4D Energiser Archives - Page 3 of 5

We’re all in this together…and ‘this’ can feel very different.

by Matt Beresford | May 7, 2020 | 4D Emerging Talent, 4D Energiser, 4D Leadership Development, 4D Workplace WellBeing

In this article, 4D’s Katie Churchman is discussing the diverse range of pandemic experiences. Maybe you’re sad, happy, frustrated, jealous, hopeful. And maybe that’s okay. As opposed to labelling them in a binary way- right/wrong, good/bad- can we sit with them in the grey space and see what they’re trying to say?

I love the sentiment behind ‘we’re all in this together’ and I certainly sense more appreciation for community in my own local and global networks. Tom Moore- the 100-year old war veteran who raised over £30 million for the NHS is a great symbol for this shared sentiment. His efforts- walking 100 laps of his backyard with a walking frame- captured the hearts of people all over the globe. Yet just because we are sharing similar sentiments with our global neighbours, it doesn’t necessarily mean our emotional experience of the pandemic is in any way the similar. Even if someone is having a similar external experience- regarding finances, space and social contact- their internal system might be impacted in a very different way.

Stop comparing

Social media has- for a long time- been a comparison trap. When we see the edited version of our friend’s #amazinglife we may find ourselves feeling a little less good about our own. During the pandemic, we may find that some of these impacts have been heightened. Even though we know, on some level, that it’s been edited and tailored to create a certain impact, it’s hard not to feel less than adequate when you learn about your co-worker’s perfect home-schooling routine, super organised house, and the fact that she ran a half-marathon last Thursday (just for #fun!). You may be thinking ‘how is she thriving while I’m struggling to [X]’ (you can fill in the blank.)

Well firstly, know that everyone in your network will be dealing with some sort of challenge. To quote Elizabeth Gilbert from her recent TED Connects talk, “I think you would have to be either a sociopath or totally enlightened not to be feeling anxiety at a moment like this.” We’ve all been challenged differently by this uncertainty and change. So whether we choose to show it or not, we are human, and we’ve all found different parts of this hard.

I know some people who are completely overwhelmed and exhausted juggling multiple roles- perhaps as a mum, manager and- as of 6-weeks ago- a home-school teacher. And yet at the other end of the spectrum, I know people who are incredibly lonely and struggling to fill their time. The breadth of experience is massive.

All of these challenges are related to Covid-19. And yet they are all vastly different. So try not to compare your response patterns to others. There’s no ‘right way’ of doing lock-down. This is unfamiliar and uncertain territory for all of us and we’re all trying to work through it in the best way we can.

Self-Compassionate Inquiry

It’s one thing to talk about the diversity of experience in the world around us. But there’s also a real range of experiences and emotions going on within us. I know I’m not alone in feeling like I’m riding a wave of emotions: one day feeling positive and energized, then the next I’m feeling hopeless or guilty that I’m not feeling more grateful for what I’ve got.

When the negative emotions show up what we can do is lean in with compassionate inquiry. We can lean into the hurt, anxiety or anger and softly find out what it wants. There are many ways of stepping into this sort of internal inquiry and a practice I am enjoying at the moment is Byron’s Katie’s 4 questions.

Katie- known for her international bestseller ‘The Work’– has a wonderfully straight-forward approach to self-inquiry: “If I can teach you anything, it is to identify the stressful thoughts that you’re believing and to question them, to get still enough so that you can hear your own answers. Stress is the gift that alerts you to your asleepness. Feelings like anger or sadness exist only to alert you to the fact that you’re believing your own stories.” When you believe your stressful thoughts – or any negative thoughts for that matter– you will suffer, in one way or another, sooner or later.

Instead of ignoring or feeling overwhelmed by these negative thoughts, we can choose to get curious and interrogate them with Katie’s 4 simple questions:

Is it true? – this is a yes or no answer. If yes, move to question 2. If no, experience it as a no for a moment and then move to question 3.
Can you absolutely know that it’s true? Dig deeper.
How do you react, what happens, when you believe your thought? How does it show up in your body? What’s the impact it has on you?
Who would you be without that thought? Notice what is revealed.

“A thought is harmless unless we believe it. It’s not our thoughts, but our attachment to our thoughts, that causes suffering. Attaching to a thought means believing that it’s true, without inquiring. A belief is a thought that we’ve been attaching to, often for years.”

