Monthly Archive for October, 2008

When the teacher is ready…

Published on 31 October, 2008 in Cool friends and ideas and Self-awareness. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

It’s a simple enough concept – when you are ready to learn something new, someone will arrive to help take you to the next level.

When the teacher is ready, the students will appear.

Again, a fairly simple concept – an ironic reversal of the previous statement, reflecting how when you are ready to share knowledge, students will find their way to you.

However, a few days ago, Joanna Hsu was kind enough to share with me a new insight on this old and delightful notion. That not only are these phrases similar in structure, but that they are actually equivalent in meaning. As ‘real’ teachers are not just telling people what to think, but rather they are called to demonstrate that which they purport to know, both the role of teacher and student are learning processes; when a ‘teacher’ is ready to learn by demonstrating their skills to ‘students’, individuals will present themselves to the ‘teacher’ to help them learn – to take them to the next level.

As we are perpetually and simultaneously both students and teachers, we can remember that when we come across an interesting or challenging student, we are being called to demonstrate.

What’s next?

Published on 20 October, 2008 in Self-awareness. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

One of the beautiful things about my life is that there have been some very clear stages. There was primary school. There was high school. As I spent a long time in University, most of that time was broken up into smaller parts. There was “the election”. There were my Sydney adventures. And more recently there has been my time in Shanghai. In each case, there has been a clear transition point.

We use transition points to mark the start and finish of a period. Whether it’s the school bell or the lunch whistle.

Maybe it’s a home. When we move from one place to another, that final closing of the door can have much greater importance than just closing the door. When I moved into my first apartment in Shanghai, I slept on the floor for the first night because there was no bed – but at least that place was mine!

Sometimes we take photos of these special occasions. Oftimes we don’t.

How can we deliberately create these special events? How can we design experiences that are worth photographing? If you want to make a decision – to move forward in a new direction or just to draw a line in the sand – how can you help create that new sense of identity with a symbol, ritual or an experience?

It doesn’t need to be with a special handshake and a funny-sounding word. It just has to work for you…

Boost

Published on 18 October, 2008 in Business, Creativity and genius, High performance, Science and technology and Travel. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

Sitting at the Manly Wharf food court, I noticed a Boost beside between the Thai and Sushi outlets. Boost is a great success story – the founder even published a book – and yet it reminds me of an old friend.

Kim created Juice Break many years ago. Before juice bars had really even hit Australia – well before Boost – Juice Break was helping make Brisbanites more healthy by introducing them to the wonders of fresh juices and intensely healthy nutrition. Kim had a great little store and brought together some really cool people.

But Juice Break no longer exists.

It wasn’t that the product wasn’t “right” – as evidenced by the roaring success of Boost and a host of other juice outlets today. And the timing was pretty good too – Juice Break closed as the first of today’s successful juice outlets were opening. They could have been a market leader, ready to reap the turn of the tide and the resultant massive wave.

And Kim was – and is – really cool! A surfer, he’s likeable and fun to hang out with.

There were many reasons that we now know the story of Boost rather than the story of Juice Break. But one of the most important lessons for me is that success often lies just a short twist in the road away. So when you find something that inspires you, something that you feel is worth pursuing, you really gotta go for it.

It can take a long time to make your dreams a reality. Research into genius shows that it takes about a decade before anything really significant can be achieved. So choose something that you love to do… Something that is worth doing even if others don’t know you’re doing it… Something that you enjoy doing for its own sake rather than because you believe it will get you something.

I’m doing my NLP Trainers’ Training at the moment. It’s exciting. It’s interesting. It’s engaging. And with my good friends in Shanghai I’m looking forward to sharing my insights with more people upon my return. Maybe I’ll make some money from it – heck, I’d like that – but even if I don’t, I love being here and doing what I’m doing right now.

I figure that if you’re doing something that you love to do, even if it doesn’t get you where you want to go – even if it’s a total waste of time – if you choose to do something that you love to do for its own sake, you’ll never be really wasting your time.

A friend was telling me about his friend who wants to study law but who fears that she’ll not live long enough to practice. She’s just 20 and doesn’t think she’ll make it to 25. We all have our perculiarities, but to me the reason to study law is to enjoy the process of learning and experiencing the study of law… Not because you’ll become a lawyer.

I’d love to give the appropriate source, but I can just hear Marianne Williamson saying to me: “Do what you love. Do what makes your heart sing. And never do it for the money.”

And now I’m going to enjoy my tempura prawn roll and Berry Crush…

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