[Emergence]January 2006, The Conversation is the Relationship. Take a moment to think about the most important relationships in your life. Are there any conversations that are not being had? And what about the other relationships, the ones with your co-workers, your suppliers and your customers? Is there a conversation that you know needs to be had? What is the cost to you and your business, your life, of not having these conversations, not just the financial cost, the emotional, physical and energy cost? Practical action you can take to improve your leadership, communications and awareness. More than 1,500 subscribers now receive this free monthly newsletter. Thanks for passing it on! To SUBSCRIBE, please use the links at the bottom of this issue. Copyright 2005, Syzergy Pty Ltd. For permission to post or reprint, please see notice at the end. Notes from a Subscriber Dear Christine, I have been studying and in pursuit of freedom my whole life. I very clearly remember as a little child (6 or 7 years old) the moment and place I stepped onto the path of freedom. Once you get a glimpse of it you always think about it. Once you taste it you can't go back. For a lot of women, it's the first time their parents let them wear panty hose, lipstick, and perfume. From that day until this day they would never be without them. Once you cross over you can't go back. For men it's the first time you get some. Once you cross over... Freedom is like that. Here is how I illustrate freedom: I ask someone to ball up their fist very tightly and tell them 'discipline' is a tight word like that. 'Control' is a tight word like that. But if you have great 'self discipline' and great 'self control' (then I tell them to open their hand fully extended so they can feel the blood rushing to the tips) then you can have great personal freedom. I'm going to be quoting others and I don't exactly know when, where, or how they came to me over decades.

To approach freedom I must learn to subdue my passions (Moderation and I have never been close friends) and to chip away at the superfluities in my character to improve myself as a man. The price of freedom is that I must be willing to be my own master. The price of wisdom is experience plus reflection. Both are difficult to attain. That's why they are valued. That's why we crave them. That's why the price is so high. Wisdom is another topic for another day. You give so much of yourself so that the world can grow. God bless you my friend. Jerome (If you missed the last edition, on the Paradox between Freedom and Discipline, please send an email to [email protected] with Paradox in the subject line and I will forward this to you.) The Conversation is the Relationship. If you are older than 35 years then I could say with great certainty that you have had your heart broken at least once. You have been in at least one relationship that ended up in betrayal, loss of respect, disappointment, anguish. It is also likely that you have also had experiences of great love, moments when time stood still, where every part of your being was in harmony with another human, or with nature. In my work I most often get to coach the broken down relationships. Tension, misunderstanding, blame. The emotions of anger, upset, hurt, anxiety, scorn. Because our life is so busy, because we have competing commitments snapping at our thoughts all day long, we often forget the most fundamental principles of life. At the basis of all that we are, and all that we do, are our relationships. No relationships, no life. Literally and emotionally. There is a huge amount of evidence that demonstrates that small children and animals that are deprived of touch and connection do not develop normally. They become physically, emotionally and mentally retarded. We simply cannot do without relationships. And the fundamental building block for every relationship is conversation. No conversation, no relationship. At any one time, we live in at least four main conversations. (I am quite sure that I often live in far more than four.J) The conversation with the future. Our hopes and dreams. The conversation with the present. What is happening now. Conversations we have with co-workers, service providers, customers, our team, other teams, partners, children, lovers, friends, family. The conversation with the past. The baggage and memories we bring to the present. The conversation with ourselves, which makes all other conversations meaningful and relevant. Our values and sense of self, our esteem, our meaning for being. If we loose the conversation with our customer, they become lost to us. If we loose the conversation with the most important people in our lives, we loose them to us. If we loose the conversation with ourselves, we become lost to ourselves. I once read a story about a young couple in couples therapy. The therapist asked the man when was the last time he told his wife that he loved her. He replied, "I told her I loved when I first met her seven years ago. We have already had that conversation." He had made the assumption that telling his wife once was all the relationship needed. Why go over what had already been said? What he did not realise was that we do not say, "I love you," because we need to hear the words. We say I love you because saying this from the heart calls forth the presence of love. Presencing love is critical to the success of any significant relationship. The conversation is the relationship. No conversation, no relationship. And the more feeling we put into the conversation, the more powerful the conversation will be. No matter what work we do, and who we are, there is something that all of us want, at our core. We want to be loved and held fondly in another's heart. If we do not find the opportunity for care and respect in our workplace, our workplace with loose all meaning to us. We will participate as a machine, empty and uninspired. I see too many people inhabit that world. It breaks my heart. We yearn to be engaged in conversations that have meaning, that bring feeling, passion, care, connection, to the work place. We yearn for leadership that inspires us, that makes us want to be better, do better. Yet few leaders have the courage and or capacity to inspire to this level. They are afraid of expressing their vulnerability and humanness to others. They want to stay separate from the crowd, to be seen as capable, strong, all knowing, smart, tough. To create relationship depth, we have to risk. We have to be prepared to be vulnerable, open, incapable, nurturing, and to not have all the answers. A simple example of this that springs to mind is Oprah, and her way of humanising herself by her very obvious battle with her weight. The part of her that she expresses that is vulnerable and imperfect is the very part of her that allows all of us to feel connected with her, because she does actually struggle with certain things, as we all do. Knowing that she struggles makes me feel less anxious about my own struggle, makes me feel like I could relate to her and connect with her. I am therefore more inspired by her, than if she presented herself as this perfect person, a goal so many famous people try to convey (and in the aspiring to achieve this perfection, so often become broken and damaged.) Another example of this is Princess Dianna. More people watched her funeral and were moved to tears, than any other person in our history to this point. She made it OK for all of us to feel and to accept our shortcomings, even for a moment. We loved her because she was imperfect. No conversation of any importance occurs without bringing feeling into it. The difficult conversations are difficult because they involve feeling. The great conversations, the inspirational conversations, are so because they are feelings based conversations. A conversation that exists from the neck up, i.e.: devoid of feeling, can be important when we need data...how to get from A to B, how to do X. But they are not the conversations that sustain our needs and desires. They are certainly not the conversations we remember. A very great saying, taken from the text, "A Course in Miracles", is. "In my vulnerability, I become invulnerable." Last month I wrote about the paradox between freedom and discipline. Well here is another paradox. If you have nothing to hide, you cannot be attacked. If you are completely vulnerable then no one can shame or humiliate you. This is called humility. The ability to stand in our exposed nakedness, of body mind and spirit, and be accepting of all that we are and are not. The more we can do this, the more we have conversations from this place, the greater the depth of our relationships, with others, and with ourselves. The conversations that are etched in our memories of the great leaders of our time, Gandhi, Mandela, and Martin Luther King, all expressed tremendous humility, profound emotion, and came from great love. Take a moment to think about the most important relationships in your life. Are there any conversations that are not being had? And what about the other relationships, the ones with your co-workers, your suppliers and your customers? Is there a conversation that you know needs to be had? What is the cost to you and your business, your life, of not having these conversations, not just the financial cost, the emotional, physical and energy cost? Next time you are in a conversation with yourself asking yourself should you really risk all and say what is in your heart, go for it. Go all the way. After all, this is your life.