– Byron Katie

Lean in with compassionate inquiry and find out what information is arising. What does that part of you need to feel safe and secure? Get curious, be kind and try not to judge what comes up. Just notice.

You are enough

Whilst I’m impressed by the creativity that has emerged from the crisis, I’m somewhat tired by the endless drive to fill this time with something worthwhile and productive. No, you don’t have to write a book, or get a 6-pack, or learn how to cook like a Michelin star chef to use this time effectively. Right now, doing the normal things, like getting up, getting dressed and making breakfast should be heralded as big wins. Small victories in a sea of change.

It makes me think of James Clear’s book ‘Atomic Habits’ and his idea that tiny habits are the ‘compound interest of personal development.’ Whist admirable, big goals focus on ‘winning the game.’ Whereas a ‘system of habits’ focuses on continuing to play the game. This is why good habits often don’t surpass their goals. For example, we train for a 5km run, we run a 5km, and then we stop running. Further still, goals don’t separate the winners from the losers. Everyone entering a competition or interviewing for a job has the same goal: to win the race or to get the job. The difference between the best of the best and everyone else is that the former has a system of habits that support the big goal.

A goal might set you off in the right direction. But it’s the small daily habits- or the ‘Atomic Habits’ as Clear likes to call them- that create real and meaningful change. So ask yourself: do you want to run every day during lock-down or do you want to be a runner beyond the pandemic? And do you want to write a book during quarantine or do want to become a writer? It’s a subtle shift but it’s difference between doing something in the short-term and becoming someone in the long-term. And right now, I do believe we’ve been given a rare opportunity to create new habits. But start small. Keep it simple. And stay consistent. What’s the smallest viable step that you can take towards your big goal? Maybe it’s a walk around the block. Or drinking a glass of water as soon as you wake up. Whilst these small habits may seem inconsequential in the short-term, they build up over time. As Clear says: “Time magnifies the margin between success and failure. It will multiply whatever you feed it.” And here’s the math: “If you can get 1 per cent better each day for one year, you’ll end up thirty-seven times better by the time you’re done. Conversely, if you get 1 per cent worse each day for one year, you’ll decline nearly down to zero.”

Writing for 10-minutes each day might not seem like that much. But times that by the number of days you’ve been in lock-down and it starts to add up…

One Pandemic. A Million Experiences.

This is true of the pandemic and life in general. Even if we had identical lock-down situations, we would still experience them very differently. Because we aren’t the same. Our external and internal worlds are so different, and the challenges vary drastically.

With that in mind, can we step-in and embrace this diversity of experiences, within ourselves and in other people? We’ve never walked a mile in someone else’s’ shoes. And equally, they’ve never walked a mile in ours. So, I leave you with a revision of ‘we’re all in this together’: Can we all be in this together with whatever shows up? Can we honour the diversity and hold the paradox within…?

The pandemic is so many things. There’s so much goodness showing up and there’s much to grieve. And just like life, it’s not one ‘thing.’

4 Reasons to turn to Interactive Online Coaching

by Philippa Waller | Mar 16, 2020 | 4D Energiser, 4D Leadership Development, 4D Team Performance, 4D Virtual Impact

Whether it’s personal impact, leadership, team performance or organisational change – coaching can be completely transformational both for the individual as well as for companies. And plenty of organisations recognise the incredible value great coaching can bring. At 4D we are passionate about bringing life-changing and leadership-changing coaching to more and more individuals and companies around the globe.

However, we live in an ever-changing, super-paced, busy world in which the contexts around travel, team schedules and leader availability can change in a heartbeat. The good news is that online coaching and development via online tech can be more than simply a substitute for face to face coaching programmes. More and more coaches and coachees are finding smart and creative ways to work together online. Even counsellors and psychotherapists are finding that working at a deep, intimate level around sensitive and vulnerable issues with clients can be highly effective when undertaken online. When thinking about taking on a coach, whether you are working on your personal growth as a leader, your impact as a speaker and presenter, your communication skills as a manager or your network and career progression as a valuable contributor to your organisation – building a strong coaching relationship online can tangible and outstanding results.

Here are four reasons why you might want to turn to online coaching to take your career, personal or leadership impact, company culture and performance to the next level:

1. Convenience

When working online you can work from the comfort of your own home or the convenience of your own office. It means you save on valuable travel time which means you can maximize your development and learning time.

