Giving Back vs Giving First

When I hear guilt-ridden "digital plantation owners" divert their interest to philanthropic missions saying that they want to "give back" I ask myself, "Why did they steal in the first place?!"

To "give back" implies that something was previously "taken".

In my coaching work, I have lost count of the number of times people tell me that they want to "give back" and when I have a strong enough relationship of trust I ask them "How about giving first?"

The recent series of "The Secret Millionaire" on Channel 4, Wednesdays 9pm, is one of the most inspiring programmes I have seen since The Apprentice....in this programme, millionaires go "under cover" to the poorest regions in Britain, living as members of the impoverished communities, in order to identify worthy recipients of their donations.

Time after time...what I have noticed is that the generous-spirited but financially unsuccessful people in this series were all GIVING FIRST...the 'under-cover' millionaires pretending to be poor were all, without exception, astounded by the generosity of their poor acquaintances willing to share with them, the little they had.There is a world of difference between the attitude of "give and take" and "give and receive"...the millionaires seemed to express an attitude of "giving & taking" whereas the recipients of their donations were "giving and receiving".

Which businesses come to mind for you that are built on the model of "giving first" and "giving & receiving"? Ecademy is one.

How about your own business? Are you going to give back? or "are you giving first"?

Future of Work

How do you foresee the "Future of Work"?

Most of us were forced to go to school for at least 10-12 years, in order to prepare ourselves for a JOB that would result in some kind of value for the GDP of our country.

Education was made compulsory in Europe & the USA during the period of indutrialisation when a labour force was required to manufacture products as agricultural profitability declined. The sharp increase of manufactured industrial goods, meant that families no longer needed to rely on each other for survival. Indeed, industrialisation favoured family members who were willing to disperse in order to get better jobs or any jobs at all, in order to survive.

The decline of industrialisation & the rise of technology and information industries created a new wave in the way we work, allowing more self- employment flexibility and opportunities to work from home.

Will this bring families back together again? I doubt it. During the agricultural era, families had fundamental reasons to stay together; their survival depended on it. Technology has given us the independence that agriculture did not.

Industrialisation forced us to work in rigid hierarchical organisations using Taylorism methods for maximum efficiency (Charlie Chaplin's movie Modern Times is an excellent parody of Taylorist methods of production)

Technology has enabled us to work within a framework of NETWORKS rather than HIERARCHIES. Hierarchies are very masculine in nature whereas networks are feminine in the way they grow, develop and create business opportunities.

Whereas our survival depended to a large extent on the strength of our FAMILIES, during the agricultural era, and HIERARCHIES in the industrial era, during the technology era, our success is increasingly dependent on the strength of our NETWORKS.

A friend of mine is making a film about the changes the world is expected to undergo in the year 2012. The trailer for this film is very inspiring. You can watch it here: The Time of the Sixth Sun


The world as we know it will end in 2012. My belief is that we are going through a transformation of consciousness where the way we live & work in 2012 will be beyond our wildest beliefs. What is your belief about 2012?

Money Making Strategies

How many strategies do you have for making money?

I ask you this question because this afternoon, I heard Mark Anastasi, a young millionaire, talking about the time, a few years ago, when at the age of 24 he was £7,000 in debt and had to decide whether to buy a cucumber or a few pieces of broccolli for his next meal. He said that when he found himself in such dire straits, he was desperately trying to make money using the only strategy he knew at the time.....looking for & getting a job!

For most of us in the western world, I'd say that looking for a job to make money remains the ONLY strategy we EVER use in our whole lifetime.

If you want to make money, get a good job! If you want to make more money, get a better job! Most of us will spend decades of our lifetime educating ourselves to get that ultimate dream job that will enable us to live the lifestyle of our dreams.

Times have changed!

The difference between someone with an "employee" mentality and someone with an "entrepreneur" mentality is the range of strategies they have for making money.

