NEWS: "Innovative Coaching" Talk & Workshop

This is a quick post to promote an upcoming talk and workshop entitled Innovative Coaching (click the image to view full-scale) more info) that I am organising in association with the Life & Business Coaching Association of Ireland (LBCAI).

I've developed this workshop in response to what I see as a growing need for creativity and innovation among Irish Life Coaches who may be struggling to stand out in such a small marketplace. I think that it is important to acknowledge that the traditional (or US) approach to coaching may not work with an Irish audience that is maybe not as open to talking about hopes, fear, goals and dreams. Ireland just doesn't have the same cultural background of psychotherapy and counseling. It can be a big leap for someone to start talking about what is important to them. I believe that a big challenge and opportunity is for us to start developing tolls and services that allow an Irish audience to take baby steps into the world of self-development and coaching I see a lot of people struggling to promote themselves as coaches using an approach that just does not work with an Irish audience.

An example of this is Rory's Story Cubes. I invented these as a way to get people talking about matters that are important to them using metaphors and stories, without having to talk directly about the issue itself. This has been a great help in empowering people to take that first step towards addressing issues, imagining brighter futures, and experiencing a real benefit from coaching, which they might not have allowed themselves otherwise.

As a creativity coach, I guess I see it as my responsibility to walk my talk and invent tools and products that will assist me and others with their creative thinking, problem-solving and coaching work. I do this myself on a regular basis, and I'm going to share the various techniques that I use with workshop participants, so that they can create a niche for themselves.

This workshop is a prototype itself and the price will go up next time around, so if you want to gain the benefits early and be part of the process drop me an email. I'll also be exploring how to turn this into a teleclass for later in the year. If you want to be kept informed about the teleclasses, please also drop me an email.

Scrybe - a new/old kind of Organiser?

If you haven't seen or read about it already, I encourage you to take a look at scrybe - a new browser based organiser that allows you to work offline as well as online. If this is an example of the kinds of applications that can be produced as part of Web 2.0, then I am very excited at the future! Scrybe's design is based on the principal that human beings have the ability to focus on one thing while keeping others in soft focus, and can easily shift focus, while keeping everything in context. Scrybe organises it's information in a similar manner. You can see the promo video below.

I've seen this approach before in software for both the PC and Pocket PC. I haven't seen it done as elegantly as this, while combining it with a wide range of tools to synchronise your data.

Of special interest to me is the ThoughtPad, which acts similarly to my Portable Memory Bank (or Little Red Brain). This is a small ring-bound notebook that I carry with me at ALL times.

I've signed up for the Beta, and will post on how I get on with the ThoughtPad, and it's usefulness for capturing my insights and awarenesses as compared to a traditional notepad.

TIP: Capturing ideas with your mobile phone

I'm not sure if it is legal, but yesterday I saved myself about twenty pound on reference material for an idea I was developing. 
I was interested in gathering visual designs from some magazines that I would never normally read. As I considered whether to buy the magazine for the one or two visual references I wanted, I remembered that I had my mobile phone in my pocket! And so, I quickly whipped it out, used the built-in camera to snap the visual references I wanted, and went on my way.

[NOTE: I do not think that my ethics would allow me to do this to copy an article I wanted to read, but my sense of logic seems to allow it for a simple graphical inspiration. What do you think?]

This was a real 'Aha!' moment for me about how sometimes I do not make full use of the technology available to me, in the way that can serve me. And that the technology becomes useful when it does work for you.

So, the question is...how can you make a piece of technology you own, work for you in a way that was never 'officially' planned?

Sociocracy Article in Strategy & Business

Brian Roberston, CEO of Ternary Software has an article in Strategy & Business this month on how his company implements Sociocracy. Brian explains how implementing Sociocracy as a form of dynamic governance has resulted in profit growths of between 38-50%. Sociocracy means "rule by the socios", or "people who know each other" as opposed to democracy which is "rule by the demos - the crowd".

What is not mentioned in the article is that John Buck, founder of the North American Centre for Sociocracy, trained Brian and his team on how to implement Sociocracy in their company.

