Book Cover

Buy this book now:

Tripcover Car Rental Excess Insurance

A Test of a First Rate Intelligence
F. Scott Fitzgerald famously said that “The test of a first rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.” Rethink Perfect is a “test of a first-rate intelligence”. I like to think it is the combination of the “glass half full” AND “glass half empty” thinking. Or, the art of being pragmatic AND a dreamer, able to hold both opposing or contradictory outlooks at the same time. Being able to find the balance, however fleetingly, between false dichotomies such as right and wrong, good and bad, love and hate, perfect and failure is the goal of Rethink Perfect thinking.
What is new, I think, is my application of Rethink Perfect on relationship theory and the tools that have been spun off by being able to plan for perfect relations and prepare for the failure.

Seeking Dissent and Diversity
In Think Twice, Michael Mauboussin’s book on harnessing the power of counter intuition, talks about on page 34 seeking out dissent by finding data from “….reliable sources that offer conclusions different than yours. This helps avoid a foolish inconsistency”. And “when possible, surround yourself with people that have dissenting views. This is emotionally and intellectually very difficult but is highly effective in exposing alternatives.”
Rethink Perfect is designed to reduce the emotional and intellectual difficulty of having relations with people with dissenting views.

In Guy Kawasaki’s book Enchantment, he talks about having a diverse team.
” A diverse team helps make enchantment last, because people with different backgrounds, perspectives, and skills keep a cause fresh and relevant. By contrast when a naked emperor runs a kingdom of sycophants and clones, the cause moves towards mediocrity.”
Rethink Perfect is my way of encouraging and maintaining diverse views, together.

From free to full-service, CreateSpace offers on demand self publishing options to meet your needs and budget. Sign up free now.

Discussion Vs Conversation

Steve this is for my blog.

What do you think is the difference between a discussion verses a conversation?

I have my own personal idea, of course.

Accountability and Rhetorical Questions

DES said:    When you split up was  part of the reason was because you wanted
a 3 step apology? Well I do remember thinking that at the time you couldn’t even get a 1 step apology! So now what would you say about this in light of (our latest understanding) of Accountability?

Anonymous said:   “We didn’t have an agreed way to discuss and resolve stuff.”

To me, that is still a bit like saying the reason the plane crashed is because it fell out of the sky. In this context, I think you both did not have one of the 6A Framework agreements that me and you have. This one being Accountable, what it entails and how to address it when either of you fail.

That is, me and you have agreed how to “discuss and resolve stuff” by to splitting it into 6 parts, (3 for listening to the speaker and 3 for listening to the responder) and have the overall governing agreement that any anger during the process is understandable but not acceptable (hence back to accountability if anger occurs and the 6As help us to detect and moderate it).

So the 6A framework, to me, is about moderating/governing/measuring our levels of anger during a conversation and holding us accountable throughout the process, which in turn reduces anger on both sides.

For example if someone responds to a comment by saying:
“What makes you think a discussion about our relationship boundaries didn’t happen??” This, to me, feels like it is the beginning of anger by its rhetoric, yet without an agreement on accountability, I did not have the courage to address it.

Having an Accountable agreement which includes rhetoric, allows us to point out the rhetorical question and ask them to be more accountable in their delivery, using the agreed 3 As for responding.

ie. “Thanks for your question however it seems to me to be rhetorical. Can you put it in a way that that will encourage me to respond more constructively.”

See, this rhetorical approach is a villain here, as it tries to cloak or dress up our anger, expectations and resentment. What a more acceptable response (if I had of had the courage to discuss her rhetoric and get an agreement) would have been if she said:
“Des, I think that you are assuming that our boundaries were not discussed”

To me this is a much more up front and friendlier approach than “What makes you think….??” and could very well be one of the reason that her friend left. As without discussing and agreeing to this boundary of rhetoric and accountability in general during a conversation I think a conversation and the relationship it comes from are doomed to be compromised.

So the real villain here is, I think, that without having these agreements on how we hold each other’s anger to account, that what starts out as a spark, is enough to make us retreat from all attempts to communicate, out of fear of a full blown bushfire resulting.

Accountability and Not Invented Here (NIH)

Steve when you split up was part of the reason because you wanted
a 3 step apology?

Well, I do remember thinking that, at the time, you couldn’t even get a 1 step apology!
So now what would you say about this in light of our understanding of Accountability?

I read a very interesting theory called Not Invented Here (NIH), Dan Ariely writes about it in his book The Upside of Irrationality or you can see more on it on Wikipedia where people, and organisations are more interested in and likely to adapt their own ideas rather than someone else’s, regardless of the quality.

