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What Shintaro Taught Me
Ron Lee
3036 Corporate Ninja 11-16-cos
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© Ron Lee
The Corporate Ninja Pty Ltd
PO Box 699
Double Bay NSW 1360
Phone: 612 9363 1599
Fax: 612 9363 0211
Mobile: 612 411 47 53 78
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.corporate-ninja.com.au
First published in February 2002
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise,
without the prior permission of the author.
Book produced by Parker Pattinson Publishing
Suite 2, 211 Forest Road
Hurstville NSW 2220
Phone: (02) 9570 1923 • Fax: (02) 9570 2344
on behalf of the author.
Cover compiled by Tracie Gill
Typeset in Palatino 11/16 pt
Cover design by Mark Denning Graphics
Chinese characters by Bing Wu
www.bingartstudio.homepage.com
National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
Lee, Ron.
What Shintaro taught me : Zen and the art of success.
ISBN 0 646 41803 3.
1. Success. 2. Success in business.
3. Zen Buddhism – Psychology.
I. Title.
158
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Dedication
Thank you to my parents, brother, my daughter Belinda and
all those other people who have also provided support and
challenge. The lessons have been profound. Other special
thanks to the people who have tolerated the highs and lows
on my journey so far.
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With Gratitude
Andrew Moon, then a senior manager with a major Australian bank, first
participated in a Corporate Ninja public workshop on 29 May 1995 and has
since become a valued client and friend.
Since that time he has been sought after by many corporations and, at the
time of writing, is Managing Director of Tower Risk and Investment
Management, and I am grateful to him for including Tower as a sponsor in
publishing the first edition of What Shintaro Taught Me.
I asked Andrew his reasons for becoming involved with the book, and he said,
We are pleased to be involved with your project because I have used
the services and benefits of the Corporate Ninja:
•
by taking staff out of their comfort zone and showing them what
is possible is well beyond their own expectations the benefits
and achievements possible through individual focus and effort
•
the use of theatre sports to apply different perspectives and to
apply acting skills to everyday situations
•
the use of ‘centering’ to achieve the levels of focus which are
necessary to achieve the results which are sought
•
sublimating the ego in order to get different and better
perspectives on situations and problems
•
demonstrating the power of the mind in overcoming obstacles
and defeating aggression or withstanding on onslaught
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•
the use of the hoax to demonstrate the need to keep a healthy
and active listening attitude as all is not always what it seems
Through the various and numerous sessions in a number of different
forums, you have been able to assist me in a number of significant
change programmes which have really made a difference, particularly
in a couple of companies which were very old fashioned and had
deeply entrenched cultures. I have, personally, developed and
significantly changed my approach to many everyday issues as have
many of my colleagues. We have all learned an enormous amount.
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Contents
Introduction ................................................................................................................ 9
The Origins ............................................................................................................... 15
Individuality ........................................................................................................... 18
Purpose & Passion ........................................................................................... 27
A Book of Five Rings ..................................................................................... 38
Action ............................................................................................................................. 45
Alliances ...................................................................................................................... 48
Balance .......................................................................................................................... 51
Beauty ............................................................................................................................ 61
Breath ............................................................................................................................. 65
Bushido ........................................................................................................................ 71
Certainty ..................................................................................................................... 73
Coincidence ............................................................................................................. 75
Collapse ....................................................................................................................... 79
Courage ........................................................................................................................ 86
Egolessness ............................................................................................................... 89
Encouragement .................................................................................................... 92
Energy ............................................................................................................................ 95
Expectation ............................................................................................................... 99
Flexibility ................................................................................................................. 103
Flow ............................................................................................................................... 109
Focus ............................................................................................................................ 113
Forgiveness ........................................................................................................... 115
General ....................................................................................................................... 118
Giving ......................................................................................................................... 123
Gratitude .................................................................................................................. 127
Higher Force ........................................................................................................ 135
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Honesty ..................................................................................................................... 139
Humour .................................................................................................................... 143
Intuition .................................................................................................................... 151
Kaizen ......................................................................................................................... 153
Knowledge ............................................................................................................ 157
Laughter ................................................................................................................... 161
Listening .................................................................................................................. 163
Love ............................................................................................................................... 169
Meditation .............................................................................................................. 171
Mind/Body Connection ......................................................................... 177
Mission ...................................................................................................................... 181
Moment ..................................................................................................................... 189
Politeness & Courtesy ............................................................................... 195
Reflection ................................................................................................................. 199
Remembering Names ................................................................................ 201
Respect ....................................................................................................................... 207
Self-Image ............................................................................................................... 211
Solution of Perception ............................................................................... 219
Team .............................................................................................................................. 223
Universality .......................................................................................................... 224
Vision ........................................................................................................................... 229
Voice .............................................................................................................................. 234
Void ................................................................................................................................ 236
Zen .................................................................................................................................. 238
Wisdom ..................................................................................................................... 243
Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 244
References / Bibliography ................................................................... 245
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9
Introduction
Conquering others requires force.
Conquering oneself requires strength.
— Lao Tsu —
The title, What Shintaro Taught Me or Zen & The Art of Success is the result of a
great deal of thought and inspiration. How do I convey the martial artists’
approach to achievement? How can these concepts be related to business and
personal life? What catchy title would say what it needs to say in a way with
which readers will identify? Possible titles considered were, Absolute Power or
Zen & The Art of Success Without really Trying, Thick Head, Black Eye or Miso Soup
for The Soul. The first was too serious and the other two perhaps a bit too frivolous
and giving too much attention to other books of deserved popularity.
As a child growing up in the 1960s, I, as well as many of my schoolfriends,
was fascinated by a character named Shintaro Akikusa, played by Koichi Ose
in an action-packed Japanese television production called The Samurai, a lowbudget effort that we thought was mysterious, fabulous and extremely
empowering. As a boy with Asian heritage living in western society, life was
not always easy. I am still baffled by the term ‘tolerant’ when used in the context
of describing Caucasians’ acceptance of other races living in society. Surely
people who are ridiculed and abused for their racial backgrounds are the ones
who are ‘tolerant’. In light of this, Shintaro proved to be a more significant role
model, although my schoolmates were also very much caught up in the series.
Who can forget Shintaro’s faithful Iga Ninja sidekick Tombei the Mist and
that irritating little boy, Shusaku, and their endless battles against the evil forces
of the black-gi (uniform)-clad Fuma Ninjas and Koga Ninjas? Some might
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10 • What Shintaro Taught Me
remember The Death Ninja who could not be cut by the sword and hence seemed
to be an adversary impossible to defeat, but Shintaro, as always, found the
way. I was enthralled by the ninjas leaping backwards into high trees, and at
one time the question crossed my mind—If ninjas actually exist, why doesn’t
Japan hold the world high jump record?
To me, Koichi Ose as Shintaro looked like he was over six feet tall, but in
fact was only five foot seven, so how tall then was Tombei? Not that it mattered;
Shintaro could have been any height and he still would have been a role model.
Coincidentally, and perhaps not surprisingly, my friend John Walters
nicknamed me The Ninja, a sobriquet that was quickly adopted by my circle
and would return many years later to be of benefit in the corporate arena. Thank
you John.
Also of undeniable fascination with the series was the inevitable rapid-fire
throwing of star-knives. In fact, at my all-boys school every student I knew
either secretly made star-knives in metalwork class or cut them out of discarded
tin-can lids. Thinking back, it’s astounding that no-one was injured considering
the predominance of this activity and the number of near-misses that occurred.
Shintaro, as we fondly recall, was a warrior of poise, handsomeness, coolness
and acute perception, a man who could accomplish anything because good,
righteousness and justice were on his side, and was possibly the first person
we saw ‘use the force’. He had absolute certainty about his mission in life and
pursued it with confidence and fearlessness. What an example for a teenager
about to embark on his life path.
Shintaro was also a man of great power, not egotistically overt power, but a
strongly defined inner strength that could not be denied. It was this internal
energy that continually made me wonder how to achieve that state.
It wasn’t until many years later that I embarked on a quest to find the
answers. A client, Nigel Purves, a granite-jawed accountant who was proficient
in karate (in fact, he drove a De Tomaso with ‘KARATE’ licence plates),
suggested that I seek out Chan Cheuk Fai who had migrated to Australia two
years before, and whose father, Chang Heng Wan, was Grand Master of Jin Wu
Koon Kung Fu. In my ninth year of study under Sifu Chan Cheuk Fai, I incurred
a severe spiral fracture of the fibula in a sparring session, and after the operation
took some time off to allow the metal to eventually be removed and give time
for the bones to strengthen. There was definitely a reason that the broken leg
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Introduction • 11
occurred; it was to take me to another level, which turned out to be an ‘internal’
form called Aikido. Unlike Jin Wu Koon Kung Fu, we didn’t execute kicks or
punches, just using mostly the other person’s energy to thwart them, or assist
them to succumb to us.
From there I went on to study several other forms that are all brilliant in
their own ways and have been beneficial to my overall understanding of inner
strength using the martial arts metaphor and they have allowed me to facilitate
situations in which clients and students have been able to glimpse their own
greatness.
One of the lessons here is that everything serves, and that all experiences
are valuable. Nothing is wasted. Everything that happens to us will strengthen
us if we are open to that possibility.
It is not power that corrupts but fear. The fear of losing
power corrupts those who wield it, and fear of the
scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.
— Aung San Suu Kyi —
winner of the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize
The person who feels the need to overtly display the power of the position is
the one who is obviously unsure of his or her strength, confidence and ability.
The truly powerful individual is internally assured of his or her talent and
ability to excel in any situation.
If a person has inner strength they will be more receptive, more ready to
listen, and, at both a conscious and unconscious level, honour and respect the
person with whom they are communicating. Loud assertiveness is a sign of a
suspect ego.
In a martial arts contest it is unwise to underestimate the opponent. Even if
you are favoured to win, it is foolish to underrate the opposition. The astute
competitor respects the opponent for their strength, intelligence, enthusiasm,
know-how, energy and power.
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According to the ancient martial arts, there are nine levels of power:
1.
Strength of Mind and Body, or ‘Rin’, or’ Chu’ in Japanese and Chinese
respectively.
2.
Direction of Energy, ‘Kyo’ or ‘Shen’.
3.
Harmony, ‘Toh’ or ‘Tai’.
4.
Healing or ‘Sh’a in both Japanese and Chinese.
5.
Premonition of Danger or ‘Kai’ in both.
6.
Knowing the Thoughts of Others, ‘Jin’ or’ Jen’.
7.
Mastery of Time and Space, ‘Retsu’ or ‘Tung’.
8.
Control, ‘Za’i or ‘Hua’.
9.
Enlightenment, ‘Zen’ or ‘Tao’.
Throughout this work, you will also see references to Bushido.
The code of Bushido is a philosophical, moral or ethical system that, roughly
translated into English is ‘military-knight-way’. It came out of Japanese
feudalism that followed the ascendancy of the warlord, Yoritomo. As a result, a
professional warrior class emerged, functioning as guards and attendants who
carried the titles, ‘bu-ki’ or ‘bu-shi’. Fighting was their only vocation.
In 1870 feudalism was abolished and in 1875 the wearing of the sword was
prohibited, but the code lives on the lives of a few adherents.
The tripod supporting the framework of Bushido is wisdom (ch'i),
benevolence (jin) and courage (yu), which are qualities that are as relevant today
as they were in nineteenth century Japan.
Even though the philosophies, techniques and exercises in this book have
proven to be effective, they are at the same time uncomplex. A football coach
once said, ‘Psychology is common sense made complex.’
An ancient Chinese proverb said, ‘Tell me and I will forget, show me and I
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Introduction • 13
may remember, but involve me and I will understand.’
Throughout this book there are exercises that are designed to keep you on
track. Even though they require some thought, they are not difficult to complete,
and will serve to provide focus. I have endeavoured to keep the book simple,
as are many of the great practical works. A Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto
Musashi, The Art of War by Sun-Tzu and the Tao-te Ching by Lao-Tzu, although
inspired, are uncomplicated
.
East and west can no longer be kept apart.
— Goethe —
Most of the chapters contain only one concept in an easy-to-read format to
make them user-friendly and to encourage you to utilise this resource.
The power of this work is already within you; it’s simply a matter of
identifying and appreciating your inner strength. Once you have recognised it,
all that you are able to envision will be achievable.
By the time you finish this book, you will hopefully have gained insight
into your personal answers.
Many, if not all of the chapters overlap and can be read in conjunction with
each other. ‘The universal is the universal.’
This book has been deliberately designed to be simple because all effective
concepts are not complex; they are only complicated by theorists.
My intention is that everyone who reads it will comprehend at their level
and utilise the philosophies so they can more rapidly approach their purpose
and their dreams.
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15
The Origins
The ultimate Truth is beyond words.
Doctrines are words.
They’re not the Way.
The Way is wordless.
Words are illusions.
Don’t cling to appearances, and you’ll break
through all barriers.
— Bodhidharma —
The more astute of you will realise that, despite the title of this book, there is
cross-over to and from Japanese culture to Chinese, to apparent western
philosophies.
In fact, it is generally accepted that the entire martial arts culture was
initiated by Bodhidharma who is credited with having taken Zen Buddhism
and tea to China. Born in Kanchi in the Southern Indian kingdom of Pallava in
the mid-400’s, Bodhidharma was a prince, the third son of King Syandria. He is
also considered to be the twenty-eighth Indian Patriarch in a direct line from
Gautama Buddha and First Patriarch of Chinese Zen Lineage. His spiritual
instructor, a Buddhist master named Prajnatara, told him to go to China, and
he travelled there by ship, arriving in Southern China around 520.
Why did Bodhidharma make the trip?
According to The Zen Teaching of Bodhidharma:
The only reason I’ve come to China is to transmit the instantaneous
teaching of the Mahayana: This mind is the Buddha. I don’t talk about
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precepts, devotions or ascetic practices such as immersing yourself
in water and fire, treading a wheel of knives, eating one meal a day,
or never lying down. These are fanatical, provisional teachings. Once
you recognise your moving, miraculously aware of nature, yours is
the mind of all Buddhas. Which leaves me wondering whether a man
who’s hacked off his eyelids would accuse another man of being a
fanatic for only eating one meal a day. Apparently, Bodhidharma cut
off his eyelids to prevent himself from falling asleep while meditating;
tea-plants are said to have sprung up for the first time where his
eyelids fell to the earth. This story serves as a traditional basis for
Zen monks’ drinking tea in order to stay awake during meditation.
Shortly after his arrival in Canton, Bodhidharma was granted a meeting with
the Liang emperor Wu-ti, a man noted for his good works. To the emperor’s
dismay, Bodhidharma stated that merit applied to salvation could not be
accumulated through good deeds, in contrast to Christian principles of ‘good
versus evil’, ‘right versus wrong’.
Everything good and bad comes from your own mind.
To find something beyond the mind is impossible.
— Bodhidharma —
Bodhidharma then went to Lo-yang, and legend has it that he spent nine
consecutive years in meditation, facing the rock wall of a cave about a mile
from the Shaolin Temple. During his life he had very few disciples, only three
of which were mentioned in the history books. Bodhidharma transmitted the
patriarchy of his lineage to Hui-k’o, and soon afterwards, Bodhidharma died
in 528. A few years after his death, a Chinese official reported encountering
Bodhidharma in the mountains of Central Asia. Was this akin to a former-day
Elvis sighting? Bodhidharma was reportedly carrying a staff from which hung
a single sandal, and he told the official that he was on his way back to India.
When this story reached the home of Bodhidharma, his fellow monks decided
to open his tomb. Inside there was nothing found but a sandal.
Was this a sign?
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The Origins • 17
Did this part of the legend inspire that memorable scene in the movie, The
Life of Brian?
Who knows?
All that I can tell you is that Bodhidharma is broadly acknowledged as the
father of martial arts, and martial artists have a great deal of gratitude for the
life and times of Bodhidharma. Some historians, however, believe he taught
the Shaolin monks nothing more than meditation and yoga.
Whatever you believe, Bodhidharma and his legacy hold a special place in
the martial arts. Both viewpoints, as everything else we perceive, are nothing
more than illusions for our personal interpretation.
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18
The Power of Individuality
“It is always important to remember that you
are absolutely and totally unique, just like
everyone else.”
— Ancient Irish proverb —
One of Lao Tzu’s messages was, ‘Discover who you are. Observe the world
around you and deeply contemplate your impressions. Do not rely on ideologies,
because to do so will rob your life of meaning.’
In fact, it will give the ideology your inherent power.
Many years ago, I attended a conference that lasted three days, but I only
remember one concept. A charismatic and down-to-earth speaker named John
Savage said:
Most of the world’s social problems are caused by people being
concerned about what other people think of them.
He followed this with,
Most people think about themselves 95% of the time, so even if
someone really hates you, they have a maximum of 5%.
If somebody dislikes you for a particular character trait, someone
else will like you for exactly the same characteristic.
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Individuality • 19
This aphorism changed my life, even though it didn’t ‘take’ until several years
later.
After breaking up, a former partner said:
“There’s one thing I really disliked about being in a relationship with
you.”
“Only the one?”
“Well, the main one.”
“Would you like to tell me?”
“You have this evil sense of humour.”
“Thank you.”
“It wasn’t a compliment.”
Yet, thinking of the partners who preceded and succeeded her, both said,
after the break-up,
“There’s one thing I will really miss about you. You have an
endearingly wicked sense of humour.”
You may as well be yourself.
Every individual has a place to fill in the world and is
important whether he chooses to be so or not.
— Nathaniel Hawthorne —
Think of the last presenter that you perceived to be exceptionally effective at
communicating the message.
Think of someone whom you strongly admire in your business or personal
life.
Is that person trying to be someone else, or are they unique, undeniably
themselves?
Are they afraid to project their personality and sense of humour, or do they
just let it flow unapologetically?
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It is the chiefest point of happiness that a man is
willing to be what he is.
— Desiderius Erasmus —
In the 1970s I attended a Zig Ziglar seminar, and some people walked out of the
room with a Southern accent. Were they hoping that someone else’s individual
brilliance would rub off on them if they became a watered-down version of
their hero?
As long as you are trying to be something other than
what you actually are, your mind merely wears itself
out, but if you say, ‘this is what I am, it is a fact that I
am going to investigate, understand’, then you can go
beyond.
— Krishnamurti —
As long as your are operating with integrity, it is always better to be
unashamedly individual.
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Exercise 1
To focus on your uniqueness, please complete an introduction as if you were to be
introduced to an audience as a keynote speaker by the Master of Ceremonies.
To give you an idea of the format, below is the introduction used at conferences at
which I have spoken.
The Introduction for Ron Lee —The Corporate Ninja
Ron Lee is known globally as The Corporate Ninja.
Ron is an inspirational humorist, keynote speaker and executive
trainer. He studied at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (where
Judy Davis and Mel Gibson trained) and was involved in the
performing arts as an actor, director and theatre critic. Over the past
20 years he has also studied six forms of martial arts.
As well as regularly lecturing at the University of New South
Wales, Ron trains senior executives internationally in leadership and
personal power. He uses acting, humour and deeper martial arts
philosophies.
Ron has been consulted by the CEOs of some of the top 100
corporations in Australia, New Zealand, USA, Canada, Asia and
Europe as well as politicians and sportspeople including marathon
swimmer Susie Maroney.
Ron has also had roles in eight feature films including the
legendary Zombie Brigade.
The Introduction for __________________________________________________________
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Exercise 2
As an added challenge, write your own obituary in about 200 words.
Assume it’s been written and spoken by a friend who knows the REAL you very
well.
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I once heard INDIVIDUALITY defined as ‘The ‘unfragmented, indivisible state’,
the true nature, the soul, the essence’.
In knowing ourselves to be unique , we possess the
capacity for becoming conscious with the infinite. But
only then.
— Carl Jung —
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27
The Power of
Purpose & Passion
When you are inspired by some great purpose, all
your thoughts break their bonds, your mind
transcends limitations and your consciousness
expands in all directions. Dormant forces, faculties
and talents become alive and you discover yourself
to be a greater person by far than you ever
dreamed yourself to be.
— Patanjali —
I am writing this section after recently being reminded of my purpose in life.
Some time ago I received a call from a friend and fellow-corporate trainer,
Greg Meyer, who is originally from California, and has been described by some
people as well as himself, as “a loud American”. Greg is an excellent and
effective trainer, and began his call in typical fashion,
“HEY BUDDY, HOW’RE YA GOIN’?”
“Great Greg, how are you?”
“FANTASTIC! HEY, I GOT A GIG FOR YOU!”
“Excellent. Thanks for thinking of me. When is it?”
“IT’S IN JANUARY!”
“That’s terrific; January’s normally a quiet month, so it looks fine.
Which part of January?”
“EARLY JANUARY!”
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“EARLY JANUARY!”
“Even better. I have nothing else on in early January.”
“GUESS WHAT ELSE?”
“What, Greg?”
“IT’S A FREE ONE!”
“Sorry Greg, what did you say?”
“IT’S A FREE ONE!”
“For a minute there, I thought you said you put me up for a FREE
presentation.”
“YEP, THAT’S RIGHT!! ISN’T IT GREAT?!!”
“Define ‘great’.”
The group turned out to be participants in the Rotary Youth Leadership Award,
consisting of youths aged from mid-teens to mid-twenties and the event is
sponsored by various Rotary Clubs. They spend a week at a camp at which
they are exposed to a variety of speakers and trainers, all of whom donate their
services, time and expertise. Greg had been working with them for several years
and he decided that my work would be of benefit to them.
My third annual presentation was last Sunday, and part of it involved
breaking of three-quarter-inch thick wooden boards using a palm-strike that
uses an open-hand technique as compared with a fist, knife-edge (ridge of the
hand) or fingertip strike.
Most of the participants were able to do it even though the time allocated
to martial arts was very limited, but some couldn’t do it at that time.
One in particular was Amanda Watson who attempted the board-break
numerous times without success. My attitude to this is that she decided not to
do it yet. After leaving the session, I felt that it was playing on her mind and
that she was having an issue with it.
On the following Tuesday night, the Rotarian sponsors were invited to
attend a dinner at which the waiting staff were the participants on the camp.
As Amanda walked past, I stopped her with my eyes and said, “You are going
to break a board tonight”. She looked nervous and half-nodded.
Later that night when the official proceedings were over, I walked over to
her and asked, “Ready?”. She nodded tentatively. After at least another ten
attempts of fear over-riding the instruction, she decided to trust herself and the
board fractured. Amanda burst into tears and hugged me with all of the people
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Purpose & Passion • 29
watching. Her tears were of joy, elation, gratitude and relief.
Cut now to three months later (yes, I was slow in writing this book).
Unannounced in my mail was the following letter (quoted with permission):
Dear Ron,
I am writing to say thank you. Thank you for helping me to find a
brighter life.
Meeting you and breaking my board at RYLA has had a lasting
impact on my life and who I am.
When I arrived at RYLA I was confident, outgoing, cheerful,
friendly & totally unaware of the block inside that was holding me
back from being who I could be. There was something inside
constricting me, which was stopping me from living life.
The hurt that I’d experienced when my parents split up two
years ago and my own relationship had ended too had left me afraid.
My heart was in turmoil. The counselling I’d had, had helped me
to deal with it to a certain extent & I was able to function in my
life day to day, but when I couldn’t break that piece of wood in
your session at RYLA, I realized there was an enormous amount
of self-doubt and fear inside that was holding me back from being
able to achieve what I wanted to achieve.
In the next couple of days I tried to work through it, but it
wasn’t until you said you wanted me to break the board on the
night of the dinner that I realized I needed to deal with this fear or
otherwise be restricted forever. As you helped me to calm down
and focus I saw my goal; everything that I ever want to achieve in
my life was there for me; I only had to reach out & get it. And I
did!
It was a wonderful moment & a very exciting achievement,
but more so than that it’s had a permanent affect on me & how I
live my life.
I’ve been living to the max, I’ve been able to commit to someone
else, & I’ve been feeling so much happier.
Thank you Ron
You’ve given me more than you realise
Amanda Watson
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
This is why I do what I do.
What our deepest self craves is not mere enjoyment,
but some supreme purpose that will enlist all our
powers and give unity and direction to our life.
— Henry J Golding —
Those who have listened to their inner voices and followed their purposes are
the ones who have made the greatest contributions to and impact on mankind.
Think of Joan of Arc, Galileo, Nostradamus, Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein,
even Hitler.
Accomplishments and short-term goals are temporary, but purpose is
immortal.
If at first you don’t succeed, try again, then give up.
There’s no use in being a damn fool about it.
— W C Fields —
Most people have heard of the achievements of well-known business leaders
following many obstacles.
