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How to close the gap and receive feedback

ames — Sat, 22 May 2010 07:21:11 +0000

I used to be shy of feedback. In fact, I had no confidence to receive positive feedback, let alone anything constructive to help me grow. Receiving feedback – to grow, is an essential part of our evolution as people. If we want to stay on a flat line of existence, responding to, and be commanded by our senses, our cravings, our tendencies, or our conditioning, then we do not need to listen or look within.

But if we want to grow, we need to listen. This can be frightening, exhilarating or damn right awful. Whichever is the case, this comes from:

Our perception of the feedback: whether we see it as positive (even if it is negative), changeable, or personal.
Our habitual response to feedback: do we blame others, get defensive?
Who the feedback comes from
How important the feedback is, in our life

It takes time to learn how to receive feedback, and let go of the vulnerability around being right, or simply not knowing; and being ok with that. Once you realise that to be vulnerable, to open yourself to that, is a huge strength, then you can take it on, chew on it, and spit it out as growth. This first started for me when I decided to say thank you if something complemented me. I struggled with that at first, always negatively responding to positive feedback. If someone said something as simple as “your hair looks nice today,” my habitual response would be “no, it looks awful,” or “it was fluke today.” Saying, “thank you” created a big lump in my throat, but gradually that went away.

Next came anonymous feedback through work. This happened three years in a row, surveying people I worked with (an external organisation did it for me), and then comparing the summary of these results with where I thought I was in various aspects of my role. This was enlightening. I learnt I had strengths I did not know I had. I also learnt that this process allowed me to close the gap between where I thought I was; my own reality, with true reality, which aided my mission: to see things as they really are. Not through my habits, not through my conditioning, or emotions.

At the beginning of this year I did this process with friends and family using the online audit form on Kerry Spackman’s website. He encourages this process in his book, The Winner’s Bible. It is worth a read if you are interested in self development. Again, this taught me some valuable lessons, and helped me close the gap a little more.

The skill of how to receive feedback is important when uses tools such as the online audit. From the above experiences, I have learnt to ask myself the following questions when receiving feedback:

Is this a repeated stream of feedback? Has it happened before? If it has I will take it on, and look at solutions.
Is it something completely random, and likely to be the persons reaction, or button being pushed? This is important to differentiate, because often we can take on feedback, and take it personally when we do not need to. If someone has fired an arrow at you, because of their own stuff, then you do not need to twist and turn it, to create suffering.
Look for examples of situations to contextualize the feedback. Are they right? If so, is it important to me to change? If so, how am I going to do this?

Anger

ames — Tue, 18 May 2010 08:54:12 +0000

“One moment of anger can destroy years of patience.”

- Matthieu Ricard

Insight

ames — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 22:29:55 +0000

“True insight means seeing things as they really are, not as we want them to be. Coming to this acceptance is the work of mourning. So, insight and mourning go hand in hand. We can’t give up what we don’t understand. We have to come to know something for what it is before we can let it go.”

- Larry Rosenberg

Choice

ames — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 18:41:40 +0000

“How we relate to adverse conditions is our choice. No one else has that power over us… Other people’s actions are one thing, but how we respond and are affected by those actions is within our power to change.”

- Tara Bennett-Goleman

Beginners mind

ames — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 09:56:06 +0000

A big concept in Buddhism that fascinates me, is beginners mind, or seeing things as though new/fresh, or with child-like fascination. This goes back to our ability to form habits. To layer things to automatize is a brilliant function for efficiency, but awful if we want to change it. Tara Bennett-Goleman explains in her book Emotional Alchemy that each time we do something habitually it is imprinted on our emotional brain, our amygdala. And each time we follow that habitual path we strengthen its use, so anything remotely similar quickly, and efficiently takes that path. But the problem comes when the result of that path does not serve us, yet we go down that path anyway. Mindfulness helps to slow down this process, to be consciously aware.

“Seeing things freshly as though for the first time lies at the heart of mindfulness.”

- Tara Bennett-Goleman

Seeing something fresh, without our filters, or habits removes judgement, or opinion. It’s a tough thing to do. Just try looking at a light switch for what it is: just a light switch. It’s not easy to remove all the thoughts around the light switch. “It needs cleaning, I need to change that bulb, it doesn’t work so well, is the light enough in here or should I turn it on? The shape of the switch is different to my old flat.” Try it, see if you can look at the switch and just see it, without layering it.

“Mindfulness is not bound by expectations, habits or the weight of our past. In Zen, beginners mind keeps a fresh awareness.”

- Tara Bennett-Goleman

Children have that beautiful ability to see things as they are and that is why they can be fascinated with paper, and forget the present inside the paper. As we grow we attach layers, conditioning that changes our perception but mindfulness can help peel back the layers. It’s an interesting concept to play with, and worthwhile pursuing.

“Mindfulness improves our ability to control our negative emotions, and let’s us see the bare facts, and not fall for our own cover stories.”

