range of alternatives, rather than every possible option. This idea of "touring the solution space" spawned the playful metaphors in "The Universal Traveler -- a soft systems guide to creative problem solving and the process of reaching goals" (Koberg & Bagnall, 1973, 2003).

Christopher Alexander's pattern languages also organize the field of infinite possibilities. Unlike constraints that force the designer/problem solver to get creative, patterns constrain the functional use made designed solutions. Patterns focus on the users -- as Kathy Sierra champions us to do.

I find the essential role of "incubation" to be missing in all I've just said about constraints. There is a time to cook the problem and a time to give it a rest. There's a time to use techniques and added constraints, and a time to give it over to the subconscious to resolve. As with anything, there can be too much "waiting for an inspiration" that fails to "stoke the intuition with the problem "and "work the mind into a focused frenzy" first.

So there is a middle ground between overwhelming constraints and excessive freedom. There is another middle ground between an effective use of constraints and getting inspirations out of the blue (via emptiness, innocence, letting go or not knowing). Combining two balancing acts creates a mandala, medicine wheel or whole understanding.

Technorati tags: Roger von Oech, Kathy Sierra, creativity

Getting creative

Roger von Oech has left a very inviting comment on Home Free at Last. I recommend reading his blog: Creative Think to keep your own creative flame alive. I frequently add comments to his blog and get inspirations for what to write here -- from his posts and gathering of commenters. Today is no exception. Responding to Roger's comments calls for two taxonomies (a.k.a. learning curves, four stage models, developmental sequences): Getting Creative and Playing with the Problem.

Getting Creative
Conformity kills creativity. Pressures to obey, fit in, stop deviating -- have the damaging effect of disconnecting us from our inner resources. Getting the impression there is one right answer and valid ways to give grades --sends the wrong message. We adapt by becoming outer-directed and rely on an "external locus of control". We are hard wired to what happens - a victim of our circumstances. "Command and control" managed jobs inhibit our proclivity toward trusting our intuitions and inspirations. We think our inner promptings are irrational, illogical and wrong. Getting machined this way positions us under the table, feeling powerless, getting kicked around. We argue for our limitations and say "I can't get creative" or "I'm not creative". We ask to be kidnapped again and again.

Rather than get creative when we outgrow our powerlessness, we get productive and fixated. We close our minds to avoid distractions. We focus on the task without questions. We become determined to outsmart the others, to win at their expense and to overcome the "stupid" opposition. We have a one track mind and go on predictable powertrips. We are too smart for our own good or the good of others. We are thinking like curmudgeons. We are creating harm, doing damage, trashing relationships and asking for trouble. We are proud of our conquests, victories, and accomplishments regardless of how problematic, pathological or poisonous they are.

Getting creative requires shattering realizations that come to us during an arduous psychological transition. We get a taste of our own medicine. We face ourselves in the mirror or eat humble pie. Once we see how we are part of the problem and pointing at ourselves when we blame others, we can see how to get creative. Our successful cognitive strategies have failed us. We lose faith in our ways of thinking, reacting, judging and winning. We see how they were closed, lacking creativity and uninspired.

We start to get different ideas from within. We receive intuitions, inspirations and imaginations -- that respond differently to familiar situations. We begin to find it helpful to play with metaphors, reframe the problems, and combine different viewpoints. We see value in being unproductive and scatter brained. We treasure new questions instead of jumping to our well-worn conclusions. We find ways to utilize contradictions to our own ways of thinking. We profit from constraints. We get glimpses of paradoxes where "it takes both on a spectrum", "it's two sides of one coin" or "it's neither this or that" (netti netti).

Once we get oriented in this way of playing, we are creative. We rotate between four roles or six thinking hats with ease. We balance our wild diverging in the field of possibilities with the tame converging in the realm of realism. We combine "what-if" questions with "what-is" data. We become pragmatic visionaries. We are of a mind to play with problems. (to be continued).

Questioning procrastination

I previously blogged about Changing Our Questions. This morning I discovered an ideal situation to apply this approach to creativity. Timothy Johnson has launched a "Creativity in Business" college class and has already encountered lots of student procrastination. Having taught beaucoups college classes myself, I'm no stranger to this problem, but I've played around with it many different ways. Here's how I've learned to change my questioning of student, or my own, procrastination.

• At first, procrastination appears as an obvious, known problem to react to and deal with. In that case, I have "no further questions your Honor" and I'm dealing with lemons obviously. If I question all this, procrastination becomes a partially known problem (incomplete) to explore and get creative about. Then "I'd like to cross examine the witness your Honor" and I'm dealing with lemonade by choice.


• Procrastination appears as a question of not getting work done promptly and falling short of steady accomplishments of tasks. I can then question how to play around with this, to see it in a new light, and to discover other frames of reference to use with this.


• Procrastination appears as something to put a stop to, oppose without question and resist until it decreases. I can then question whether I am feeding the problem by opposing it or "persisting by resisting" it. I can wonder what difference it could make to give it "go" messages, ways to learn from it and permission to continue until it makes more sense.


• Procrastination appears as deviant behavior when I'm in charge of policing conformity. I can question whether I am acting like a control freak when I could be encouraging different voices, viewpoints and experiences.


• Procrastination appears as something losers do in a game with a clear cut way to win. I can question whether the context I've created is based on one way to win, one right answer and one rule to play by -- instead of many ways to win and many ways to see what's occurring.


• Procrastination appears as a side effect of pressure to conform, comply and meet deadlines. I can question whether pressure is devastating the sense of balance, timing and freedom in this.


• Procrastination appears as procrastination - no two ways about it. I can question the paradox being presented and wonder if procrastination is the flipside of incubating an inspired approach, perfecting a better approach or anticipating a combined approach (that kills two birds with one stone).

When we get creative, nothing is only as it appears. Everything is an opportunity to redefine the problem, change the meaning, or apply a metaphor. We get creative whenever we change the questions.

Technorati tags: creativity, procrastination, problem solving