Colonel Sanders approached over one hundred banks before he was able
to acquire funding for his idea, Walt Disney was bankrupt three times before
he built Disneyland, and Thomas Edison, in his attempts to perfect the
incandescent light bulb, failed more than ten thousand times.
Dr Ian Wilmut and his team of Scottish scientists failed 277 times with the
same experiment before they successfully cloned Dolly the sheep. Of all the
animals to clone, why did they do a sheep? Why didn’t they clone something
with more perceivable differences? Why not do one of the endangered species?
Cloning a sheep would seem to be something of a scientific tautology.
Yes, persistence is crucial to success, but the key is to be on purpose.
If you are not following your purpose, persistence will only prove to be
frustrating.
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
For sixteen years I was a financial planner, disillusioned with the profession
and feeling not at all contented or fulfilled, but unqualified to do anything else.
In the rare moments of self-motivation I was frustrated at seeming to have to
spend a massive amount of time and energy for very little return.
As soon as I acquired the courage to follow my purpose, I gave back the
financial planner’s licence and it took only two days for the calls to come in,
and in the first year revenue was double that of the best year as a financial
planner.
In business, anything that is not part of your purpose becomes baggage.
As mentioned in other parts of this book, the four most common questions are:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Where do I come from?
Where do I go?
Who am I?
Why am I here?
Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.
— Albert Einstein —
What is the secret to finding your ultimate purpose?
What would you do if there were no limitations on you?
Limitations are nothing more than illusions or delusions that are selfimposed; they are perceived reality, and actuality, in which there are no
limitations, is the truth.
What would you do if you were financially independent, and could do
anything you wanted on a full-time basis?
How could you maximally utilise your assets and resources to serve
humankind, to enhance the greater good?
Obey your own destiny; it is often very difficult, but it is
the only means of attaining serenity.
– Chuang Tzu —
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
Part of the problem is that sometimes we attempt to find security and approval
in conformity, which provokes inner conflict and confusion.
Only when we free ourselves from the craving for approval can we really
know ourselves and our purpose. The road to our destiny runs through our
nature.
We are often lured from our spontaneous nature by the illusion of security.
The way of nature means embracing creative insecurity, thereby running with
spontaneous change. By following the way of your nature, you are doing the
work to which you are naturally suited, and you enter the river of your destiny.
All you have to do is simply flow with it.
When one is engaged in a favourite pursuit or a
subject absorbingly interesting, the normal conception
of labour or time and artificial social distinctions
disappear from the mind. In fact, life itself is absorbed
in the engagement, or it may be said that one’s life is
tuned in harmony with eternal life.
— G Koizumi —
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
There was the story of a Zen priest,
who, when he was young, was
weakened by a serious case of
tuberculosis which at the time was
considered to be a terminal disease.
One day during Zen training, he
collapsed and the doctors deemed
him to be beyond help. He resigned
himself to a short life.
The young man thought to
himself, it is a great sorrow that I had
to fall ill in the midst of my training,
but if I must die, I shall do it bravely
seated in the Zen position as a priest
should.
He rose from the bed, assumed
the sitting Zen position, entered a
state of perfect spiritual concen-
33
tration, and calmly sat waiting for
death to overcome him. He did not die.
On the following day he did the same,
and death did not come.
After several days he decided to
cast the question of life and death
from his mind and leave it up to the
will of heaven. He also resolved that
as long as he was alive he would
follow the disciplines of Zen to the best
of his ability. As he continued his
studies, he became unaware of his
tuberculosis and it left him. The result
was that he was able to teach others
the way of Zen until beyond the age
of seventy.
The body will always follow the
mind.
29/07/18, 08:01 AM
Exercise 3
This seven-step exercise has been designed to assist you in finding your reason for
being on this planet.
The first three steps pertain to your identity. If you know who you are, you will have
a basis on which to start.
1.
Write down a description of yourself if you had no name.
2.
Write down a description of yourself as you believe someone else would perceive
you.
3.
Have other people write down a description of you as if you had no name.
By doing this, you will have a clearer picture of how you see yourself, how you believe
others see you, and how others really see you.
4.
Write down seven achievements that left you feeling fulfilled, and why.
These are not necessarily times when other people gave you approval or validated
you, but rather times when you genuinely felt gratified internally.
5.
Write down what you wanted to do when you were aged five or younger.
We were far more expressive and uninhibited before the school system conditioned
us to aspire to uniform mediocrity, to be one of the many rather than one of the few,
when individuality was frowned upon, and ‘fitting in’ was encouraged. Do I seem to
have an issue with the education system? You bet! To be fair, there are some
enlightened educators who celebrate and respect individual talents and nurture
the special gifts that each of us have.
6.
Clarify and write down your talents, passions and interests, even if they are unusual.
Passion is an undeniable force, a form of motivation and inspiration that, when
resisted, throws the possessor into confusion.
In my experience, countless people believe that their dreams are too ridiculous,
and the common question is, ‘How can I make a living out of THAT?!’
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
Over the years, I have accumulated
a few pinball machines, and my
pinball mechanic, Michael Shalhoub,
periodically services them. When I
first met Michael, he told me that he
had been passionate about the
machines from the time he was a
small child, often looking in shops that
were likely to have one. He mentioned various machines, and I would
recall some of the titles from my
misspent youth. Michael knew every
machine that I mentioned, not only
knowing the machine but also the
manufacturer, the year in which the
machine was released, sometimes
the designer, and he could describe,
in great detail, the back glass and the
playfield of the machine. I even
looked up some pinball history on the
internet and tested him. Michael was
faultless. Because of this unique
knowledge, he was commissioned to
write two books about his attraction
to, and the history of the silver ball,
and as I write, he is in the process of
7.
establishing Australia’s first pinball
museum. This is a man with not only
an interest, but a passion, and an
intense childhood interest has become a career and a way of life for
Michael and his supportive wife, Anne
and their four children because he
dared to follow his instincts despite
pressures to ‘get a real job’. His
company, The Pinball Master, sources
pinball machines for a few select
clients. Those of you who played
pinball as a child might be wondering
where the machines are, considering
they are infrequently in shops and
amusement arcades. I was surprised
to hear that they are mostly in private
homes. It is obvious that if Michael
Shalhoub was not passionate about
pinball, he would not have acquired
the knowledge that makes him a
leader in a field that has many
thousands of fans, those babyboomers who sought adolescent
escape and recreation through those
fascinating mechanical creations.
Write down your purpose, the way in which you can maximise your service to
others.
As a guideline, here is one on mine from several years ago.
My primary purpose in business and in life is to entertain, educate
and enlighten people in both their personal and business lives as
effectively as humanly and divinely possible, to make a lasting
difference in how they focus and achieve, and to the way in which
they interact with everyone with whom they come in contact.
Penetrate the minds and spirits of the team members of organisations
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
so that they will recognise their purpose and approach their potential
more rapidly.
A more recent one was:
My purpose is to inform, inspire and entertain the people of the world
in order that they become aware of their inner strengths, approach
their potential and pursue their purpose in a spirit of fun and
playfulness
Please complete:
My primary purpose is to:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Have your managers, spouses and/or partners also complete a personal
purpose statement, and to encourage them to share your vision, ask yourself
how the vision is able to serve their individual purposes.
If you are stuck for answers to this question, perhaps you should ask yourself
some other questions, such as:
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
— What am I doing purely for the approval of others?
— Why am I doing this job?
— Am I content with my current level of income?
— What is the single most significant part of my experience and education
that will contribute to the universal benefit?
— Am I as physically fit as I want to be, and if not, what should I be doing
to amend this?
— Am I socialising and networking too much or too little?
— Am I satisfied with my level of spiritual awareness? What can I do to
increase it?
— Is my family in balance with the other areas of life?
If you are still uncertain about your purpose, I suggest an analysis to determine
your motivational profile, a system that is designed to work out what drives
you to do what you do the way that you do it.
Having personally been exposed to the DISC Personal Profile System and
Myers-Briggs, and having an associate look at Margerison McCann Team
Management Profile—a management research group leadership effectiveness
analysis—and the Dalby Payne Psychological Assessment, my preference is
the ID (Instinctive Drives) System co-devised and developed by Paul Burgess.
ID, from my viewpoint, is more useful at a practical level, clearly giving the
information needed to develop a life strategy.
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
38
A Book of Five Rings
The only journey is the one within.
— Rainer Maria Rilke —
In every era there is a stand-out individual who excels in his or her chosen area
of passion. Try to think of another outstanding swimmer at the time Mark Spitz
dominated the pool in the 1970s, or Dawn Fraser at her peak, or a cricketing
batsman who came close to Sir Donald Bradman (before, since or during his
time), or golfer Tiger Woods, or suggest a martial artist who captured the world’s
imagination as much as Bruce Lee, and continues to do so decades after his
death. In seventeenth century Japanese swordsmanship it was Miyamoto
Musashi.
Musashi was a samurai, born Shinmen Musashi No Kami Fujiwara No
Genshin in the village of Miyamoto in 1584. As popular belief would have it,
Musashi, known to the Japanese as Kensei (Sword Saint) defeated no less than
five hundred men with his katana or daito (long sword), shoto or wakizashi
(short sword) and other available weapons and articles that he could improvise
as weapons.
At the age of about fifty he no longer felt the need to fight, and became
more mellow, reflective and philosophical.
As reported history would have it, he travelled the Japanese countryside
and later retired to a cave to write A Book of Five Rings, or A Book of Five Spheres,
according to some translators.
As a lifestyle guide, Musashi’s principles are uncomplicated and remain
extremely powerful in today’s society, and have none-too-surprising relevance
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
Five Rings • 39
both in business and in personal life, and thousands of my clients have benefited
from these simple philosophies.
The Book of The Earth, or The Ground
— Be a student of the Arts.
Study opera, music, painting, literature, sculpture and drama, for if you are a
student of the Arts, you will become familiar with the workings of the human
mind.
The main areas of study in the Bushido curriculum were fencing, archery,
horsemanship, use of the spear, tactics, ethics, literature, history, calligraphy
and jiu-jutsu.
There is no way to describe what a warrior should do
other than adhere to the Way of the warrior. To die with
your intention unrealised is to die uselessly.
— Unknown —
— Do not neglect anything that is relevant to your purpose, irrespective of
how trivial it may seem.
Attention to detail is crucial.
In the Olympics, races are won by one-hundredths and sometimes onethousandths of a second. If you focus on every aspect of your purpose, you are
more likely to achieve the edge that makes the difference between winning and
the oblivion that is synonymous with second or third place.
— Know the Ways of all professions that are relevant to your purpose.
Become acquainted with the tasks of your associates and sub-ordinates.
Overlook nothing.
If you are aware of these matters, you will know what to expect from them.
— Do nothing that is of no use and is inconsistent with your purpose.
Too much energy is wasted in such areas as office and social politics. If your
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concentration is on an individual whom you perceive as a threat, you will not
focus on your purpose, and that person will control your existence.
— Perceive those things that cannot be seen.
It is too easy to only see that which lies on the surface. We must learn to read
between the lines and penetrate the essence of the situation. Red herrings swim
freely in business today.
The Book of Water
The only constant in the world today is change. Musashi said:
Water can adapt to any vessel in which it is held, irrespective of the size
and shape of the vessel. It goes with the flow.
Water can also destroy the vessel if there is a crack in the vessel. It will subtly
and relentlessly flow along the weak points of the container and gradually tear
apart that which holds it.
Have you ever observed the course of a river and seen that in a relatively
short time, it will significantly change the landscape?
Constantly dripping water is able to eventually split a mountain in two.
In other words, it not only ‘goes with the flow’, it uses the flow.
Appreciate the power of nature, knowing the rhythm of
any situation, you will be able to do anything you wish.
— Miyamoto Musashi —
Water is impossible to grasp a handful.
Strike it and it does not suffer hurt or pain.
Stab it and it is not wounded.
Sever it and it is not divided.
It has no shape of its own.
Heat it and it becomes invisible and potentially destructive.
Cool it and it becomes as hard as rock.
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
Five Rings • 41
The Book of Fire
This has to do with combat.
Become familiar with the terrain, or the area in which you will engage in battle.
Musashi said:
When the fight comes, always endeavour to chase the enemy around
to your left side. Chase him towards awkward places. When the
enemy is in an inconvenient position, do not let him look around,
but conscientiously chase him around and pin him down.
The Three Methods to Forestall the Enemy:
1. Ken No Sen
On attacking, keep calm and attack quickly. Advance seemingly strongly but
with reserved spirit, forestalling with the reserve.
Alternatively, advance with as strong a spirit as possible, and when you
reach the enemy, move quicker than normal, unsettling him and overwhelming
him sharply.
The other technique is to attack with a calm spirit, with a feeling of constantly
crushing the enemy from first to last.
2. Tai No Sen
When the enemy attacks, remain undisturbed but feign weakness. As the enemy
reaches you, suddenly move away indicating that you intend to jump aside,
then dash in strongly as soon as you see the enemy relax.
Alternatively, as the enemy attacks, attack still more strongly, taking
advantage of the resulting disorder in his timing, and win.
3. Tai Tai No Sen
When the enemy attacks quickly, attack strongly and calmly, and aim for his
weak point as he draws near.
If the enemy attacks calmly, observe his movement, and, with your body
virtually floating, join in with his movement as he draws near. Move quickly
and cut him strongly.
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
The Book of the Wind
If you know the enemy, you will be able to defeat the enemy, even if the enemy
is bigger and stronger than you.
Study your opponent, your competitor, and you will be half-way to victory.
The Book of the Air, or Book of the Void
There is no beginning, no end, only cycles.
There are no successes, no failures, only cycles.
When you are in a slump, a downturn, if you persist and adapt, as water, and
use the flow, you will find yourself back on the track to a successful part of the
cycle.
On the other hand, if you do not also change and adapt to new situations,
you will find yourself in regression; the surroundings will progress, and you
will remain stagnant.
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Five Rings • 43
This is a simplistic precis of an already-simple set of concepts that have been
adopted, to its advantage, by corporate Japan, and corporate America is also
finding Miyamoto Musashi extremely useful, so much so that a producer of a
talk-show said to his co-producer,
“Get this Musashi guy for the show.”
“You’re about 350 years too late”, came the reply.
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45
The Power of Action
Do the thing and you will have the power.
— Emerson —
Nothing is achieved without action.
Since 1990 my main line of work has been performing inspirational/
motivational comedy hoax presentations at conferences.
The character is a Japanese industrialist who is highly educated, powerful
and influential on a global scale, studied the martial arts from birth, and uses
those philosophies in corporate management and group take-over strategies.
He controls 57 companies, three of which are in Japan’s Top 100.
He is also an authority on the integration of eastern philosophies and
methodology into western management practices.
The motivation, genuinely based in the martial arts, is interactive and
effective.
The character then delivers the ‘sting’, which could be that his corporation
has taken controlling interest in the client company and his intention is to make
extensive and intensive changes.
During question time the character reverts to another character low on the
social scale and of limited cultural awareness, illustrating the juxtaposition of
the high status with the low status, the yin and the yang if you like.
The alternative that I give clients is to revert from Kinoshita to myself, and
give an amusing and thorough debrief of the hoax according to the messages
the company is imparting.
The lessons that the martial arts can be used in business and that appropriate
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change is to be encouraged, and to expect the unexpected.
Several months after one of these one-hour performances to the National
Personal Banking section of a major bank, one of the state managers telephoned
me:
“Remember that conference you did for us seven months ago?”
“Yes, I remember. The brief was Personal Power in relation to Sales.”
“Well, I’d like to book you for another conference.”
“Fine.”
“Would you like to know why I’m booking you?”
“Yes.”
“That stuff you did in the hoax; we’ve embraced it, we’ve run
with it, we’ve incorporated it into the culture here, and in the last six
months all of my divisions have been running at between 130% and
170% above target, and one division is at 200% above target.”
“Is that 200% of target or 200% above target?”
“It’s 200% in excess of target.”
“Your targets may have been too low to start with.”
“Our targets were 125% of the previous year’s productivity.”
“Do you attribute this to the session?”
“I attribute most of it to the session because it changed their
attitudes to themselves, each other, the bank and their goals.”
“I have two requests. Would you mind putting that in writing
on your letterhead?” [Which he was kind enough to do.]
“Yes, and what’s the second?”
“I like you and I like your bank, and would like to do more work
with you, so for the next conference, I won’t be charging you a fee.”
Without taking a breath, he asked, “What’s the catch?”
“Instead, all I want is 0.01% of growth over the next twelve
months.”
“We’ll gladly pay the fee.”
Although the event was two months away, we received their cheque the next
day.
46
29/07/18, 08:01 AM
Action • 47
Man is not the creature of circumstances.
Circumstances are the creatures of men.
— Benjamin Disraeli —
It’s a bit like Gilligan’s Island. The seven castaways were able to build anything
they needed—a pedal car and bicycle-generated electricity, and they could stage
a musical production of Hamlet in the style of Carmen. As well, they had costume
changes that were not limited by the restrictions of the clothing that you would
normally take with you on ‘… a three hour tour, a three hour tour’.
As an aside, I have a question for the male readers. Please be truthful with
your answer because I’ve conducted this research at hundreds if not thousands
of conferences and conventions. Did you prefer Ginger or Mary-Anne?
If you initially preferred Mary-Anne, was there a specific and memorable
moment (I was sixteen) when you were watching an episode and thought to
yourself, I think I could handle Ginger now?
Please be honest because numerous men to whom I’ve posed this question
remember exactly where they were when they had that thought (a bit like the
Kennedy assassination). My only fear is that one day, I’ll be watching Gilligan’s
Island and catch myself thinking, Mrs Howell looks quite attractive.
The cliché says that the journey of a thousand miles must start with a first step.
When I was writing this book, I would be distracted, using any excuse not
to sit down at the keyboard. Then I set a plan to write at least one page every
day for a month. This concept worked until the month was over, and the project
fell by the wayside for awhile. I managed to complete it when I strung a series
of ‘at-least-a-page-a-day-for-a-month’ for a few months and set a completion
deadline.
This might sound really basic, but it’s amazing how many people don’t
have an action plan.
Nothing will happen until you take action.
Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute.
What you can do, or dream you can do, begin it.
Begin it and the work will be completed.
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe —
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48
The Power of Alliances
The superior man cultivates a friendly harmony,
without being weak.
— Confucius —
At an initial meeting with the CEO of an IT multinational, the Financial
Controller of the company was also present. The meeting was to discuss the
appropriateness of my speaking at one of their monthly meetings. It was clear
that the two had totally different personalities. The CEO (whom we’ll call Geoff)
had worked his way up from a junior position in the company, knew the
operation well, and was genuinely warm, friendly and natural with a wicked
sense of humour. He was a bit like a high school friend who sat at a desk at the
back of the classroom. Jason, the Financial Controller, was a few years out of
university and possessed the superior attitude of a bespectacled Volvo driver.
It was impossible to align with both, so I decided to empathize with the
one with whom I more readily identified. This, by now, should be clear to you.
After asking Geoff about the desired outcomes of the proposed session,
and ensuring it was clear to him that I understood his intentions for his team, I
indicated that humour constituted a significant part of the presentations. This
was the all-clear for him to tell me a couple of his favourite jokes and stories
about his experiences in the company, which contributed to a valuable briefing.
Jason:
(impatiently) Excuse me, Geoff, you have a meeting across
town in twenty minutes.
Geoff:
Okay. Ron, is there anything else you’d like to know?
Ron:
I think that about wraps it up, Geoff. If you think of anything
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Alliances • 49
else I should know before Friday, please feel free to call.
Jason:
(insistently) Geoff, you really should get to that meeting.
Geoff:
Ron, before you go, let me tell you another joke
After Geoff’s funny, personalised version of a popular joke, he looked at
Jason and said, “Make sure Ron gets anything he needs for Friday’s
presentation.”
Jason:
Er, right Geoff.
Yes, it’s important to connect with each person with whom you are
communicating, but sometimes the option is to align with one person, and this
calls for prioritising for maximum all-round benefit.
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51
The Power of the
Perception of Balance
The Great Way is not difficult
For those who have no preferences.
When love and hate are both absent
Everything becomes clear and undistinguished.
Make the smallest distinction however
And heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.
— Seng-T’san —
Even the most ancient sages acknowledged the counterbalances that exist in
nature, and more recently, it has been universally accepted by scientists that
magnetic fields are integral parts of our existences.
Therefore, by virtue of the definition, any perception of disadvantage must
have an equal perception of benefit in one of the seven areas of life, i.e. Career,
Family, Financial, Intellectual, Physical, Social and Spiritual.
We descend from a particle of immortal greatness when we are born and
western society and the church instills in us the concepts of ‘good’ versus ‘bad’,
‘right’ versus ‘wrong’, ‘us’ versus ‘them’. It polarises rather than unites. Nothing
is good or bad until we judge it to be so.
We start out as just a ‘being’ that observes and takes in our surroundings
and we are soon conditioned to become judgemental and experience pendulous
swings to emotional extremes.
With an adjustment to our attitudes we can return to the perception of ‘it’s
not good, it’s not bad, it just is’.
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God
Soul
Buddha
(insert your version of the superior being)
Vibration
Polarisation
Preatomic particles
Earth
Vegetation
<
>
Mammals/animals
Good
Bad
Right
Wrong
52
29/07/18, 08:01 AM
Perception of Balance • 53
As a guest of the promoters, I
once attended a seminar held over a
period of four days. The trainer was,
as we describe in the trade, a ‘Rah
Rah’ type, or as one cynic put it, ‘very,
very American’. At regular intervals he
would have the auditorium full of
people standing on their chairs,
punching the air and chanting positive
slogans at the tops of their voices.
This would sometimes be accompanied by references to his impressive
range of products for sale in the foyer.
During one of the high-decibel
interludes I was apparently the only
one sitting quietly reading a book.
One of the disciples approached and
encouraged me to join the hundreds
of others on their seats and wanted
me to participate in the chorus of
affirmations.
I said, “To be honest, I’m feeling
quite well-balanced at the moment,
thank you”.
“No, no, you don’t understand”,
she insisted, “you should get up on
your chair and do what we’re all
doing, you should participate”.
“May I ask you a question? Do
you agree that the universe and
everything in it is a magnetic field and
a series of magnetic fields, right down
to the smallest organism? Edison
asserted this and since then it has
been proven scientifically.”
“Well, er, yes, I guess so…”
“Then would you agree that by
definition, any perception of a positive
is equalled in magnitude by a perception of a negative, and in any
case, they’re only perceptions and
that is ALL they are?”
“I, um, suppose so…”
“Then how would you describe
the opposite of this?”
“Deep depression, I guess.”
“Where would you say these
people will be shortly?”
“I don’t know. Where?”, she
asked confusedly.
“It’s okay, I’ll be fine thank you”, I
said conclusively.
Excessive pains or pleasures are justly to be regarded
as the greatest disease to which the soul is liable. For
a man who is in great pleasure or in great pain, in his
unreasonable eagerness to attain the one and avoid
the other, is not able to see or hear anything right; he
is mad and at the time utterly incapable of any
participation in reason.
— Plato —
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On occasions over several years I’ve had discussions with psychiatrists and
psychologists who inevitably become animated when I suggest that each person
in this world is in perfect balance.
They always ask, “Do you mean to say that nobody is in a state of
imbalance?”
“That’s correct.”
“Then why do they see people like me?”, they ask.
“They see you so that they can shift their perceived dependency away from
the issue to you, so that you can have a medium-to-long-term patient.”
At this point they become more agitated and ask me to elaborate, to use the
euphemism.
During a recent conversation I asked the psychologist if she agreed that
everything in the universe is in balance. She said she agreed, but that is on a
macrocosmic level. So what is more macrocosmic than the universe? Nothing,
which means that the balances occur both locally and non-locally, so any
perception of imbalance must be balanced somewhere. This was exactly the
theory and practice that I used in the following consultation.
I once had a part in the implementation of the neutralisation of charges held by
a man we will call Simon who was aged 42 at the time of the consultation, and
of that time, he had spent about 27 years in jail, significantly for crimes relating
to assault.
As a child, Simon had regularly experienced his father coming home from
the pub with his mates, then seeing the men beat up his mother and abuse him
and his siblings.
The father deserted the family when the boy was eight.
Simon had the dual charges; he hated his father, and at the same time,
desperately wanted love, affection and acceptance from his father.
Eventually, through some processes that took about three hours in total, he
saw that the experiences he had judged as being nothing but massive
disadvantages had contributed significantly to his current positive values in
the areas of family and work; it gave him focus on the harmony that exists
between himself, his wife and his mother-in-law, and it gave him clarity and
certainty about his life’s work as an artist.
His paintings had a depth that I had not seen in that type of artwork before.
You looked at them once, and they had a certain depth, you looked at them
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again and there was even greater depth. These amazing paintings were able to
be viewed on several levels. I asked Simon if this ‘depth of field’ would have
been possible if he had not believed he had suffered, because there was a definite
dark side to his work.
