Firstly, apologies to all of my regular blog readers, who may have noticed that I have been inactive for a month. It’s not a holiday, much less a picnic… Imagine this: you are a strong boat sailing on various waters; accustomed to repelling the pirates of the sea, and repulsing the birds of prey fromContinue reading “Entering the Whale”
Category Archives: Weblogs
Winning the war
Somebody was speaking to me today about how important story telling is for a speaker, and I couldn’t agree more. The Cox Report on English teaching, like most Government sponsored reports, was full of well meaning waffle, but it did have one blindingly brilliant sentence in it: “Narrative may be regarded as a primary actContinue reading “Winning the war”
The Motivation of Art
Like most people I love art in all its forms, especially literature, music and painting. We take it for granted that art exists; after all, the papers are full of reviews of it. Only last Saturday the Telegraph was stuffed with interesting art reviews. But as I read some of them I thought: is thisContinue reading “The Motivation of Art”
Acorn to Oak
I was recently invited to address over 100 Sixth Formers about motivation and their careers. It’s a wonderful opportunity and it’s great to not talk to business people sometimes, and have an entirely fresh audience – at 17 years old, very fresh! As I scanned their ranks I could see the overwhelming problem: just howContinue reading “Acorn to Oak”
The nebulous, the subjective and the sub-conscious
I find when I talk about motivation I frequently have to admit three things: that motivation, as a topic, is nebulous, subjective and mostly ‘sub-conscious’. What do I mean by this? When Dr Johnson, of dictionary fame, was asked, What is poetry? He famously replied that this was like asking, What is light? We allContinue reading “The nebulous, the subjective and the sub-conscious”
Being a pilgrim
For those of you who haven't read it, or seen it, my latest collection of poetry is called To Be a Pilgrim and is available on Amazon. I won't bore you with self-eulogies – I'd like to say it's sensational, but hey: you be judge. What I will say is sensational, however, is my wife'sContinue reading “Being a pilgrim”
Increasing billable hours
For those in the service industry – accountants, lawyers, consultants, trainers and coaches, yes coaches – one of the most important aspects of their business is selling their service. And after that, the second most important thing, if they want to stay in business, is increasing their billable hours. Now let's be clear here:Continue reading “Increasing billable hours”
Windsurfer, the beach, the baby
Last Thursday morning Linda and I decided to take a long walk through King's Park, across to the Woodland Walk and then down to the beach, from where we could walk onto the centre of Bournemouth. Quite beautiful. As we hit the beach at Boscombe we realised there was – what technically might be calledContinue reading “Windsurfer, the beach, the baby”
Building unshakeable optimism 2
Step 3 is to recall past achievements and better performances. Many people have problems recalling good events and high achievements. I once coached a young man whose only recollection of success was being able to recall winning a swimming race when he was ten! Clearly, this is wholly debilitating. One secret to overcoming this handicapContinue reading “Building unshakeable optimism 2”
Building unshakeable optimism 1
Optimism is one of those prerequisites for a successful life. Why? Because fundamentally it is about our belief system: the belief that things will turn out well. To those who believe, as Jesus himself said, all things are possible. And the well known law of attraction also informs us that what we don't want willContinue reading “Building unshakeable optimism 1”
The Mapping Motivation Series 