2. Flexibility

When scheduling and working online it means you can be far more flexible when it comes to rearranging a session or the amount of time you might spend on a call. Once trains and planes have been booked and paid for it can be challenging to rearrange coaching sessions at the last minute so by cutting out the travel you immediately embed more flexibility into your coaching programme. On top of this most coaches, if working face to face, may charge a minimum fee of one or two hours. Which locks most face to face coaching programmes into traditional length sessions. Whereas when working online you might schedule a quick 10 or 20 minute session with your coach when your diary gets squeezed. Allowing you to have that all-important touch point and check-in, even when the pressure of your working day is squeezing your timetable.

3. Worldwide

By choosing to work with a coach online you are also giving yourself the gift of choosing from the best coaches in the world. By working virtually there are no limits to who you can partner with to help you succeed. If you have seen a coach speaking online and loved what they had to say, if you have read an inspiring piece by a coach or if you follow a coach on social media who works in the specialised field you are keen to explore – whether they are based in Boston, Bali or Blackpool – this is your chance to drop them a line. Nothing is stopping you working with the pick of the international coaching crop from the comfort of your own couch.

4. Modelling Leadership Impact Online

As a leader or manager you will be spending much of your time holding and participating in meetings, exchanging updates and idea sharing via conference calls – particularly at the moment when travel is limited. Another advantage of doing online coaching is that your coach gets to see you and your leadership impact online and so can get a real-world sense of how you relate, interact and make an impact in a virtual context. Meaning that they can help you adapt and develop your style to maximise your leadership impact across the web and across the globe. So that you as a leader can then model a conscious, impactful, present and engaging online leadership style to your team and people. Which is the beginning of the ripple effect for the culture of virtual communication you will create across your organisation.

As teams and tasks go more and more online, as business and briefings increasingly take place virtually, and as community and communication happen more frequently over the world wide web, a great online coach can be the partner and support that makes the world of difference to your personal, impact, professional success and your organisation’s journey. If you’re interested in exploring powerful and bespoke online leadership coaching with 4D Human Being do drop us a line and we can talk about how virtual coaching and development will take the impact and performance of you, your team and your organisation to a whole new level.

4D Human Being – helping individuals, teams and leaders communicate with impact – everyday.

Creatively responding to a changing world….

by Penelope Waller | Mar 4, 2020 | 4D Energiser, 4D Leadership Development, 4D Team Creativity & Collaboration, 4D Team Performance

Fear! Risk! Loss! Collapse! Danger! Concern! Alert! Threat!

Just some of the headline words in the papers today. It’s true we are living in an ever-changing world, full of uncertainty – whether that’s extreme weather, travel disruption, changing regulations, environmental concerns or as we are experiencing at the moment particularly – global health concern. So perhaps it is unsurprising that these are the headlines that greet us. And yet what happens to us as human beings when we are pushed into a state of fear is most likely to be a ‘defend and secure’ pattern of behaviour. Going into lockdown to secure and protect what we already have – contraction rather than expansion. And we can start to see the effects of this on ourselves and how we feel, our jobs, organisations and the global economy at large.

But is there a different approach? Is there a way to expand into uncertainty for the benefit of our own growth, security and flourishing as well as for the companies we work with? If so, how can we tap into this? Well for us at 4D Human Being it’s about responding creatively. In our 4D2C (4 dimensions 2 context) model, the environment has a much bigger impact on us than perhaps we are aware and often we allow the world (environment) to ‘happen’ to us. But how can we HAPPEN to the world? How can we create something new, exciting and positive in the face of uncertain and changing world events?

There are many models to use to delve into our business creativity and I’m going to offer three of them:

1. Traditional SWOT analysis

Listing out your existing Strengths and Weaknesses, and looking to the future by brainstorming the Threats and importantly the Opportunities that the market conditions are presenting could present new business streams. Recent GDPR data protection regulations may have felt to many of us as a threat due to additional costs, potentially falling foul of the complex laws etc. However, GDPR regulations opened up a huge opportunity for data protection companies and IT consultants to support and grow their customer base.

Recent floods and climate change fit many of those headlines above and are indeed global threats. However they also represent incredible business opportunities in the field of ‘Climate Adaptation’ – from flood defence systems, to agricultural solutions, to solving wifi connectivity in extreme conditions, the list goes on.

So how can we identify opportunities when we may be stuck in current patterns of working or fearful of the threats?