Endnote. Syzergy's premier program, Dare to Care, is a two-day experiential workshop that gives you the skills and tools to have the difficult and the most important conversations. This program is available for delivery into the corporate sector. It can also be made available as a public event for 18 to 20 people. If you would like to have an experience of this program we will be holding a one day experiential event in Sydney February 9th, Auckland NZ on March the 15th, in the USA late April (Venue and date to be advised.), and in the UK in May. (Venue and date to be advised.) If you would like more information on either the program or the events, please send an email to [email protected], with Dare to Care in the subject line. If you want to let others know about these events, please either forward this email, or send an email to [email protected] and we will forward information to them, or go to http://syzergy.biz/downloads/DareToCare.pdf for the brochure, which will be downloaded to your computer. On the Personal Side. Our ~White Christmas~ holiday in Park City with 10 other family members was a wonderful success. For us Aussies, wearing a jumper on Christmas day is a big novelty. Usually we are doing everything we can to get out of the heat. On the way to Utah, my father and daughter and I stopped off in Honolulu. The side trip was originally planned so I could run the Honolulu marathon on Dec 11th. However, I had had a foot injury and hadn't done a run over 2 hours, and a very few of those, so I had decided not to run. The day after we arrived, the Friday immediately before the marathon, Natalie and I were making lei's, as you do in Hawaii, with a group of other hotel guests, and a man in his late 50's, a rather large man, said that he was doing his 5th Honolulu marathon, that he walked the whole way, and loved it. That was it. If he could, so could I. So that afternoon I registered, and on Sunday morning at 5am I was one of the 24,000 starters. It was a highlight of the trip. The atmosphere was the best I have ever experienced, and the after party was simply wonderful. It felt like half of the people in Waikiki were either wearing their finishers T-shirt, or medal, and there was such a degree of pride and camaraderie I felt privileged to be a part of it. As for the run, given I hadn't trained for it, I let go of all expectations, resolved to be happy with whatever time I ran, or walked, and to just enjoy it. I was thrilled to come in just under 4 hours...and to feel great the whole way. It seems it was important that I learnt once again a lesson I teach many times. Relax, let go. Enjoy. No pressure, no expectations, and I not only have a great time, I run a good time. The marathon for 2006 is Boston, April 17th. (Towards my goal of running one of the worlds big marathons every year for the next 8 years ..New York and Honolulu already complete.) I will apply the same formula and I will do a bit more preparation for it. ~~Some Humour for You.~~ A friend sent me this and it is simply too delicious to not share with you. (Thanks Joanna Thomas) Once again the Washington Post published its yearly contest where readers are asked to supply alternative meanings for various words. And the winners are... 1. Coffee (n.), a person who is coughed upon. 2. Flabbergasted (adj.), appalled over how much weight you have gained. 3. Abdicate (v.), to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach. 4. Esplanade (v.), to attempt an explanation while drunk. 5. Willy-nilly (adj.), impotent. 6. Negligent (adj.), describes a condition in which you absentmindedly answer the door in your nightgown. 7. Lymph (v.), to walk with a lisp. 8. Gargoyle (n.), an olive-flavoured mouthwash. 9. Flatulence (n.) the emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run over by a steamroller. 10. Balderdash (n.), a rapidly receding hairline. 11. Testicle (n.), a humorous question on an exam. 12. Rectitude (n.), the formal, dignified demeanour assumed by a proctologist immediately before he examines you. 13. Oyster (n.), a person who sprinkles his conversations with Yiddish expressions. 14. Pokemon (n.), A Jamaican proctologist. 15. Frisbeetarianism (n.) the belief that, when you die, your soul goes up on the roof and gets stuck there. 16. Circumvent (n.), the opening in the front of boxer shorts. Resources. For anyone who would like to hold audio conferencing for free, please go to http://www.freeaudioconferencing.com/sendpage.php This is a great service. Their basic service is free, they make their profit from the extra's they offer, like recording, and more advanced features such as introducing the callers to the conference.

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