Typically, an "employee" has only ONE strategy for making money. If they lose their job they are devastated because they equate losing their job with losing their wealth.

Entrepreneurs on the other hand notice that people are buying and selling things all around them. Therefore, they do not equate the loss of ONE client with loss of wealth but just a vacuum that needs to be filled with the next money generating service or product. An entrepreneur uses a RANGE of money making strategies to acquire a flow of money into their lives.

What are you and others around you buying? What are you selling? If you do not have a business, you are probably selling your time. When you go for an interview, the recruitment panel are making a decision about whether your time will generate profit for their organisation.At what price are you selling your time? How profitable is your time?

Let me ask you the question again: How many strategies do you have for making money?

If selling your time is the only strategy you have for making money, notice that times have changed. If getting a "job" is the only strategy you have for selling your time to make money, take a deep breath, relax and think of at least 3 different options available to you. The more options you can think of, the more freedom of choice you have created for yourself!

What money making strategies do you have?

Going Broke Trying to Make Money!

I was at an Internet Millionaire's Bootcamp this weekend and one of the first speakers asked the audience:
"How many of you have gone broke trying to make money?!"

In a room of about 1,000 people, I'd say at least a couple of hundred raised their hands.

I wondered about the psychology behind the irony of "going broke trying to make money".

There are two aspects to this phenomenon of "going broke trying to make money"

The first is that people don't usually make remarkably high amounts of money while they are doing safe, secure, comfortable 9 to 5 jobs. All the internet millionaires that spoke at the event had suffered extreme bouts of discomfort (homelessness, bankruptcy, boredom) before making seriously high sums of money. The extreme pain they felt somehow propelled them into massive action that produced results.

Tony Robbins often says that "the level of your success will be related to the level of uncertainty you can handle". Taking risks creates a high degree of uncertainty or discomfort and our millionaires at the Bootcamp this weekend had obviously used the pain of their discomfort to produce fruitful results.

The second aspect of this "going broke trying to make money" irony, is not so straightforward. When fear, pain and discomfort are the motivating factors, what happens when the person is comfortable again?

They usually go broke again!!

You will notice whether the people you know are operating from fear-based motivators because their wealth or success goes in cycles. They get rich. They get broke. They get rich. They get broke.

In order to sustain a steady increase in our wealth requires perseverance towards what we feel passionate about rather than trying to escape that which we fear.
Several of the millionaires at the event this weekend mentioned the common refrain "Most overnight successes have spent years in preparation!" In other words, there is no "get rich quick silver bullet"

How do you combine risk-taking, perseverance and reslience in your life & business?

I read something in the "I Ching: Book of Changes" today that reminded me of the cross-cultural misunderstandings that arise around the issue of "equality".

On Page 10 of the "I Ching", the following extract explains the difference between "Receptive" & "Creative":

"It is the perfect complement of THE CREATIVE - the complement, not the opposite, for the Receptive does not combat the Creative but completes it"

Page 11 provides further clarification about the difference between Creative & Receptive):

"But strictly speaking there is no real dualism here, because there is a clearly defined hierarchic relationship between the two principles. In itself of course the Receptive is just as important as the Creative, but the attribute of devotion defines the place occupied by this primal power in relation to the Creative. For the Receptive must be activated and led by the Creative; then it is productive of good. Only when it abandons this position and tries to stand as an equal side by side with the Creative, does it become evil. The result then is opposition to and struggle against the Creative, which is productive of evil to both".

In Chinese philosophy, there is emphasis on the yin/yan balance between feminine/masculine energies and I loosely translated the above extract about "Receptive/Creative" as an interesting insight into gender issues.

