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THE POWER OF PRACTICES FOR TAKING NEW ACTION

Larry Burback

06 January 2017

When we engage with teams, one of the first questions we ask is "how many of you want something to be different in your life". In over 30 years of doing this work, without exception, over 98% of people raise their hand "yes" to that question. 

Whether senior leaders of a fortune 500 company in CA, or people working the night shift on a manufacturing floor in the poorest county in the nation - we all, as humans, have something we'd like to shift in our lives. What we don't always acknowledge as adults is that shifting something, means we need to learn something new (and unlearn the old). A new way of communicating with our partners, a new way of eating or moving, a new way of managing our emotional response, a new way of earning or managing our financial wellbeing.

Whatever it may be, we need to first get clear about what we're aiming for and why, then it's really about being willing to commit to a new practice and new way of being in the world to get to the outcome we want.

The only way to truly learn something is to create a new practice that allows us to take some new action and have it be sustainable. Practices are hard work and especially as adults, it means not only learning something new, but also unlearning the old.

 

Video transcript

"We clearly believe that the body is the only thing that really learns. The mind may understand - which is kind of the booby prize - but the body is what really learns.

If you can’t take some new action, you may understand it, but you haven’t really learned anything yet.

The only way that happens is by shifting some of the actual practices you have in your life, to the goals you say are important to you.

You’re always practicing something. Are you practicing the things that lead you in the direction you say you want to go? And that happens through experiences.

So designing practices that move you in the direction you say you want to go, is critical.

If you don’t do that, then what happens is that any epiphany that you say you have, will evaporate in a short period of time."

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