When the new reality of the situation hit home, Simon put his arms around
me and began to cry, apologizing and saying that he hadn’t cried since he was
a child. When he looked up his appearance had altered. His wife and motherin-law stared at him, then looked at me, looked at him, and looked at me, then
looked at Simon again.
“Your eyes are shining!” they said.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“And your face is actually glowing!”
“That’s funny”, he said, “I feel like I’m a lot lighter.”
As you ascend to higher levels of awareness, you emit more light.
[See the chapter on Collapse]
Man is subject to influx from both good and evil spirits,
but the Lord preserves a perfect equilibrium between
these influences, which only the human himself can
disturb.
— Swedenborg —
Newton’s Third Law states, as most people know, ‘For every action there is an
equal and opposite reaction’. The most brilliant light will blind you as equally
as pitch darkness.
According to the great acting teacher, Konstantin Stanislavsky,
In all beauty lies ugliness, and in all ugliness lies beauty and in all
pain is pleasure, in all pleasure, pain.
Without the ugliness, there would be no standard by which to measure beauty,
and without the lows, the highs wouldn’t exist. All things are relative.
Masters of their destinies realize that the balancing forces of the universe
are endlessly and constantly changing. These changes are inevitable, inexorable
and undeniable.
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When all things are seen with equal mind, they return
to their nature.
In all light you will find darkness and in all darkness you will find light.
One cannot exist without the other. You cannot perceive one without the
other.
In all ugliness lies a perception of beauty. In all beauty lies a perception of
ugliness.
In atomic physics no distinction is recognized between matter and energy
since they are one essence, or at least two poles of the same unit.
Matter and energy, yin and yang, heaven and earth are conceived of as
essentially one, or as two coexistent poles of one indivisible whole.
A professional speaker whom I had trained asked, after several years on the
circuit,
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“How can I improve prospective and existing client perceptions of
me and my work?”
“You need to get more ‘mongrel’ in your presentation”, I said.
“What do you mean?”
“At the moment you’re being ‘Mrs Nice’, a goody-two-shoes.
It’s boring. You need more balance.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You have a very dark side; I’ve seen it, not that you have
deliberately projected it, but I have sensed it. Besides, you must have
it to balance all the sweetness you project.”
Two years later, she confided in a friend that she realized what I had meant.
You cannot have a perception of right without wrong, good without bad,
pleasure without pain, happy without sad. Everything is in perfect balance.
The more you try to suppress someone or some event, the more you will
attract it, create it or even become it.
How many people have negatively perceived a characteristic in one or both
of their parents, asserted to themselves and others that they would not, in any
way, under any circumstances, ever become like that, and they eventually begin
to project those traits?
In Australia, the Port Arthur massacre prompted political lobby groups to try
to compel politicians to ban automatic firearms. The Prime Minister supported
the movement. Immediately, the gun lobby became more organized and rose
as a united force, and John Howard, the Prime Minister of the time, felt the
need to address the group whilst wearing a bulletproof jacket.
Quantum physics states that for every positron there is an electron, and if
there is a change in one, there will be a change in the other, wherever they are,
relative to each other, in the universe. Remember Newton’s Third Law?
All opposites are generated simultaneously, so any attempt to isolate them,
or to deny the existence of one without the other is futile. Your attraction to one
concept will be in exact proportion to your repulsion to the opposite. Without
one, the other would cease to exist.
How many times have you had an issue with a person or a concept where
you’ve vehemently declared, “I would never do that, buy that, have that or
think that”, and perhaps years later found yourself doing that, buying that,
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having that or thinking that?
Any person or event on which you have a ‘charge’ will recur in your life
and will control your life.
By maximising or minimising infatuation or resentment you will be
distorting the truth, or the actuality.
Reality versus Actuality
In Reality, you make the decisions.
—You decide whether a situation or person is good or bad.
—You decide whether a situation or person is right or wrong.
—You decide whether a circumstance is the source of happiness or sadness.
—You decide whether a circumstance is the source of pleasure or pain.
The decision is totally up to you.
In Actuality, the situation or person is neither good nor bad, right nor wrong,
and the circumstance is neither the source of pleasure nor pain, happiness nor
sadness; it’s just there.
—Your Reality is nothing more than a matter of perception and choice.
—Actuality is the whole picture. Reality is but a small part of it.
If the mind makes no discriminations,
all things are as they really are.
The acquisition of our absolute power is determined by the speed at which we
merge the dualities.
Whether you are positively influenced or negatively
influenced by another person, you are giving them
your power.
— Irene Koziol —
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To everything there is a season, and a time to every
purpose under the heaven:
A time to be form, and a time to die; a time to plant,
and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down,
and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn
and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather
stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to
refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a
time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep
silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a
time of peace.
— Ecclesiastes 3:1–8 —
(Which of you thought of The Byrds’ 1965 hit Turn, Turn, Turn?)
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61
The Power of Beauty
Though we travel the world to find the beautiful, we
must carry it with us or we will not find it.
— Emerson —
Many have remarked and asserted that beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, a
claim that I dismissed when I wore much younger clothes.
I thought,
Beauty is undeniable; it’s obvious, it’s unquestionable, it’s nonnegotiable. It’s the most universally accepted and sought-after
commodity in western society. Beauty is beauty!
That was until a major turning point in self-perception occurred some 11
years ago. For 13 years I was infatuated with the most physically and socially
gorgeous woman I had ever met. I didn’t pursue her because I didn’t believe
someone like that would consider a relationship with me. After all, why would
a beautiful Caucasian woman go out with an Asian guy? This was one of my
perceived, self-imposed limitations.
Somehow we eventually found ourselves in a relationship, and in that
situation, more than the surface aspects of an individual manifest themselves.
It quickly became apparent that she was, at that time, ‘philosophically limited’,
and I grew tired of discussions about how she looked, the tailoring of her suits
and the most appropriate make-up for optimum compatibility with a particular
outfit.
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The relationship hit a turning point when, as we were walking down the
street, a family of obese people in tracksuits were walking towards us. This
group was clearly winning its war against the evils of anorexia.
My partner nudged me and remarked, “There are some UGLY people in
the world, aren’t there?”
Almost without thinking, I found myself saying, “Some people are only
ugly on the outside”.
The end was nigh.
From that time, my perception of ‘beauty’ and perception of myself changed
forever. I immediately switched from ‘non-deserving’ to ‘deserving’.
Thank you for that invaluable experience.
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Beauty • 63
People are like stained glass windows: they sparkle
and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness
sets in their true beauty is revealed only if there is a
light within.
— Elizabeth Kubler-Ross —
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65
The Power of Breath
Wise people breathe from deep within them,
whereas most people breathe with their throats.
— Chuang Tzu —
A comedian once said that oxygen is like sex in that you don’t really notice it
until you stop getting it.
Humans can do without most commodities in life, but oxygen is not one of
them. If the cells of the body are richly supplied with oxygen, the transformation
from food to energy takes place more efficiently.
External breathing has been described as the inhalation of air into the lungs
from an external environment and the exhalation of carbon dioxide from the
lungs.
Internal breathing is the process in which oxygen is taken from the lungs
by capillaries covering the air cells of the lungs into larger blood vessels, then
into the capillaries, supplying the cells with oxygen. In the opposite direction,
carbon dioxide produced in the cells are absorbed by capillaries that flow into
larger blood vessels then into the capillaries of the lungs where it is exhaled.
Most modern diseases are the result of nervous problems. Worry, anger
and tension cause the capillaries to contract, impeding the circulation of blood.
Internal breathing is dependent on the flow of blood to exchange oxygen and
carbon dioxide at a cellular level. The result is a downward spiral in power and
vitality.
Deep breathing benefits every part of the body.
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The Cockroach Exercise
A pilot employed by a small commercial airline attended a public course that I
ran one Saturday. The reason for his interest was that he wanted to fly with a
larger airline because its starting salary was double the amount he was earning.
His problem was that he had attended twelve interviews and became nervous.
As a result, he’d say something stupid, and in his terms, ‘stuff it up’. Mark was
searching for a way to relax so that he at least appeared natural and composed.
The Cockroach Exercise involves:
— standing in the centre of a room with your feet one shoulder-width
apart and your knees slightly bent.
— About one foot (0.3 of a metre) diagonally out from each little toe,
visualize cockroaches.
— Imagine you detest cockroaches, and the only thing that will destroy
them is moist clay.
— Imagine you have clay in each hand, and throw the clay across your
body at the cockroaches.
— As the cockroaches are squashed, more appear, and you have endless
supplies of clay.
— Exhale each time you throw the clay.
— Imagine the cockroaches are moving slowly outwards toward the walls,
so you have to throw harder and harder.
— As the cockroaches start to climb the walls, throw harder and harder.
— Imagine them walking across the ceiling, eventually hovering above
your head.
— Throw, harder, harder, HARDER, then relax.
— If your head is starting to spin, focus your breathing on a pinpoint at
eye-height on the wall in front of you.
— You will find that your breathing is deeper and slower, and you feel
more relaxed.
— In this state you give the illusion of greater authority and self-control.
Eureka! This was the answer to Mark’s problem.
On the Monday following the workshop, Mark attended his fifth interview
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Breath • 67
with one major airline, and he decided to do The Cockroach Exercise in the
empty elevator. As the cockroaches were approaching the ceiling, Mark was in
full flow and didn’t notice the elevator doors opening. A suited man with an
attache case was standing in front. Mark pretended he was doing nothing more
than straightening his clothes. The man did not enter the elevator.
Later that afternoon, Mark phoned me and said excitedly, “I did The
Cockroach Exercise and didn’t stuff up the interview!”
“What’s next?” I asked.
“I have to do the flight simulator interview which involves proving, in a
practical way, that I can fly a plane.”
“Let me know how it goes.”
Two months later, I was working and studying in China, and received a
telephone call from Mark.
“I did it!” I’m now flying the big aircraft, and it’s great!”
“Well done, Mark. I knew you’d do it.”
In internal martial arts, breathing is an integral part of accumulating and
projecting personal power.
Because the universal is a magnetic field and series of magnetic fields [see
the chapter on Perception of Balance], there are, by definition, positive forces
and negative forces.
One technique that martial artists use is when inhaling they visualise
positive energy being drawn through the crown of the head. When exhaling,
the energy, through the breath, gently settles in the ‘hara’, which the Japanese
use to describe the ever-diminishing point that is a focal point for meditation. It
sits about three inches below the navel between the extremities of the pelvis. In
China, it is known as the ‘tan-t'ien’. You often hear Chinese martial artists talking
about ‘sinking the ch'i to the tan-t'ien’.
The quality of the air we breathe is also important. In today’s industrialised
environment, we have compromised on the electrical balance of the atmosphere.
Ions, which are the basic positive or negative unit, are atoms that have gained
or lost an electron. Those that have lost an electron are called positive ions and
those that have gained an electron are negative ions.
Why is this significant?
Extensive research has shown that air predominantly charged with positive
ions has a debilitating effect on the human body, contributing to tension,
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irritability, lethargy and depression, while negative ions (so-called ‘good ions’
or ‘happy ions’) are said to promote energy, libido and alertness.
Positive ions are caused by, amongst other factors, air friction such as storm
activity, the movement of air over the ground, air over metal such as a car body
and air over air. Do you ever feel depressed in an air-conditioned office? Do
you ever feel sleepy while travelling in a car? This is no coincidence. Air over
metal, through either the air conditioning ducts or the car body, depletes the air
of negatively-charged ions, or, if you like saturates the air with positivelycharged ions.
Where do we find air containing predominantly negative ions? Nature
manufactures them, and they are found in such places as pine forests, near
waterfalls, beaches, coastal rock formations and in mountain areas. We have a
natural attraction to this type of air. What do you instinctively do in the
mountains? What do you instinctively do in a pine forest? It is our natural
inclination to take a deep breath because it helps us feel invigorated. Have you
ever breathed deeply in a mountain forest and thought, ‘It’s great to be alive!’?
Have you ever felt like taking a deep breath in an air-conditioned office or in a
car?
We can duplicate that feeling while living in a polluted environment such
as a city. Devices called ‘negative ion generators’ or ‘ionizers’ charge the air
with negative ions that reputedly kill bacteria, viruses and fungi.
It is definitely worthwhile to look at ionizers to contribute to your overall
health and continued well-being, but you get what you pay for, so steer clear of
any that seem like a bargain.
Exercise
1.
Stand with your feet one shoulder-width apart, knees slightly bent.
2.
Arms are relaxed by your side.
3.
There is a straight line from the base of your spine to the crown of your head. The
crown is being drawn towards heaven.
4.
As you inhale through your nose, visualise the positive energy of the universal
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Breath • 69
being drawn through the crown, and as you exhale through the mouth, perceive it
gently settling in your Centre.
5.
This will lower your centre of gravity and any physical activity can extend from this
point.
Some people find it helpful to place two fingers of the non-dominant hand on
the Centre because it assists them in concentrating on the point of focus.
Another variation that you might find useful is to stand with your arms
straight in front, in the popular perception of a ‘sleepwalking’ position. As you
inhale, allow your wrists to ascend to a height equal to the top of your head,
and then slowly descend as you exhale. It’s a bit like a meditation version of
the ‘wax-on/wax-off’ scene in The Karate Kid. In fact, some of the philosophies
in this book could be described as a martial arts interpretation of that film.
Soon after joining the local gym I tried performing a series of leg-raises
that involved holding two vertical metal grips while being supported by the
forearms on horizontal pads. Without the centred breathing technique I managed
twenty, and as soon as I focused the breathing, I was immediately able to execute
sixty. I have also used this centring technique to lift heavier weights and also to
overpower much physically taller and heavier opponents, although my
preference is to use ‘flow’ when it comes to people who choose to oppose me.
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70
The Power of Bushido
The true path of the Way applies at any time and in
any situation.
— Miyamoto Musashi —
Bushido, literally the ‘Way of the Warrior’, is the starting point for all Martial
Arts. ‘Bushi’ means ‘Warrior’ and ‘Do’ means ‘the Way’.
Bushido was the Code, the Way of life of the Samurai. The Samurai were
warriors who used to practise Bujutsu (all fighting methods of the Samurai).
Bushido was for years the most important part of the education and studies
of the Samurai. Budo developed itself gradually taking its resources in the mortal
war techniques of Bujutsu.
Later on, in a trial to group all Bujutsu principles to a more easily
understandable system, the code of Bushido was distilled to five main
requirements:
1.
Fidelity
— towards the master and towards the fatherland
— respect towards parents, brothers and sisters
— assiduousness, steadiness
2.
Politeness
— respect and love
— modesty
— correct etiquette (formality)
3.
Virility
— valour, courage and bravery
— hardness and coolness (never lose self-control)
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Bushido • 71
— patience and endurance
— promptness (always be ready to fight)
4.
Truthfulness/Veracity
— sincerity and straightforwardness
— sense of honour
— justice
5.
Simplicity
— simplicity
— purity
Today, these qualities are appropriate for any parent, teacher, manager, CEO,
mentor and any kind of influencer of people.
All fans of The Samurai surely agree that Shintaro, although a character in a
television series, truly walked the talk, and even though he had another identity,
George Reeves in The Adventures of Superman truly personified these principles.
The Way is not far from man;
if we take the Way as something superhuman,
beyond man, this is not the real Way.
— Confucius —
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73
The Power of Certainty
When walking just walk.
When sitting just sit.
Above all, don’t wobble.
— Zen saying —
Many people are averse to criticism.
Criticism is presented to you (or at you) to give clarity that you are on your
path. The challenges help to assure us we are heading in the right direction.
People will criticize you because of their own agendas, be it jealousy, an
inferiority complex, needing to be right, a sense of their own inadequacy …
and this group is mainly represented by our friends!
Most of the time, that attitude accompanies the best of intentions.
Whatever you do, do it as if you have absolute certainty that it is correct,
even if you have doubts.
Have you ever been sure of a fact, or been decisive regarding a situation,
only to be talked out of it by someone who seemed to have greater certainty,
only to eventually and inevitably discover that you were right in the first place
and that you would have been better advised to have followed your initial
instinct?
The reason I know this is from experience from both sides of the equation.
I inadvertently tested it out while in discussion with an acquaintance. We were
talking about the noble art of Professional Wrestling. Maintaining the stance
that all sports at the senior professional level such as basketball, motor racing,
baseball, cricket, golf, all codes of football, horse racing, and boxing were rigged,
I strongly claimed that the only remaining sport that had any semblance of
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decency, integrity, honesty and ultimate credibility was professional wrestling.
In response, he asserted that Professional Wrestling was choreographed and
that the results of some matches might be predetermined. After citing instances
and incidents that supported my argument, along with generous amounts of
conviction and certainty, my associate started to relent, conceding that
Professional Wrestling might after all be a legitimate sport, and that other sports
should be questioned.
Remember, the one with the most certainty is victorious, and if you have
doubts about your ability to achieve your dream, allow your instinct and
intuition win out over logic and friends’ advice.
You are never given a wish or an idea without also being given the power
to make it come true, but you may have to work for it.
— Richard Bach —
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75
The Power of Coincidence
Do not struggle. Go with the flow of things, and you
will find yourself at one with the mysterious unity of
the universe.
— Chuang Tzu —
The title of this chapter is essentially a misnomer because ‘coincidences’ occur
by design. We meet people because it will benefit our life’s purpose and their
life’s purpose to connect with them at that particular time.
We encounter people because of the lesson or lessons we need to learn.
Having ridden motor cycles and having been unable to afford a Harley
Davidson as a youth, I decided it was time to be a Hog owner, so a few years
after I started as a full-time speaker and trainer I checked out the models that
were available and obtained a price-list from my friendly local Harley dealer
and selected my long-awaited set of wheels. That was on a Saturday afternoon.
That night I watched the 500cc motorcycle race in which world champion rider
Wayne Rainey crashed and sadly became a paraplegic.
I thought, ‘How unfortunate; he seems like a nice guy’.
That was the last I thought of it … almost. Four days later I received a
telephone call from a woman in my local area:
“You’re a financial planner, aren’t you?” she asked.
“I used to be, why do you ask?” I replied.
“Oh, I see. Well, I have a three-year-old copy of the local Pink
Pages directory, and you have an advertisement in it”, she said.
“Even though I’m no longer a licensed financial planner, a friend
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of mine is very experienced in that area and he will be able to help
you. When is it convenient for us to meet, and where are you located?”
She told me the address.
“Will next Wednesday at 1.00pm be alright?” she asked.
“Yes, I’m sure that will be fine; we’ll see you then.”
When we arrived, we noticed that the house was ramped. We
knocked on the door and a woman in a wheelchair greeted us.
After the mandatory introductions, I asked the obvious question,
“What happened?”
“I was riding as a pillion passenger on a Harley ten years ago
when we had an accident and I ended up this way. The matter has
just been settled and I now have a $300,000 lump sum to invest.”
Wayne Rainey’s unfortunate accident occurred on the day I obtained the Harley
price-list. That Pink Pages advertisement was in a directory that was threeyears-old, it was the only ad I had ever placed in that publication, and the
inquiry was the only one I’d received from that ad.
Was that a coincidence?
This was not an anti-Harley Davidson message; it was a message for me
not to buy a motorcycle at that time.
We are constantly given messages; it’s just a matter of being in tune and being
receptive to those clues.
A priest was trapped in a house around which flood waters were
rapidly rising, so he climbed onto the roof. A man rowed up to him
and said,
“Father, get into the boat and let me take you to safety.”
“No, my son, the Lord will take care of me.”
The waters were rising, and a man in a passing speedboat said,
“Father, get into the boat and let me take you to safety.”
“No, my son, the Lord will take care of me.”
As the waters rose to the top of the roof, a man in a helicopter
slowly lowers himself on a rope,
“Father, hang onto me and let me take you to safety.”
“No, my son, the Lord will provide.”
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Coincidence • 77
The priest dies and, of course, as you would expect, goes to
heaven.
Upon coming face-to-face with God, he says exasperatedly,
“Lord, I trusted that you would rescue me! Why did you forsake
me?”
God says, “Forsake you? I sent you two boats and a helicopter.
This is a very old joke, but it demonstrates how the obvious can be in front of
us. How many times have you disregarded your gut feeling, your intuition,
and later thought, “I should have listened to that little voice in my head”?.
To those of you who are now thinking, “I don’t HAVE a little voice in my
head”, THAT’S the little voice in your head.
This applies to every area of life and business.
When one door closes another door opens; but we so
often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed
door, that we do not see the ones which open for us.
— Alexander Graham Bell —
I found out a great way to get into trouble with a partner—tell the truth. At one
stage I was in a relationship with a delightful, intelligent and beautiful woman.
We discussed philosophy, we spoke of marriage, we were happy in a balanced
relationship that was equally supportive and challenging. Then I told her that
I believe that relationships, business, social and personal, have an ‘expiry date’,
and that after we learn the lessons that we are destined to learn from each
other, it’s time to learn from others.
It’s a bit like the television sitcom, Married With Children in which the
relationship between Al and Peggy Bundy is strained to the point of resignation
to a miserable, stagnant, boring and unhappy life. It’s hardly the June and Ward
Cleaver relationship in Leave It to Beaver or the even more illusory ‘ideal’ family
situation portrayed by the characters Mike and Carol Brady in that stomachturning series, The Brady Bunch.
Of course, once the stagnation in a relationship is acknowledged, the
dynamics can be altered so that there is again equal support and challenge, and
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therefore further growth is perpetuated. Some refer to this as “working on the
relationship”.
The discussion totally changed the way Caroline and I interacted. The
“gazing longingly into each others’ eyes as we walked into the sunset, forever
holding hands in eternal bliss” balloon had been burst beyond re-inflation. The
fact that I told her that the ‘expiry date’ can last for many, many years, until the
death of either partner, had no effect. I told her that my own parents have been
married for 52 years, and they’re still learning from each other, but the damage
had been done; there was no turning back. Her illusion of ‘happily-ever-after’
had to be sought elsewhere.
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79
The Power of the Collapse
Whatever you condemn you breed until you love it.
— Dr John Demartini —
The ‘Collapse Process’ was developed by Dr John Demartini whose aim was to
‘turn chaos into order’ at the person level, and consequently, therefore, at the
universal level.
The design was to dissolve the illusions of right versus wrong, good
versus bad, pleasure versus pain, happy versus sad, me versus you
by rising to a higher perspective that embraces both. It eliminates
the stress associated with extreme emotions, and any beliefs about
‘victim’ which keep us locked in cycles of resentment and reaction.
We are then free to pursue our true passion and fulfil our higher
purpose.
The term ‘collapse’ comes from the study of quantum physics. It represents a
process of synthesis where and when two oppositely charged, yet complementary energy particles (human emotions), come together, join, transform,
transcend and emerge as new forms of energy, light and matter (vitality, purpose
and love).
According to popularly quoted research, 80% of people are unhappy with
their working situation. Closer to the truth would be that they oscillate between
doing those tasks they like and those they dislike, moving from infatuation to
resentment, and with their eyes constantly on the bigger, better deal, they jump
from elation to frustration.
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To collapse these ionic emotional charges is to eliminate the dualities that
are caused by judgement and self-righteousness.
The result is a balanced perspective and increased calmness and awareness.
There is also an immense sensation of relief.
[See the ‘Simon’ story in the chapter on Balance.]
The ‘Collapse Process’, in practical terms, is best used with regard to someone
about whom you have an unbalanced perception. Initially, this person is usually
a parent. Whether you blame that parent for ruining your life or whether you
are infatuated, they will be suitable.
Usually the subsequent people who push your buttons are reflections of
your perception of your parents, so it’s appropriate to return to the source.
As long as you misjudge people as either good or evil,
you lead yourself towards unwise and conditionally
loving reactions, or those that block the flow of true
and honest communication.
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Collapse • 81
Procedure:
1.
Create the following charts on sheets of A4 paper, six times each.
2.
Write the name of the person you are collapsing at the top of the pages.
3.
On a separate sheet of paper write Career, Family, Financial, Intellectual, Physical,
Social and Spiritual.
4.
On Chart 1, Column 1, write down the positive characteristics that you see in that
person, referring to the seven areas of life to assist you. Keep referring to the
seven areas when you get stuck or begin to feel frustrated.
5.
Column 2—Corresponding with the Column 1 trait, write down the instances when
you have done it or been that way.
6.
Column 3—What were (are) the drawbacks to others when you are that way?
7.
Column 4—What are the drawbacks to you when they are that way?
8.
Column 5—When has that person been or done the opposite?
9.
Chart 2 addresses the negative perceptions and is to be completed in a similar
way.