I am training with John, at this time I am the only person in Ireland, trained in how to run Sociocratic circle meetings and elections. If you are an Irish company or organisation wanting to find a more effective way to organise yourselves, please do not hesitate to contact me.

http://www.strategy-business.com/press/article/06314?pg=1

The Ten Faces of Innovation - People Make Innovation Happen

"The Ten Faces of Innovation: Strategies for Heightening Creativity" (Tom Kelley, Jonathan Littman)

I've been reading The Ten Faces of Innovation by Tom Kelley at Ideo. I must say that I was won over to this book within a few pages after reading that he saw innovation as not just "New Ideas - plus action or implementation - which result in an improvement, a gain or a profit" as defined by 3M, but as "people creating value through the implementation of ideas."

I wholeheartedly agree with this, and see in in my work daily. It takes people to make things happen. And this can make it really easy to get things done, or really difficult. However, if you always consider the human component, you have a much better chance of succeeding in your endeavours than if you continue to see people as simply things to be manipulated, managed, watched, or figures on a resources chart.

I'm finding this book really easy to read, and am constantly inspired by the stories that Tom uses to illustrate the various characteristics of the Innovation personas. I particularly enjoy this book as it promotes an open approach to innovation, and does not promote a once-size fits all methodology.

So, if you are at all interested in innovation, creativity, or even just people, check out The Ten Faces of Innovation

Back to School & back to Learning (Hell for some)!!

I was getting my hair cut yesterday, and was talking to the hairdresser about her daughter who is starting into secondary school today. I asked her, had anyone talked to her about her learning style. She said No. I explained the 3 basic styles - visual, aural and kinaesthetic. I also explained how the basic question of 'How do you give (and like to receive) directions?' can tell you a lot about a person's leaning style. Immediately she recognised her own preference. I also highlighted that approximately 60% of prisoners in Northern Ireland have a visual/kinaesthetic leaning preference, as opposed to aural, which is the predominant form of teaching - often the preferred style of teachers, which in turn creates a self-perpetuating problem.

So to all the parents and students out there, I encourage you to discover your own and your child's natural learning style/preference. It will help give you some control in determining what you can do to learn more effectively, even if the material isn't presented a manner that really works best for you.

Here are some links I would recommend to find out more about

learning styles and multiple intelligences

http://www.learning-styles-online.com/

http://www.memletics.com/learning-skills-test/default.asp

http://www.accelerated-learning.net/learning_test.html

And for a great recource of creativity and learning visit -

http://www.winwenger.com/

Also, check out Amazon.com, or your local bookstore for many, many books on these topics.

Creativity & Conflict Resolution results in Impetus Award for Human Rights

I've just found out that a recent project that I was involved in with The Educational Shakespeare Company Ltd, has received the Impetus Award for Human Rights for the second year running.

The award is designed to recognise

...creative and innovative work by young people who use ethical values and human rights to respond to contemporary, challenging and contested issues in our society.

The award is given to projects that demonstrates:

• Exploration of shared rights and responsibilities


• Creative application of shared values


• Engagement with the local community

The award-winning project Crossing The Divide, is the first of an on-going series of cross-community projects co-produced with the Education and Outreach Department of Queens Film Theatre. This project aims to link young people from nationalist and Loyalist areas of Belfast, with the intention of learning how to work together to make a short film. These projects are pretty intense as they only run for 10 weeks, making them pretty demanding. The result of this project between the (mostly) Catholic Mornington community group from Ormeau Road in South Belfast, and Protestant Ballymac and East Belfast Mission of the Newtonards Road in East Belfast was three short films and a documentary. The first film, Turn the Music Down, is a short tale about who the real police are in the community. The second film Hoodin' It' looks at the role that boredom plays in so-called 'antisocial behaviour'. The final film Don't Judge Us is a heartfelt message to adults about how young people are perceived and the assumptions made, that are not always true.

The project is accompanied by a documentary that charts the journey of the participants during the filmmaking process. I'm personally really proudof the documentary and believe that it was instrumental in us receiving this award. Why? Because the documentary charts the highs and lows of our work, and we are not afraid to show when things went wrong.

You can see the Crossing The Divide along with An' Wha'? (winner of the Impetus Award in 2004/05) at Google Video.

Finally, I want to send out a big note of recognition to everyone who took part in this project. Well Done everyone!