I read something similar about Chinese Confucianism in "The Reflecting Glass" by Lucy West & Mike Milan page 134:

"....Confucianism, a source of values and beliefs for many Chinese, teaches that people are not equal. To this day, people in China are defined by their role in society and their contribution to it. Status is influenced by relationship, which is in turn attached to implicit duties and obligations. People are viewed as relational beings, regulated by pivotal relationships that dictate an individual's obligations ('renqing') towards other people. Observance of proper relationships is essential for the smooth functioning of society. Thus, the concept of development coaching, based upon a partnership of equals, may not be compatible with Confucian values, in which a relationship between a 'wise elder' and an 'apprentice' is more common."

end of extract.

I read the above passage in the context of perception of coaching across cultures. However, as with the extract from the I Ching, there are obviously subtle differences in what is meant by "equality" compared with the European view.

What is YOUR understanding of "equality" in terms of race & gender, and how would you explain your perceptions about this? In what way do you think we are equal?

The Language of Friendship

At an Ecademy business networking event yesterday we had an actor do a presentation about the importance of body language in communication. He based his body language work on his experience of teaching Nepalese monks how to speak English even though neither he nor they spoke a word of each other's language.

I am sure that all of us have had elements of this kind of experience, perhaps during our travels, when we had to rely solely on our body language to express ourselves, be understood and even to form friendships.

My parents were experts at the use of body language to form strong friendships. When we emigrated to Stafford, UK in the late 60s, we did not speak a word of English and our English neighbours did not speak a word of our native Panjabi.

Within a year, my siblings and I had learnt to speak fluent English because we had the privilege of going to school. My parents however, remarkably, formed deep friendships with our neighbours with about 5 words of English: hello, 'bye, thank you, alright?

I say they formed "deep" friendships with our neighbours based on the fact that our neighbours had keys to our home.

How was it possible to build that level of trust with just a few words of shared English language and obviously a LOT of communication that was beyond words?

On the other hand, you may notice those who share each other's language and use it most articulately without a trace of friendship between them.

When you walk into the office, or a shop or any other place where you encounter other being beings, you will notice whether someone is engaging with you in the language of friendship, well before they open their mouth to speak any words.

And they will notice the same as YOU approach them!

How do Leaders Lose Compassion?

I took a friend of mine to see the psychic surgeon Stephen Turoff this week for some healing. I have been to see Stephen Turoff a couple of times previously and read on a website that :

He (Stephen Turoff) cannot, however teach anyone to become a healer. In Stephen's words, "a healer needs to posses two qualities, Love and Compassion". He can therefore not instruct others in the mystic field of magnetism and electricity, only give a greater understanding of who you are and how best to apply yourself.

That belief led me to reflect on the concept of "compassion" as part of the research I am doing for my new book "How to Rock the Boat ... Safely!" What I have noticed in organisations is that when a "worker" gets promoted to being a "manager", often, their former peers will complain of a decreasing level of "compassion" with an increasing focus on "profit" by their colleague who has shifted loyalties from "workers" to "management".

Sometimes there is a gradual drain of "compassion" in favour of task-focused, efficiency-driven strategies which leads to redundancies, dismissals, tribunals and disciplinary processes. Years of friendship turn into sour memories.

How do people in leadership/management roles so easily lose the compassion which formed such an integral part of their relationships at work at some point?

Is compassion innate or is it something we learn? If compassion is innate what determines our choice over "people first" or "profit first"?

Passion, Purpose and Workaholism

In his blog entitled Passion Equals Purpose, Ecademy member Mike Myatt writes,

>>>>>For many in the workforce a job is not who they are but simply what they do. These people's passions lie outside the workplace and for the individuals who fit this description their jobs are little more than a means to an end. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this outlook on life and in some respects it is a more healthy and simple way to live.

As a leadership coach for high-flier executives, I have rarely had clients that fit the above picture...what I have found more common is the type of person that is so passionate about their work that they have no idea where the boundaries are around it.

There is a popular saying: Find work that you love, and you will never have to work another day in your life

So, if you are someone that has found work that you love, in developing your own business, for example, you have a perfect lifestyle don't you?