People – make sure you have the right people in the room. Introduce new unexpected people into the brainstorm for a new perspective. Ask yourself “what would so-and-so say? Get a new perspective
Place – Change the environment – take your team somewhere new, maybe a partner site, or a rural location, or even a part of the building you haven’t ever been to. Change your location, change the dynamics, change the thoughts.
Plot the Strengths, Weaknesses and Threats on your SWOT analysis. How can you then build on the strengths or counter the weaknesses and threats to create something new and exciting?
Play a game – at 4D we use the wonderful world of improvisation and games to open up ideas, new ways of being and new ways of thinking. As human beings we love to play… So create a game around the business problem – you may be amazed at what your team come up with!

“Same thoughts always lead to the same choices, same choices lead to the same behaviour and the same behaviours lead to same experiences and the same experiences produce the same emotions and these emotions drive the very same thoughts.”

– Joe Dispenza

2. The Obstacle map

What is the problem you face? Where would you like to be? And what is the blocker or obstacle that is stopping you from getting there? Until we set this out in black and white, it can sometimes be challenging to even understand what the problem is – let alone respond creatively! So we find ourselves trying the same solutions or behaviours over and over again, frustrated that things don’t change. Isolate the obstacle and see how you can move through or around it.

4D Tool: Draw three columns and leap the obstacle!

I was speaking with a friend of mine recently who runs a restaurant business – which is likely to be hard hit by current global health concerns as people are going out less. He’s a great cook, runs a great business and loves delighting people with wonderful meals. He felt in a ‘holding pattern’ of waiting, whilst the business started to suffer. Clearly the economic impact of the current global situation may well evolve and change, however when he isolated the business ‘obstacle’ he was able to see that, for now at least, the obstacle was the willingness of the customers to physically locate themselves in a restaurant. So by brainstorming around the specific obstacle a new solution could be found – in this case the solution may be to take the food to them. Something my friend is excited to quickly explore….

3. The What How Why

Simon Sinek’s What How Why Golden Circle model so often helps pull us back to the real core of why we do what we do, which can be incredibly helpful in a crisis.

We can get lost in the What and How we do which can lead to less flexibility in the face of change. Here at 4D we have considered the impact of potentially less large gatherings and less international travel and reflected on the core of why we do what we do.

“Helping leaders, teams and individuals consciously communicate with impact every day”

– 4D Human Being

At 4D we have been working with global companies for many years delivering a wide range of coaching, training courses and seminars centred on impactful communication between human beings. What we are seeing right now is due to global events is an impact on WHAT we do – as we predominantly deliver workshops and seminars around the world. And of course for the time being we are seeing less travel and fewer large events as organisations and individuals take measures to protect themselves and the wider community from the spread of disease.

So, coming back to the WHY we do what we do…4D is about communication, impact, connection, leadership and growth – so starting from there, and with more people working from home we are well placed to help people learn, grow, connect and communicate with impact. It’s just about flexing the HOW. And the online and virtual space is arguably core to our WHY! We need strong connectivity, engaging communication and flexible leadership skills EVEN MORE as we migrate to virtual working.

So if you’d like to discuss high impact, engaging virtual training in communication skills, storytelling, team building, leadership or creativity – to ensure that your teams respond to the world with the best interpersonal tools and techniques – do get in touch with the team at 4D Human Being.

The Fresh Start Effect

by Matt Beresford | Feb 27, 2020 | 4D Confidence & Impact Training, 4D Energiser, 4D Leadership Development, 4D Workplace WellBeing

Why new beginnings bring new energy to life

In this article, 4D’s Matt Beresford is exploring the power of Fresh Starts. Why do beginnings have more energy, than ‘middles’ and ‘ends’? And how might we capture some of this fresh start energy, wherever we are in our careers or relationships? Fresh starts and fresh approaches can help us to see our lives in a whole new way. What might you discover, if you start something new, or step in, as if for the first time?

Join Matt as he begins again…

Spring has always had a special place in my heart. For many of us, the longer, warmer days that follow Winter bring a sense of anticipation for the seasons to come and a promise of sunshine, colour and harvest. I am also a keen gardener, so after the enforced rest of Winter, I always find myself keen to get back into the garden, planting and sowing for the year ahead.

Plants aside – my birthday is also on the 20th March, and often coincides with the first day of Spring. So there’s always a lot to celebrate! And this year there’s been an additional fresh start to celebrate as I finally took the leap from a career in the IT industry to a vocation working full time with the team at 4D Human Being. I am hugely excited about the harvest we will reap in the months and years ahead as we grow the business and continue to develop ourselves, our work and the impact we have on the lives of those we work with.