It is essential to have someone to sit by you while you do it because you will be inclined
to give up, walk away take frequent breaks and become extremely frustrated and stuck.
Better still, find a qualified Collapse Trainer to take you through the procedure.
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COLLAPSE PROCESS – CHART 1
Positives
Truth
The qualities, traits
or actions I like or
admire.
‘Goods’
Where have I done
or been seen to do
this, in any of the 7
areas of life?
82
√
Drawbacks
Drawbacks
What are the
What are the
drawbacks to others drawbacks to me
when I am, or act, when they are or act
this way?
this way?
Opposites
Where and when
have they been or
done the
opoosite?
29/07/18, 08:01 AM
Collapse • 83
COLLAPSE PROCESS – CHART 2
Negatives
Truth
The qualities, traits
or actions I dislike
or resent.
‘Bads’
Where have I done
or been seen to do
this, in any of the 7
areas of life?
83
√
Benefits
Benefits
Opposites
What are the
benefits to others
when I am, or act,
this way?
What are the
benefits to me when
they are or act this
way?
Where and when
have they been or
done the
opoosite?
29/07/18, 08:01 AM
I once was entrusted with an executive team of merchant bankers with diverse
backgrounds. Some were scientists, some were engineers and some were
financiers, and nine out of ten have MBAs.
We did a simple Collapse using two columns, the positive and the negative.
I asked the group what they would perceive to have only a positive side. In
other words, what would they all want?
“Business success and wealth!” They were unanimous.
“Are you sure you all want that?” I asked.
“Yes!”
I asked the scribe in the group to draw a vertical line on the whiteboard,
and at the top of the left column write the word ‘Positive’ and at the top of the
right, the word ‘Negative’.
They called out all of the positive aspects of business success and wealth—
power, options, credibility, respect, etc.
I then asked them to call out all the negative aspects associated with business
success and wealth. There was a long silence.
“Would you suggest that your situation might provoke jealousy?’’ I asked.
They agreed. The scribe wrote.
“Would you think that you might feel stressed because of the pressure to
maintain your standard?”
They agreed. The scribe wrote.
We reached the point where they could not think of any more to put on
either side.
When we counted the items in both columns, each added up to 27! To give
them the opportunity to disprove one of the universal laws of balance, I again
asked them to add to the tally on either side.
There was no exception to this rule.
As you progress through the more comprehensive version of the Collapse forms
you will slowly perceive that everything, indeed, is in balance.
This process is very simple, but certainly not easy, and if you embark on it
alone, your willpower must be strong.
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Collapse • 85
The Collapse Process will benefit the seven areas of life.
In your career, you will have more certainty and you will more readily see
both sides of decisions. Vision, inspiration and sense of purpose will be
enhanced and you will have an inclination more to action rather than
reaction.
In family, communication will be enhanced, respect and appreciation will
be heightened and there will be a decrease in blame.
Financially, self-sabotaging will decrease, over or under-spending will be
moderated and you will have a greater feeling of self-worth.
Intellectually, your mind will expand to embrace greater possibilities, your
thoughts will be more organised and emotionally charged memories will
be neutralised.
Tension will be physically released, lowering stress levels and calming the
body.
Socially, fears of rejection will be overcome, clarity and direction will be
enhanced and leadership qualities are more likely to manifest themselves.
In a spiritual sense, your mind will be awakened to the hidden order
underlying apparent chaos and your perceptions will be expanded to what
is, rather than placing judgements on people and situations.
When you follow your elations you get depression.
When you follow your inspirations your get balance.
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86
The Power of Courage
A man with outward courage dares to die.
A man with inward courage dares to live.
— Lao-tzu —
In 1987, my lady partner and I were watching a television programme called
Star Search. As a fan of comedy I was a bit critical of mediocre comedic
performances, so I said, “Those comedians are hopeless. Even I could do better
than that.”
She looked at me and said, not asked, “Then why don’t you?”
“Alright, I will.”
I rang the Star Search office the next day.
“What do I have to do to get on your show?”
“Which category?”
“I’m a comedian.”
“Do you have two two-and-a-half minute routines for the audition?”
“Of course I have, I’m a comedian.”
“Can you be here at one o’clock on Tuesday?”
“See you then.”
Considering that I hadn’t attempted stand-up, even at a party, my next
thought was, better write some stuff.
At the audition, the producer and production assistants seemed fairly
content with the material and asked if I was available in the next two weeks.
Star Search is not only a talent quest, but also a competition between two
performers in the same category. The night’s winners progress to the following
week’s show, up to a maximum of five appearances before the finals series.
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Courage • 87
In the one-hour break between the rehearsal and the recording, one of the
female solo singers looked at me and said, “What you do must be the hardest
thing in the world.”
“You mean financial planning? No, it’s fairly easy once you’re into the
routine of understanding your clients’ needs and attitudes, and …”
“No, I mean being a comedian. What’s it like to stand up there in front of
an audience and try to make them laugh?”
“I don’t know, I’ve never done it before.”
“You mean you are doing it for the first time on national television? Still,
that must be the hardest thing in the world, don’t you think?”
“Make me sing by myself in front of a television audience of two million!
That’s the hardest thing in the world.”
After that conversation failed to settle the dough-kneading machine that
was my stomach, I was told that my opponent had won the four previous shows.
Great!
As it turned out, I managed to defeat him, going on to appear also in four
shows. As anyone involved in comedy will tell you, writing is not easy, especially
if you haven’t done it before, so not having expected to get past one show, the
material I was delivering by the fourth show was dredged from the bottom of
the barrel.
A career was born out of a dare from my partner.
Theresa, I am eternally grateful.
Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.
— Anais Nin —
Rather than a display of courage, I must admit this was more a case of rashness
and ignorance. If you don’t know that you can’t do something, you will be able
to do it. The mind will lead the body. There is an old story about the
hummingbird. According to the laws of physics, the hummingbird is
aerodynamically unable to fly, but because it is unaware of the laws of physics,
it flies regardless. The same is true of people.
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Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the
judgment that something else is more important than
fear.”
— Ambrose Redmoon —
Fear and doubt cause you to tune out of your inner wisdom.
The person who fears is denying God
— Plato —
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89
The Power of Egolessness
The universe is sacred
You cannot improve it
If you try to change it, you will ruin it.
If you try to hold it, you will lose it.
— Lao Tzu —
The ego seeks security by attaching itself to whatever it thinks it needs to survive.
Ironically, it is the psychological commitment to separation and the attachments
of the ego that give the feeling and appearance of lack. If we are experiencing
ourselves as one with all of life, how could we know any lack?
‘Giving’ under the guise of moral superiority applies to all kinds of giving
based on the notion of receiving some material or ego benefit. Premeditated
manipulations born of separation and lack are never to be confused with
spontaneous gifts given in a spirit of abundance.
At one point in time when I worked as a freelance theatre critic, Ross Honan,
an actor friend asked me if I’d like to review a play that was being produced by
the Sidetrack Theatre Company, a co-operative troupe that mainly had migrant
audiences. He said he was appearing in it, and it could do with some publicity.
I was straightforward in telling him that if I didn’t like it, even though I wouldn’t
give it a pasting, it would not get a run in the column. Ross assured me that the
production would be well worth seeing, so on a Saturday night in a suburban
church hall, I sat in anticipation.
At the end of the first half, as the houselights came up for the intermission,
the middle-aged women sitting in the next seat saw that I was jotting down the
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odd note, and asked, with overly-clear enunciation, “So, – how – did – you –
enjoy – the – first – half?”
With a playful attitude, I looked at her in a somewhat bewildered manner
and tilted my head slightly to the left.
She responded with larger pronunciation and more volume, “DO – YOU –
UNDERSTAND – WHAT – IS – GOING – ON?”
With the same confused look, I tilted to the right.
Even more insistent and with much greater audibility (apparently
foreigners’ ability to comprehend the English language is in direct proportion
to the loudness of the person endeavouring to get the message across), she
yelled, “DO – YOU – UNDERSTAND – WHAT – THEY – ARE – SAY – ING???
In my finest North London accent, I finally replied,
“Madam, there is no need to yell. As a theatre critic, I find it not only an
advantage, but I would go so far as to say that it is an absolute necessity to be
fairly conversant with the English language as it stands at the present point in
time, and I also have the capacity to comprehend Shakespeare and even some
Chaucer with a greater degree of concentration, so one might say that, yes, I
have a reasonable understanding of the language, the dialogue, the main plot,
the sub-plots and the development of both the major and the minor characters
in this production, and am eagerly looking forward to the second act. What
about you?”
The woman picked her jaw up off the floor and adopted a more bewildered
and confused look than I had given her.
Some people have said that this was cruel; after all, she was only trying to
help. In my playfulness, it was apparent that this woman was on a mission of
ego-fulfilment, trying to display her superiority over someone apparently less
educated. It was fun.
The only difference between a wise man and a fool is
that the wise man knows he’s playing.
— Fritz Perls —
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Egolessness • 91
The more a person is compelled by society to focus on his name, social position
and possessions, the more strongly he is likely to become identified with the
ego level of consciousness. This is particularly true if he has never been made
aware of any other levels of consciousness, let alone encouraged to access them.
Having no exit from the barriers of time, space and ego, he feels trapped. He
seeks release through attachments and experiences that only serve to remind
him of, and further encase him in, his ego.
In the idea of ownership of nature is the psychology of scarcity and poverty.
With ownership, the emphasis shifts from one of receiving the abundance from
nature to concern for exercising one’s property rights.
To be selfless is to be all-pervading.
To be all-pervading is to be transcendent.
— Lao Tsu —
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92
The Power of Encouragement
Flatter me, and I may not believe you.
Criticize me, and I may not like you.
Ignore me, and I may not forgive you.
Encourage me, and I will not forget you.
— William Arthur Ward —
So many managers rule by the iron fist philosophy.
A senior executive employed by a large client company exemplified this.
Kevin Barrington-Smith, a ‘traditional’ style of manager, was both addressed
and referred to as ‘The Boss’, both directly and even when he wasn’t there. He
possessed a ruddy complexion and appeared to have high blood pressure. He
equated vulnerability with weakness and his policy was to conceal any softness
for fear of being perceived as spineless. To him, giving encouragement would
lead to complacency, so his people seldom received acknowledgement and
recognition for jobs well done.
The result was that Kevin alienated his staff members who were actually
afraid of him.
There eventually was a management shake-out in the corporation and
Kevin, along with several other senior managers, was retrenched aged in his
mid-fifties.
The result was a talented and capable man who was forced to retire early,
apart from a few consultancy projects.
The strange aspect of this entire experience was that Kevin BarringtonSmith (name changed for this story) convinced me to do some work with his
favourite charity, and through this I discovered his warm nature, open generosity
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Encouragement • 93
and richly dry sense of humour. I detected this at the initial meeting but it was
nowhere near as evident in that situation.
One of the remaining managers who was one management level below
and has since consulted me, said that when the announcement was made, Kevin
didn’t receive support from anyone in the company, and I couldn’t help but
wonder if the situation would have been different if he had allowed the facets
of his after-work nature to be seen by the members of his team.
A word of encouragement
during a failure is worth more
than an hour of praise after
success.
— Unknown —
Several years ago when I gained some credibility and respect as a
professional speaker, many new and aspiring speakers requested that I review
their work, and having been a freelance theatre critic for ten years, I felt qualified
to tackle the task.
We also conducted (and occasionally still do) public workshops called “The
Astoundingly Effective Speaking, Presentation, Comedy & Life Skills
Workshop” at which these people, as well as experienced speakers, could be
further trained and reviewed.
At first I was analytical as well as using intuition and gut-feel to assess the
presentations, focusing more on areas ripe for improvement, and I was
considered to be honest but very blunt at the time. In the early days, I even told
a now-prominent professional speaker, that she would find it hard-going in the
speaking business. How wrong I was. She is now globally respected her ‘CSP’
verifies that she is in the top 7% of speakers in the world.
I eventually learned that if the mentor doesn’t also give encouragement,
the student is less-inclined to take notice of the teacher.
The finest gift you can give anyone is encouragement. Yet, almost
no one gets the encouragement they need to grow to their full
potential. If everyone received the encouragement they need to
grow, the genius in most everyone would blossom and the world
would produce abundance beyond our wildest dreams.
— Sidney Madwed —
American poet and philosopher
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95
The Power of Energy
Man is in ch’i and ch’i is within each human being.
Heaven and earth and the ten thousand things
require ch’i to stay alive.
— Ko Hung —
In the world of martial arts, if you ask most practitioners and exponents who
have studied the ‘internal’, or ‘soft’ forms, what ‘energy’ is, they will reply with
the word ‘ch’i’ (Chinese form) or ‘ki’ (Japanese), or sometimes ‘qi’. For the
purpose of simplicity we will refer to it by the Chinese form. Ch’i is at the core,
the base, the centre (a term we will use later) of all effective execution of all
forms of martial arts.
Have you heard stories of a woman seeing a child trapped under a car? She
runs over and lifts the car so the child can be freed. I know a Salvation Army
officer, small in physical stature, who performed this remarkable feat under
those very conditions. Where did this tremendous increase in strength come
from? If asked to do it consciously, do you think he could repeat it? Of course,
the answer is ch’i. As in most cases, if we don’t know we can’t do something, it
is more than likely that we will do it, given the right circumstances.
Ch’i, which has been translated into English to mean ‘energy’ and ‘breath’,
is the life force that maintains and nurtures not only our bodies, but also our
minds and our spirits. It can be detected and perceived through our intuition
and directed mentally through our intention and our breathing.
The channelling of ch’i can be used constructively or damagingly.
When a person has an injury such as a sprain, a cramp, a headache, etc.,
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there is said to be a ‘ch’i blockage’. Practitioners will usually use some form of
massage or acupuncture to clear the blockage and again promote ch’i through
the meridians.
A person that knows how to allow his ch’i to circulate
will preserve himself and banish illness that might
cause him harm.
— Ko Hung —
You might have heard an expression, ‘dim mak’, commonly called ‘the death
touch’, whereby an exponent will strike the victim at a precise point on the
body, with a certain amount of pressure and appropriate intention, and a
malfunction such as the collapse of an organ will occur. Did you see the JeanClaude Van Damme movie Bloodsport in which his character, Frank Dux, was
called on to ‘do the dim mak’. It is possible to stop a person’s heart using one of
these techniques. Some people have theorized that Bruce Lee died because a
Chinese martial arts master resented his sharing of deeper martial arts
philosophies with non-Asians, and that he used dim mak on Bruce Lee.
Although dim mak is an effective form of healing or destruction, my view is
that it is unlikely that The Little Dragon died from it.
If you doubt that power is more a factor of energy flow than physical strength,
try this exercise.
— Reach for a glass, then pick it up and put it down.
— Next, become aware of the neck muscles on the same side as the arm
that you used to raise the glass. Flex the neck muscles, flex the biceps,
then the forearm, wrist, hands and fingers to the tips. As tightly as you
can, tense all the muscles from the neck to the fingertips, and in that
state, pick up the glass.
Which of the two was easier?
— In the first instance, the brain sends the message to the hand in a split
second.
— In the latter, when a conscious effort is made to use maximum strength,
the force result isn’t as effective.
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Energy • 97
Remember a time when you were playing either tennis or squash. Your opponent
hits the ball out, and just for the heck of it, you return it, and more often than
not, it’s an excellent shot.
Why?
There is no pressure, so the muscles are not tense.
Muscle tension blocks energy flow.
The less effort, the faster and more powerful
you will be.
— Bruce Lee —
At a resort hotel, a major transport company engaged me to perform a keynote
hoax, followed by three hours of communications and team training, and in
the evening, a trivia quiz.
The training section involved some empowerment based in the martial arts.
If a person has a heightened perception of themselves and their abilities, they
will be more receptive and open to their team-members.
After the trivia quiz, a woman, whom we’ll call Leanne, was small in
physical stature (about 157 centimetres or 5’2" tall and weighing about 44 kilos
or 97 pounds) came over and asked if I go more deeply into the martial arts
aspects than we did in the training session.
“Yes, I do.”
“The others are going for a drink in the bar. Would you mind showing me
some deeper techniques?”
Two of the others also said they would like to be shown, and because I
believe that if someone shows interest in self-improvement for the greater good,
the wisdom should be shared, so I obliged.
One of the exercises was ‘unlift-able body’. I asked a woman who was about
175 centimetres (5’9") and about 60 kilos (132 pounds) to lift Leanne. She did it
easily.
Talking Leanne into a conscious, non-hypnotic state based on breathing
and visualisation, I asked the other woman to lift her. Leanne didn’t budge. I
then tried to lift Leanne, without effect.
Leanne looked at me questioningly with a degree of incredulousness and
suspicion.
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“You’re only moderately impres-sed, aren’t you. You think that maybe I
was faking it, and that Marie was subject to autosuggestion?”, I asked.
“Well, yes, that did cross my mind.”
At that moment, the company’s general manager walked in.
“What are you guys doing?”
“They wanted deeper training.”
Clyde was a large, strong man of about 190 centimetres (6’3") and about
105 kilos (231 pounds) and he worked out daily.
“Clyde would you do me a favour? Would you mind lifting Leanne?”
“No problem.” He was right, he lifted her easily.
“Leanne, would you do as we did before?”
“Right.”
“Clyde, would you lift Leanne now?”
Clyde tried, increasing his power, and he was unable to lift her. After about
twenty seconds, Leanne looked at me and started to laugh loudly out of the
realisation that her newly discovered strength was for real. At that point she
lost focus and was lifted.
The power of the mind is infinite while brawn is limited.
— Koichi Tohei —
Strength has nothing to do with physical muscle, but rather concentration, selfbelief and focus.
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99
The Power of Expectation
It is funny about life; if you refuse to accept
anything but the very best you will very often get it.
— W Somerset Maugham —
By now you will know about the American experiment in which three teachers
were each given a classroom of students. One was told his were the bright
students, another told that he had students of average intelligence, and the
third told that he was saddled with the less-talented class. The three classes
performed to expectations even though it was revealed later that all were average
students. The other similar situation revolved around laboratory experiments
involving rats in mazes. All rats performed to expectation despite coming from
the same litter.
You always act in a manner consistent with your
expectations, and your expectations influence the
attitudes and behaviours of the people around you.
— Brian Tracy —
A popular example of the power of expectation giving rise to reality is the ageold question, “Are Volvo owners born bad drivers, or do they become
incompetent and oblivious to other road-users after they buy a Volvo?”
My view is that, because of social conditioning, there is an anticipation of a
limitation of driving capability with people who decide on that brand of motor
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transport. Many other drivers will admit to certain additional and inordinate
defensive care when they see a Volvo driver in front, an expectation of the
unexpected, the unorthodox, perhaps a misleading indicator or maybe sudden
stopping for no apparent reason.
Some drivers, especially ex-motorcyclists, display a bumper sticker that
reads, ‘Motorcycle-aware Driver.’
I have also seen motorcyclists wearing crash helmets that carry a sticker
that reads, ‘Volvo-aware Motorcyclist.’
This isn’t an anti-Volvo story; it’s simply a recognition of general thoughts
that are already out there in society.
If you’re a golfer, have you ever hit the ball into a sand trap, and thought or
said, ‘I knew that would happen!’, or addressed the ball and thought—Don’t hit
it into the water. Don’t hit it into the water.
No prizes for guessing where it ends up.
This is consistent with the ‘dominant thought’ theory in which the
unconscious mind hears it as, ‘the water, the water’. The mind will always lead
the body.
There’s no need to dwell any more on the subject of Expectation.
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Expectation • 101
Life always keeps its agreement with you.
— Unknown —
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103
The Power of Flexibility
Expect nothing: be prepared for anything.
— Samurai saying —
Many executives whose management style involves a large dose of testosterone
experience a significant amount of frustration and opposition.
The more rules you have to enforce, the more illusions are created.
The Western mind is like a mighty oak tree that resists the force of the
wind, but eventually cracks or is uprooted if the wind becomes strong enough.
The Eastern mind is likened to bamboo that bends with the wind and then
springs back without having lost any of its strength.
Anyone who takes a stance will inevitably experience the opposite of stance,
which is resistance.
On one occasion, I was called by a management consultant and told that a
managing director of a division of a large multinational corporation was
interested to discuss the possibility and suitability of one of my motivational
and humorous keynote talks at their annual conference.
When I arrived at the consultant’s office, the boardroom was set up so that
I was sitting beside Mr Kevin Barrington-Smith on one of the longer sides of
the table, and we were both sitting opposite the consultant.
After some small talk, the consultant asked the prospective client, “Is there
anything you would like to ask Mr Lee?”
“Ask Mr Lee his fee for a one-hour presentation at our conference”,
Mr Barrington-Smith replied as he looked at the consultant.
At very close range, I then looked at the side of our client’s head (from that
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point, I knew that the ‘prospective’ status would change), and stated my fee.
“Tell Mr Lee that his fee is too high.”
I said, again looking at the side of his head, “Tell Mr Barrington-Smith that
this is my fee”.
The session resulted in a one-hour keynote speech at the opening dinner of
the conference. Kevin Barrington-Smith was referred to as ‘the boss’ by his
subordinates, even when he wasn’t present, and his management style was
described to me as ‘an iron fist in an iron glove’, a manager who was tenacious,
fixed and demanding, and his raised voice struck fear into the hearts of even
the strongest of his staff.
At the dinner, I decided to take a calculated risk. Part of the comedy routine
involved a friendly roast of some of the personalities in the group. Tradition
dictates that I roast myself first, then the most senior member of management,
then everyone else will feel comfortable. Sometimes tradition is also
psychologically sound.
When it came time to mention ‘the boss’, I said, “It doesn’t need to be said
that Kevin Barrington-Smith is the head of the organisation, but very few people
realise that he secretly likes to be addressed by another name, ‘Kezza’.
The room suddenly became absolutely quiet; everyone literally stopped
breathing as they slowly turned to ‘the boss’ for a reaction. He didn’t disappoint
as he folded his arms and assumed a facial, physical and attitudinal sternness.
I then said, “Or if you do something of which he approves, he doesn’t mind
being called ‘Big Kez’”
As they say in the classics, the silence was deafening apart from the hushed
gasps. They again slowly turned for the response which was the trace of a smile,
and all knew that everything was fine, and a good time could be had.
Softness triumphs over hardness. What is more
malleable is always superior over that which is
immovable. This is the principle of controlling things by
going along with them, of mastery through adaptation.
— Lao-Tzu —
The ninja earned a reputation of invisibility by providing a target that was
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Flexibility • 105
elusive. He would stand in a position clearly seen by the enemy, and when the
opponent advanced in a linear direction, the ninja would blindside, sidestep,
duck or roll away to give the illusion of disappearance.
A cloak was also used to camouflage intention.
The ninja would hold the cape in front like a screen, giving the impression
that he was standing directly behind it. When the opponent attacked, normally
in a straight line, the ninja might throw the cape over the enemy to smother the
attack and take the offensive or run away. He may also flap the cape as one
would with a blanket to distract the enemy while blindsiding him.
Another alternative was to hold the cape up in front, and in the event of the
enemy coming close, the opponent is compelled to grab the screen, and again
the ninja could attack, flee or go to the blindside.
Tenth dan jujitsu grandmaster Professor Wally Jay advises one to avoid the
head-on collision of forces.
Avoid the full power of your opponent’s attack by evading, defecting,
blending or redirecting.
These principles will be effective in both a physical and metaphorical sense.
If the opponent is focused on attacking you, because the force is usually
straight at you, all it takes is a slight move, spin, roll or deflection to avoid the
confrontation and end up in a position of advantage.
The mind of a perfect man is like a mirror. It grasps
nothing. It expects nothing. It reflects but does not
hold. Therefore, the perfect man can act without effort.
— Chuang-Tzu —
This philosophy is clearly evident in Chapter 76 of Tao Te Ching (The Book of The
Way).
A newborn is soft and tender,
A crone, hard and stiff.
Plants and animals, in life, are supple and succulent;
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In death, withered and dry.
So softness and tenderness are attributes of life,
And hardness and stiffness, attributes of death.
Just as a sapless tree will split and decay
So an inflexible force will meet defeat;
The hard and mighty lie beneath the ground
While the soft and yielding dance on the breeze above.
A gung fu man never asserts himself against an
opponent, and never puts himself in frontal opposition
to the direction of the force. When attacked, he will not
resist, but will control the attack by swinging with it.
— Bruce Lee —
This non-resistance principle is popularly illustrated through the tree analogy
in which the unbending branches of a fir tree snap under the increasing weight
of falling snow, while the bamboo bends with the weight and at a certain point,
effortlessly throws off the snow to spring back to its original position.
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Flexibility • 107
Inability to adapt brings destruction.
— Bruce Lee —
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109
The Power of the Flow
Do not struggle. Go with the flow of things, and you
will find yourself at one with the mysterious unity of
the universe.