Do you or your business need an Ideas Transfusion?

Do you find that you keep having the same ideas, the same solutions to every situation? And do you find that those ideas and solutions usually fail? Do you find yourself getting stressed, stuck, and sometimes despair that things will never change?

You need an

Ideas Transfusion

!! The term is Inspired by the old art of blood letting, where the old blood is drained from the body, and replaced with new blood. With an ideas transfusion, you unearth and drain (of power) as many of your old and outdated beliefs, habits and assumptions about yourself, your work, and your world. You can then start to replace these with fresh beliefs, new awareness' drawn from first-hand experience, and a new openness to what is in front of you now.

I'll post more on this over the coming days. In the meantime, if you're interested in attending an ideas transfusion workshop or teleconference, contact rory@thecreativityhub.com

A useful definition of Innovation

Visiting the BROKEN BULBS: Innovation blog, I disovered Gordon Graham had identified what is for me a useful definition for Innovation. Here it is:

Besides being the tool of the entrepreneur, innovation is defined here as:
"The profitable implementation of ideas." - Broken Bulbs (2005)

You seee, it's not just about having ideas. We can all have ideas. The real challenge, and the real rewarding part is seeing how we can change the world by bringing those ideas to fruition. I'm not clear on Gordon's definition of profitable. For me, this means something that makes a meaningful difference in the world, be in on an indivudual, business, community or societal level.

Check out the BROKEN BULBS: Innovation blog where you can find a longer definition on Innovation on the right-hand side of the page

What has the fall of democracy got to do with me?

I discovered this posting on an mailing list I am involved with...

About the time the original 13 States of the USA adopted their new constitution in 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2000 years prior:

" A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship." "The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

1. From Bondage to spiritual faith;

2. From spiritual faith to great courage;

3. From courage to liberty;

4. From liberty to abundance;

5. From abundance to complacency;

6. From complacency to apathy;

7. From apathy to dependence;

8. From dependence back into bondage"

So what relevance does it have to creativity and innovation? Well, as I looked at the cycles I began to wonder how it connected on an personal level to our personal development. I see the sequence as somewhat linked to Spiral Dynamics, the difference being that Spiral Dynamics illlustrates an ever onward and upward spiral, where the above 7 stages are a cycle.

I can see times when I have been at these different stages in my life. Some times longer than others. Let me map them...

As a baby, I moved from basic needs and dependency on my parents to interaction with the wider world. The world was a big mystical place, where GOD and religion really helped to make sense of that which I didn't understand. As I continued to grow, religion didn't help to answer all the questions I had, so I struck out alone seeking understanding rather than the blind unquestioning faith I had. As a young adult, this brought with it a sense of exuberance and freedom, where I believed that I could do anything. Knowing that I could do anything, a feeling frustrated that I wasn't getting much done, it became a little overwhelming, and so I decided to simply sit with the intellectual knowing without necessarily doing anything. And focused on comfort. As I sat in front my TV, this was reinforced, that all these terrible things were going on in the world, and I was let feeling like there was nothing I could do, so I would pick up a book or play a computer game, rather than deal with the reality. This was dependence. Luckily, I broke free of this. And how did I do it? Well, after hitting a low, low slump , it was creativity...expressing myself...and play.

And that is why I do the work I do....to empower people through creativity. Pure and simple.

Ireland ranked No1 in cultural perception of entrepreneurship

The Irish report of GEM (Global Enterprise Monitoring) 2005, published last month by the Irish Minister for Enterprise Trade and Employment paints the picture of enterprise in Ireland today.The report states that Ireland is ranked number 1 in terms of cultural perception and support for entrepreneurship. I believe that this factor alone - support from family and friends - can play a big part in whether a business will ever get off the ground. How often have you shared an idea with family or friends, only to have it dismissed or outright ridiculed? And what difference does it make when they say "Go for it?"

The report also says that research found that almost one in ten of the adult population living in Ireland is actively planning or has recently set up a new business.

And so, to everyone in Ireland who has set up their own business or is planning one. I salute you! It is an exciting journey, and one of the greatest forms of personal development I can imagine.

Click here to read the press release and download the full report.