Well, I suppose you do, as long as you know where to draw the boundaries ....I know a very sad number of people in London that claim to be doing work that they love and they spend Christmas & New Year's on their own and oblige acquaintances to keep them company on their birthdays!

All the workaholics I know claim to love their work....that is wonderful except that "work" cannot love them back!

"Work" may fulfill your emotional, intellectual & even spiritual needs but "work" cannot brighten your day like the smile of a loved one, like the signs of human affection, like the unpredictable, spontaneous expressions of love and happiness that people can earn when they don't even do any work at all.

As part of my research for my new book "How to Rock the Boat....Safely!" I am interested in both success & failure stories about how those who find their passion & purpose through work, manage to remain connected to their families, friends and communities.

I would be interested also in your comments about mathematical genius Grigory Perelman who refused to accept a million pound cheque given as an award for his mathematical discovery because he does not believe in self-promotion. On this website it says that "Perelman said he felt isolated from the mathematical community, and therefore had no wish to appear to be one of its leaders."

Do you know people that are potentially geniuses and highly successful in their work and the "causes" they serve, but miserably isolated from the roots of their experience as human beings?

Surviving the Tyranny of Positive Thinkers!

As I continue to do my research for my second book "How to Rock the Boat ... Safely!", I have arrived at the alarmingly frequent theme of people being ostracised, marginalised and abandoned because the "positive thinkers" in their lives, like in a fascist regime, cannot support those that do not fit in with the status quo vision.

During my quest for exemplary trailblazers that I can use as case studies for my book, with tales of both success & failure, I have been told stories of sexual harrassment claims being ignored in communities of "positive thinkers" who vehemently deny that charismatic men could be responsible for overstepping the boundaries of decent interaction...according to the "positive thinkers" in these tales, the fault must obviously lie in the "negative thinker" victims of the transgression who perceived the situation erroneously.


Are you a "positive thinker"?


or


Are you a "negative thinker"?


I do hope that you did not answer "yes" or "no" to either of those two questions. The rationale for dividing people into "good/bad", "good/evil" "winners/losers", "capitalists/communists" "you're with us or you're against us" comes from the primitive part of our brain which Lewis et al in "A General Theory of Love" describe as the "reptilian brain" useful for survival based on fear-based responses.

It is the cortical brain that allows us a more evolved choice of reasoning & solutions. The cortical brain enables us to emerge from an either/or primitive mentality which puts people into "positive" & "negative" cages. Using the cortical brain, we can learn to be highly perceptive & aware of what is going on around us. Dr Phil McGraw and others often give the example of the positive plane pilot who is in denial of the dangers until it is too late. They say that a pessimistic pilot is a lot safer than an optimistic one as the former will perceive dangers much earlier than the latter, in time to think of solutions.

Many self-professed "postive thinkers" may fall into the trap of "denial" with an attitude of "see no evil, hear no evil...." Dr McGraw in his book "Life Strategies" p.111 says that "Denial can, quite literally, kill you"

He uses the psychological term "perceptual defense" for denial and warns that "Perceptual defense is active in your life every day. It can and does keep you from seeing things you simply do not want to be true. In a number of situations, it may prevent your picking up warning signs that, if you acknowledged them, could prompt you to take important and timely coping steps. Perhaps this mechanism keeps you from recognising that you are falling out of favor with your boss. Maybe it blinds you to the deterioration in your most important relationship, thus allowing further distance and damage to occur......." (extract from page 112, Life Strategies, Dr Phil McGraw)

If you are a trailblazer, how do you ensure that you are not in denial or overusing the "perceptual defense mechanism"? How have you personally survived the tyranny of positive thinkers that were quite happy & content with the status quo and denied you your needs? Have you Rocked the Boat Safely? or Have you gone overboard several times with a mighty splash! Please share your variety of "positive" & "negative" stories with all the shady areas of grey in between!

Building Rapport with the Enemy

As a leadership coach I have witnessed several bright, gifted and charming employees meet their downfall as a direct result of not being able to maintain rapport with their "enemy" in the workplace...often this is a line manager and sometimes a colleague at the same level.