– Chuang Tzu —
Most people by now are familiar with the term, ‘going with the flow’, but many
dismiss it as a passive acceptance of others’ control.
My attitude is to not only go with the flow, but use the flow.
When I was a life-saving instructor, we advised people that, if they were caught
in a rip or undertoe, don’t swim or fight against the current; go with it, slightly
varying your course, so that you head towards land.
If you try to fight the flow, it will overpower you and you will end up being
somewhere you don’t want to be. By using the might of the natural flow, you
can guide yourself to the desired position. When surfing, either with or without
a surfboard, the surfer uses the water’s power, the water does not use the surfer.
Lao Tzu believed the ideal way was to utilise methods that did not create resistance or provoke counter-reactions. In observing the laws of nature, he noticed
that excessive force in a particular direction triggers the upsurgeance of an
opposing force, and therefore cannot provide a situation of long-term stability.
The physical laws of the universe directly affect the ways in which people,
individually and in groups, behave, and contribute to the evolution of societies.
If a leader understands these laws, he will acquire power and promote
harmony.
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Meeting in the massive office of the managing director of a multi-multi-million
dollar international exporter, I was invited to sit on a couch in the corner. The
MD, an ex-Rugby player standing about six-foot two, sat almost facing me in
front of a large window. The sunlight was shining in my face, and he was sitting
in a Chesterfield-style firm leather chair that was about three inches higher
than my couch seat.
The cushion on which I was sitting seemed to gradually sink as the meeting
progressed, so to take the scenario to the extreme, I sat deeper and deeper into
the couch, making the height difference even more pronounced. As this was
happening, the MD sat more upright, shifting to the front edge of his chair.
From my aspect, he was beginning to cause an eclipse. To an observer, the scene
would have looked quite absurd.
At the point at which I thought it appropriate to end the meeting, I stood,
thanked him for his time, and suggested that if he had any questions, he should
feel free to contact my office.
He said, “I’m going to engage you to work with our team.”
“Fine, I’ll look forward to your call.”
“Do you want to know why I want you to work with us?”
“Yes I would.”
“I want you to work with us because you’re different. In our meeting
you weren’t, er …”
“Intimidated?”
“Well, yes.”
Because of his stature, the positioning of the office and personal attitude, it was
apparent that the MD’s game was intimidation. By trying to beat him or even
match him at his game I would have won no respect, but in going with, and
using the flow, the impression was made.
Flow with whatever may happen and let your mind be
free. Stay centred by accepting whatever you are
doing. This is the ultimate.
— Chuang-Tzu —
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Flow • 111
In Aikido, when an assailant attacks, you use his strength and weight to
unbalance him. Wherever you lead his mind, his body will follow; wherever
you lead your mind, your body will follow.
Perhaps the final quote in this chapter should be one by Sensei Koichi Tohei,
who said,
Do not give in to your surroundings. The difference between a wise
man and a mediocre man is the difference between a man who uses
an environment and one who lets his environment use him.
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113
The Power of Focus
It’s not strength that matters, it’s focus.
— Bruce Lee —
When she was seventeen, marathon swimmer Susie Maroney participated in
one of my public courses on presentation and speaking skills.
Her mother, Pauline had heard about the work and phoned to say that,
because of her growing notoriety, Susie was increasingly asked to speak at school
assemblies and other functions.
I told her that I realised that most of her money was funding the swims and
that Susie was and would be more and more an inspiration to the youth of
Australia, so she was welcome to participate in the training as my guest.
Apart from the acting exercises and humour section of the training, Susie
was very interested in the martial arts part of the day, and when she broke a
three-quarter-inch-thick plank of radiata pine with her hand, she became very
excited.
“Susie, you’ve achieved a double channel crossing. Why is this exciting to
you?”
“This is great!”
“Susie, I’ll jump into a pool and swim to the other end and back; you did it
with France!”
“You don’t understand, it’s not breaking the board, it’s the mental process
I had to go through to get to this point. I know it will help me in my swims and
other parts of my career.”
I believe it was eighteenth century Swiss physicist Daniel Bernoulli as well as
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Albert Einstein who said that ‘the smaller the area on which a force is exerted,
the greater the pressure on that area’, so if all of your endeavours are
concentrated on a project, without distractions, you will be maximally effective.
During a training session for managers of a multinational IT company, I asked
Shaun, an executive who was also a body-builder and weight-lifter (weighing
about 115 kilos or 253 pounds) to stand behind one of his associates, Gavin,
who was tall and skinny, described by the CEO as ‘a propeller-head’ with the
spectacles and ‘the pens of knowledge’ in his shirt pocket, and approximately
half the weight of his counterpart. You get the picture.
When I explained to Shaun that his task was to prevent Gavin from moving
forward, he just smiled and confidently reached around and put one arm around
Gavin’s chest and stomach. I instructed Gavin to look at the arm that was holding
him back and to walk forward.
He was a blur of arms and legs, unable to make any impression on Shaun’s
physical strength.
After giving Gavin some instructions on visualisation, centring, focus and
breathing, I suggested that Shaun use two arms for the next part of the exercise.
“Walk!!” I said, and Gavin was then able to drag Shaun across the carpeted
conference room, and Shaun was powerless to stop him, as hard as he tried.
Such is the power of focus; seemingly physically impossible feats can be
achieved if you channel your efforts.
Never look down to test the ground before taking your
next step; only he who keeps his eye fixed on the far
horizon will find his right road.
— Dag Hammarskjold —
Secretary General of the United Nations and
1961 Nobel Peace Prize Winner
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115
The Power of Forgiveness
Forgiveness is both overrated and unnecessary.
Many people assert that we must forgive others for past offences.
This theory relates at a mammalian fundamentalist level.
A person whom we should ‘forgive’, and the event itself are best seen as
simply an event that has occurred, an incident from which we benefit by treating
it as a lesson, and the person was simply doing what they felt they needed to
do in order to get through the situation. The moment we put a charge on it
means that the situation or the person who perpetrated it has control over us.
Going into ‘victim mode’ is nothing more than a way of handing over our
power to the person or event.
There are entire races of people that are living in a state of emotional hostility
because they believe another nationality committed a sin against them 50, 60,
100, 500 years ago, and these people are still carrying emotional, attitudinal
and cultural hostility. Hatred of a group of people whose ancestors offended
their ancestors are controlling their lives.
Some groups of people have been engaged in religious wars for centuries.
Is this productive?
I once heard a comedian say that, ‘religious wars are fights over who has
the best imaginary friend’.
Holding a grudge is like drinking poison and hoping
someone else will die.
— Unknown —
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The ability of a ‘competence-deprived’ driver who cuts in front of us cannot be
improved by our abusing him or her. They will cut in because that’s what limited
drivers do; it’s their job.
We might respond by being rude to other drivers. Some people even think
that if the offender is a cab driver, we can feel free to seek revenge by cutting off
any cab driver.
Keep in mind that half of the driving population are, by definition, of belowaverage ability, and a quarter are in the bottom 25%. These are the ones we
notice.
Sometimes the bad driver is oblivious to their incompetence, but yet they
affect us all day. In other words, the controller is unaware that they are controlling
us.
Sometimes people hold grudges for 30, 40, 50 years or longer, and the object of
their hatred is probably unaware of the animosity.
Which of the two would you consider more intelligent?
Which of the two has control?
The person who adopts the victim position is doing nothing more than
copping-out, blaming another person because they are either too lazy or too
afraid to take responsibility for their own happiness.
In the words of Dr John Demartini,
Forgiveness is an illusion, a lie. It is of the asymmetrically
misperceiving lower mind. It stems from a lower-minded misperception that evil can occur without an equal and opposite good
occurring. It comes from someone who has the audacity to judge. It
is an action of pride and self-righteous ego to think that you have
some right to forgive someone in the first place.
Forgiveness implies something wrong or evil has occurred. It demands a
prior judgement of some unethical or immoral action or negligence. It requires
a lopsided perception about what is in the universe. Forgiving someone will
not set them free, it will only perpetuate further cycles of judgement and
illusions, which imprison. The actual truth requires no forgiveness.
There is only one person we are entitled to forgive—ourselves.
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Forgiveness • 117
We are often our most extreme critics; we emotionally and intellectually
beat ourselves up because of minor lapses. How often do we call ourselves
idiots after a minor example of imperfection?
The fact is, we are human, and as long as we learn from each experience,
we will progress at our own speed.
Remember, nothing we do and have done is wasted. All contributes to our
growth.
Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity,
or registering wrongs.
— Charlotte Bronte —
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118
The Power of the General
When the best leader’s work is done, the people
say, ‘we did this ourselves’.
— Lao Tsu —
Running a company has, by many people, been compared with military
leadership.
According to the ancient Chinese there are eight main qualities of effective
military leadership:
1.
Humanitarian generals guide with virtue, treat all equally with
courtesy, know when the troops are cold and hungry, and notice
when they are weary and pained.
2.
Dutiful generals do not try to avoid any task, are not influenced
purely by profit and would die with honour before living in
disgrace.
3.
Courteous generals are not arrogant because of their high status,
they do not make much of their victories, are wise and can
humble themselves, and they are strong, tolerant and courteous.
4.
Clever generals’ movements and responses are multifaceted,
able to turn disaster into fortune and seize victory from the jaws
of danger.
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General • 119
5.
Trustworthy generals give rich rewards to those advancing and
have strict penalties for those retreating. Rewards are given
immediately and penalties are the same for all ranks.
6.
Fierce generals’ mettle makes the armies tremble and their
determination makes light of powerful enemies. They are
hesitant to engage in petty fights while courageous in the midst
of major battles.
7.
Cavalry generals are in the vanguard when advancing.
8.
Great generals consider themselves lacking when they see the
wise and go along with good advice like following a current.
They are magnanimous yet able to be firm, uncomplicated yet
have many strategies.
An authentic leader acts in ways which serve to
elevate those around him.
— Sean M Georges —
Coincidentally, there are eight types of Decadent Generals:
1.
The insatiably greedy.
2.
Those who are jealous of the wise and able.
3.
Those who believe slanderers and befriend the treacherous.
4.
Those who assess others without assessing themselves.
5.
The hesitant and indecisive.
6.
Those heavily addicted to wine and sex.
7.
The malicious liars with cowardly hearts.
8.
Those who talk wildly without courtesy.
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They may forget what you said,
but they will never forget how you made them feel.
— Carl W. Buechner —
Through the guidelines described in The Eight-Fold Path, Buddhism also provides
direction for the General:
1.
Right Views:
ask yourself ‘why do I do what I do?’ Examine your motives, your goals.
No action should be mindless; a spiritual person knows why he acts.
2.
Right Resolve:
are you prepared for the task at hand? What are your preparations of
thought, speech, motivation? Is the task at hand worthy of your time and
effort?
3.
Right Speech:
words are powerful; do you use them wisely? Careless words may hurt
others and open yourself to attack. During World War II, the US Navy was
not joking when it placed posters on ships and in bases proclaiming ‘loose
lips sink ships.’ Buddhists are aware of the power of words and the thoughtentities they can invoke.
4.
Right Action:
once you decide on a task, is your procedure well-thought out, or is it
haphazard? If you wish to become a doctor, you must gain admittance to a
medical school. Each step leading to that must be precise. One does not
enter medical school directly from a manager’s position at a hardware store,
but a hardware worker may become a doctor if he makes the appropriate
actions.
5.
Right Livelihood:
Buddhists believe that work is a manifestation of spiritual development.
Enlightenment is difficult to achieve if you are in the wrong occupation for
you, i.e., a vegetarian may find extreme moral difficulty working as a
butcher. The choice of career is important, and Buddhists believe that the
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General • 121
choice must come from within, not from ‘following in the family footsteps’—
that is, unless you truly find fulfilment in that business. To a Buddhist, a
large part of your physical self is what you do.
6.
Right Effort:
having embarked on a path, are you giving the journey the logistical and
emotional support it needs to be accomplished? Buddhism frowns on halfhearted efforts.
7.
Right Attention: are you giving enough attention to yourself, to gauge your
moods and relationships to be sure you are still on the right path for you?
If you cannot hear yourself, how well can you hear others?
8.
Right Meditation:
have you the discipline to fully focus on the task at hand? You need not be
single-minded; life is, after all, made of many experiences and relationships.
But the task at hand deserves your full focus.
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123
The Power of Giving
Giving is the highest expression of our power.
— Vivian Greene —
During one visit to the United States I spent an entire morning in a hotel room
in New York City in thrall watching a Texas-based televangelist strutting his
stuff. Wearing a 1950’s memorial haircut and a shiny serge suit, he loudly
asserted,
THE MORE YOU GIVE, THE MORE WILL COME BACK TO YOU
IN ABUNDANCE! IN OTHERS WORDS, THE MORE YOU FREELY
GIVE TO OTHERS, THE MORE YOU WILL RECEIVE, NOT
NECESSARILY IN THE FORM OF MONEY, BUT YOU WILL
RECEIVE!
Not only that, he was magnanimous enough to provide the medium for
accepting the generosity of his viewers, i.e. his ‘ministry’, and he was gratefully
thanking them on television, even quoting the amount of money they donated.
Giving with the intention of expected reciprocal gains is not true giving; it
is done with a self-serving motivation. Also, giving with a sentiment of moral
superiority is nothing more than an ego trip. Giving in its pure sense is
performed with a feeling of sharing the abundance of your life and universal
love. Anything else perpetrates an attitude of separation, or ‘me and them’.
Jung’s ‘universal unconscious’ promotes an attitude of ‘us’.
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The most beautiful compensations of man can
sincerely try to help another without helping himself.
— Unknown —
To test yourself out, why not give anonymously?
In western society we are told that ‘it is better to give than to receive’.
According to the universal laws of balance, it is of ‘equal’ benefit to give as
it is to receive.
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Giving • 125
The sage does not accumulate for himself.
The more he uses for others,
the more he has himself.
The more he gives to others,
the more he possesses of his own.
The way of heaven is to benefit others
and not to injure.
— Lao Tzu —
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127
The Power of Gratitude
If the only prayer you say in your whole life is ‘thank
you’, that would suffice.
— Meister Eckhart —
Fundamentalist belief is that if a person, situation or event is not good, it must
be bad, if it is not pleasurable, it must therefore be painful; there is no middle
ground.
These people are ruled by guilt and regret which is related to the past and
fear which is related to the future.
Their existences oscillate between fear and guilt, right and wrong, etc.
An interesting aspect of gratitude, as with other universal truths, is that
whatever you express, you will attract.
How many ungrateful people attract gratitude for
themselves?
— Irene Koziol —
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Higher self
Entropy
>
>
>
Syntropy
>
Gratitude
The present
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Gratitude • 129
The ideal state is vibrational potential energy rather than the wild and extreme
pendulous swings that define kinetic energy. This vibrational centre line
represents presence.
When in this state there are no extremes of emotion, no perceptions of right
or wrong, good or bad. Situations, people and events simply exist and occur
and they are acknowledged as contributing to one’s life purpose.
How does one ascend towards a state of presence? One of the ways is through
gratitude.
— It is impossible to be simultaneously fearful and grateful.
— It is impossible to feel simultaneous guilt and gratitude.
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Exercise
If you were told you had 24 hours to live and you were to stay in a room with only a
telephone, pen and paper, what would you write and say, and to whom would you write
and say it?
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Gratitude • 133
Even though you may have more than 24 hours to live, why not do it anyway?
Gratitude promotes:
— Inspiration
— Certainty
— Self-worth
— Focus
— Non-self-sabotaging
Gratitude is heaven itself.
— William Blake —
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135
The Power of the Higher Force
There is a power above and behind us and we are
the channel of its communication.
— Emerson —
“USE THE FORCE LUKE!”
This often-quoted line from Star Wars is not as silly as it might seem. There is
unquestionably a higher force that gives us clues when we need them, and it is
up to us to take notice of them.
When I was about 19 years old I was riding my motorbike towards a familiar
intersection that had ‘stop’ signs on both sides but for some unexplainable reason
I hit the brakes, only to see a speeding car run the stop sign and flash past a few
inches from my front wheel. Was this a coincidence, was it intuition, or was
some higher force looking out for me? That was one of many instances in which
I knew there was a reason for my life being saved.
In Aikido class we used to stand on the mat, and someone would attack us
from behind. We wouldn’t know how fast they would approach or what type
of offence they would utilise, but we would have to defend ourselves, and to
the unknowing observer it was astounding how appropriate and effective our
defence would be.
According to martial arts history, a naval officer once challenged Morihei
Ueshiba, the founder of Aikido, to a Kendo (sword) match. Morihei consented
but remained unarmed. The officer, a high-ranking swordsman, was offended
at this perceived affront to his ability and lashed out at Morihei, who easily
escaped the officer’s attempted onslaught of thrusts and strikes.
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When the exhausted attacker finally conceded defeat he asked Morihei how
he managed to be so elusive.
Just prior to your attacks, a beam of light flashed before my eyes,
revealing the intended direction and allowing me to evade them.
Following the contest, Morihei went to the garden well to wash the sweat
from his hands and face. He suddenly began to tremble, then fell, immobilised.
The ground beneath his feet started to vibrate, and he was bathed in rays of
light streaming from the skies. A golden mist engulfed his body, causing,
according to his own accounts, all of his petty deceit to vanish. He imagined
himself assuming the form of a golden being; the inner workings of the cosmos
appeared to him in perfect clarity.
Of this experience, Morihei said,
I saw that I am the universe. All at once I understood the nature of
creation; the way of a warrior is to manifest divine love, a spirit that
embraces and nurtures all things. I saw the entire universe as my
abode, and the sun, moon and stars as my intimate friends. Tears of
gratitude streamed down my face.
This came from a man who could not have been described as a ‘sensitive
new-age man’. He was a strict disciplinarian who trained leaders and soldiers
in the military forces, and even when aged in his fifties, was regarded as ‘the
strongest man in Japan’.
Some people call the higher force ‘God’, ‘guardian angels’, ‘protectors’, ‘spirit
guides’ and numerous other names, but one thing is certain; we are not alone.
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Higher Force • 137
God is an intelligent sphere whose centre is everywhere and whose
circumference is nowhere.
— Hermes —
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139
The Power of Honesty
This above all, to thine own self be true;
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
— Hamlet, Act I, Scene III —
Although politeness is advantageous in a social and business sense, to sacrifice
truth for the sake of politeness was regarded as an empty form.
According to the code of Bushido, lying was deemed to be not only
dishonourable, but also cowardly.
Dishonesty lowers the self-image.
I never did give anybody hell. I just told the truth and
they thought it was hell.
— Harry S Truman —
Several years ago I was having a chat with a fellow speaker, Robert Donald,
who was at the time perceived to play on a beaming smile that suggested that
he might not have been absolutely sincere in all his personal communications.
On that occasion he asked for my understanding of the word ‘oxymoron’.
I said, “Examples would be: military intelligence, the public service, resident
alien, friendly fire, rap music, self-help groups, your sincerity …”
Showing slight surprise, he interrupted to ask, “Don’t you think I’m
sincere?”
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I smiled and explained that sometimes the filter between my brain and
mouth malfunctions.
The truth was that I simply expressed a view that others had been observing
and commenting on for years. Whether he was genuinely insincere (another
oxymoron) is not for me to assess, but this was the basis of remarks made to
me.
Five years later he gave a talk that I attended and when he finished he stepped
off the stage, leaned over, and said, “Is THAT sincere enough for you?”
He had been holding on to that comment for FIVE years. Three years later
he confided that he realised what I had meant and had been working on it, and
we have since become much closer.
Dishonesty lowers the self-image.
Yes, I realise what you might be thinking at this point, and yes, there is a chapter
in this book about The Power of Politeness and Courtesy.
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Honesty • 141
Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom.
— Thomas Jefferson —
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143
The Power of Humour
Humour is emotional chaos remembered in
tranquillity.
— James Thurber —
Humour is able to explode the cloud of banal consciousness and charge the
moment with energy and insight.
The laughter lifts spirits and restores vitality.
A man once approached me in the street and excitedly asked, “Do you remember
me?”
“Yes … you do look very familiar.”
“You mentioned me in one of your presentations!”
“Oh yes, when was that?”
“Eight years ago, and you know what? In that three-day conference, yours
is the only presentation I remember.”
“Was mine the only one that included humour?”
“Ummm … yes it was, come to think of it.”
If you deliver a message with an element or degree of humour, the audience
will receive it more effectively and retain it more readily.
Part of the perceived power of the individual is that ability to unashamedly
project his or her unique sense of humour.
When I was a small child growing up and going to school in 1950’s Australia,
there was a government initiative coloquially called ‘The White Australia Policy’
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which encouraged immigration from England and other northern European
countries, so the attitude towards Asians was less-than-accommodating. This
is an attitude that has softened in forty years but racism has by no means
disappeared. At that time, I used humour to distract my perceived tormentors
from their initial intention. I didn’t realise I was employing the ninja tactic of
diversion and distraction. One teacher required me, in every class he had, to sit
next to the school bully. Using humour as a buffer, we ended up becoming
quite amicable toward each other.
In my observation most people are afraid to allow their sense of humour to
expose itself.
“What if they don’t laugh?”
“What if they don’t like the jokes?”
“What if they think I’m an idiot?”
“What if they don’t get it?”
The only reason for people being reluctant to express their own humour is that
insecurity and self-doubt take over.
HOW DO YOU CONSTRUCT HUMOUR?
Humour consists of one-liners, jokes and stories, both fictional and factual.
According to an American survey that I’ve chosen to believe, 98% of the
population don’t know how to tell a joke well.
Unfortunately, I’m sure you will agree that many of the people who are in
that 98% don’t realise that they’re in the 98%. We have all experienced those.
Some of us have been those.
Paradoxically, everyone possesses a sense of humour, so it’s a matter of
tapping into an individual’s personality and having them project it so that it’s
natural, credible and hopefully endearing.
Therefore I recommend the use of the anecdote.
Why?
(a) You’ll be able to see the pictures, smell the smells and re-adopt the
body positions. Your motor systems will automatically respond to the
mental stimulus. In other words, you’ll relive the experience.
(b) You’ll be able to tell the story with greater conviction than with a joke
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Humour • 145
because we mostly tell jokes as we think we heard them. The person
who told us told it as he thinks he heard it, and so on. The result is
similar to the old story of a battle:
A soldier at the end of a long line said to the man next to him, ‘We’re
going to advance; send me reinforcements. Pass it on.’ By the time
the message arrived at the other end, it had been transformed to,
‘We’re going to a dance, send me three-and-fourpence.’
This may be an old analogy, but it’s so true.
A story is often diluted and distorted as it travels down the line,
but if you are telling it from first hand experience it will be far more
vivid.
(c) The other reason for staying with the anecdote is that unless you’ve
addressed that audience before, they will not have heard the story, and
the previous speaker will not have told it.
HOW DO YOU CREATE AN ANECDOTE?
Life Experiences —Everything that happens in your life is potential material for
humour.
Penny Wynne was selling copier toner when she attended our inaugural
public course (The Astoundingly Effective Communication, Presentation & Life
Skills Course). The only other job in which she’d been involved was working
behind the counter at a pharmacy.
At the end of the day, to my amazement, she came up and said, “Ron,
you’ve changed my life! I’ve made a decision. I’m going on at The Comedy
Store [a stand-up comedy club in Sydney].
“When?” I asked.
“Wednesday week, and I’m telling all my friends, so I have to do it.”
I advised Penny not to tell a string of jokes, but rather look at life events
that she could look at in a funny way, and that she should deliver the stories as
if she’s talking to a few friends, extending her ‘ki’ or ‘chi’ energy around the
200 or so people, 40 of which, as it turned out, were her supporters.
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Being New Talent Night, she only had to do five minutes, but that length of
time can be an eternity in front of a room full of people who have had a few
drinks and expect big laughs.
Penny spoke about some of her disastrous dating experiences. She ridiculed
the men she was describing and because she also showed her own vulnerability,
she slayed them, or in her own words, they ‘loved her’.
A year later, Penny became pregnant and wrote a 15 minute routine about
it.
After one of her routines at The Harold Park Hotel, another female comic
came up, looked at Penny’s six-month bulge and said,
“Some people will do anything for a routine.”
The next step was obvious.
On the night after the birth of her daughter, I visited Penny in the hospital
with another student. I told Penny that we could only stay for a short while, as
I was putting Lynne on at an ‘open mike’ night at a comedy club later that
night.
As Penny raised her head, her eyes lit up.
“You’ve written a routine about the birth, haven’t you?” I asked.
“Well, I’ve been lying around here for days; I had to do something didn’t
I?”
“You want to come with us, don’t you?”
At that point, the eyes of the six people in the room slowly converged onto
her husband, Chris.
