Saturday, October 1, 2011

Edward de Bono and happy thinking - makes you smile

Today I will be watching an interview with Edward de Bono: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-09-03/one-plus-one---friday-3-september/2248444 (20 min in...)

This is an AMAZING man. So cute, so clever, so quirky. Experiencing him at Cannes Lion was one of those Moments in life when you just... aaaah. The whole room of egos (yeah, you know the adland types :) were quiet, just stunned by this man. Like children.

Kevin Roberts from Saatchi & Saatchi pointed me to the direction of this tv interview (in his blog). He found a few interesting insights:

- At an everyday level, thinking can help to unravel the problems that make us miserable – become better thinkers and we’ll be happier people.

- Teaching creative thinking puts wayward young people on the right track (de Bono cites the outcomes 20 years after a UK school started teaching his approach to thinking) and reduces recidivism rates when taught in prisons. Happy thinkers are less likely to turn to crime.


So what is a "better thinker"? A "happy thinker?

In coaching, one of the greatest tools we use to put people on the right track, is "re-thinking". Many of us are unhappy because we focus our energy and mind space on the wrong parts of life; we dwell on disasters, pain, trouble and ugliness instead of all the blessings that are around us. We see what needs to be fixed more often than what´s working, and this fills the head up with more darkness than light - leaving us unhappy. Our job as coaches is to talk about what you wish to have, instead of what you´re missing, and about what you love instead of what you hate. Dwell on the fantasies and dreams and you´ll get a better future!

We also tend to think that we will be happy "when..." - when something happens to us, like getting the job, the boyfriend, a holiday - instead of seeking joy in NOW. This video explains:



Another blog post about de Bono: Why ad people sounds stupid: http://howwemove.blogspot.com/2011/06/why-ad-people-sound-stupid-and-edward.html

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