Our Complacency
Perhaps our real problem is not so much our deficient thinking, but our complacency. We do believe that our thinking is wonderful. Our existing thinking has indeed been wonderful in science and technology - and getting to the moon and beyond. Yet our poor thinking has been responsible for most of the human disasters such as wars conflicts, persecutions etc. The reason is obvious. We rush to use judgement rather than to design the way forward.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Raymund Kwok on -
Dennis,
In your previous experience, did you try to change the rH of your students? Such as from unhappy to happy, or from uninterested to interested using the support of the other 5 hats?
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Permalink Reply by Raymund Kwok on
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Dennis,
I fully agree during teaching 6 hats, we do not want the students to get pressure when showing their true feeling. When we use 6 hats as a team discussion on a topic, it is also better not to mention change of people's feeling.
But when we use the 6 hats as a personal thinking tool, we can understanding our own feeling and then change it as suggested by the other 5 hats.
Here is one example. My son got to write a project on air pollution in Hong Kong. His rH was angry to the factories in Mainland China. I asked him to check the sources of pollution in Environmental Protection Department. He found the pollutants are mainly generated locally and the pollution becomes serious under low regional air flow. Then, his rH changed.
So, we may need to separate the two issues:
(1) During teaching or team discussion, we want to see the true rH and better not to mention change of rH
(2) As a personal thinking tool, we do need to change rH
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Permalink Reply by William Jack Jordan on -
Another approach with the rH in a group situation is:
If it might make other people feel uncomfortable, people don't need to show feelings that may be negative.
Instead perhaps they could simply state in a calm manner their feeling. e.g.
"rH I feel angry that factories might be causing this pollution".
Different cultures may have different views of what sort of feelings are acceptable to express in group situations. in some countries people very excited and nobody cares. In others people migth not understand it all. In some cultures displaying anger is simply rude. (OPV)
How rH is used (in groups) may depend on the context of the culture.
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Permalink Reply by Charlotte Fairchild on -
I thought you would enjoy this youtube, Raymund. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ltva-NFCzM
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Permalink Reply by Sinclair McLay on -
Septine on complacency
Ignorance
Confusion
Fear
History
Peace
Reward
Value
Could be that people are confused by new ideas - plus many new ideas in the past were shown to be ineffective at best, dangerous at worst. Perhaps we need some system for singling out the best ideas - ranking, competition, reward , voting etc etc.
A market in ideas could be a wonderful thing.
Another approach could be a variation of the 'edge effect'. Work on very small but effective good ideas in any area, garner support, agree on one then and then put into action and then move onto the next -...this way good ideas get good press..
Good news stories - good ideas stories...
A New Thinking forum.
A group on this site for new ideas ?
Work with other sites with same aims...?
A test bed for new ideas ? - maybe in the virtual world ?
Schools mark new ideas?
New ideas classes ?
A New Ideas party?
Focus on coutries and states with petitioning mechanisms?
Sorry, starting to wander a bit now !
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Permalink Reply by Franis on -
On the contrary, what you are doing seems to be a sort of directed wandering - which is a good thing. Sort of free-range associative activity on the heels of having just done the Septine, which, if I'm not mistaken, is the objective of the second part of the Septine.
Did we get that right, Dennis?
Your suggestion of a "New Ideas party" has been developed in a very specific direction by a career counselor named Barbara Sher. She calls it an "Idea Party". It's an event that is a mixture of brain-storming that can turn into a sort of networking and even a barn-raising as people offer very specific opportunities to help someone's dream of a new livelihood to come true. The way it works is that the subject introduces their idea into a "Wish"; then they direct the problem-solving suggestions by forming an "Obstacle" that seems to be preventing that wish from becoming true.
I'd be interested in knowing about other things people have worked on that contain some of these elements of Sinclair's Septine "Wanderings"...
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Permalink Reply by Franis on
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I thought his example was fascinating! It strikes me that people who are wheelchair bound in old folks homes would be happy to take advantage of such services...
I can see why people such as himself who travel for work (so they associate travel with working rather than taking time off.) I can imagine how they would rather stay home and be pampered.
It strikes me this is what many bed and breakfast places attempt to provide. Also it would be a cool service to provide for people who already live in vacation spots. The only time I get to enjoy the island I live on is when people come to visit and I get to show them around.
Got this result when I decided to follow de Bono's and Barbara Sher's recommendation to view my possible lifestyle as a design problem rather than an impossible roadblock. Now my problem has been finding someone to sublet my house to provide security when I want to go away for a few months. Not a bad problem to have, compared to being completely miserable with allergies for six months of the year! I got the idea from examples in Barbara Sher's book "Refuse to Choose." Barbara Sher is quite a designer herself when it comes to how people can make their dreams come true, but her ideas came from having known so many examples of people who made their dreams work for themselves, as well as having helped people think up these interesting lifestyles in the first place.
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Permalink Reply by Charlotte Fairchild on
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I have been to one of the "New Ideas Party" and the most helpful aspect is the note taking. So many ideas flew that capturing them in print made it 10X more meaningful.
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Permalink Reply by Bhuvaneshwar Joshi on -
In addition to a number of causes that you have listed, people are not only cautious of accepting new ideas but knowing how our mind works,namely it prefers to stick to the known familliar ideas than risking change- the Second Law of Motion also applies to the way we think,that is,stick to existing ideas till a new forceful idea challanges it.
