Hello,

Now the last chapter of Harry Alder’s book “Train your brain”. I embedded a list at Amazon of all the great Harry Alder self-help books.

Let us start with chapter 9: Three Week Peak Performance Plan – that is all, just read the chapter if you want to go on the 21 day exercise.

Before that, read chapter 8: Techniques to Train your brain

• Balloon Diagrams – they are forerunners to mindmaps and allow you to represent your thoughts in a graphical way
• Brainstorming – you should be familiar with that and don’t forget the most important rule not to interrupt anyone else or ridicule someone else’s thought/idea
• Brainwriting – graphically as Brainsketching (one puts ideas on a board graphically, same rules as at Brainstorming applies) or as Brainwriting Pool (one writes 4 ideas on a piece of paper and shares them in the middle, same rules as at Brainstorming again)
• Chunking – you take a word/problem and chunk it down or up
• The Concept Fan – you work your ideas backwards; it reminds me of DBM where you e.g. ask yourself “I like to drive a car” – What kind of car you like to drive? How do you like to drive it? Why is it that you like to drive a car? You simply go into more detail and ask for the right motivation and solution to a problem. Sometimes you discover that the obvious answer is not right because the problem described is not the real problem. This is similar to a method mentioned as Repetitive Why Analysis.
• SWOTs – using the SWOT technique: Strenght, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats. Again, DBM has a tool called “FADS” – Fear, Angst, Development, Safety. The more dynamic and the more you might want to move in the model, e.g. you could draw a cross on the floor and stand in the situation, the better. Have someone to guide you through it!
• Flowscapes – you write down what comes to your mind when thinking of the problem. you then rank them time wise A, B, C – arrange the base list graphically to have a flow-chart. You then examine the points and see where the problem lies.
• Force Field Analysis – showing similar to SWOT which forces are for or against a situation
• “How to” Diagram – working backwards asking how to do certain things – very similar to the concept fan
• Metaphors and Analogies – using stories and examples from out of the workplace to find a new idea.
• Reversal – you change your point of view by 180 degrees. This can be physically, mentally, imaginative or just by putting yourself in someone else’s shoes.
• Root Cause Checklist – checking whether your answers touch the root of the problem. Going deeper into possible solutions.
• Sleight of Mouth – reframing technique from NLP which is described in detail in Wikipedia.

Let me thank Harry Alder for this great book. It summarizes a lot of NLP, common sense and how to use certain techniques to be more creative, perform better and have a greater life. Enjoy reading it in detail and start changing your life today.

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Alder talks about Serendipity – a word I had to look up to be honest. It is about noticing the unnoticeable. About having experience in different fields and ambiguity to find a new way of doing things. Question anything unusual. And, come up with the great idea on how to make life more worthwhile or earn millions of pounds. Whatever might be your goal?

Getting into a creative state of mind

Without wanting to rush, chapter 6 was only a few pages but great examples! Now, back to creativity. Change your self-belief and stimulate your mind. You need to relax, to might want to bounce ideas off other people’s thought/ideas, you like to talk about a problem, draw or write it down…. – do a self-appraisal and find out when you did what and why you were creative. You might have to change your current situation or routine to get into the state of mind you really want.

Alder offers help on “changing a belief”.

1. Identify the disempowering belief
2. Decide on an empowering replacement belief
3. Choose three supportive behaviours
4. Mentally rehearse your new behaviours

Alder then offers more help on changing beliefs, behaviour, relaxation and refers to the Disney technique. I do not want to go into much detail but his techniques are great and similar to meditation. While meditation really tries clearing the brain and thoughts, his relaxation technique opens up new thoughts and pleasant feelings.

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I hope I do not bore the audience but Alder has really valid points in his book. Whilst some think it is nothing new and more of a guru talk I really think that Alder has a nice guideline into everyday life with things that really work. The next chapter is about:

I remember studying that at university. But, I am still not sure how to measure your own anxiety level. Guess it is try-and-error and it is all about yourself. If you do sports, live a healthy life-style and sleep a lot, your anxiety level might be higher and so your performance. However, if you are easily stressed, cannot take any pressure, then you might not have such a high peak performance, a lower anxiety level.

What about the long-run? Can we all perform at peak performance with a high anxiety level? Is this peak performance something to wish for? This comes back to ideas of Work-Life-Balance (this year is the 10th anniversary of WLB) and the idea of relaxing after a proper stretch.

Alder offers a guideline on how to make your own personal pressure training plan. He also talks about re-framing, acceptance of the situation and changing of mentally attitudes. Those NLP techniques are brilliant to make the most of the situation. But do not believe you are a super human – Alder refers to sensory acuity, something John from Sensory Systems often refers to.

This is the first chapter where Alder offers an action plan – mental action plan. It is a great way of changing your attitude towards life and life situations. Best refer in detail to his book!

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday.

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In this chapter it is all about taking your mind off things to come up with the answer to a question that you already know in your unconscious. Musicians, actors, entrepreneurs, scientists and so on have experienced it. Everyone of us has experienced it. But there does not seem to be a how and why?

What I would be interested in is how do you spark your creativity? How do you think outside the box? Einstein who “sat on light beam”.

On my homepage I have Alan Alda’s quote:

Be brave enough to live life creatively. The creative is the place where no one else has ever been. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. You can’t get there by bus, only by hard work and risk and by not quite knowing what you’re doing. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover will be yourself.

Going into the wilderness of intuition and on the other hand Alder says take your mind off. Going for a walk, sleeping on the sofa, doing something different. Was it not proven that people who go outside for a cigarette break during their working day come up with more ideas than others. But, you do not have to start smoking in order to be creative.

Anything will do, e.g. you are working on a problem on how to find a job. If you do what you have always done, you will get what you have always got. Be creative, think outside the box. Start thinking about other ways on how to find the right job and then do not think about it for a while. Your unconscious still works on it and bang…..it might just happen while you do the dishes, you think of a new way and find the job you always wanted.

Nothing spectacular I suppose – not a new technique at all.

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