In NLP terms, "rapport" is the ability to relate to others with trust & understanding. In order to create rapport with another, NLP practitioners will typically advocate finding common ground, respecting the other's model of the world, being willing to see the other's point of view and generally being responsive to the other person in terms of matching & mirroring them at the level of physiology, tonality (voice) and the words they use.

As part of my research for my new book "How to Rock the Boat....Safely!", I initiated a discussion called "The Importance of Creating Rapport" to identify real life examples of how trailblazer leaders have created rapport. It is assumed that creating rapport effectively is of fundamental importance in leadership as it would be difficult to have support without rapport.

In the previous discussion, The Importance of Creating Rapport, Martin Dewhurst, Mike Myatt, Harun Rabbani contributed some excellent anecdotes and insights into how rapport can be created. Some of these included common NLP strategies such as:
1. Understand & respect the other person's model of the world and affirm their values & beliefs by using language that mirrors & matches their own.
2. Find common ground
3. Be willing to serve & put others first.
4. Be sincerely interested in the other to bring out their best.
5. Listen
6. Care
7. Realise our inter-connectedness with each other

NOT building rapport, would of course mean NOT implementing the above strategies. In other words, instead of understanding & respecting the other person's model of the world, we set out to prove them wrong; we focus on our differences instead of similarities; we defensively put ourselves first; we are interested in promoting our OWN talents rather than eliciting the gifts of the other; we talk but don't listen; we don't care and remain encapsulated in our own distinct individuality.

Most of the clients I have coached are highly skilled in creating rapport and even if they were not, it is easy for intelligent professionals to learn the communication techniques described above. What is NOT so easy is to find the motivation & desire to build or maintain rapport with those that one considers to be the enemy (the saboteurs who will continue to sabotage and erode your very presence in the organisation until they have managed to get rid of you). Choosing NOT to create rapport with those we consider to be vile, dysfunctional or aggressive usually ends with resignation notes or dismissals.

Nelson Mandela & Bishop Tutu identified the need to build rapport & to embrace the enemy when the apartheid system was dismantled ...they made the Truth & Reconciliation Commision a priority in survival of the country. Enemies had to learn to forgive each other for past abuses in order to live together.

However, the Truth & Reconciliation programme worked for volunteers who were willing to acknowledge that they used to be enemies and it required highly skilled mediation.

In organisations, without mediators, how have you managed to build rapport with someone that you know is ready to stab you in the back & to destroy or sabotage your best work efforts? At some point in your career you might have faced this situation personally or witnessed a colleague being made redundant, sacked or demoted because of their inability to "build rapport with the enemy"...I would love to hear your experiences & stories.

The book "How to Rock the Boat.....Safely!" is based on a systems approach to leadership and theories of emergence. Therefore, I am looking for practical examples of building rapport with the enemy in systems/organisations. I look forward to your participation.

The Importance of Creating Rapport

I am writing my second book, called “How to Rock the Boat….Safely!” and interviewed one of the people recommended to me when I put out a request for trailblazer leaders that I can use as case studies for this book. (Please send me your recommendations of trailblazers)

Martin Dewhurst, is the founder of the GSR project which aims to eradicate hunger round the world.

In my short conversation with Martin, I asked him what he thought of Bob Geldof and his Live Aid campaigns. Most of my friends say that "Bob Geldof used to have great intentions but then he got colonised!" so I was interested to see whether Martin would share this view. I was disappointed to hear that he held a mass media view of the celebrity being responsible for creating awareness about poverty and the likes...I interrupted the flow of our genial raconteur with "well, I don't hold Bob Geldof in high regard I'm afraid! I am a systems thinker and I don't believe that we can ignore the systems which create poverty!"

Now what happened next is what truly impressed me.