Live Radio Interview on NVC & Parenting with South East Radio

I'm going to be interviewed on Wednesday 17th at 10:35 on South East Radio. I'll be talking about my presentation on NVC and Parenting at the Irish API Conference in the Glenroyal Conference Centre, Maynooth, Co. Kildare this Friday 19th May. The interview will last about 15 minutes.

You will be able to listen to the broadcast live via the South East Radio website.

Rory's Story Cubes - today's story

In the run-up to the release of the latest version of Rory's Story Cubes, I thought it might be fun to post a new sequence daily-ish of a random roll of the Cubes. By challenging yourself, children, friends and colleagues to weave the sequence of icons and symbols into a story you will develop your imagination, creative thinking and storytelling skills. I've rolled the dice for today, and here is a photo of today's Story Cube symbols.

Remember, start with "Once upon a time..." and beginning with the first image to grab your attention, weave a story together that SOMEHOW links all the icons together. The challenge is to see how far you can go with one icons before having to move to the next. This will encourage you to move past the literal interpretation to find new associations. And if you are not certain what an image represents...make it up. Ask yourself, what does it look like to me. Using the Story Cubes is all about building trust in yourself and your imagination.

The five most imaginative stories (in my opinion) posted between now and the release of Rory's Story Cubes, will receive the gift of a set.

Have fun.

Bridging the Divide (One) - Video Now Online

I am really excited about being able to share with you a link at Google Video of the latest conflict-resolution film-making project called Bridging the Divide. This work is carried out with my co-facilitator Tom Magill under the banner of ESC - Escape Into Creativity.

The project took place from Oct-Dec last year and involved bringing together Ballymac and East Belfast Mission - two Protestant youth groups from East Belfast with Mornington - a Catholic youth group from South Belfast. It was co-produced with the help of Marion Campbell from Queen's Film Theatre here in Belfast.

The video is made up of:

Making of Doc - Bridging the Divide - 15mins

Short Film 1: Turn the Music Down - 5mins

Short Film 2: Hoodin' It - 3mins

Short Film 3: Don't Judge Us - 10mins

You view or download the video here.

I would really enjoy hearing and responding to any and all feedback or questions.

"Once upon a time.." Storytelling and Innovation with Rory's Story Cubes

Having just read Chuck Frey's post Enhance your creativity through storytelling and his review of A Whole New Mind by Dan Pink, I thought it time to share how I developed Rory's Story Cubes and use them as an aid to innovation.

Using a technique developed by Win Wenger know as Beachhead, I developed Rory's Story Cubes in an attempt to create a game that explored the use of pattern recognition. If I get a chance, I'll post the audio file of this session.

I quickly prototyped a Rubik's Cube version which proved incredibly popular.

After unsuccessfully getting the International distributor of the Rubik's Cube to pick up on the idea, I developed a dice version with the help of Kate Jones and Kadon Games, as there was no copyright on their usage. Here you can see the sample version as they come of the line in China.



So how do I use them? I ask the person to frame a question that they want to gain some insight into. This may be "How do I innovate our service?" or "How do we break free of clients we aren't happy with?", etc. They then roll the dice, and tell me a story that begins with "Once upon a time..." that somehow links all the images on the the dice into one coherent story.

What inevitably happens is that the story that unfolds acts as a metaphor for the issue that the person is facing. By asking how does this or that event, character, location provide some insight into your question, my clients usually experience a breakthrough in their understanding of the issue, leading to greater insight and answers they had never previously considered.

Rory's Story Cubes will be available by the end of May to purchase from The Creativity Hub

You can try out this technique now, by checking out my previous post Rory's Story Cubes - The Counterbalance to Sudoku

Diagram Illustrating our 'Sidebands of Awareness'

I've wanted to share with you a diagram that I use to visually explain Win Wenger's Sidebands of Awareness. For ease of access, I've also included the full text of his article below.

SIDEBANDS - SO BEAUTIFULLY SIMPLE

by Win Wenger

While some of the tens of thousands of things going on in your mind but outside your focus are trivial and unrelated, many others definitely are neither trivial nor unrelated and, when examined, prove to be a very powerful part of our thinking and perceiving. We just hadn’t been noticing them. When noticed, and examined, they are proving to be quite useful — indeed, quite powerfully useful.