Of course, at forty-four, this is also a step I make with some trepidation!

The Second Mountain

Whilst I have been planning this career move for some time, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to make the ‘leap’ this year. As I may have only 21 further springs in my working life (!), I’d like each of them to be spent in pursuit of something that I deeply care about rather than a career which ‘pays the bills’.

David Brooks’ recent book ‘The Second Mountain’ concerns itself, amongst other things, with exactly this challenge:

“Some people get to the top of that first mountain, taste success, and find it … unsatisfying. “Is this all there is?” they wonder…At this point, people realise, Oh, that first mountain wasn’t my mountain after all. There’s another, bigger mountain out there that is actually my mountain. The second mountain is not the opposite of the first mountain. To climb it doesn’t mean rejecting the first mountain. It’s the journey after it. It’s the more generous and satisfying phase of life.”

This is where I had been for some time – enjoying the people aspects of my role in the IT industry more than anything else. Through my time managing Google for Tech Data, I found myself increasingly interested in finding ways to connect it to the people who would be impacted by the technology that I was promoting – the schools and businesses I believed would become better connected, more collaborative and more creative by using Google Chrome.

For Brooks, that’s a crucial way to tell whether you are looking to start climbing your Second Mountain. “Where is your ultimate appeal? To self, or to something outside of self?”

Many of us, of course, also have substantial responsibilities that we cannot simply drop to follow a dream – we have mortgages to pay and families to provide for. I certainly still want nice things, nice wine, holidays, trips to the theatre…

So, the Second Mountain could be a major change, the banker who is now a teacher, for example, but it needn’t be – for many of us it may be a shift in emphasis:

“Still others stay in their same jobs but are transformed. It’s not about self anymore. If they work in a company, they no longer see themselves as managers but as mentors; their energies are devoted to helping others get better. They want their organisations to be thick places, where people find purpose, and not thin places, where people come just to draw a salary. “

Transformation through Work

One of the challenges of making ‘big step changes’, like a change in career, is that it will inevitably change you as well. My new role will require a new routine and will see me primarily working from home and interacting with different people. And that will transform me too – perhaps quite dramatically.

“Never underestimate the power of the environment you work in to gradually transform who you are. When you choose to work at a certain company, you are turning yourself into the sort of person who works in that company. That’s great if the culture of McKinsey or General Mills satisfies your very soul. But if it doesn’t, there will be some little piece of yourself that will go unfed and get hungrier and hungrier.”

Martin Luther King, Jr., once advised that your work should have length—something you get better at over a lifetime. It should have breadth—it should touch many other people. And it should have height—it should put you in service to some ideal and satisfy the soul’s yearning for righteousness.

Your obvious is your talent

If you have been feeling this tug towards another path it’s worth asking, ‘What are your unique set of skills?’ For me, it was years of directing and performing in theatre, twenty years of business experience, a lot of energy, a love of learning and wide, eclectic interests. You will have a set of skills that might build into an offering that is perfectly unique to you.

Scott Adams in ‘How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big’ says: “Failure always brings something valuable with it. I don’t let it leave until I extract that value. I have a long history of profiting from failure. My cartooning career, for example, is a direct result of failing to succeed in the corporate environment.” Adams likes to make the point that whilst he wasn’t great at any one particular thing – drawing, comedy, middle management – by combining the three he could create Dilbert, one of the best known and best-loved cartoons of the last twenty years.

What is your portfolio of ‘failure’ from which you have learnt something? What set of skills, experiences and relationships are unique to you and that can help you identify the talents you might bring to your Second Mountain?

At 4D we like to say: “Your obvious is your talent” – a favourite saying of improvisation teacher Keith Johnstone. What seems to you to be the most simple and basic skill may be one that many others have to work very hard to emulate. This might be something as seemingly ‘obvious’ as powerful listening, being organised, or being able to host a dinner for customers. What do others value you for that you barely give a moment’s thought to and that, by doubling down on, might unlock new opportunities for you?

A System of Living

When making a fresh start it is tempting to set oneself lofty goals for what one wishes to achieve – the weight we will lose, the language we’ll learn or the money we’ll earn. The 4D2C model provides a great tool for thinking about communication, whether 1-1 or 1 to many, with a much broader lens than the one we normally bring. It can also be a way of thinking about one’s life and how to ‘be’ and ‘grow’ in all four dimensions. It provides a system of living, rather than a goal with an end destination.

