May 26, 2008 Happy? Monday

This is about contradiction.  There’s no work.  There’s no school.  It’s a perfect day; temperature 80+, cloudless sky, just the right breeze.  And it’s memorial day.  Be happy.  Remember the dead, the brave, the sacrificed.  Watch war memories on television with the windows open.

How do we be on a day like this?

Here’s how I am.  Happy, playing with happy grandchildren, being outside.  Praying the war will end — everywhere, praying for us to build our future, not destroy it — saying what I want, writing poems.  Being grateful for what we have, for what works, for today.

Going for a walk.

May 23, 2008 Walking

As soon as the sun shines, I take Camron for a walk – he loves it; so do I.

The one area where my memory is non-existent is in the names of  pieces if music.  This doesn’t bother me with pop tunes – I just don’t care. But when classical pieces that I know well tickle my mind and my mind  comes up empty, I get annoyed.  I don’t make it mean anything, I just get annoyed.  Is this The Planets? or is it the Fountains of Rome?  and why do I give a shit?

I’m at 6s and 7s today… start of a long weekend and I haven’t spent enough week.  Do you get like that?

May 22, 2008 New Ideas

Group Coaching is an interesting phenomenon,,, a lot like a jazz combo – one riff comes after another and flies above it.  The rhythym of the group creates a certain tension that facilitates the solos.  Sounds strange, I know, but the things that are said are often unpredictable.

Last night we dealt with each person’s goals.  I saw that the way we normally treat a goal is similar to the way we usually deal with a project – in some sense like a straight line.  Here’s the starting point – then this step, that step, and on until this milestone is reached, then that and so on.  That’s not even what happens with project plans.  We lose sight of “Man plans, God laughs.”  When plans are fixed, we often scramble to deal with frequent emergencies, shifts in outside factors, oversights, etc.  They often seem to rely on one or two people who somehow deal with the breakdowns and move forward regardless.

Goals rarely start with a well-defined plan; the plan -if any – is usually incomplete or non-existent.  There’s often floundering around, searching for a useful direction.  I use the prairie dog metaphor — constantly sicking your head out and scanning the horizon to see what’s next.  Course correction is constant; ‘next’ is often more valuable than ‘forward.’  Too many people are discouraged by an apparent blunder.  Blunders teach.

Anyhow – ’nuff said.  I’ve begun to listen … Our hierarchy is often urgent – important and, if we’re good – commitments.  The trouble is we confuse contexts.  Commitments are paradigmical; urgent – even important are in a different domain.  When I coach, I put that in the domain of my commitments.  For me it’s all interconnected with a sustainable world, spiritual fulfillment and social justice.  And it’s all in the domain of living a joyous and satisfying life, in harmony with earth

April 29, 2008 Gratitude

Sunday is World Laughter Day…never new that.  We need more laughter. Be grateful for the human comedy.

I take specific time every day to be grateful – though spontaneously, not scheduled.  Certainly, whenever I have down feelings, I remind myself of the wonders of life – simple sunlight, a spring rain, the miracles of my family, the blessings of having friends.  Gratitude is a very high state of being – sends out great vibrations.  And, I’m sure, attracts great vibrations.

I am convinced of the validity of Me to We coaching.  In fact the path to a winning future is creating a Me to We world.  Gratitude can lead the way, replacing resentment.  With resentment you forget what to be grateful for.  With gratitude you can enviion a sustainqble environment, spiritual fulfillment and social justice.

April 23, 2008 I Forget

I forget that I’m okay.  I forget that I am loved.  Mostly I forget that I matter, that I make a difference.
Mostly, I forget my stands in life; I delude myself and sell out for survival. Too bad.

April 14, 2008 Autism

Comedy Central should be applauded for holding a terrfiic fund raiser.  Very funny; very effective.  And without the garbage of most fundraisers.  I think their writers took a break for Adam Sandler’s routine – more than made up for by Sara Silverman and Chris Rock/Steven Wright.

I think they were smart to focus on educating autistic children.  I know that homeopathy can reverse autism.  But I realize that homeopathy is not easy to find out about and it’s tricky.  And the psychological trauma of a “cure” must play havoc with the parents, not to mention the kids.