These are the "Sidebands" of your awareness, a rich and fertile source, a veritable motherlode of valuable information. Now we are examining several strategies for capturing or eliciting some of these “Sidebands” of ongoing aswareness.

What's so beautiful about "Sidebands" is that almost ANYthing you do in reference to something, and then are alert for relevant perceptions to come into focus of awareness during discrete times afterward, will have something of this effect. This whole thing is getting so very simple that it's beyond belief.

One of our more successful experiments with this is simply to write a problem statement, question, or matter you want to understand, and WHILE writing it pay attention to and note down your sidebands, your secondary awarenesses and associations relating to the matter. Then change your handwriting - block print is the way we ran the second part - the same statement and even the same wording - and again record what comes up for you this time when you do so. Then a third cut with the same statement or question in the same words but with an exotic handwriting very different from yours, and again record the new secondaries that come up. (Other ways to vary the "medium" would be with differently colored paper, differently colored ink, lined and unlined and graph paper, different formats on your computer.) Then LOOK at one of your written pieces, notice the further sidebands; look at your next written variant and again notice the different STYLE of secondaries which are coming up for you on it, and then the third.

As simple as that - try it and you will generate major new insights you never had before. That easily.

And almost ANYthing you do, in context of the question or issue, while staying alert for a discrete interval of time for such sidebands or relevant secondaries to emerge for you, will bring into your conscious focus such insights! Unbelievably simple! Everyone reading this: you are missing something great if you don't try this, simple as it is, easy as it is.

This is so COUNTER to how we were raised to think of thinking, to think of grit-your-teeth mental effort, to think of the great and extraordinary suffer-suffer effort of somehow being a genius, something only a very few mysteriously could do and the rest of us moping around in outer darkness.

Hey: it takes only a few minutes; try this utter simplicity, stand for a minute in the sunlight of your own mind, and wonder how we could have missed something this major and this simple all these centuries...

- Win Wenger ( wwenger101@aol.com )

My understanding is that (for whatever reasons - convenience, habit, survival) we are only ever partly aware of our surrounding environment. There is simply too much to take in consciously. Luckily however, we are still taking in the information, it is just by-passing our conscious awareness, and being stored for future reference, in case we need to access it. A large part of being creative, is about our ability to access these Sidebands more consciously, thereby widening the thin sliver of conscious awareness, so that we have more awareness to play with.

Presenting a talk on 'NVC and Parenting'

I have been asked at the last minute by my colleague Sarah Bird to step in and give a one hour talk on NVC and Parenting at the Attachment Parenting International (API) Conference on Friday May 19th 2006. The conference runs from 19-21st May 2006 at the Glenroyal Conference Centre, Maynooth.

From their website

The mission of Attachment Parenting International (API) is to promote parenting practices that create strong, healthy emotional bonds between children and their parents. These practices nurture and fulfill a child's need for trust, empathy, and affection, providing a lifelong foundation for healthy, enduring relationships.

Through education, support, advocacy and research, API seeks to strengthen families and increase awareness of the importance of secure attachment, ultimately helping to reduce or prevent child abuse, behavioral disorders, criminal acts and other serious social problems.

I am both excited and anxious about sharing my experiences of using Nonviolent Communication with my wife and 2-year old daughter Niamh (whom you can see a photo of in my profile opposite).

Escape Into Creativity

My colleague Tom Magill and I have have just created a new blog Escape Into Creativity to share our insights and experiences of facilitating together and using film with groups in Northern Ireland. We aim to help people to transform their lives by turning their unique experiences into films and documentaries. We work with prisoners, prison officers homeless adults and young people.

Check it out.

New Inner Vision Deck Yahoo! Group

I have just created a new Yahoo! user group called ivdforum. This group is designed to be your first port of call for asking questions and sharing experiences about the Inner Vision Deck.

As the creator of the Inner Vision Deck and moderator of the forum, I intend to answer questions personally whenever possible. I will also be uploading new files when appropriate.

If you haven't yet bought your copy of the Inner Vision Deck, you can buy it now at www.innervisiondeck.com

What are you waiting for? Join the ivdforum now!