Chris erupted. “Penny! The kid is barely a day old. Don’t you think you
should look after it for a while before you go off doing routines about it?”
By looking at three areas of her life experiences, Penny was able to compile
45 minutes of solid comedy.
She now runs her own company that stages performances and spruiking at
shopping centres, employing a staff of 18, including her partner.
I once went out with a woman who, in two years inspired a limitless amount of
comedy material.
Such lines as, “Let them have their argument in peace”, “Just turn left here
and park anywhere there’s a vacant space” and “I want to be by myself, but I
want you here too” were typical of the dialogue we engaged in over two years.
On describing Priscilla Queen of the Desert: “They dress up—as transvestites”,
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Humour • 147
and “That’s the last time I cook you a takeaway meal.” Thank you Caroline.
Remember, the best source of comedy is your own life, mainly any
occurrence that has changed your perceptions.
Steady Eddie is a comedian who has cerebral palsy. My favourite line of his is,
Why do people stare at me when I get onto an aeroplane?
Is it my limp?
Is it my deformed arm?
Is it my dribble?
Is it my pilot’s uniform?
Use your own experiences and perceptions of people and issues to express your
curiosity and views of the world.
THE NEWS
When touring, I always read the business pages of the morning newspaper
over breakfast. If you’re observant, a headline will leap out at you, begging to
be turned into part of that day’s presentation.
This concept is not new; remember Lenny Bruce and Mort Sarl?
Topical humour is a way of creating immediate rapport with your audience.
During one visit to the US, for example, there was a headline announcing
that a man in North Carolina went skydiving, and guess what he forgot to put
on? You guessed it; his parachute.
This was too good to pass up, so I said,
Did you read this item in your local paper this morning? Some guy
went skydiving in North Carolina and forgot to put on his parachute!
To me it would be a priority.
Can you imagine him preparing for the jump, saying to himself,
‘Let’s see, I’ve got my parachute pants, got my parachute jacket,
got my parachute helmet, got my parachute goggles … Ready’.
They fly to an altitude of 10,000 feet. He hangs onto the wing
strut. He releases. He arches. He freefalls. He feels to pull the ripcord.
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No ripcord.
He rechecks, ‘Hmmm, let’s see, parachute pants, parachute
jacket, parachute helmet, parachute goggles … PARACHUTE!!!’
Humour is an affirmation of dignity, a declaration of
man’s superiority to all that befalls him.
— Roman Gary —
WHAT HURTS?
Sometimes an effective way to write material is to focus on life experiences that
were and are painful. Why?
One of Australia’s finest female comics, Rhonda Carling-Rodgers, split up with
her partner of eight years.
How should a comic cope with such a situation, especially when people
with whom you are in contact seem to believe you should always be ‘up’.
Did she wallow in self-pity?
Did she drop out of the scene until she felt better?
No. Rhonda wrote a routine about it; not a bitter and twisted account of
her ex-partner and men in general, but a reflective fondness that pointed out
both their frailties especially her vulnerability.
We also had the pleasure of hearing about the time she had to purchase her
partner’s haemorrhoid cream.
This not only looked at a painful situation from a more positive perspective,
but also proved to be cathartic.
Penny Wynne, after an absence of a year-and-a-half from performing, asked, “I
don’t want to perform the old material; what will I talk about?”
“What do you fear most to divulge to a group of strangers?”
She told me and I suggested she write a routine about it. She did and
performed it in front of about 120 people.
Walk the edge; it will give you clarity.
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Humour • 149
Take your work seriously, but take yourself lightly.
— Ron Lee —
The Corporate Ninja
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151
The Power of Intuition
A moment’s insight is worth a life’s experience.
— Cowper —
How many times have you thought of someone, the telephone rings and you
say to the caller, “I was just thinking of you!”?
On a summer’s day in 1985, I was walking by a shop owned by a clairvoyant
named Victor Voets. At the time I was extremely sceptical of astrology,
numerology and clairvoyancy and other forms associated with the occult, but
in the window I saw some attractive pieces of pottery.
My cousin is a professional potter, and I wondered if it was her work, and
if it wasn’t, perhaps he should be given the opportunity of having her work. In
other words, I entered the shop, which was a time warp back to the 1960s,
ready to do a sales job for my cousin.
At the time, Victor looked like the popular visual interpretation of Jesus,
although he has since come to resemble Rasputin and more recently, David
Crosby of Crosby, Stills and Nash.
As we started to talk, Victor told me my year of birth, at which I shrugged
and was mildly surprised but unimpressed. About three minutes later, he told
me my date of birth. Now I was impressed, so we arranged a consultation.
He told me the types of events that had occurred in the past two years,
including well-defined and specific changes in attitude; occurrences about which
only I knew.
During that consultation, he said, “You make most, if not all of your
decisions based on logic, don’t you?”
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“Yes.”
“You make the wrong decision about 50% of the time?”
“Yes.”
“You’re a very evolved logical being; this is why rationality and reason
play such a big part, but you’re also highly-evolved intuitively. Why don’t you
try spending a month listening to the inner voice and going with your intuition?”
Not wanting to be half-hearted about it, all of my major decisions for the
following two years were guided by the inner voice, gut feel, or whatever you
would like to call it, and every one of these major decisions turned out to be
correct.
Some of the more sceptical readers may question the existence of ‘the inner
voice’, but when you read the term in the last paragraph, the inner voice was
that part of your consciousness that said, ‘I don’t have an inner voice’.
I have consulted Victor every year since then, and two years ago I saw that
he had a stand full of new age mood music titles, Waterfalls, Rainforest, Pan
Pipes, etc. At the end of one of the rows, there was a CD recorded from the
original masters by Del Shannon.
I laughed and said, “How come you have Del Shannon in this group of
spiritual CDs?”
Victor smiled with a warm certainty and said, “Del’s spiritual.”
All I could do was return the smile and reflect on Del Shannon’s influence
on my generation of rock ‘n’ rollers.
Yes, indeed Del was spiritual.
Since that first meeting with Victor, I came to realise, with greater certainty, that
the ‘sixth sense’ enhances and magnifies the other five.
Psychic phenomena most frequently occur when in a state of gratitude [see
the chapter on Gratitude].
The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind
is a faithful servant. We have created a society that
honours the servant and has forgotten the gift.
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153
The Power of Kaizen
If a man has not been seen for three days, his
friends should take a good look at him to see what
changes have befallen him
— Ancient Japanese saying —
Kaizen is a Japanese word meaning gradual and orderly continuous
improvement. The Kaizen business strategy involves everyone in an
organisation working together to make improvements without large capital
investments.
Kaizen, as originally defined in the book, KAIZEN, the Key to Japan’s
Competitive Success, by Masaaki Imai, is:
continuing improvement in personal life, home life, social life, and
working life.
It is a culture of sustained continuous improvement focusing on eliminating
waste in all systems and processes of an organisation.
The strategy begins and ends with people. Involved leadership guides
people to continuously improve their ability to meet expectations of high quality,
low cost, and on-time delivery.
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Two Elements of Kaizen
The two elements are improvement/change for the better and ongoing/
continuity. The expression of ‘business as usual’ contains the element of
continuity without improvement. On the other hand, the expression of
‘breakthrough’ contains the element of change or improvement without
continuity. Both parts are necessary.
As far as our individual lives are concerned, Kaizen is very natural to
individual, continuous improvement in the seven areas of life. Everybody
deserves to, and would benefit by improving himself/herself continually.
Three functions should happen simultaneously within any individual and
organisation: Maintenance, Innovation, and Kaizen.
Not a day should go without some kind of improvement being made
somewhere in the company and in personal life.
Tips for Kaizen Activities
1.
Discard conventional fixed ideas.
2.
Think of how to do it, not why it cannot be done.
3.
Do not make excuses. Start by questioning current practices.
4.
Do not seek perfection. Do it right away even if for only 50% of target.
5.
If you make a mistake, correct it immediately.
6.
Wisdom is brought out when faced with hardship.
7.
Ask WHY? five times and seek root causes.
8.
Seek the wisdom of ten people rather than the knowledge of one.
9.
Ideas are infinite.
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Kaizen • 155
If you want one year of prosperity, grow seeds,
If you want ten years of prosperity, grow trees,
If you want one hundred years of prosperity, grow
people
— Chinese proverb —
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157
The Power of Knowledge
The best leaders lead by example … if the leader
excels it is because he has superior intelligence.
Knowledge is power—knowledge of how to lead,
knowledge of the lie of the land, knowledge of how
to fight and win and knowledge about the enemy.
— Ashida Kim —
in Ninja Cloak & Dagger
The better armed you are with information about the opposition, the competition
and your own team, the better-equipped and more confident you will be
regarding the action that is to be taken.
In the Sun Tzu classic, The Art of War,
Know your enemy, know yourself, and your victory will not be
threatened. Know the terrain, know the weather, and your victory
will be complete.
and
The highest skill is to subdue the enemy without fighting … the
opportunity for victory is provided by the enemy.
Yes, knowledge is power, but to possess knowledge is only a part of the plan. It
has to be assimilated and manifest itself in the character of the practitioner.
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A man who has attained mastery of an art reveals it in
his every action.
In professional speaking circles it is known as ‘walking the talk’, although I
prefer to believe it is ‘approaching the talk’. If you have already achieved the
desired objective, there is nowhere to go; you may as well quit.
To know and to act are one and the same.
— Wan Yang Ming —
The Bushido code required knowledge to be a means to the attainment of
wisdom; it was never to be an end in itself.
Learning without thought is labour lost;
thought without learning is perilous.
— Confucius —
In the performing arts you can distinguish the ‘technical’ actors from the
‘method’ actors because the technical actors have learnt their lines and deliver
them accompanied by an appropriate emotion. The method actor not only learns
the dialogue, but also feels the experience of the character that has taken hold.
Think De Niro, think Hoffman, think Pacino.
Most soap opera acting is ‘technical’, partly because of lack of preparation
time for the actors, and the result is a contrived performance that comes off as
melodramatic.
Watching Rainman for the first time, while being taken on the journey, I
couldn’t imagine anyone other than Hoffman playing that role, and at the same
time couldn’t imagine Hoffman playing any other role. You knew that no matter
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Knowledge • 159
what happened to the character, the responses would be totally consistent.
When Judy Davis was required to play the role of a commando she lived with
commandos for six months prior to the shooting of the movie so her
subconscious would guide her, resulting in a more natural and credible
portrayal.
Just as knowing the character from the inside is of benefit to an actor, having
knowledge of all aspects relevant to our purpose, neglecting nothing,
irrespective of how trivial it may seem, is crucial to the pursuit of our dreams.
Technical knowledge is not enough. One must
transcend techniques so that the art becomes an
artless art, growing out of the unconscious.
— Daisetsu Suzuki —
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161
The Power of Laughter
Mirth is like a flash of lightning that breaks through
a gloom of clouds and glitters for a moment;
cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the
mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual
serenity.
— Joseph Addison —
At the end of most episodes of The Samurai, apart from the ‘to be continued …’
ones, Shintaro and Tombei laugh at some incident that we also find amusing to
some degree, but it didn’t matter, because when Shintaro laughed, we laughed.
What are the benefits of laughter?
— Laughter increases the body’s flow of beneficial compounds.
— Children, on average, laugh about 400 times per day, adults about 15
times.
— Laughing is aerobic, exercising the diaphragm and increasing the body’s
ability to utilise oxygen.
— Increases immunity to infections by instantly increasing a flood of
disease—fighting cells and proteins into the blood.
— Brain wave activity changes when we catch the punchline of a joke.
— Frequent laughter helps control pain, lower blood pressure and relieve
stress.
— Laughter boosts the immune system and triggers a flood of pleasureinducing neurochemicals.
— It increases muscle flexion and triggers a flood of beta endorphins, the
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brain’s morphine compounds that can induce a sense of euphoria.
— Natural killer cells that destroy viruses and tumours increase during
states of mirth.
— Levels of gamma-interferon, a disease-fighting protein, rise with
laughter, as do B-cells which produce disease-destroying antibodies.
The most wasted day of all is that on which we have
not laughed.
— Sebastian-Roch Nicolas Chamfort —
People who are typically hostile and anger-prone are more likely to suffer heart
attacks and sudden death because stress hormones bombard the hearts of hostile
people. Stress hormones suppress the immune system, raise blood pressure
and increase the number of sticky cells that cause obstructions in the arteries.
In other words, laughing is good for you, but laughing alone isn’t enough.
I was once invited to a ‘laughter workshop’ in which participants were asked
to perform different types of laughs. They initially simply executed the laughter
as instructed by the facilitator. Then there were games involving balloons and
streamers to try to evoke laughter. I perceived the situation as a room full of
sad people trying to have a good time.
Laughter is great, but there must be genuine motivation to stimulate the
laughter.
There isn’t a person I know who doesn’t feel sensational after a good laugh.
[See the chapter on Humour]
There is nothing left to you at this moment but to have
a good laugh.
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163
The Power of Listening
A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but
after a while he knows something.
— Wilson Misner —
In any negotiation or conversation, the most powerful strategy you can employ
is to listen.
In the early 1970s I was invited with my wife to afternoon tea. There was only
one other male there, so we gravitated towards each other. Remember, this was
an era in which the women gathered to talk about their children, the home, and
shopping, and the men would discuss the more important topics of religion,
politics, sport and sex.
I asked him what he did for a living, and he said, “I’m a microbiologist
with the CSIRO.”
“Really, in which area is your research?”
“Salmonella.”
“Isn’t that the bacteria that’s found in undercooked chicken and can cause
gastroenteritis?” [This was the extent of my knowledge on the subject, as
information about it was not known in the broader community at that time.]
“Yes, it is.”
“Is it found anywhere else?”
“As a matter of fact, it’s found in several other areas …”
He spoke for about ten minutes on the places and circumstances in which
Salmonella was to be seen.
This prompted another question. His answer encouraged another question,
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and another, and another.
The conversation, or at least the monologue interrupted by my occasional
inquiry, lasted about one-and-a-half hours during which I gained a substantial
amount of information.
When the function was coming to a close, I thanked him, and as Margaret
and I were leaving, he said, “Wait a minute! No-one outside our research unit
knows as much about Salmonella as you do. How did you acquire that much
knowledge?”
“You have to keep your eyes and ears open to expand your general
knowledge, especially in today’s world, don’t you? I enjoyed our talk.”
He was still shaking his head in bewilderment as we departed.
Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative
force. The friends who listen to us are the ones we
move toward. When we are listened to, it creates us,
makes us unfold and expand.
— Karl Menninger (1893–1990) —
US psychiatrist
Active Listening
I knew a woman whose social skills were unequalled by anyone I have met,
before or since.
Jacqueline and I would attend a social function and she would engage a
person in conversation and make them feel like a king or queen, and naturally,
their impression of her was extremely favourable.
How did she do this?
She asked questions, a lot of questions, then listened intently as if that person
was the only person in the entire world. She was absolutely enthralled, riveted
to every word.
When they answered, she would look at them as if they were all that
mattered in the world; nothing else existed in her field of awareness, and she
would respond appropriately with, “Really!?” and “Aren’t you clever!?” and
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Listening • 165
“How did think of that?” She seemed totally fascinated by their presence and
personality.
The fact that she had enormous smiling brown eyes wasn’t exactly a
disadvantage either.
After one particular dinner party, we were driving home and I remarked
that the man who was sitting next to her had an interesting story to tell.
“Who was that?” she asked.
“Bill, the fellow with whom you were fascinated for most of the evening.
He started up those businesses by himself, he overcame two divorces and other
hardships, and the projects he’s working on now could be quite significant
further down the track.”
“Oh, really? I don’t remember everything that people say to me; it was just
a conversation.”
She was involved in the fashion industry and much of her persona was
merely surface affectation, but it shows how powerful listening can be; Bill
thought he had made a lasting impression.
Sincerity. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made
— George Burns —
Bushido Negotiation
An American businessman wants to do some business with a Japanese
corporation. He contacts the company to arrange a meeting with the appropriate
person and is politely invited to visit the headquarters in Tokyo.
He arrives slightly before the appointed time and is politely asked to sit in
the waiting area.
He waits.
He waits about two hours.
He asks the receptionist if the person with whom he is meeting has forgotten
that he is there.
He is reassured.
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He is becoming somewhat anxious, and his contact finally emerges. They
go into the boardroom where the host offers green tea and initiates small talk
about the American’s family, some unimportant and trivial aspects of his
business and changes in the weather, both in Japan and in the USA.
The American becomes increasingly impatient and blurts out his entire
range of intentions regarding the prospects of a Trans-Pacific import-export
deal, right down to the most minute detail.
The Japanese counterpart asks many and varied questions relating to the
information so generously shared by the American.
After the American has expressed his company’s desires, the Japanese
knows everything; how much does the American know?
The Japanese knows everything and the American knows nothing.
POWER lies in intensive and active listening.
Often, being spoken to has little effect on a listener, being listened to, has a
profound effect on a speaker.
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Listening • 167
Never miss a good chance to shut up.
— Anonymous —
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169
The Power of Love
You will find as you look back upon your life that the
moments when you have really lived are the
moments when you have done things
in the spirit of love.
— Henry Drummond —
There is no force stronger than love. That is the beginning, the middle and the
end.
‘Love’ doesn’t mean being ‘in love’ or lust or infatuation, but rather
unconditional love without judgement. As surely as night follows day,
infatuation will lead to resentment.
Unconditional love is absolute and unqualified acceptance, appreciation
and gratitude for another person.
Carl Jung said that we are all connected, so why wouldn’t we acknowledge
and appreciate one another?
Besides, we are all on a quest to find love, validation and unconditional
acceptance, not according to what we aspire to become, but rather for what we
are. There isn’t an individual in this world to which this doesn’t apply.
Love has power to give in a moment what toil can
scarcely reach in an age.
— Johann W von Goethe —
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171
The Power of Meditation
Only in quiet waters things mirror themselves
undistorted. Only in a quiet mind is adequate
perception of the world.
— Hans Margolius —
T’ai Ch'i or Qi Gong
T’ai Ch'i Chu’an, or taijiquan is an ancient Chinese form of co-ordinated body
movements focusing on the cultivation of internal energy ‘ch’i’ or ‘qi’.
Its aim is to harmonise the mind, body and spirit, promoting both mental
and physical well-being through softness and relaxation.
When practised correctly the movements of t’ai ch'i appear to be rhythmical,
effortless and in a continuous flow.
With the practice of t’ai ch'i the student becomes revitalised, relaxed,
resilient, self-confident and stronger and healthier in both mind and body. Unlike
most forms of exercise and sport, t’ai ch'i does not rely on strength, force and
speed, making it ideal for people of both sexes, young and old alike whether
physically strong or weak. It is this approach that makes t’ai ch'i such a unique
art, and one that brings benefits in many areas.
People usually practise t’ai ch'i for one or both of two reasons, namely health,
relaxation and stress-relief, or self-defence.
Even with a small amount of practise, you will find beneficial effects to
your health and fitness. The mind and body relaxes, helping to combat the
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stresses of modern society. It gently tones and strengthens the muscles, improves
balance and posture and relieves some medical conditions such as
cardiovascular, respiratory and digestive disorders.
Through its long history, there are many reports of improvements and even
cure of some medical conditions such as hypertension, gastric, heart and
musculoskeletal disorders.
One spring morning in The Blue Mountains, west of Sydney in New South
Wales, I was walking along a bush track with a friend and sometimes
co-presenter, Teresa Brett. To explain the relevance and relativity, I should let
you know that Teresa is a fitness trainer, having set up health spas and fitness
centres in five-star hotels and resorts across Australia. She also lectures at the
Fitness Institute, and if that’s not enough, she was a grand finalist in the
international series of The Gladiators.
Teresa’s motivation for the walk was exercise, and mine was meditation.
She was talking and walking a few metres ahead when I felt a strong compulsion
to take a couple of steps off the track, and began to do some moving meditation.
Upon realising that I had stopped, Teresa walked back, waited for me to finish,
and asked, “What are you doing?”
I told her that I sensed a powerful concentration of energy, a magnetic field
that was almost riveting.
“Let me try; show me what to do”, she insisted.
I showed her three types of movements, and upon performing one of them,
she excitedly exclaimed, “Wow! I can feel it surging through my entire body.
This is amazing!”
This experience was a catalyst for feeling the energy that is at our disposal
at any time.
Directed by concentrated and relaxed breathing and visualisation, the
energy will reach every part of your body to provide relief from ailments, often
even chronic conditions.
There have been many misconceptions about t’ai ch’i’s practical use for selfdefence, the art being often only regarded as a health and fitness exercise. Each
movement of the form has a logical practical combat application. If a posture
cannot be used, the form is incorrect.
Developing skill in this form of self-defence requires firm dedication and
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Meditation • 173
persistent correct practice. With such practice women and men can attain equal
proficiency, as skill is not restricted to size, strength and speed. Raw muscle
and physical strength are less important here than in other forms of martial
arts. At a higher level, internal martial arts movements simultaneously achieve
the apparent paradox of effortlessness and extraordinary power. The subtlety
of such skill cannot be adequately described, only experienced, although it takes
longer to become proficient in t’ai ch'i as a form of self-defence than other martial
arts.
While once conducting executive experiential training at the annual global
conference of a large multinational computer corporation, there was an exercise
in which I instructed a physically small woman (about 90 pounds or 41 kilos)
to kneel on the floor, sitting on her heels. I stood in front of her with both of my
hands resting on her shoulders, and gently pushed her backwards and
downwards at an angle of about 45 degrees. It didn’t require much effort to
push her over. I then asked her to resist me, and it took a little more strength to
achieve the same result.
The third part of the exercise involved her total relaxation, visualisation,
breathing, focus and concentration of energy flow. Pushing as hard as I could,
she could not be moved. At this point, you’re probably thinking the same thing
as the rest of the participants on that day, as they looked incredulously at the
scene played out before their eyes. I looked around the room and asked Eric, by
far the largest man present (about 255 pounds or 116 kilos) to come out to assist.
He did exactly as I did, but with much more physical power. As his feet
were slipping on the carpet, two of the other male participants sat behind him
and positioned their feet behind for greater leverage. The veins in Eric’s neck
were bulging and it was clear he was genuinely trying, but Leanne was
immovable.
At the completion of this seemingly unbelievable feat, Eric told me that he
had played in the front row for South African Rugby, and that, in pushing
Leanne, he had used enough force to shift a rugby scrum machine. Such is the
power of t’ai ch'i energy.
When performing t’ai ch'i it is important to relax and unlock your joints; if they
locked, and your muscles are tight, they will block the flow of energy. To
demonstrate this concept, please lift a glass or a cup and put it down again.
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Next, be aware of that side of your body and flex the neck muscles on that
side. Now flex the shoulder muscles, then the biceps, then the forearm, then be
aware of flexing every muscle in the wrist and hand, right down to the fingertips,
so that you are as strong as possible. While in that state, lift the glass or cup. It’s
more difficult, because the power of the mind and the breath is much greater
than physical muscle.
Such are the benefits of t’ai ch’i and qigong.
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Meditation • 175
Stop thinking that meditation is anything special.
Stop thinking altogether.”
– Surya Singer —
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177
The Power of the
Mind/Body Connection
You give birth to that on which you fix your mind.
— Antoine de Saint-Exupery —
The mind moves the body, and not vice-versa. If a person is bound and gagged
to the point of absolute physical immobility, does this mean that the mind is
also restrained? On the contrary, to compensate, the mind will be much more
active. The mind will not follow a still body.
On the other hand, a composed spirit and a calmed mind will promote a
relaxed body.
There is the story of a seventy-year-old Hawaiian man who was learning
aikido for the purpose of mind/body co-ordination. Whilst driving, he was
focussing his breathing to his ‘hara’ (Japanese) or ‘tan-tien’ (Chinese). On a
mountain road, a truck suddenly appeared from around a bend. It was raining,
the car slid, and the vehicles collided head-on. The front of the car was crushed,
and, in the normal sequence of events, the steering wheel would have crushed
the old man’s chest, but he was completely unhurt. The steering wheel was
twisted by the man’s hands. By unifying mind and body, the extraordinary can
become commonplace.
Russia has spent enormous amounts of money on weapons to defend the
nation. That country was also jailing poets, writers and even jazz musicians.
It’s not artillery that is dangerous to a government, it’s ideas
In other chapters I have described seemingly superhuman feats
accomplished by participants in my workshops, but they are simply a matter
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of the mind leading the body. Indeed, it is mind over matter.
A physically larger person being unable to lift a smaller person, a physically
larger person being unable to push a smaller person, a physically larger person
being overpowered by a smaller person, Susie Maroney spending 39 hours
swimming from Miami to Cuba. Described before the fact, many people might
believe these achievements to be physically impossible, but if the mind doesn’t
know it can’t be done, the body will do it anyway.