“How things seem depend on the lens or filter through which we look at them. Some filters are temporary; others last a life time, creating an enduring sense of our reality.”

- Tara Bennett-Goleman

Tara goes onto to say we can change our habits at any four levels:

Our thoughts
Our emotions
Our behaviour
Our relationships

And that by intentionally acting in a way that opposes our negative habits of mind helps to change our habits. In this way, first with conscious awareness, we are re-carving a new, positive pathway.

“When changing a habit, people often stop too soon, failing to push themselves past the stage of awkward unfamiliarity. It feels unnatural at first, so we revert to the familiar habit, which feels more comfortable, even after we realize it no longer serves us. This is so often what keeps us bound to our emotional habits.”

- Tara Bennett-Goleman

Judgement

ames — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 10:51:55 +0000

I realized today that as I get older and learn more about Buddhism, and Psychology that my habit to judge others is dying out. I’m quite glad about that. When I hear others judge others it’s like a stab in an unnecessary place. I have heard that as you wake up, you become more sensitive to things such as this.

KC wisely said, “I don’t like it when people judge others aspirations.” It struck a deep cord with me. An aspiration is something not yet achieved. And to judge someone else’s dream, or aspiration is unnecessary but how many of us do it? I know I used to a lot. But what is our intention behind that need to judge? Be it verbally in front of others, or in our thoughts. And this is what I return to if my mouth is about to open with anything like that. What is my intention behind such a comment? That consciousness easily breaks down judgement because you realize it is not serving you, or others.

The Buddha aptly said “if you can’t improve on silence, then don’t speak.”

Stress

ames — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 16:26:35 +0000

Kagyu Samye Ling Tibetan Buddhist Centre

“We must give up our unrealistic expectations. We are not machines and do not perform best under stress.”

- Clive Holmes

Who am I?

ames — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 20:40:55 +0000

Clive should have received a hefty commission from the bookshop on day two of the Emotional Intelligence course. He mentioned Tara Bennett-Goleman’s book Emotional Alchemy several times. In the lunch break most of the class brought the book from the small store behind the Tea Rooms. This store had an amazing collection of Psychology and Buddhism books, making my credit card quiver in my bag.

“Who am I if I am not my usual pattern of assumptions and self-definitions?”

- Tara Bennett-Goleman

This is such a powerful question. When we peel back the layers, what is left? And are we brave enough to see and try? Listening to a podcast by Jack Kornfield the other day he cited a great quote by James Baldwin:

“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to the hate and ignorance so stubbornly is because they sense when that is gone they will be forced to deal with their own pain.”

Compassion

ames — Fri, 25 Dec 2009 15:53:13 +0000

“Your suffering is not you

it’s ok to not be ok

nothing is perfect, and that’s ok”

- Clive Holmes

Compassion is a big topic. Where to start? Perhaps with what grabbed me most? “If you have a talent to receive compassion, you have no limits on giving.” Clive said and the whole room perked up as if confused with what he had said. In the western world we are taught to give, continuously. To do things for ourselves is selfish. So when Clive said to receive means you have no limits on giving the class breathed a sign of relief, and many emotions came out. It is a difficult thing, to receive. Even just a thank you – to really take it can be difficult sometimes. It took me a long time to learn how to receive a compliment. In New Zealand to be above or set out from others is negative. You don’t want to acknowledge success in yourself or others.

Pity is without compassion. It has ego, but compassion has respect. There is a fine line between compassion and being walked on, and we talked a lot about this. Clive said that to be compassionate yet have that street wise knowing of when to have boundaries is key, and that out of compassion for others you can’t be a soft touch. Otherwise you are feeding their habits and attachments, and not respecting yourself. Knowing when to be open and when to have tough love is a skill, and to have compassion, respect for yourself is essential to truly give it to anyone else. “If it’s good for the other person but not for you, then it’s not compassion” Clive dropped another anti-cultural teaching at us, creating confused looks, and breath holding.

This was our classroom

ames — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 20:52:34 +0000

As the EQ and Buddhism retreat dug deeper we learnt different meditations to help turn our reactions into appropriate responses, by cultivating time, and space, and self awareness. To have self awareness of those button pushers, with time we can master them, if we are motivated to do so. Clive talked about habits a lot: one of my favourite topics. As physiological systems, being able to cultivate habits is both our greatest strength, and our greatest weakness. They help us learn things quickly, but also help us take on unskillful things we later struggle to get rid of.

“Anything that takes us out of our habits is good,” Clive said nodding his head. You could see every cell in his body emanating agreement. Ultimately habits are reactive as they use pre-paved pathways which are normally filters, conditioned responses, deep seated beliefs, which aren’t necessarily real. But if we are out of our habits, we can respond instead of react.

Suffering can become a habit and just like giving up smoking we can give up suffering. This reminds me of one of my favourite quotes “some people are content to suffer.” But first we need to realize we are, realize we can change and then be motivated to do so.

“When we are lost in thought, in our habitual mode, we have left ourselves. We are not there.” – Zencast