I lost count of the times Martin used the word "systems" and "systems thinking" in his conversation with me after we almost parted ways. Skilfully, he captured my attention once again by speaking my language....by repeating and acknowledging what I had already expressed was fundamentally important to me, he placed himself in alignment with my values.

This is a communication skill taught in NLP courses...I haven't asked Martin if he was using this communication skill of mirroring & matching consciously to create rapport with me but it certainly worked.

"How to Rock the Boat...Safely!"... learning from trailblazers such as Martin Dewhurst....for a start, we can become masters of building rapport with perceptive communication skills....learning how to speak the same language as the people we need to communicate with is not merely a case of using the same vocabulary & grammar …we need to speak using language that they value which reflects what is fundamentally important to them.

How do YOU create rapport with people? I would love to hear of what works for you….This discussion has developed very interestingly on the Ecademy forum and you can read & add your views here: The Importance of Creating Rapport.


Alternatively, please add your views here.

Jesvir Mahil, Director, University for Life www.universityforlife.com

The Law of Attraction

In the realm of coaching, we often talk about the "primary questions" we ask ourselves. New subscribers from the government agency, The Tribunals Service, will recall that during my workshop there last week, I explained that the primary questions we ask ourselves can determine the direction in which we steer our life.

If we assume that the quality of the questions we ask ourselves determines the quality of the responses we get and therefore our behaviour & results, we are advised to avoid "why" questions as these elicit justifications and excuses which may not be helpful in taking us to the next step.

I found a chapter headed "How can I get There from Here?" in "Ask and it is Given" by Esther & Jerry Hicks.

In essence, this is the question that I also hear most often from my coaching clients wishing to take their life to a higher level of quality according to their specific criteria.

Esther & Jerry Hicks start their chapter "How Can I get There from Here?", page 15, with the following:

"Perhaps the question we hear most often from our physical friends is: Why is it taking me so long to get what I want?

It is not because you do not want it enough. It is not because you are not intelligent enough. It is not because you are not worthy enough. It is not because fate is against you. It is not because someone else has already won your prize.

The reason you have not already gotten what you desire is because you are holding yourself in a vibrational holding pattern that does not match the vibration of your desire."

This is based on the "Law of Attraction" philosophy which is becoming an increasingly widespread school of thought in the personal development industry.

Charles Haanel describes the Law of Attraction as "that law by which thought correlates with its object". In other words, we attract what we think about.

What do you think about this Law of Attraction?

Do you believe that we create our reality with the thoughts that are created in our minds?

How important is it for you to be selective about the thoughts you generate?

What is your primary question in life at the moment?

Many of my readers have been to Tony Robbins seminars and if you have too, you may recall that he says our life is driven by our personal primary questions?

For example, "How am I going to feed my family?" may well be the primary question of someone with inadequate resources to provide sufficient food for themselves & family. This question may be modified to "How am I going to pay the bills?" for someone slightly better off, and "How am I going to pay my credit card debts?" for someone used to a lifestyle beyond their means.

Not all of us are driven by financial questions of course.

What type of questions are you driven by?

The quality of your primary question may well reflect the quality of your life.

For example, my guess is that a day in the life of someone with a primary question, "How can I beat my competition?" will be very different to that of someone focused on the question "How can I express more of myself & contribute more?"...and the irony is that the latter may much more readily beat their competition without even trying! :) :)

So, remind yourself of your primary question and the results you are achieving in life as a consequence of the direction in which that question is steering you.

Would you like to share your interesting primary questions?

I spent most of this weekend at a Millionaire's Boot Camp!

If English is not your first language, you might look in your dictionary to see what "Boot Camp" means and find one of the following definitions:

1. A training camp for military recruits.
2. A correctional facility that uses the training techniques applied to military recruits to teach usually youthful offenders socially acceptable patterns of behavior.

