Yesterday I was watching a fascinating show on Dutch television with medium Derek Ogilvie. He’s a Scottisch guy that uses his telepathic capabilities to communicate with children that can’t talk themselves (either because they’re too young, or because they have an ailment that prevents them from talking).

In the show last night he was working with a three year old that did not talk or walk yet. One of the messages he got through went something like this:

“There are so many words in your house…so many words, but nothing gets done.”

“It’s making your son confused, he thinks: if you want a new car, get a new car! If you want the house redecorated, redecorate it! Don’t talk talk talk, but do.”

“So many words, you talk but don’t decide, the words… YOU ARE WASTING WORDS!”

“There’s no fun in words, they get wasted and lead to nothing…”

Wasting words

The scene struck a chord in me, and especially the phrase “wasting words”. As a writer and a NLP enthusiast I know the power of words, and I use and choose words deliberately. What words you choose to use can make or break a message or result in an entirely different response than intended. Click to continue »

A little story for you to enjoy and some questions afterwards:

A little bird got lost while flying and ended up flying over the north pole. The air was so cold that the little bird got all cold and crashed into the ground. Shivering of the cold, the little bird uttered weak chirps every now and then, hoping someone would come and rescue him.

A polar bear was nearby and heard the chirps of the little bird. Curious as he was he looked where the sound was coming from and found the little bird, all blue of the cold and shivering. The bear felt sorry for the little bird and wanted to help him. So he turned around, squatted and took a massive dump on the bird.

This startled the bird, now he was all covered in shit. What did this bear do!?

But then the warmth of the shit was slowly warming up the little bird, and he felt happier as his blood started to flow again. To show this he started to chirps some more and even sang an enthusiastic song.

Satisfied with helping out, the polar bear took off. The little bird was happy with the warmth and continued chirping and singing.

This was noticed by a polar fox who was nearby. Curious as he was he followed the sounds and found this little bird in a big pile of shit.

Now that was a funny and sorry sight, and the fox took the bird out of the pile of shit and washed him in some water to really clean him up. As soon as the bird was all warm and clean again, the fox ate him.

The morals of the story?

1) Someone who puts you in shit, isn’t necessarily an enemy.
2) Someone who takes you out of shit, isn’t necessarily a friend.
3) When you are in shit…please shut up!

Are there management lessons in this story? Hardly, yet my experience is that a lot of people recognize this in the organization they work for, or know friends that are in similar situations.

Do you recognize this behavior? Please share your story.
Is something missing in the organization that makes people do this?
What do you think is needed to stop it?

photo by CoffeeGeek

I enjoy drinking several cups of coffee a day, but I never really knew whether I should or should not drink this stuff. Is it bad for me, or is it good for me? Does it really have an effect, or do I think it has an effect? I know the latter can be true, as one of my former colleagues once said to feel much more awake after drinking a decaf (without knowing).

So to put an end to ignorance, I did some research. And it contradicts a little. So for your enjoyment, 5 reasons to drink coffee, and 5 to don’t drink it.

5 reasons to drink coffee

1. It heightens your senses
   Coffee has several effects on your awareness, your senses and your mental capabilities. Albeit on a short term only, there are no lasting effects. Coffee contains caffeine, but is also known to stimulate the production of cortisone and adrenaline. These are hormones that prepare your body for a fight or flight response.

   They make you very aware! But you can feel a little stressed out as well…

2. It protects against diabetes
   Drinking coffee reduces the risk of getting diabetes mellitus type 2. This is the type where body tissues become resistant to insulin. Obesity, among a lot of other factors, is currently a major cause for diabetes type 2.
   Click to continue »

On Sundays I’m looking back on the past week. How did I perform towards my goals? How did my blog do? And how am I keeping up with my GTD system?

Blog performance
This week was a good week. Lots of articles published, and I finished the NLP Presuppositions series.

One of my articles got featured in a Blog Carnival on Life Editing, it’s been a while since I’ve been involved in those.

I’ve been around the place as well and engaging in various discussions on entrepreneurship, that have me thinking still. Check out some of them:

• Jarkko (who’s Insanely interested in Everything) had a guest post over at Shane & Peter’s. It’s called “Bring People With You - A Recipe For A Small Business Revolution“. It brings a valuable message, and is followed by a very interesting discussion about loving what you do or doing what you love.
• Christine wrote a post about her start as an entrepreneur, it’s called: “What’s It Really Like to Take the Plunge Into Entrepreneurship?“
• Naomi responded to Christine showing her experience, totally from another perspective: “Taking The Plunge Into Entrepreneurship, A Response“. Wildly successful can be a problem too.

The discussions are ongoing, join in if you like!

Stats are in the table as usual. No big changes really.

Click to continue »

I’m only weeks away from being a certified NLP Practitioner, I will be officially recognized as someone who is capable of practicing Neuro-Linguistic Programming. There’s still lots to learn and to write about of course, and I plan on continuing my education to also get certified as a Master Practitioner.

In the past months I have taken up a battle with the presuppositions of NLP. They define a foundation of beliefs and attitudes that are necessary to really get the value out of NLP. And foundations are very important, so I took them up for a fight to see whether I choose to belief them.

They came out pretty much standing (and me too by the way). Here’s an overview of the posts and the presuppositions:

1. The ability to change the process by which we experience reality is more often valuable than changing the content of our experience of reality.
2. The meaning of the communication is the response you get.
3. All distinctions human beings are able to make concerning our environment and our behavior can be usefully represented through the visual, auditory, kinesthetic, olfactory, and gustatory senses.
4. The resources individuals need in order to effect a change are already within them.
5. The map is not the territory.
6. The positive worth of the individual is held constant, while the value and appropriateness of internal and/or external behavior is questioned.
7. There is a positive intention motivating every behavior, and a context in which every behavior has value.
8. Feedback vs. Failure - All results and behaviors are achievements, whether they are desired outcomes for a given task/context, or not.

There’s so much more to write about…there’s definitely more to come.