From what I’ve seeen and read, we can all learn much from this.  Apparently some parts of the mind are unblocked with those children.  They exceed genius, but in a fixed dimension.  The kids can teach us; but we don’t come close to trying to learn.  We try to cure.

That’s like trying to cure indigenous people from their inherent knowledge of sustanability; socialization and spiritual fulfillment.

April 12, 2008 Stopping michael lipp

Starting and stopping are the hardest things.  Inertia is both physically and psychologically difficult to deal with.  Mostly we talk about starting, but strting one thing often means stoppping something else and stopping is very hard.  I use the analogy of my washing machine.  The final spin cycle shakes my whole house – probably true of the presidency, too.

It’s very clear that solving the climate crisis means stopping many of the things we’re used to.  Establishing a carbon tax as the basic tax will work, but will have far reaching effects.  Better than the alternatives, however… much better – food shortages, droughts, extreme weather.

Stop driving?  We can’t even get people to car pool.  Stop watering lawns?  You’re kidding, right?

We too quickly become habituated.  It takes long, strong laws, enforcement and public relation campaigns.  And we need to start now.  When I say I’m out to have people have joy and satisfaction, I need to look past today.  Immediate gratification does not often lead to long periods of joy and satisfaction.  If I’m out for environmental sustainability, social justice and spiritual fulfillment, I may have to learn how to stop things with joy and satisfaction.

March 27, 2008 Coaching Two Point Oh Oh

Coaching 2 Point Oh Oh

You know, I’ve been writing about Coaching 2.0 for a while now.  As I’ve told you, the feedback from my clients has been unvaryingly great.  The problem is that talking about it isn’t it.

So I’ve been wondering how I can give you a taste of it, give you some way of discovering it so you can make use of it in your life, make use of it in your business or, if you’re a coach, make use of it in your practice.

Then I thought – Maybe I can do a teleseminar and really show people how exciting it can be.  Except that would have you hear me talking about it instead of reading about it.  Big deal.  But then I got this idea.

I’ve been on teleseminars where they sometimes let one person from the audience interact with the leader.  Or one person acts as moderator and others interact with the leader.  That’s better, but it’s still not what Coaching 2.0 is, because the flavor is still missing, the dynamism is not there.

Well, I’ve given myself a small research project and I’ll tell you about it on April 3rd, hoping I’m not a fool, because here’s what I’m going to do.

I’m going to schedule a teleseminar in a few weeks.  And I am committing to be able to demonstrate Coaching 2.0 in a way that you will absolutely get it.  Call it a bold experiment.

March 26, 2008 Nancy’s Home

Wednesday’s the day that Nancy works at home.  I’m still adjusting.  I think my buggest ine is that I need to wear headphones to listen to music – it distracts her.  But her presence keeps me on track.

I am very excited, getting ready to launch my teleseminar on Coaching 2.0.  This method of coaching makes results more accessible and immediate.  I’ve said before that one of the main things is that insights are contagious.  And the other, that I articulated yesterday is that Coaching 2.0 gives each participant an opportunity to contribute.  And it’s much easier to contribute to someone who contributes.  Normally, everyone wants to contribute, but nobody wants to be contributed to.

Stay tuned.  I’ll be talking about this as we lead up to it. 

I’m clear that giving this technique to you furthers my own mission, which is  to inspire and empower people to live fulfilled lives in harmony with Earth.

March 25, 2008 Gratitude

The whole notion of blogging is fascinating – I talk to the world and here and there, people listen and even respond from time to time.  I just say different things and I assess responses (which are the most important stuff)

I’m launching a new teleseminar program – possibly unlike anything that’s been done.   I’m in the research phase, to determine the technical feasibility of what I want to do…. which is to demonstrate Coaching 2.0 —  I’v written about it, but there’s a huge difference between finding out and experiencing.

So I’m filled with gratitude today – About everything in my life – family, friends, pieces of earth that are special because they listen, my health… just great to say thank you.  But I’ll never forget to share my commitment.  I have the notion that simply sharing it will spread it – My commitment is to have our world be spiritually fulfilling, socially just and environmentally sustainable for the species we are luck enough to share it with (though I often wonder about mosquitoes)