Posted by: nlpboot on: May 10, 2009
As we discovered at our last Boot, clarity and congruity of outcomes have significant influence on success, which doesn’t mean that you have to know everything about your direction before you start something, since you’re unlikely to know everything about what you’ll find next, but having some contact with a congruent intention can help anyone to stay on track with a particular job, a big project or life in general.
A few weeks ago I had the notion that things would go better for me if I could formulate an outcome for every interaction with every person I ever meet. This is part of some larger outcomes that are becoming clear for me, such as “accelerate my NLP training” and “have more satisfying interactions”, which are themselves part of the outcome of “transform myself into a happier, more competent person”. The good part about trying new things is that you always learn something.
At the beginning of this process, in my naiveté, I took what seemed a logical step of creating a one-size-fits-all kind of outcome, which was “the person will associate me with something happy”. This fits with my altruistic streak but also pays homage to the self-serving side. It was an interesting exercise because it focused my attention in a more directed way and enabled me to learn something valuable, namely, that there are lot’s of people with whom, for whatever reason, my desired outcome turns out to be “no outcome or interaction at all”.
This revelation has two parts. The first part is learning to ask the useful question of “What do I want with this person?” It may be I would like them to smile at me, maybe I want to practice micro-mirroring, or have a conversation about something specific, or enjoy their physical beauty, or something else. If I ask the question, I have a better chance of achieving something I really want, and the more I ask the question, the quicker and better I get at answering it.
The second part builds on the first. If I have a clear understanding of what I want, I can avoid mushing together incompatible outcomes, such as “enjoy her physical beauty” AND “have her smile at me”. I developed a new understanding of the phrase “Oops, she caught me looking!”
As I continue along this vein, I begin to notice when other people mush together intentions that don’t fit very well. I have also relegated my “associate me with something happy” goal to a higher level, a meta-outcome. It seems to work for now.
Will I see you this Wednesday?
Cheers,
Cabot
May 11, 2009 at 10:25 pm
Actually, what I really should have said in the post is that, in applying my one-size-fits-all outcome I found that there are simply lots of people with whom the outcome isn’t realistically possible, due to time constraints or people being preoccupied or whatever. In that case, I can modify my desired outcome to “letting go of any particular results” which frees me up to some extent.
-Cabot