You may be wondering why wannabe "Millionaires" may need to attend "Boot Camps". Well, if you have ever attended a Tony Robbins seminar, or seminars based on the same model, you will know that the audience is controlled & manipulated by a set of regular "Simon says" type of commands eg. stand up! sit down! raise your fist! shout "I'm a millionaire!", louder! jump! shout "I'm a millionaire!"

When you get 12,000 people in an auditoriam with Tony Robbins, people will even walk over burning coal shouting "Cool Moss! Cool Moss" after a whole day of being asked to jump, shout and gesticulate. What the controlled mind is capable of!?

So, the title "Boot Camp" is quite apt for the Millionaire Mindset weekend where we were treated to the wisdom of self-professed multi-millionaires flown in all the way from Australia and Europe.

One of the most interesting statistics I heard over the weekend is that immigrants in any country are 4 times more likely to be successful in business than the indigeneous folk. The reason given for this is that immigrants are much more aware of the opportunities available to them and much more in gratitude (which is supposedly an essential character trait of the rich and wealthy...must be hard! :) :))

On the other hand, when I have met successful immigrant business people, they have usually given their prime reason for starting a business as the fact that they had no other choice...that it was a case of survival. Racism and discrimination in the workplace pushed the intelligent to restore their self-esteem and take control of their own capacity for success.

Perhaps it makes no real difference whether the cause was an attempt to escape pain or to gain pleasure. What matters is the end result?

Actually, it's not quite as simple as that.

One of my second-generation Indian friends gave up her professional career as a Lawyer and bought a large hotel in the centre of London instead. This roused the disappointment and despair of her parents who have been successful business people ever since they migrated to England from East Africa.

"We had no choice but to go into business" they admonished their reckless daughter. "We have worked hard all our lives so that our offspring could enjoy doing something professional instead!"

What do you think? If you were advising a younger friend about choosing a careerpath in business vs a profession, what would you say?

So many entrepreneurs & successful professionals seem to be driven by a deep underlying fear of not being good enough. The psychologist Adler, a contemporary of Freud, based psychological theories on this "inferiority complex" ...he said that we are driven to compensate for our feelings of unworthiness and inferiority by engaging in behaviour that disguises this...sometimes this manifests in the "superiority complex" which is basically just a disguise for the former.I have been wondering about how this inferiority/superiority complex manifests in the slave trade (which unfortunately is not just a thing of the past) and workaholism where we make OURSELVES slaves to work.I know I have an inferiority complex...do YOU? or do you, like most of us, just disguise it well....or was Adler just off his head and way off the mark? :) :)

If you saw the BBC programme "The Happiness Formula", you may recall the experiment they did where three participants were given an envelope each and asked to open their envelope in turn. The first participant found a "thank you" note and £5 and was pleased. The second participant found a "thank you" note and £10 and was even more pleased. Seeing that the second participant had received twice as much money, the first participant felt disappointed with his lot (whereas previously he'd been happy). The third participant opened the envelope and found only a "thank you" note. She shook the envelope several times hoping to find some money like the previous two participants had received but her envelope was totally devoid of any monetary reward. As you can imagine, she was quite peeved.

The point of this experiment was to illustrate how comparisons cause us to be disappointed and unhappy.

And yet, we are biologically programmed to compare. Our senses discern subtle differences between the essence and quality of everything we ingest and absorb, whether it is physical matter, emotional or intellectual stimulation.

Did you know that one of the greatest fears that drives people to become workaholics or other expressions of despair, is the deep-rooted belief that they are not good enough? When we feel that we or anyone else that we are judging is "not good enough", it may be appropriate to ask ourselves "compared to what?" or "compared to whom?"

Comparing yourself or others to something or someone inappropriately can be one of the most dangerous weapons of mass destruction. Relationship patterns at the micro level reflect themselves in the macro level. If you feel you are "not good enough" with a mediocre salary, you will continue to feel that you are "not good enough" when you win the lottery.

How have you escaped from the "enough" comparison trap? I am interested to know what strategies people use to rise above the "good enough" trap.....