Instead of setting ourselves goals and being in a constant state of what Scott Adams calls “a state of continuous pre-success failure at best, and permanent failure at worst’ we can use the 4D2C ‘system’ to provide a way of committing to a set of behaviours or attitudes that we believe will provide success in a given endeavour.

We cannot control what is out there in the world, however as Adams says:

“Systems people succeed every time they apply their systems, in the sense that they did what they intended to do. The system-versus-goals model can be applied to most human endeavours. In the world of dieting, losing twenty pounds is a goal, but eating right is a system”

The 4D2C model provides a useful way of checking on how I am choosing to grow and behave, within what environment and with what people. It encourages us to ask questions like: is this an environment and culture within which I can learn, grow and create the kind of impact I want to have on the world? And will it allow my 4-dimensional self to develop and find creative expression?

When to Start

If you’re thinking of making a fresh start in your life, in whatever field, Daniel Pink’s recent book, ‘When’ provides some great ideas for starts (as well as middles and ends!)

“The recipe is straightforward. In most endeavours, we should be awake to the power of beginnings and aim to make a strong start. If that fails, we can try to make a fresh start.” Pink also celebrates what he calls Temporal Landmarks for making those starts:

“The first day of the year is what social scientists call a “temporal landmark.” Just as human beings rely on landmarks to navigate space—“To get to my house, turn left at the Shell station”—we also use landmarks to navigate time.”

First days of the year, month and week are commonly used for these Fresh Starts. Other landmarks are personal – say for example landmark birthdays and anniversaries. These dates “allowed people to open “new mental accounts” in the same way that a business closes the books at the end of one fiscal year and opens a fresh ledger for the new year.”

Spring Beginnings

Whether it’s dedicating your working life to a different vocation, training for an Ironman or learning a new language, as George Eliot said, “It is never too late to be who you were meant to be”.

So, do join me in embracing a Fresh Start this Spring. Whether big or small, it’s the ideal time to find a landmark and make a change that will move you closer to being who you were meant to be. If that also involves growing your first vegetables, I am happy to provide advice!

4D’s Phil & Pen: Mirror, Mirror…

by 4dhumanAdmin | Jan 28, 2020 | 4D Energiser, 4D Essential Communication Skills, 4D Workplace WellBeing

4D Human Being Podcast
EP22 – Mirror Mirror
by4D Human Being

Instead of blaming another person in a relationship, can we turn the mirror on ourselves in order to uncover what we might be rejecting in ourselves? In this funny and light-hearted podcast, Penelope and Philippa turn the mirror on themselves and lean into triggers their triggers. What might we learn when we see our attitudes and behaviours reflected back at us?

4-Dimensional Dreaming

by Philippa Waller | Jan 27, 2020 | 4D Confidence & Impact Training, 4D Energiser, 4D Leadership Development

Never stop dreaming.

Dreams are not a childish waste of time. It’s in our dreams that we plant the seeds of our future. Today, we’re matching the power of dreaming with the energy of intention, so that we can catch our dreams and turn our wildest fantasies into our reality.

In this article, we’re looking at how we might live from our dreams in lots of different ways. We may have some disappointed dreams. Perhaps your job, hobbies, house or social life might not look exactly like you dreamt at 10-years old (and that’s not necessarily a bad thing!) But are there parts of the dream or attitudes of the dreaming that you can bring into your adult life? In 2007 Randy Pausch delivered his “Last Lecture.” A month before giving the lecture Randy had received the prognosis that his pancreatic cancer was terminal. So Randy used his ‘last lecture’ as an opportunity to impart his final wisdom on the world. And what did the professor of computer science, human-computer interaction and design at Carnegie Mellon University choose to present on? “Achieving your childhood dreams.” In this surprisingly upbeat and light-hearted lecture, Randy talks about how you can still accomplish your childhood dreams and truly live your life to the fullest.

Join us as we look at ways we can reinvent our childhood dreams and bring an attitude of dreaming into our everyday interactions. To quote the American poet and philosopher Henry David Thoreau: “Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake.”

So…let’s get dreaming!

Distill your Dreams

You can still live from your childhood dreams. Because your dreams don’t have to look exactly as they did when you were growing up. Not if we deconstruct the dreams and capture the essence of the dreaming.

In ‘The Last Lecture’ Randy Pausch talks about his childhood dream of wanting to be an astronaut. However, as he got older he realised that it wasn’t blasting thousands of miles up into orbit that was the aspiration. Rather – the fun and fascination of floating in zero gravity was really at the very heart of his dream. What this distilling process left him with was the dream in its purest, simplest form. And this was a much more reachable dream that he could realise in many different ways.