But with regards Rethink Perfect it can work in my favour as RP seems to take NIH into account and forces me to continue to simplify the concept until even the NIH people will choose to adopt it.

Looks like I have a long way to go still to convert my ideas.

The Blind Leading the Blind

In Taylor Clark’s book Nerve he refers to psychologist John Leach’s research that some 15% of people in a crisis will stay cool, 15% will fall apart & some 70% will act like lost sheep waiting to be led or misled.

The good news is however, with a bit of preparation and training most of us can act responsibly during a crisis. In other words fail to prepare & prepare to fail.

Gold Coast Police Bikie Blitz

How about this for a police blitz. Two female police officers and their police van were staked out around the coner of Hedges and Peerless Avenue, stalking boys and girls on the bicycle path and instantly booking them even if they are overseas visitors and did not know the severity of the law in Qld.
That is exactly what I witnessed while I was riding there this afternoon.

Yes folks your taxes at work. But worse still all along the path boys and girls on the bike path were warned about the cops were down the end of the road so they were fleeing to the safety of the roads to avoid them.

“Come on” I told the cops but it just seemed like a revenue raising outing for them. With no warnings handed out to anyone stopped. At one point there was a crowd waiting for a ticket. What a joke. ”We are just doing our job” they said, so I guess their sargent told them to do some stalking and raise some money. See I have a doctor’s certificate which allows me to ride within the law but these boys and girls do not know any different. Australia is one of the only countires that makes bicycle helmets mandatory by law.

With all the shootings happenng on the Gold Coast (BTW they were parked within 300 metres where the bikie gang shooting happened just last week) surely these police have better things to do on a May day afternoon? What are they thinking?

Bag a real Bikie Gang shooter not boys and girls on bicycles I say!!!

Not So Perfect Marketing

I just came from a not so perfect date but I met her through my marketing ploy, and it goes like this.

I have just completed my book/manual called Rethink Perfect: The Upside of Uncertainty and the art of moderating our own disputes.

As it is a book about and for me and my mating cycle, I created a profile on a popular dating site here in Australia called RSVP using the title of my book as my profile handle, Rethink Perfect.

http://www.rsvp.com.au/profile/display.action?handle=rethinkperfect&uid=3115353

I used my profile to explain the idea of the book and referred to my blog by the same name Rethink Perfect. Although this is not really allowed, I got away with it. The woman that contacted me said that she loved my profile and even more loved my blog and so I gave her one of my books as a present on my date.

She said that I was using my profile to market my book but I explained I use my book to market myself!

Anyway, obviously this type of marketing would not suit every author but it shows a lateral way of thinking and marketing.

Fear Resonance or Swing

Just reading a book last night called Nerve by Taylor Clark and he talks about the story of how this prince came to enlightenment some 2500 years ago (now called Buddha).
Just before he came to this point he realised that his mind was like a monkey swinging
from tree to tree. Once again it is interesting the use of this analogy of a swing for the mind
and how we deal with fear.

Another point I thought interesting is that in his book he more talks about
people in relation to their own fear and how they come to deal with these personal fears.
Where as my concept is much more about how two people connect and deal with their joint fear. This “coordinated fear” (and coordinated behaviour) seems to be left out in psychology books generally but included in economic books much more. Think of phobias like acrophobia, arachnophobia, fear of snakes, hypochondria etc and general anxieties. He does not seem to mention fear of disagreements and our one-on-one fears. Such as fear of losing what we have already with a person and fear of losing our future time with a person.
Fear of non-conformity/peer pressure or fear of not showing who we really are. I think that most of our fears are made up of these one-on-one or coordinated fears. For every connection we make we have associated and coordinated fears, I believe.
How we talk to each other can either exasperate or reduce our coordinated fears.
After all who doesn’t fear being screamed at or being ignored (given the silent treatment)?
Two opposing fears but also both legitimate and can be used as torchure techniques.

i.e. She says “you never do that” and he says ” you always say that”. This feeds our coordinated fears (use of non-Adjustable and non-Accountable language)and creates the resonance that expands in to a full on fight, as we push each other’s thought back and forth.

Think of two people pushing a child on a swing from both sides. The resonance of each action, from both sides, contributes to the swing reaching its highest point much quicker (a heated conflict).
This is the same as the coordinated behaviour I mention in my book with the swing fault in the original millennium bridge design caused by pedestrian coordinated side to side movement.

Having a plan to inject non-coordinated movement, from at least one person, is the plan of
Rethink Perfect, through responses such as Appreciation, Acknowledgment and Apology.

I have taken this swing and turned it upside down as in the diagram below but is still driven by our coordinated fears. And can be dampened using, the agreed to, 6A rules of engagement, counter balance or moderator.