OPENNESS

Fourth publication in the Change Acceleration series

Get into a flow of true openness; while interacting with yourself and people aroundOpenness is a prerequisite for understanding. 

Without it there will be no enough space in you and others to get to the true understanding. Naturally we tend to protect ourselves from external influences, from opinions of others, from potential changes in the way we perceive reality. We are afraid that a change of our opinion about ourselves or opinion about the topic we strongly identify with; the change of our beliefs; will shake our core to the undesirable extend. Our mind likes to keep everything under control. When we know something we feel peaceful. When we don't we start feeling anxious. The life is dangerous; for limited mind; when we open up to new possibilities

That is why people in your team have so much trouble getting in a real and deep discussion; the discussion that will produce new brave ideas, new breakthrough thoughts, innovative initiatives. It is safer to manage business in a way we used to. Every change in your organization creates a resistance, as every change of beliefs that you or others collect in your minds meet with a push back. Even though the external change is reasonable and expected results desired by everybody, some people will resist, because it will force them to personal change. With every change, feelings are coming to the surface and with feelings Something gets triggered. Something causes you to resist even though it is much better and healthier to open up. When you open up, your mind shakes, and that it is a good sign, when you learn to understand that it is ok for the mind to shake for a while. When you fight with it you will immediately close down.

People will open up to the extend they will see openness in you. When your team members will see you: changing your beliefs, acknowledging your mistakes, appreciating new ways of doing things, they will be more able to take a risk of a personal change. There is one additional condition. They need to see that your openness is real, in your actions not in your declarations. In addition you need to realize that negativity does not help with openness. We tend as leaders to push things forward, find mistakes or issues and correct others. All those natural inclinations for seeing negativity; seeing failures; comes from Something and when it is triggered in us it is difficult to stop it. Do you remember meetings when all the flow of productive and creative discussion was killed by one strong negative statement and from that statement on people started seeing only risk, failures and barriers?

Openness is developed in you and others; during your team interactions; by appreciation not negation. Negation, critique, correction of yourself or others triggers Something in people that forces them to protect, shield and freeze they way of thinking. Praising yourself will open you up, praising others will open them up. Unfortunately it is easy to say, more difficult to be practiced. Not because we tend to forget about a need to appreciate, not because we have no idea how to praise ourselves or others, just because appreciation and positive approach triggers in us a strange feeling, something that some of us are not used to. That feeling triggers our barriers, internal tensions and we want to push all of that back to normal. The normal for us is control, overthinking and negativity. We are accustomed to that. Some of us even tend to feel more relaxed while being criticized then when somebody praises us.

If you are a leader there is a high probability you were born and raised for a long time in rather critical environment (childhood, school, university, first years of work). If it was not so bad at least it was the environment with more correction than appreciation. The question is whether you want to stay in that environment, continue the pattern and let the Something else; that triggers negativity in you; become even stronger? Just notice that now it is not an external environment that criticizes you but the internal one.