Celebrating a new arrival

I'm posting a quick note to tell the world that my wife anita gave birth to our second child and daughter, Shona last Tuesday 14 March, 2006. Weighing in at 6lbs 6oz, she is pretty tiny in comparison to our other daughter Niamh, who is now two years old!

It turns out that Shona shares her birthday with Albert Einstein.

No pressure to perform Shona, no pressure!

Don't think about it.

It seems that scientific research is finaly proving what proponents of creative problem solving have been saying for years. From 'Sleeping on it' best for complex decisions at New Scientist.com (16.02.06)...

Complex decisions are best left to your unconscious mind to work out, according to a new study, and over-thinking a problem could lead to expensive mistakes.

The research suggests the conscious mind should be trusted only with simple decisions, such as selecting a brand of oven glove. Sleeping on a big decision, such as buying a car or house, is more likely to produce a result people remain happy with than consciously weighing up the pros and cons of the problem, the researchers say.

It seems that our brain can only handle a certain amount of concious data at any one moment. And many of what we consider to be problems or challenges have many more factors involved that make it difficult, if not impossible to solve using logic - at least to our satisfaction. So the next time you realise that the same issue has come up for you again, consider using creative problem solving to push past the limitations of your logic. In fact, this is exactly what The Inner Vision Deck helps you to do. Happy problem solving!

The Feedback Loop

This diagram is based on an article by Win Wenger, founder of Project Renaissance. Win is someone who I have much respect for and have trained with in the past. I wholehearted agree with many of his views/theories about the value of creativity in our lives. Especially as to how it relates to our growth, meaning, learning, and wellbeing among other things. In fact many of the tools I have developed (The Inner Vision Deck, and Rory's Story Cubes) have been done so using the methods that he freely shares.

I have designed this diagram for a workshop that I run, and generally do not say too much to participants about it. Their task is to work it out for themselves. So, what does this diagram mean to you? How do you make sense of it? Please examine your own thoughts, before reading Win's article at the link above. That very request, will tell you alot about the diagram.

Consent-based decision-making as an alternative to violence

Having been a few days since I've posted, I'm not quite sure what to talk about. A lot has been happening, and most recently it is Sociocracy that has been to the forefront of my mind.
The reason for this is because decison-making in Northern Ireland has largely been based on the threat of violence - both physical and mental. And Sociocracy provides an alternative based on consent. We introduced this consent-based decision making process with the young people on our cross community project.

For our groups, the issue they were facing was that not everyone could come to the project on the originally agreed nights - Monday and Tuesday. Instead of just saying, "that's tough!" we decided to use the consent-based or 'circle' meeting process to explore a 'third-way' solution. Within twenty minutes the group had agreed that Mondays would be for personal development, and tuesday for working on their film. In this way everyone got to work on the film. And for those who wanted, they could use Monday for pesonal development i.e. increasing confidence, developing communication skills, creativity, teamwork, decision-making, etc.

The groups really taken to it, and feedback so far is that it is inclusive, gives everyone a voice, ensures that people listen, and helps them to reach a decision in a way that is an alternative to violence. And the wonderful thing is that you can learn this method in practise.

I have also used this approach to decision making in businesses and with the board of the charity I work with - The Educational Shakespeare Company. In every case it has provide a result far greater than anyone initially imagined.

Squishing Creativity

Last night was my second night working with a new group of young people from Nationalist and Loyalist areas of North Belfast. Between now and June, my colleague Tom Magill and I will be helping them make a film about their experiences. We are working with a group who have identified lack of self-cofidence, low self-esteem and creativity as major hurdles to overcome.

From talking with them, these issues are affecting their school grades. They admit to not answering questions in class, for fear that they will get it wrong, that others will laugh, or that they'll look stupid.They are an incredible group of young people, who I guess are often overlooked, as they are so quiet.

This connects to something that I firmly believe in...that we are ALL inherently creative, and have a lot to contribute to society as a whole. Unfortunately our environment squishes this down so that we end up believing that it is not safe to be smart, creative, open, trusting, etc.

We become stuck, frozen or defensively dismissive for fear of getting hurt again.