The story of the child being trapped under a car described in the Energy
chapter illustrates this perfectly.
Not he is great who can alter matter,
but he who can alter my state of mind.
— Emerson —
The mind-body connection was, with the inspiration of Rene Descartes,
supported in Europe by historian, mathematician, philosopher, scientist, and
diplomat Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716) in the seventeenth century.
In the Système nouveau de la nature (1695) and the Eclaircissement du nouveau
sisteme (1696), Leibniz presented the famous articulation of psychophysical
parallelism in which he adapted an occasionalist metaphor to support the view
that soul and body exist in a pre-established harmony. Comparing soul and
body to two clocks that agree perfectly, Leibniz argued that there are only three
possible sources for this agreement. It may occur through mutual influence
(interactionism), through the efforts of a skilled workman who regulates the
clocks and keeps them in accord (occasionalism), or by virtue of the fact that
they have been so constructed from the outset that their future harmony is
assured (parallelism). Leibniz rejects interactionism because it is impossible to
conceive of material particles passing from one substance to the other and
occasionalism as invoking the intervention of a Deus ex machina in a natural
series of events. All that remains is parallelism—the notion that mind and body
exist in a harmony that has been pre-established by God from the moment of
creation.
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Mind/Body Connection • 179
The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a
heaven of hell and a hell of heaven.
— John Milton —
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181
The Power of Mission
The greater part of all the mischief in the world
arises from the fact that men do not sufficiently
understand their own aims.
— Johann Goethe —
Crucial to the success of any endeavour is The Mission.
According to the Oxford Dictionary, a ‘mission’ is a journey in pursuit of
one’s duty or purpose.
In history, groups of individuals that clearly personified ‘mission’ were the
Ninja.
The Ninja were a secret society of mercenary assassins who became active
in the Heian Period that ran from 794 to 1185, and they continue to be active to
this day.
In his classic, The Art of War, Chinese general Sun Tzu wrote,
send your spies and mercenaries far ahead of the army proper, that
they might create unrest, confusion and fear among the enemy.
The Ninja clans became so powerful that in 1579, the warlord Oda Nobunaga
sent an expedition to fight them, but was soundly defeated. In 1581 he led a
force of 46,000 men against the 4,000 Ninja in the prefecture of Iga, but it was
not until the seventeenth century that the Tokugawa Shogun banned the practice
of the Ninja or its mention under the penalty of death.
The subsequent execution of much of the population of the notoriously
feared Koga clan ensured the secrecy of the art.
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The primary work of the Ninja is espionage.
Know the enemy as thyself and in one thousand
battles you will be successful.
— Sun-Tzu —
The Ninja were/are sent to hostile or potentially hostile areas to accumulate
information that will be of use in carrying out operations in that area. Secondary
agendas may include sabotage or the creation of confusion, but main mission is
to gather intelligence.
Why were the Ninja so powerful? In a word, they were focused; their mission
was clear.
1.
Strive for perfection of character.
Polish the personality and develop skills that enable one to blend with
dissimilar types of people as well as with the surroundings.
2.
Foster the spirit of effort.
Encourage others who seek to improve themselves and give them
positive reinforcement. Acknowledging the good gives one a pleasant
outlook and gentle disposition.
3.
Defend the paths of truth.
The real truth to be defended is the right of a person to choose their
own pathway to understanding.
4.
Honour the principles of etiquette.
The rules of interpersonal relationships vary from nation to nation, but
he who treats others with respect is seldom labelled a troublemaker.
5.
Guard against impetuous courage.
Guard against the urge to fight when struck. Hold back from espousing
one’s philosophy to those who do not know, care nor understand.
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Mission • 183
This mission statement is to be executed with subtlety and invisibility.
A few members of the Koga clan survived, but they are carefully incognito,
living in isolated areas of the world, and placing little or no importance on
material possessions nor ego fulfilment.
The wind stirs the surface of a lake, thus the effects of
the unseen upon the visible are manifest.
— Ninja saying —
There are sometimes impediments to the execution of the Mission, and it may
seem elementary, and it’s surprising to see the number of people who use the
band-aid approach.
—
Don’t treat symptoms by setting up systems to address symptoms.
—
Treat the cause.
—
Ensure your mission is clear.
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Exercise
To know where you are going it is essential to know where you are now.
For this exercise, we will refer to the seven areas of life as:
1.
Career
2.
Finance
3.
Family / Relationships
4.
Intellectual
5.
Physical
6
Social
7.
Spiritual
According to social analysts seven levels of conscious exist.
LOVE TO
ACTUALISATION
SPIRITUAL
CHOOSE TO
SELF-FULFILMENT
DESIRE TO
SELF-ESTEEM
WANT TO
SOCIALLY ACCEPTABLE
OUGHT TO
SECURITY-MOTIVATED
NEED TO
SURVIVAL MODE
HAVE TO
DESPERATION
Using this scale, please place the seven areas of existence according to your current
attitudes.
From here we have a base from which to work.
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Mission • 185
The four most common questions of existence are:
1.
Where did I come from?
2.
Where will I go?
3.
Why am I here?
4.
Who am I?
The inner strength that we possess, the success that we achieve and our ability to
communicate are to a degree determined by our understanding of our position in the
big picture.
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Exercise
Please write down your mission statement, either in the corporate sense or in your
personal life. That is, what action are you going to take in order to fulfil your life purpose?
My mission is to:
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Mission • 187
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189
The Power of the Moment
Paradise is where I am.
— Voltaire —
Most of you will have heard of the term, ‘being in the moment’, and ‘seize the
moment’, but what do they mean?
A small child might spill the sugar bowl on the floor, and has no perception
of right or wrong, good or bad, no past regrets or future hopes, it’s just there,
playing.
In the theatre, the actors, for their own sanity, need to make the twohundredth performance as fresh as the first, so they will listen to the dialogue
as if they hadn’t heard it before and will respond to the other actors with the
spontaneity that they would experience in everyday life.
In a martial arts tournament, the combatants will assume the opening
fighting stance and they may be in that position for a minute or two. One will
suddenly rush in and it’s all over. The uninitiated might think sarcastically—
how exciting, I’ll come back for more of this.
The fact is, they are eyeballing each other, waiting for ‘the gap’. The gap is
a lapse in focus or concentration where one of them will momentarily look
away or lose concentration for an instant. It may manifest in the form of glazed
eyes. When the gap presents itself, your chances of winning are high if you are
aware enough to see it and act on it.
The opportunity for victory is provided by the enemy.
— Sun-Tzu —
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This is a more extreme and critical example of the importance of being in the
moment, but the principle is just as relevant to business and personal life today.
The principle of The Moment is also important in our perceptions of other
people and events.
If we go back to the triangle, pyramid or cone, the fundamentalists’
pendulum will swing from awareness of the past to awareness of the future.
The past is naturally associated with regret and guilt, and the future is associated
with fear.
To live too much in the future is to dilute the present. After all, don’t we
live in the present? Isn’t life a series of moving from one present moment to
another?
Higher Awareness
<
>
Emotional
kinetic swings
The Past
Regret & Guilt
The Future
Fear
The Present
In the moment
Vibrational
Potential
Energy
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The Moment • 191
Many people move from guilt to fear and back and forth, and these emotional
swings cause stress and disease. When you’re in the moment it’s impossible to
experience fear or guilt; all that is possible is appreciation.
Organised religion uses fear and guilt to control the masses, creating codependence on the Church in order to sustain the Church.
Ensure that whatever you are doing in the moment is exactly what you are
doing in the moment, and that you are at one with yourself and the activity.
The only way to eliminate fear and guilt is to bring ourselves into a state of
presence, or being in the moment. [See the chapter on The Power of Gratitude.]
After breakfast one morning in the ninth century AD, a monk approached Zen
master Joshu Jushin and said, “I have just entered this monastery. Please teach
me.”
“Have you eaten your rice porridge yet?”
“Yes, I have.”
“Then you had better wash your bowl.”
There is nothing mysterious about presence or being in the moment.
We spent all of our time in the present, so it is crucial to be there while you
are there.
To finish the moment, to find the journey’s end in every
step of the road, to live the greatest number of good
hours, is wisdom.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson —
There was once a Zen master known throughout the land for his great wisdom.
He was very old, and on his deathbed. His followers travelled from far and
wide to be near him and have a chance to hear his last words of wisdom.
A young disciple, staying by his bedside, cried, “Master, what can I do to
make you more comfortable?”
The great master said, “Please go to the village and fetch me a poppy seed
cake.”
“But master”, the young man cried, “I would not want to miss your last
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words of wisdom”.
But the master repeated, “Please fetch me a poppy seed cake. This is my
last wish”.
So the young man ran to the village and rushed from booth to booth until
he finally found a nice, fresh poppy seed cake. He brought it back to the great
master, and the old man very weakly took it in his hand and slowly began to
eat it.
Then the young man, seeing how weak his master was, cried out, “Master,
what is the greatest lesson you can teach me before you leave this life?”
The master replied, “This poppy seed cake is delicious!”
One of the greatest lessons to understand is to be in the moment, whatever you
are doing.
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The Moment • 193
The happiness of life is made up of minute fractions—
the little, soon forgotten charities of a kiss or smile, a
kind look, a heart-felt compliment, and the countless
infinitesimals of pleasurable and genial feeling.
— Samuel Taylor Coleridge —
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195
The Power of Politeness & Courtesy
To win one hundred victories in one hundred battles
is not the highest skill. To subdue the enemy
without fighting is the highest skill.
— Sun-Tzu —
According to the code of Bushido, politeness is a poor virtue if it is actuated
only by a fear of offending good taste. Rather, it should stem from a sympathetic
and empathetic regard for the feelings of others. In its highest form, politeness
approaches love.
The end of all etiquette is to so cultivate your mind that
even when you are quietly seated, not the roughest
ruffian can dare make onset on your person.
— Ogasawara —
Think of the last time you entered someone else’s office and were offered coffee,
tea or another type of refreshment.
As the recipient, did you feel:
(a) welcome?
(b) considered?
(c) relaxed?
(d) all of the above?
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When someone entered your office and they were offered refreshment, did you
feel:
(a) gratified for making them feel welcome?
(b) as if you were opening the lines of communication?
(c) setting the mood for an effective and productive meeting?
(d) all of the above?
Gestures of courtesy, if sincere, set the scene for enjoyable and profitable
interaction.
[See the chapter on Listening.]
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Politeness & Courtesy • 197
Kindness in words creates confidence; kindness in
thinking creates profoundness, but kindness in giving
creates love."
— Lao Tsu —
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199
The Power of Reflection
Admiration is the polite recognition of another’s
resemblance to ourselves.
— Ambrose Bierce —
You will like, and even be infatuated with others when they manifest the
characteristics that you consciously or unconsciously admire and possess
yourself.
You will dislike others when they manifest the ‘negative’ characteristics
that you consciously or unconsciously dislike, but possess. You perceive these
traits in yourself but have not yet learnt to accept them as part of your being.
Once you have acknowledged them as a part of you, there will be an acceptance
and appreciation of the other person, which will neutralise any ‘charges’ you
have regarding that person. The bottom line will be that the person will no
longer be in control of you.
You cannot perceive a quality, either ‘negative’ or ‘positive’, in someone
else without perceiving it in yourself. To see it, you must have it.
The hackneyed saying asserts that if you are pointing one finger at another
person, three are pointing back at yourself. In metaphorical actuality, if you are
pointing one finger at another, one is pointing back at yourself; life is in complete
balance.
Have you ever caught yourself either vocally or mentally saying, ‘I don’t
like that person because they are … ‘ (insert any series of negative adjectives),
and contemplated that statement, realising that you may have been open to the
same assertions? We all have.
Whatever traits you recognise in another person, you possess yourself.
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Can this possibly be put in any other way?
He who sees all beings in his own self, and his own self in all beings,
loses all fear.
— Isa Upanishad —
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201
The Power of
Remembering Names
The small courtesies sweeten life; the greater,
ennoble it.
— C N Bovee —
Recall a time when you greeted someone by their name, having not seen them
for a period of time. Were they impressed? Were you impressed? You can be
sure that you were elevated in their mind purely because they thought they
were important enough to you to warrant remembering their name.
How many times have you heard someone say, ‘I just can’t remember
peoples’ names’, or, ‘I know the face, but I can’t remember the name’?
There was the story of writer and renowned wit Noel Coward
strolling down the footpath of a main thoroughfare in London. He
notices a middle aged woman coming towards him. As much as he
strains his recollective powers her name doesn’t come to him so he
pretends to be distracted by the displays in the shop windows. He
glances up to see the woman heading straight for him, and the ensuing
dialogue occurs:
“Mister Coward! How are you?”
“Er, very well thank you. Tell me … er, how is … er, your
husband?”
“He’s very well.”
“Oh … good, and … er, how are your … your … your children?
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Yes! How are your children?”
“They’re all well.”
“Oh … er, good. Tell me, what is your husband doing these
days?”
“He’s still KING.”
The fact is that names can be remembered more easily than you might think.
We choose whether we want to remember information or not; it’s simply a
matter of priority.
For example, if I say the number 437, and then ask you to forget it, can you
easily erase it from your mind? Because I’ve suggested that you forget, ignore,
overlook or disregard the number, it will remain in your thoughts and you’ll
probably still remember it by the time you’ve reached the end of this book.
If I say, ‘Don’t think of a banana’, what mental picture are you seeing? Are
you able to readily remove it from your consciousness?
Remembering anything has to do with triggers; in other words, another image
or anchor to remind you.
The Visual Connection
Sometimes a picture association will assist you in recalling a person’s name.
When you hear their name for the first time, attach them to a visual
image.
1
When you meet Nicholas, you might mentally see him in a Saint
Nicholas costume so every time you see him, you imagine him as Saint
Nick and the association will trigger recollection of the name.
2
The person may remind you of a friend or relative with the same name,
so when you are re-introduced you can imagine the two standing
together.
3
You might also see someone in a situation. If the person’s name is Matt,
you could imagine him lying on a doorstep. It’s an old gag, but
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Remembering Names • 203
sometimes the more absurd the connection, the more effectively it
works.
Alliteration
Another triggering technique is to use alliteration, by joining to the name
an adjective of the same initial, such as ‘Slippery Sam’, ‘Jolly John’, ‘Simple
Simon’ or ‘Pirate Pete’. You get the idea.
One of the most interesting examples of alliterative awareness occurred
during the telecast of the 1983 Amco Cup Rugby League Grand Final.
Commentator Ray Warren said to co-commentator and ex-footballer Keith
Barnes, “Keith, have you noticed how all the players with alliterative names
are doing well. You know, Mark Murray, Martin Meredith and Mal
Meninga.”
Keith replied, “Yes, and I’d add Des Morris to that list too, Ray.”
There was a pause.
Rhyming Association
A rhyming adjective, verb or noun may precede or follow the name— Jake
the Snake’, ‘Brenda the Gender Bender’, ‘Mikey the Bikie’, ‘Itchy Richie’.
In the Moment
In my opinion, the easiest and most effective technique for remembering
names is by being ‘in the moment’. [See also the chapter on Moment.]
‘In the moment’ is a term used in both acting and martial arts training. It
involves total concentration on whatever you’re doing at any time.
How many times have we been introduced to a group of people, and
while we’re shaking hands with one person, we’re looking at the next
person, or even beyond? By the time we’ve reached the end of the line,
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how many names have we remembered?
Next time, as you’re shaking hands make firm eye contact, and as soon
as you’ve heard their name, repeat it aloud in acknowledgement,
maintaining firm eye contact.
Just as the martial artist does not allow his attention to stray from the
eyes of his opponent, we are also able, socially and in business, to obtain a
great deal of information from this technique.
The eyes are the window to the psyche.
The Ball Game
At drama school we used to play a game that was designed to help us
remember names.
All that was needed was a group of people and a tennis ball, although
these days, in my seminars and workshops, I use a ‘swoosh’ ball.
We would stand in a circle and the person with the ball would say
someone’s name, then throw them the ball. It’s most important that the
person throwing the ball says the name so that the recipient has a split
second to acknowledge before the ball is tossed.
After everyone has been involved at least once, the rules are modified.
Each person makes up another name and then adopts that name, so the
players have to remember a new set of names and associations.
The players use ALLITERATION, IMAGERY, RHYMING ASSOCIATION or a combination of two or more to remember the new names.
The next step is to go back the original names but swap them so that
everyone now has someone else’s name.
At this point we play the game very quickly so that each player must
think and connect instantaneously.
At drama school we played with 25 people, and the game wasn’t
completed until everyone received the ball at least twice.
THE BALL GAME is an exercise in being in the moment, listening and
receiving others’ energy.
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Remembering Names • 205
Memory is not usually a case of a ‘good’ or a ‘bad’ memory; it’s a matter of
choice.
By the way, what was that number?
What was that piece of fruit?
Remember a person’s name, especially after a period of time, and you will make
an impression.
Gratitude is the heart’s memory.
— French proverb —
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207
The Power of Respect
Treat people as if they were what they ought to be,
and you help them to become what they are
capable of being.
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe —
In a martial arts tournament or in any kind of one-on-one sporting competition,
it is important not to underestimate the enemy. The opponent is to be respected
for his strength, ability, intelligence, agility, knowledge and power.
If you underestimate this person, you are more than likely to be defeated,
even if, on paper, you should have won. You will have been beaten by your
own complacency. A superior attitude will set you up for a fall.
How many times in life have you felt on top of the world, been carried
away with your short-term achievements and self-importance, only to be
brought down with a crash? Perhaps more than you would care to admit.
How many times have you sat across the desk from someone and thought—
you’re an idiot? The person feels that their point-of-view is valid, and if you
dismiss them as being less-than-intelligent or unworthy of your attention,
nothing will be accomplished.
If, however, you respect that person as having a valid and worthwhile
perspective, it is far easier to be empathetic, to ‘walk in another’s moccasins’,
to join them on their track, and to be able to bring them over to your track.
Before God we are equally wise, and equally foolish.
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A good friend of mine, Antony D Robb, is one of the world’s most successful
mediators. He was engaged by two multi-million dollar organisations to mediate
a 13-year-long dispute that had been ten years in litigation. It seemed that in
that time, the combined legal representations couldn’t see the issue to an
appropriate conclusion.
ADR was called in and, apart from the necessary paperwork, it was all
over in just three months.
I asked him about his attitude towards the two parties.
“I respected them totally before I began—and I still do.”
“Is that always the case?” I asked him.
“Absolutely,” he replied. Animals and people are entitled to respect until
they lose it by their own misconduct—and when that happens they need help
to restore.”
“Everyone?”
“Everyone—male and female, educated and uneducated, manual labourer
and professional, young and old, rich and poor. When I am not working, you
have seen me initiate communications with the whole range including postmen,
garbage men, children, dogs and horses. I do it always. When I mediate, my
task is not to judge but to communicate and help them through their dispute to
a practical answer that suits them well and allows them to move forward and
achieve without friction.”
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Respect • 209
Respect is love in plain clothes.
— Frankie Byrne —
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29/07/18, 08:01 AM
211
The Power of Self-image
What a man thinks of himself determines his fate.
— Thoreau —
For most of my life I wanted to be a tall Nordic blond because, I figured, they
were the ones who win the women. In fact, I am a five-foot, nine-inch Australianborn Chinese.
At the age of thirty-seven I came to the conclusion that the change was not
going to happen.
Coincidentally at that time I was introduced to an American marketing
woman named Dottie Walters. Coincidentally, I don’t believe in coincidences;
all is planned.
Dottie was, at that time, quite chronologically advantaged. She was, by
normal social perceptions, more than a little eccentric, and some suggested that
her name would not be challenged by Consumer Affairs, but Dottie had an
impressive track record in the USA. I believe that eccentricity is a prerequisite
for genius, and I have certainty that Dottie possesses both in large measure.
For a two-hour consultation in 1987 I paid her $300 that I couldn’t afford.
At that time I was a financial planner who was going broke. Because of a lack of
motivation, I would work, possibly half-an-hour, if that, each day. One month
I earned $150 when the mortgage was $1,600.
I told Dottie that I wanted to be a professional speaker at conferences. She
asked about my experiences and background. After telling her mainly about
the theatre work, I mentioned a fascination with comedy and an eight-year
interest in some of the martial arts.
Dottie stopped and her eyes suddenly lit up in a similar way to a cartoon
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character’s overhead lightbulb when it has a sudden bright idea.
“You have to be a mutant ninja turtle! You have to be a mutant ninja turtle!
You have to be a mutant ninja turtle!” she exclaimed with the exuberance of a
small child who has made a major life discovery.
“Yes, that sounds interesting”, I said with not even a degree of polite, feigned
interest. “What other ideas do you have?”
“You have to be a mutant ninja turtle!”
“Yes, I’ve taken that in, Dottie, now what other suggestions do you have?”
Her eyes lit up again. “You could have t-shirts, little swords and other
products related to a mutant ninja turtle!”
“OK, I’ve taken that on board, what else is there?” I asked with a note of
obvious frustration.
Dottie made a couple of minor recommendations, but she kept coming back
to the mutant ninja turtle concept.
Driving home, I couldn’t help but think, “I’ve just spent $300 that I don’t
have, on a loopy woman who persisted in asserting that my career should be
modelled on and governed by a cartoon character. She’s nuts! How could a
human mutant ninja turtle possibly work in companies? How would businesses
take me seriously? It would be different if we were talking about a corporate
ninja.”
“AHA!”
The illumination in Dottie’s eyes and the lightbulb above the cartoon
character’s head suddenly manifested itself in my brain, like a sense of clarity
and realisation of life purpose that was, until now, not experienced, at least by
me.
“That’s it! A corporate ninja, or perhaps The Corporate Ninja!”
A unique selling proposition was born.
Knowing others is wisdom, knowing yourself is
enlightenment.
— Lao-Tzu —
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Self-image • 213
At a time when I conducted public
shining and his face was glowing as a
courses on presentation skills, the senior
smile slowly extended from ear to ear.
managers of the IT division of a large
The smile lasted the rest of the day
multinational corporation were in the habit
and as Graeme was by far the youngest
of attending and sending selected staff
in the room, the others would say,
members.
“Pretty proud of yourself, aren’t
I received a call from one of the
you?”
managers who said he was sending a
young man who was a genius with
He would bashfully reply, “Well,
yeah.”
computers.
Graeme’s boss rang a fortnight later
“What’s his issue?”, I asked.
with the opening question,
“I want him to share that genius with
“What did you do to Graeme?”
the rest of the organisation, but he’s
“What do you mean?”
twenty-two years of age, he’s from the
“He’s had this grin for the last two
country and he’s chronically shy.”
weeks!”
“I’ll do my best.”
“Still? What else has happened with
On the day of the training Graeme
him?
was the last one to arrive.
“He keeps asking for training work!”
“You must be Graeme”, I said,
“Wasn’t that the intention?”
extending my arm to shake his hand.
“Er, yes”, he replied looking down-
“Yes, but I just want to know what
you did!”
wards and timidly offering the ‘wet fish’
handshake.
All that occurred was that Graeme
felt that he had permission to be himself
As I introduced him to the rest of the
group he looked down and shook hands
rather than being encouraged to emulate
the trainer.
with each person in the same way.
Once he recognised that it was
In the period immediately before
totally acceptable to be an individual, the
lunch we executed some martial arts
martial arts section gave him a new
exercises and Graeme was particularly
perception of himself and his abilities. His
impressed by one at which he was
inhibitions disappeared with his previous
seemingly effortlessly successful.
self-image.
His head came up, his eyes were
I would rather have the whole world against me than
my own soul.
— Gandhi —
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I was once asked to conduct an empowerment/team workshop for fifteen
people. One was a senior product manager in a very large multinational
company whose headquarters are based in Europe. She felt the need to promote
one of her sales team to the position of supervisor to help her manage the group.
It so happened that the person she promoted was the only male in the
group. He was a sensitive, new-age guy, and observing the look in his eyes, it
was evident that he was experiencing all kinds of self-doubt.
“Will I perform to her expectations?”
“Did she promote me because I am the only male?”
“Will the team-members listen to me; will they respect me?”
These were some of the questions he seemed to be asking himself.
We did a few actors’ techniques that took them out of their comfort zones,
then some martial arts exercises that raised their personal bars. It was
immediately after one of these that Michael had a major shift. His head came
up, and, as usual, I looked at his eyes. Sensing that the product manager was
looking at me (have you ever wondered why you can sense someone looking
at you, even from behind?), I looked at her. She looked at him again, then looked
at me. I looked at her and nodded as if to say that I understood that she got
what was going on.
Michael had total certainty in his eyes, accompanied by a tear of gratitude.