Everyone cannot be expected to agree to one way of thinking,for perceptions differ but mutually exclusive homogeneous thinking groups could be a possibility. These groups (like schools of thought) could merge at a later date as has been witnessed in the past.e.g. W.W.Leotiff's famous Input Output Model showed that both Capitalistic and Socialistic economy models could be expained by his one single model.
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Permalink Reply by Franis on
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After reading the list I came up with over and over - I'm not getting anything that ties all the points together in a new way. Perhaps this is because the list I made is so routine and "close to home" that it's tricky to recombine the elements of it other than it's habitually literal combinations.
Wondering if there could be more of a description about the leap of thought that goes on while reading these lists over. Yes, it's obvious that Edward is skilled, but what is he actually skilled at here? What is he doing that is a skill as he's reading over this list that gives him the various associative connections?
This is my list, (of the dominant concerns I habitually think about)
1. freedom (of response)
2. writing (making abstract ideas into a form)
3. logistics
4. eating
5. serving people
6. deadlines
7. errands
The only observation that integrates all these points is how they change when I am a different location. The contents of what I'm concern myself with follow suit - many of these points change radically. The only ones that remain constant in their places are "freedom of response", and perhaps logistics & serving people. Perhaps because of these common points, I should be thinking more creatively about the logistics of providing people freedom of response because this is what I do all the time anyway wherever I am.
Dennis (or any trainer who wants to answer this question, including Edward) is this the sort of thing the end combination of doing a Septine is meant for?
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Permalink Reply by Franis on
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Ah....yes. That's much better. Setting up a heading is structuring a priority goal. This determines your perceptual "attitude" (meaning the cant of a sailboat sort of attitude) or direction you would be considering the question from. A point of view.
Titles for my former list would be: Is there a theme in my dominant concerns? What could I capitalize on that I do as naturally as breathing? What am I complacent about that I am missing that I could intentionally act on and exploit?
See - this is what I mean in that I find myself thinking intuitively, while leaving out being able to articulate what I'm actually doing to anyone else. Having you to ask me to define these questions you have about what I'm doing helps me quite a bit. Thanks!
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Permalink Reply by Franis on
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Maybe it would be easier to exercise this activity if I took it away from what so personally concerns me.
I'll try the topic at hand:
Complacency as a closed system; what keeps complacency going?
1. Interpretation that "it's unnecessary" "unrelated"
2. urgency or fear is the only motivator
3. the word think = prefer, opinion or judgment
4. priorities vanish
5. expected security
6. self-justified entitlement
7. Self-preservation: Freeze (not fight or flight)
When people say "I think...." what they are really saying is "My opinion is...." or "I want...." or they are passing judgment and deciding about what they don't want. There is no way using English to talk without making a statement about the nature of shared reality. So everyone is always lying to some degree, and everyone is trying to figure out how much someone else is lying to them. This is why our culture has resumes, degrees and status. Sacrifice is directly related to anticipated value.
People tell themselves a story why they are entitled to the security of complacency; they "deserve it" for some reason of having worked hard, birth, luck, or having had ill luck in the past, it's going to be wasted anyway, they've been patient, they have prayed, etc.
All the people who take risks have been killed off by doing so in much greater numbers, so more of the complacent people passed on their genes and showed their children how to emulate complacent behavior. Children of risk-takers crave security, as offspring who are over-protected will sometimes crave risk-taking.
Refreshers, antidotes or "reset buttons" for complacency:
1. threat,
2. previous loss,
3. regret,
4. curiosity,
5. gratitude,
6. sensory awareness
7. present time sense
This reminds me of the list I made previously about what motivates people to act...
* Belonging: membership - contribution to community beyond self-interests - stewardship
* Power: exerting control & influence - can be tied to identity - responsibility - philanthropy (if combined w/above)
* Curiosity: - establishing priority - original thinks - questions - push beyond tradition & habitual boundary
* Courage: - daring - unanswered question fascinate, which encourages repeated exposure
* Prestige: - status - desire for excellence - pride - mastery - having ways to express a precious value
* Craving: ownership, when tied to identity, short-term sense of fulfillment, when tied to "security", ( when tied to power, a sense of control - (the personal touch, when tied to belonging)
* Fear - of immediate consequences involving fight/flight/freeze reactions, change on a dime - desperation, rescue strategies, post-traumatic stress, a mis-placed sense of time- past-future-present twistedness
* Security - familiarity - habits - certainty - trust - longevity - gradual development - gaining advantage by practice and skill building
Anyway, now that I made the second Septine about the antidote, I guess I have to sleep on it to come up with the "story" attached to it. I think that sleep is an important ingredient to this process for me. When I "sleep on it" (even just a nap) I'm able to think with improved comprehension.
OK, since it worked the last time for me, I'll try commonality as the operation.
The only commonality that comes up for me is how curious it is that motive and inspiration is key to refreshing complacency. Because we so often wear the black hat of judgment, we assume that what we love to do will have the same intensity as what we hate...but that's not true. Positive has been trivialized by drama. (Drama is supposedly "cool", complacent life is "dull." So we can't tell the significant moments from the insignificant in our own lives.) So our own sense of what is a positive direction has become debauched and dulled - and this is complacency. How do we recognize when positively driven, passionate inspiration happens? What are it's qualities? What is positive is subtle. Significance needs thinking skills, perspective and wisdom to recognize. Mastery is effortlessness. What makes us happy is exciting, far beyond any escape fantasy. But we may need repeated contact before we can recognize the excitement of happiness beyond habituated complacency.
hey trainers, any further suggestions about this process?
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