So, how did Randy do it? Well as it turns out NASA has something called a vomit comet they use to train astronauts, which offers the experience of weightlessness for about 25 seconds. NASA offered a programme where college students could submit proposals to win a flight on the vomit comet. So, Randy got a team of his students together and they won. But unfortunately, Randy missed the T&Cs which stated that under no circumstances were faculty members allowed to fly with their students. Luckily there was another bit of small print stating that students were allowed to bring a local journalist with them…and just like that Randy retracted his application as a college professor and applied again as a web journalist accompanying the students and as a result accomplished his childhood dream of experiencing weightlessness!

Could you put some of your long-shot childhood fantasies through this distilling process and live from these dreams in different and perhaps more tangible ways? Distilling or deconstructing your childhood dreams can help you to uncover the essence of the dream and will give you clarity around what you really want. As Randy Pausch realised, he didn’t really want to live the life of an astronaut and spend months away from family and friends. What he wanted was to experience weightlessness. And that was a dream he managed to accomplish.

Let’s follow in Randy’s powerful footsteps and take a moment to deconstruct one of your childhood dreams. Perhaps you wanted to be a ballet dancer. What was it about that dream that you were specifically attracted to? Maybe it was the physical expression, the performance, the storytelling through movement. From here you can dig further still. What was it about the physical movement that made your heart sing? Maybe it was the flow, the symmetry or the precision. Keep going until you believe you’ve captured the essence of the dream. An essence that you can live from in lots of different ways. You may discover you can find a similar sense of flow or symmetry on the yoga mat. Or maybe you- like me- make your dream an important part of your personal life…

Build your hobbies into your dreams

Hands up, I have a fantasy of being on Strictly Come Dancing! 3 years ago, I started taking ballroom dancing lessons. And I immediately fell in love with the grace and flow of ballroom and the patterns and precision of the different dances. Yet the dream- to dance on Strictly- still sang in the background. And if we don’t chase our dreams, we will never catch them.

But what was it about the Strictly Dream that I longed for? The glamour, the dresses, the competition, the grace, the show. The whole thing. And all of those elements are things I can chase in my personal practice- without having to become a professional dancer. How? By entering an amateur ballroom competition. These kinds of competitions are totally accessible and represent a truly tangible way I can turn my hobby, something I love to do in my free time, into my dream. It doesn’t have to be our profession or a full-time job for it to be achievable. Not if we deconstruct the dreaming and look at other ways we can accomplish our dreams through our hobbies.

Put your goal out there and then rub out the fixed path because there are many routes to accomplishing a dream. Setting a goal doesn’t often give you a clear set of directions. What it gives you is much more powerful: it gives your internal compass a bearing and sets you off in the right direction. But there are still are many other paths along the way. Stay open and you might be surprised by which one leads you to your dream.

They say don’t judge a book by its cover. Well, the same applies to dreaming: don’t judge a dream by its title, as you’ll be undermining its depth and limiting opportunities to live from it in lots of different ways.

Dream Blockers

“Never give up on what you really want to do. The person with big dreams is more powerful than one with all the facts.”

– Albert Einstein

Can we dare to dream in spite of the potential set backs? Some of the past century’s most inspirational leaders were people who were told no, experienced great set-backs but dared to dream on anywhere. Martin Luther King is a perfect of example of someone who experienced dream blocks, yet continued to keep the dream alive by looking for ways around the dream block and towards the same end goal.

Many things can block our dreams. We don’t operate within a vacuum. We are always dealing with the 2 Contexts as we call them at 4D: our environment and shared culture. Our environment is all the tangibles, like the weather, and the country you live in. Our shared culture is other people. A lot of these things are out of our control. And they can have a big impact on our dreams. Maybe our families had different dreams for us? Or perhaps society’s version of success has impacted the career we chose?

So how do we push back out into the world when the world around us is blocking our dreams?

By waking up the 4th dimension: the intentional dimension. This is your best friend when it comes to dream enhancement. If you reach a road block to your dream, how might you find another way through, in order to reach the same end goal?

Activated Dreaming

“Dreams don’t work unless you do.”

– John C Maxwell, ‘The 21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader’

Bringing your intentional dimension online is vital for achieving your dreams. However, living with intentionality isn’t simply about setting an intention and then sitting back and enjoying the show. Intentionality is something that impacts all of your other dimensions. It’s not simply something you say or do; it’s something that affects your whole being.