His new self-perception clearly wasn’t ego-based. It was the realisation that he
captured a glimpse of his own greatness.
Being results-motivated, I can’t leave you without mentioning the outcomes
up to this date. Within two years after this experience, Michael himself was
promoted to senior product manager running teams out of Head Office in
Switzerland.
He didn’t know any more information; the only difference was that he saw
that he could actualise his potential.
To have that sense of one’s intrinsic worth which
constitutes self-respect is potentially to have
everything.
— Joan Didion —
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Self-image • 215
Would you like to know how to get a start on the self-actualisation process?
The first step is to find out where you are, identify the blocks that you
perceive are in your way and then set about removing them.
Earlier in this book there was reference to seven areas of consciousness that
related to the seven areas of life.
To take it a step further, these areas of consciousness can indicate your
current level of perception.
LOVE TO
UNIVERSE
CHOOSE TO
WORLD
DESIRE TO
NATION
WANT TO
STATE
OUGHT TO
CITY
NEED TO
FAMILY
HAVE TO
SELF
Only when you’re in the Love to state can you actualise the universal perspective.
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Exercise
If you have an issue with an associate, a friend, an enemy, a relative or anyone else,
define the issue on paper in as much detail as possible.
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Self-image • 217
Contemplate all aspects of the situation and be confident in the knowledge that whatever
element it is that you don’t accept in that other person is exactly what you don’t accept
in yourself.
You cannot recognise or identify in another person a character trait that you don’t
perceive in yourself.
On the other side of the coin, you cannot say anything about someone to them that
they haven’t already thought about themselves.
The willingness to accept responsibility for one’s own
life is the source from which self respect springs.
— Joan Didion —
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218
29/07/18, 08:01 AM
219
The Power of the
Solution Perception
Limitations live only in our minds. But if we use our
imaginations, our possibilities become limitless.
— Jamie Paolinetti —
Who said this?
Everyone has to overcome problems, physical problems. My right
leg is almost an inch shorter than my left. I wear contact lenses. Since
childhood I have been near-sighted, which meant that when I wasn’t
wearing glasses, I had difficulty seeing an opponent when he wasn’t
up close. I am limited because of my small stature (5’8" or 173cm and
150 pounds or 68 kilos) and I have difficulty with the English
language.
This is a quote from Bruce Lee, widely acknowledged as the greatest allround martial artist of at least our generation.
Because of the difference in the length of his legs, Bruce Lee worked out
that a leading left foot was to his advantage and he devised appropriate kicks
such as the uneven stomp kick. His near-sightedness prompted him to study
and master Wing-chun because it is an ideal technique for close-in fighting.
Turn your problem into the solution. In fact, your problem is the key to the
solution.
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An unsuccessful hurdler focuses on the next hurdle, while the successful
hurdler focuses on the finishing line, or perhaps the grandstand, or beyond the
grandstand. When your attention is on the solution, the obstacles become merely
incidental.
Everything that enlarges the sphere of human powers,
that shows a man he can do what he thought he could
not do, is valuable.
— Samuel Johnson —
No-one is ever given a problem that they cannot solve. If you have the question,
you have the answer.
A major transportation company that had recently formed a liaison with another
multinational asked me to train their new team. The empowerment workshop
was sandwiched between a keynote martial arts-based motivational hoax and
a team-building trivia quiz. After the quiz, when all of the prizes had been
given out and everyone was feeling quite relaxed, the General Manager came
over to me and pointed to one of his team.
“See him? (pointing towards one of his interstate managers) I was going to
sack him in two weeks because he wasn’t pulling his weight, but now I’m going
to keep him on.”
“Why?” I asked.
Even though I asked the question, the answer was obvious.
That afternoon, at the end of the training session in which all participants
broke either one or two wooden boards with their hands, I was clearing some
equipment. That manager quietly came over and asked, “Ron, do you think I
could break three boards at the same time?”
“That depends.”
“What does it depend on?”
“It depends on whether you think you can break three boards. Do you believe
you can?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Then I know you can.”
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Solution Perception • 221
“Would you talk me through it please?”
“Of course.”
He struck the boards in such a way that there was no doubt. He thanked
me, I thanked him, and he left unassumingly. Standing in the diagonally opposite
corner, the General Manager, although conversing with some staff, was
observing the action.
Back to the present, and the General Manager continued, “I noticed that he
approached you after the workshop, and he voluntarily broke three boards;
that was the turning point. I not only thought he was going to fail, but I wouldn’t
have been surprised if he didn’t even attempt it. Instead, he surpassed all of
my expectations. I can now see that with the right type of motivation, he is
more than capable of doing the job.”
“What specifically did it tell you?”
“He demonstrated that he will take initiative, follow through, will probably
do it quietly and efficiently, and will not necessarily look for approval.”
“Could it be also possible that he has been on the job, and you weren’t
aware of it? Everyone possesses their own form of greatness; it’s a matter of
tapping into it. Congratulations on seeing his.”
Focusing on the solution can create the crossroads of your career whether you’re
on the ground floor or at CEO level.
By focusing on the problem, it will grow in relative importance and become
insurmountable.
In some of my workshops people have initially been unable to break only
one wooden board because their concentration was on the board. In fact, they
said that as their hand approached the board, the wood seemed to come up at
them and obscure their vision of the objective, the floor.
In one instance, a prominent member of the alternative government was
the only person in the course unable to break the board because their focus was
firmly on the problem. Perhaps this is a by-product of being a politician.
When I trained marathon swimmer Susie Maroney when she was 17 years-old,
she relished that martial arts focus training and has since swum from Miami,
Florida to Cuba, a duration of 39 hours in the water. I don’t even want to do
something I like doing for 39 hours, let alone swimming a long distance, but
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Susie was undoubtedly focusing on the arriving at the Cuban shore.
Focusing on the solution will make the problem minor; it will be nothing
more than incidental.
Never look down to test the ground before taking your
next step; only he who keeps his eye fixed on the far
horizon will find his right road.
— Dag Hammarskjold —
Secretary General of the United Nations and
1961 Nobel Peace Prize Winner
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223
The Power of Team
When the best leader’s work is done,
the people say,
‘we did this ourselves’.
— Lao Tsu —
Every corporation is a team in which each member has a part to play in the
overall scheme. Each team member has been engaged, and should be respected
and recognised for his or her contribution to the realisation of the achievements
of the organisation. The Managing Director or Chief Executive Officer is the
team captain, but in the final analysis, is no more important than the salesperson,
receptionist or accountant.
The aim of each team member is to look in the same direction rather than at
each other, focusing on the same goals. Office politics are often powerful
influencers of attitude, but if the MD or CEO is strong and has a clear vision,
the team will respond in the desired manner.
According to legend, Ghengis Khan’s mother trained him to cultivate
alliances. She illustrated this by holding up an arrow in front of the young
Khan, then snapped it in half. She then held up a bunch of arrows tied together
and challenged her son to break them. This illustrated the importance of working
together, and history indicates that this philosophy worked for one of the world’s
most famous conquerors.
To know oneself is to study oneself in action with another person.
— Bruce Lee —
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224
The Power of Universality
You and your opponent are one. There is a coexisting
relationship between you. You coexist with your
opponent and become his complement, absorbing his
attack and using his force to overcome him.
— Bruce Lee —
Many people in the western world seem to believe in an ‘Us versus Them’
mentality, when, in fact, we are universally connected.
Jung called it ‘the collective unconscious’ that represents the larger aspect
of the individual psyche or soul. ‘The true history of the spirit is not preserved
in learned volumes or in memory, but in the living organism of every individual.’
Yes Luke, there is a Force.
There is a force that transcends individual reality and seeks expression
through the whole of existence. Freud developed the concept of the libidinal
force to expand our understanding of instinct, heredity and sexual impulse.
Jung referred to the libido as a life force from the historical universe that achieves
its ultimate expression in the Unified Self.
When you reach real ability you will be able to become
one with the enemy. Entering his heart you will see
that he is not your enemy after all.
— Tsuji —
(Japanese sword master)
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Universality • 225
Mathematics tells us that the basic entity is the number one. The Earth is one, a
pebble is one.
If you bisect a pebble, you still have one, but you have two of them. If you
shatter a pebble, the pieces are still one.
That which is One is One.
That which is not One is also One.
— Chuang Tzu —
The Big Bang is the theory that currently prevails in science to explain the origin
of the universe. In other words, we all came from the ‘One’ and are, even though
individuals, from the same source and are connected.
Once we have realised, understood and accepted the concept of The Great
Interfusion, the ego becomes insignificant, almost laughable and notably
unimportant in the greater scheme, a bit like a committee member with a
Napoleon complex.
The ego is an affirmation of fragmentation and separation from the Higher
Being, whether it is God, Buddha, the Collective Unconscious, the Soul or the
Tao, depending on your perception and belief system.
It is also within the ego to continually justify its existence and its standpoint.
Great knowledge sees all in one.
Small knowledge breaks down into the many.
— Chuang Tzu —
According to Newton’s Third Law, ‘for every action there is an equal and
opposite reaction’. If something happens somewhere in the universe, there will
be a corresponding event somewhere in the universe, either locally or nonlocally.
In nature, there are neither rewards nor punishments,
only consequences.
— Robert Ingersol —
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In Western societal and religious belief there is God who resides in Heaven, yet
is omnipresent. He or She (if God has a gender) pervades the physical universe
as we grow to know it, a Universe that, following The Big Bang 13 billion years
ago, has been expanding (to where?), and will eventually come to an end
(Armageddon).
Taoists believe that there was no beginning and there will be no end, that
time is not a straight line, but rather a circle. Every ending is also a beginning;
every beginning is also an ending. A week after Bruce Lee’s son, Brandon was
born, Bruce’s father died, supporting the belief that nothing is created nor dies,
there is simply a transfer of energy and matter.
I simply believe that some part of the human self is not
subject to the laws of time and space.
— C G Jung —
Western scientists also believe that life is a constant struggle. I have a friend
who is a nuclear physicist and Elvis impersonator, and he asserts that everything
tends toward decay and chaos (entropy), and that the struggle is to eliminate
confusion in order to create order (syntropy).
In western mythology, the dragon is the symbol of ‘evil’ which the forces of
‘good’ must vanquish; it represents confusion, and to destroy it will bring peace
and harmony. On the other hand, the Chinese dragon is compatible with nature,
assisting and promoting the flow of prosperity.
In Taoism, the tendency is to go with the flow, and to use the flow.
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Universality • 227
To embrace all things means also that one rids oneself
of any concept of separation, male and female, self
and other, life and death. Division is contrary to the
nature of the Tao.
— Lao Tsu —
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229
The Power of the Vision
In every revolution there is one man with a vision.
— Kirk to Kahn —
in the Star Trek episode, Space Seed
The only managerial concept more important than the Mission is the Vision.
To work effectively as a team all of its members need to look in the same
direction at the common goal.
The CEO must not only have a lucid picture of the organisation after the
outcomes have been achieved, but he must be able to enthusiastically share it
with the team.
Ralph Larsen, CEO of Johnson & Johnson, said:
You can only push and shove so far. It isn’t leadership until you
somehow touch people in a way that makes them want to contribute
to the maximum.
It is the lone worker who makes the first advance in a
subject: the details may be worked out by a team, but
the prime idea is due to the enterprise, thought and
perception of an individual.
— Sir Alexander Fleming —
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Professor John Kotter from Harvard Business School observed of some industry
leaders:
True, CEOs like Gates (Microsoft), Grove (Intel) and Welch (General
Electric) can be conspicuously hard-driving, but this is another subtle
bit, they may drive people towards results, but they align them with
broader ideas of what the company should be and why.
Never lose that vision.
Every man takes the limits of his field of vision for the
limits of the world.
— Arthur Schopenhauer —
Of course, the concept of Vision doesn’t only apply to the corporate world.
At a personal level, people often believe a relationship involves two people
joining together to form one, gazing into each others’ eyes and living happily
ever after.
This is the stuff of which fairy stories are made.
A long-term or even a short-term personal or business relationship involves
two individuals choosing to be together at that point in time, and looking in the
same direction at the same goal, solution or vision.
Keep the big vision; short-term goals alone lead to periods of elation and
depression.
One never climbs so high as when he knows where he
is going.
— Napoleon —
The paradox of vision is that if you become attached to an outcome, it is likely
to elude you. If the vision is clear in your heart and mind, you will unstoppably
head in the direction of the vision.
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Vision • 231
When you seek it, you cannot find it.
— Zen saying —
Several years ago, at one point in my career, I had spoken at conferences and
conventions, and trained senior executives in Australia, New Zealand, the USA,
Canada and Asia and had never been to Europe. One day I thought, I wouldn’t
mind working in Europe, especially Scandinavia, then let the thought go.
A week later there was a telephone call from Anna, the national training
manager of a multinational IT corporation that happened to be a client.
She said, “There is a woman you should meet; she’s a business associate of
mine”.
“Why?”, I asked.
“She’s over here from Belgium on business, and every year she organises a
group of experts to present to about 200 Chief Executive Officers, Chairmen
and Managing Directors of European companies. The conferences are staged in
London in June every year. She’s expecting your call.”
I thanked her, made the call, and arranged a meeting.
Doris saw three minutes of a video of a television interview I had done on
Australia’s top-rating daytime television programme at the time, we had dinner
and a brief chat, and she said, “Yes, I’d like you to give a keynote address at the
conference.
Being almost suspicious at the ease of the agreement, I enquired about the
speakers at the previous conference. Doris gave me that year’s prospectus in
which I saw the President of Nokia, the President of IBM and the President of
Philips; the main keynote speaker was General Colin Powell!
Still not totally convinced, I asked about other previous speakers.
Doris said, “The two you would probably most immediately recognize
would be Dame Margaret Thatcher and Henry Kissinger”.
I told her that mine would be the only name I don’t recognize. “Why do
you want me? These people are captains of industry, corporate giants; leaders
to thousands of people who depend on them. I’m just a guy.”
Doris observed my confusion and said, “Your presentation will be a perfectly
inspiring and entertaining complement to the rest of the programme. You have
more to offer than you realise. Besides, never underestimate the power of a
credible referral.”
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The next day I telephoned Anna and invited her to lunch.
The concerns on my part were a function of self-doubt about deserving.
The result was that I spoke on the first day of the conference, and as for
Scandinavia? As soon as I left the stage the Managing Director of the Danish
operation of one of the world’s big three pharmaceutical corporations came up
and enthusiastically invited me to perform the main keynote speech at their
annual conference three months later. In the same week I was asked to train, for
half-a-day, a senior management group at the head office of a major telephone
manufacturer in Helsinki, Finland. The presentation was also written up in the
American Management Association monthly magazine.
The natural way in this world is towards entropy, or chaos. If we allow situations
to be as they are, they will tend to become disorganised. If you drop a teacup, it
will break into numerous pieces; it will not put itself together. The universe
was once a gaseous mass the size of your fist, and after the Big Bang, it headed
in the directions of disorder.
Establishing, clarifying and gaining certainty with regard to our vision of
the big picture will create a semblance of order.
In order for it to work most effectively, the Vision must be bigger than
ourselves. The Vision must make us look insignificant.
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Vision • 233
Your vision will become clear only when You can look
into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams;
who looks inside, awakes.
— Carl Jung —
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234
The Power of the Voice
The voice, as any acting teacher will tell you, is an instrument through which
the message is delivered.
A deeper tone of voice is, in western society, considered to be more
compelling than a voice with a higher pitch.
Entertainment This Week presenter Mary Hart’s voice had a habit of rising
into staccato, and media reports had it that the programme’s producer received
mail from viewers claiming that the presenter sent epileptics into fits. She has
had some lessons to deepen her voice, and the complaints stopped.
Depth is power.
How do we achieve a deeper voice?
When we speak to a group, our ch'i is projected to embrace the audience,
and we project from the centre.
1.
Centre the breathing and recite your speech with an enlarged mouth.
Enunciate.
2.
Repeat Step One, but with a larger mouth.
3.
Repeat Step Two, but with an even larger mouth. Keep the words fluid,
even though the exercise at this point may seem over-the-top.
4.
Project the voice from the centre. Let it rise through your body and
extend to smash a hole in the wall furthest from you. Feel the energy
emanate from your very core to strike the wall.
5.
Repeat Step Four, at the same time projecting a line of energy from the
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Voice • 235
centre of your back to smash a hole in the wall behind you.
6.
In the middle of the line of monologue, stop and hum at the pitch of
the monologue. Deepen the pitch, deepen it again and resume the
recitation. Your voice will be deeper and much more powerful.
Before you address a group, do a vocal warm-up and adjust the pitch using
the hum; it is a tuning fork for the voice.
In the early days, a friend, Gary Kennedy asked to participate in one of our
public courses titled The Astoundingly Effective Presentation and Life Skills Course.
Gary was a national association chairman and was required to make speeches
on a frequent and regular basis. I asked him what he wanted to gain from the
workshop. In his own words, he thought his voice was a bit too high-pitched,
and ‘campy’, and lacked the authority of a person in his position. The Hum
was the solution to his issue. In fact, I saw him present a speech soon after, and
he actually did The Hum at the podium immediately before he began his
address.
From then, Gary was more confident on stage, had greater authority and
credibility in front of his audiences, and even changed his title from Chairman
to President because he felt it sounded better with his surname.
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236
The Power of the Void
Tell me what you brag about and I’ll tell you what
you lack.
— Spanish proverb —
Our greatest voids give rise to our greatest values. We will strive to acquire and
achieve whatever we perceive to be missing.
Show me a person who vigorously campaigns against paedophilia, and I’ll
show you a person who was unfortunate to have been molested as a child.
To you unattached readers, how many times have you sought a partner
whom you believed would ‘fill in the gaps’, provide whatever you thought
was missing from your make-up, complete the package and form a whole being?
Of those instances, how many of those partners eventually and inevitably didn’t
fill in those gaps and didn’t make you the whole being you craved to be?
The fact is that individually we lack nothing; we possess all of those other
qualities we desire in someone else. When we realise this, connecting with a
partner is less stressful and requires less effort.
I know of a woman who is on a life mission for world peace. She has organised
rallies, political lobby groups and discussions, with the ultimate intention of
achieving the global eradication of war. At the same time her personal life is in
turmoil. She has been through numerous relationships, her barely-adult children
have left her, describing her as ‘nuts’.
Whatever you manifest externally, you will create the opposite in another
part of your life, so it’s important to observe your emotional charges.
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Void • 237
If you take a stand against an issue or a cause, you will either attract it,
create it or become it.
How many of us have said to ourselves about one or both of our parents,
‘I’ll NEVER do that’, or ‘I’ll NEVER say that’, and hear yourself doing that
or find yourself saying that?
When you find yourself experiencing an extreme emotional reaction, expect
whatever you don’t want to show up, because it inevitably will.
The solution is to accept that person or event with a sense of gratitude.
Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness.
— Chuang Tzu —
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238
The Power of Zen
The Zen experience may be applied in any
direction, to any conceivable human activity, and
that wherever it is so applied it lends an
unmistakable quality to the work.
— Alan Watts —
A monk once asked a ZEN Master,
“What does one think of while sitting?”
“One thinks of not thinking.”
“How does one think of not thinking?”
“Without thinking”, the Master said.
After studying the teachings of some of the acknowledged Zen masters, standup comedian, labourer and otherwise unemployed person Trevor Crooks asked
one of his workmates the standard question, “What is the sound of one hand
clapping?”
Waving his hand in front of his own face in a studied manner, the labourer
thought for a moment and said, “It’s sort of a whooshing sound.”
This is the problem we face when asked to define Zen, which is not so
much a definition as an experience and series of experiences.
I am led to believe that the word itself is derived from a Sanskrit word that
describes both the act of meditation and the state of non-dualistic consciousness
that often comes from the meditative practice.
Many people think that to achieve non-dualistic consciousness, the ego must
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Zen • 239
be discarded or destroyed, but within the ego is all of our memories, habits,
desires, aversions, opinions and paradigms, and it is to be respected for its role
in our totality.
The ego on its own, however, gives us a limited and biased perspective.
In Zen the important thing is to stop the course of the
mind.
— Takashina Rosen —
The great sage, Lu Hsueh-an lived on the Plain of Jars 1,000 years ago.
A man came to him.
“Sage, I need your help. I have so many burdens. My house has started to
lean over. I think it will fall down.”
Lu said, “Can be fixed.”
The man said, “I have one more problem. My chief does not like me. He
wants to get rid of me. What can I do?”
Lu said, “Can be fixed with the same action.”
The man said, “I have yet one more problem. My wife looks at my neighbour.
I think she likes him. I don’t want her to leave me.”
Lu said, “Can also be fixed with the same action.”
The man said, “What is the action?”
Lu said, “Spend three days in contemplation in a temple at the top of a
mountain.”
The man did this, and when he returned, Lu said, “Your problems are fixed.
I knocked down your house, told your chief you are leaving, and moved your
wife next door.”
The man said, “This is not what I asked for.”
“How do you feel?” Lu asked.
“Free of my burdens”, the man replied.
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My friend and client, Geoff Harrington,
many of the techniques to be more
who is Executive Chairman of the
effective preachers and thanked me for
merchant bank, The Harrington Partner-
the instruction and the experience.
ship, once asked me to conduct a
Two of them said that they thought
workshop for seven-and-a-half hours at
the martial arts element was demonic.
the Annual Anglican Preachers’ Con-
They implied that it was a trick of the
ference. All of the preachers, most of
Devil and that it is dangerous to take
whom had been preaching for at least
these practices seriously. Further to this
20 years, participated in actors’ improv-
they likened the martial arts to a street
isational exercises, a humour workshop
lamp illuminating a dark street, but when
and basic internal martial arts training
the light of the true Sun (or Son) rose
that resulted in greater physical strength
behind the lamp, the lamp would be
and an increased ability to focus and
perceived to be insignificant. I suggested
be present.
that the lamp is a part of the Son and
At the end of the session most of
the participants said that they would use
that everything could be viewed as a
whole.
If we segment, analyse and judge situations and people, we will only be seeing
a fraction or at most half of the big picture.
If we limit our perspective we deny ourselves the beauty of the balance.
Zen is a balanced perception.
Zen is liberation from the self.
Zen is freedom.
Zen is looking into the nature of one’s being.
Zen is your everyday thought.
Zen is unsymbolisation of the world.
Zen is acting without effort.
Zen is arresting the vigorous horse of your mind.
Zen is being.
Zen is Zen.
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Zen • 241
The eye with which I see God is the same eye with
which God sees me.
— Meister Eckhart —
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242
29/07/18, 08:01 AM
243
The Power of Wisdom
You cannot teach a man anything;
you can only help him to find it within himself.
— Galileo —
There is nothing that can be written here that will give you more wisdom than
you have at this point in time.
All that I will do is to quote those who had it and their aphorisms might
accelerate your journey.
The wisdom of enlightenment is inherent in every one
of us. It is because of the delusion under which our
mind works that we fail to realise it ourselves, and that
we have to seek the advice and the guidance of
enlightened ones.
— Hui-Neng —
To acquire knowledge, one must study; but to acquire
wisdom, one must observe.
— Marilyn vos Savant —
The invariable mark of wisdom is to see the
miraculous in the common.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson —
Wisdom begins in wonder.
—Socrates —
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244
Conclusion
In keeping with the simplicity of the rest of this book, the conclusion is a quote
from a letter written in the third century AD by Chinese general Zhuge Liang
to his nephew:
Aspirations should remain lofty and far-sighted.
Look to the precedents of the wise.
Detach from emotions and desires; get rid of any fixations.
Elevate subtle feelings to presence of mind and sympathetic sense.
Be patient in tight situations as well as easy ones; eliminate all
pettiness.
Seek knowledge by questioning widely; set aside aversion and
reluctance. What loss is there in dignity, what worry is there of failure?
If your will is not strong, if your thought does not oppose injustice,
you will fritter away your life stuck in the commonplace, silently
submitting to the bonds of emotion, forever cowering before
mediocrities, never escaping the downward flow.
May you boldly go where the wise have gone before, with individuality, with
integrity, with flair, with focus, in your unique style, with the inner knowing
that you are powerful.
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245
References
Ninja Cloak & Dagger – Ashida Kim.
A Book of Five Rings – Miyamoto Musashi.
Small Circle Jujitsu – Professor Wally Jay.
The Art of War – Sun Tzu.
Bushido The Warriors Code – Inazo Nitobe.
Zen in the Martial Arts – Joe Hyams.
Yang Family Secret Transmissions – Douglas Wile.
Ki in Daily Life – Koichi Tohei.
Jeet Kune Do – Bruce Lee, edited by John Little.
Invincible Warrior – Stevens, John. Boston, Mass.
Shambhala Publications. 1997.
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here - The Corporate Ninja

Transcription

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