I see this happening from quiet a young age, and a lot of my work is about helping people to remove these limiting beliefs that continue to smothering these natural capacities that our society is calling for now.

What are your thoughts on this? Can you remember a time that this happened? Or have you an example of how you overcame this? I'd love to hear.

Rory's Story Cubes - the counterbalance to Soduku!

Here is a web variation of a game called Rory's Story Cubes. I invented these using creative problem solving. Designed for all ages, Rory's Story Cubes and this web variant will help develop your imagination, creative thinking and pattern matching skills.

Here is today's grid...


Instructions for Rory's Story Cubes...

1. Starting with "Once upon a time..." create a story that somehow links together all the symbols in the Grid.
2. You can start with any symbol, and end with any symbol.
   
3. Use each symbol at least once.

Simply, but fun.

I'd really appreciate it if you posted your stories as comments.

And be sure to check back for more stories. I'll aim to add one a day.

How do you explain birth to a 2 year old using the back of an envelope?

My wife and I are due our second baby in March. Some of the literature we have been reading recommended drawing pictures to show how the baby is inside the womb. This is supposed to communicate that it is this baby in the womb that will be coming back from the hospital. The goal is to reduce the level of shock the eldest child will experience during what is known as 'dethronement' - when they are no longer the Number 1 in the house.

Well, I drew the diagram (above), and we explained it all. I even used arrows, as you can see. It was these arrows that cracked me up, at the absurdity of the diagram.

I especially like the baby up in the left-hand corner. When drawing the diagram I asked my daughter, where the baby was. She pointed here, so I drew the baby in. I figured that she might know something tha I didn't - having been born not so long ago herself!

So it got me thinking...what is the strangest thing you have written/drawn/seen/read on the back on an envelope? If you have a picture, email it, and I will post it here.

Until next time...

Is Work/Life Balance important to you?

One of the ways that I introduce the benefits of creative problem solving is through the idea of 'work life balance'. This term seems to be understood by most people. And many tend to agree that there is room for improvement here.

Okay, so here's how I do it...
On a scale of 0-10 rate how you perceive your work/life balance. 0 (zero) means it is totally out of whack, and 10 (ten) means you are totally happy with it.
Please, do this now...it only takes a moment. When scoring, go for the first number that jumps into your head before you can 'edit' it.

So, did you score a 10? If you did, great! If not, why not? What are the issues, challenges and/or beliefs that are preventing it from being a 10?
Try listing a few. Is it an issue in work? Is it a relationship? Is it a believe that you should be doing more or less of 'x'? I invite you to list at least 3 issues that result in your score not being a 10.

In doing this exercise, I currently score myself a 6. The reason I do not score a 10, would be my levels of energy, fitness and focus. So, some issues for me are:
1. lack of sleep (going to bed late)
2. energy levels
3. overall focus in work
4. the amount of coffee I drink
5. Housekeeping and maintenance

In the next post, I will share how you can start to address some of the issues you listed. And I'll be using the issues listed above as an example.

Until then.

Rory

Welcome to my Little Red Brain!

This posting has been a long time coming. I have threatened over the past year to start keeping a blog. And now is the time. My plan is to post on a daily(ish) basis any thoughts and insights relating to my work and discoveries in the areas of creative problem solving, learning and personal development. I'll also be sharing the highs and lows of the cross-community conflict resolution work here in Northern Ireland.

On top of that I also plan to log my experiences in bringing The Inner Vision Deck, Rory's Story Cubes and iSolve to market. These are just three of the products that I have invented using Creative Problem Solving. Each is in varying degrees of development.

As for the title of the blog, Little Red Brain is the nickname that my wife has given to the red-cover spiralbound notebooks that I carry everywhere with me. I use them to capture ideas, to do's and general thoughts and awarenesses. This blog is essentially and extension of that little red notebook.

To kick things I would like to point you towards the site of Win Wenger and Project Renaissance, in which I am involved. This site kicked of my real love of Creative Problem Solving as a powerful tool for transformation. I trained with Win in the use of Creative Problem Solving back in 2003. Much of his material is the equivalent of Open Source, in that it is freely available. I can personally testify that the techniques described on the site work, as I have used them to invent the products mentioned above.

Until next time. Rory.