So, how can we activate our intentions in order to live with intentionality? We can start to match intention with action. Say for example you have a big dream to one day run a marathon. That’s the intention you’ve set yourself. To activate this dream, of course you’re going to have to start training! And as sports psychologists know, it is our intentional self that is going to make the difference as to whether our training is successful. Because, if the training feels physically hard, we may emotionally feel despondent, intellectually you may be telling yourself a story about being useless at running, and so perhaps you don’t push yourself as hard, so you feel disheartened and so the cycle continues. This will lead to an undermining of progress. And this unhelpful circle of feeling/thought/behaviour can appear in all areas of our lives and is why it is so important to keep our intentional dimension activated and online. Because of course when we’re tired, busy, despondent or stressed it’s all too easy to fall into our default ways of operating. And it’s our intentional dimension that keeps us motivated and our dreams on track.

Living with intentionality is the best way to fast-track your way to your dreams and help to keep you moving forward step by step in the direction of you dream. There is perhaps no better example of this than Walt Disney. He matched the magic of his dreams with the energy of intention and quite literally built his dreams into being- a reality I’m sure you’ve had the joy of exploring, whether that be via wandering the magic kingdom or watching a film. To quote the man himself: “First, think. Second, dream. Third, believe. And finally, dare.”

Dream Team

To use the wonderful words of John Lennon: “You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one.” We all have dreams, however big or small. So how might the people around us help us with our dreams? And how might we help other people to achieve their dreams? Let’s use the power of dreaming and our ‘4D Dream Team Guide’ to help our team achieve even greater things…

Become who you want to become

“Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.”

– George Bernard Shaw

Dream dreams that are bigger than the things you could do. Dream about who you could be and step into a new way of being and experiencing the world. As Dan Pallotta says in his TED talk ‘The dream we haven’t dared to dream: “It’s time for us to dream in multiple dimensions simultaneously, and somewhere that transcends all of the wondrous things we can and will and must do lies the domain of all the unbelievable things we could be.”

Who do you want to be? For both yourself and also the people around you….

We used to think that the brain was fixed from around the age of 30. Over the past two decades, research into neuroplasticity has proven that this couldn’t be further from the truth. Yes, our brain’s change at a slower rate at 7-years old compared to when we are 77-years old. But our brains are still building and changing right into later life. And that’s exciting because the science tells us that as human beings, we’re not fixed but constantly evolving. So, the question we should all be asking ourselves is: what kind of human being do we dream of being?

What would be your dream story about you? Maybe it’s around being funny. So, what behaviours would help you to build a new belief system around comedy? Perhaps it’s as simple as learning a joke a day and sharing your favourite one in your bi-weekly team meeting. Or maybe you sign-up for an improvised comedy course and try out some spontaneous comedy. Step in to the dream of who you are and your beliefs about yourself will follow. Be the thing you want to be, with regards to your actions, words and thoughts, and step into a version of you that you’ve always dreamt of.

Dare to Dream

Our modern world stems from dreams – dreams turned into reality. So if we want to help shape the experience of ours and others lives, we have to value the dreaming stage in any project, decision or relationship. Never stop dreaming, because living with an attitude of activated dreaming can completely transform yours and others experience of life and inspire your teams, friends and family to think outside of the box and push through boundaries.

Of course, dreaming comes more easily to some of us than others. So if you’re someone who struggles with dreaming, try asking yourself these 4 questions in order to fire up your dream muscles, and you might notice how much richer your life becomes and how much bolder and braver you can be! You may find yourself surprised by the dreams that arise…

1. What do you want your days to consist of?

Take a moment to think about the things you love to do, the places you like to go and the people you enjoy being around.

2. Imagine your 8-year old self…What did they dream of?

And how might you bring elements of these childhood fantasies into your adult life?

3. Now imagine your 80-year old self…What did they dream would happen?

How much of their dream could you make come true? Now plan it!

4. And finally, if your life were a movie what character would you be?

What appeals to you about the character or story plot? And how might you bring parts of that character into your everyday life?

Your reality starts from the essence of your dreams and the dreams of those close to you, so start living from your dreams today – with your whole being- and watch as your fantasies turn into your reality. Remember “You gotta have a dream, if you don’t have a dream, How you gonna have a dream come true?” (South Pacific, “Happy Talk”).

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