What we learned at CGW6

[Andrew Wilcox]

Here's a thread to post anything you want to say about what you learned at CGW6: insights about yourself or your situation; about how you're perceived by others that surprised you; any of the tools, techniques and personal growth information that you found new and useful; and anything else you learned, discovered, or realized at the workshop

[Andrew Wilcox]

I'll start... I learned at lot of things, and here's one:

I had come to the workshop with a new career path in mind that I was stalled on. Steve’s approach is to look at career / relationships / etc. in four quadrants:

body (i.e. the physical reality): looks good for this idea

mind: yes, a good fit

heart: very low; feel very little desire

spirit: yes, this would be a good contribution to make to help other people

What I uncovered during the relationship part of the workshop is that I’ve been unwittingly starving myself of the affection I need. My heart’s reaction to the idea of any project is to say, “no more! enough!”

So my intention now is to focus first on my relationship needs, and see what happens with the career idea… perhaps I will feel reinvigorated with relationship abundance in my life; perhaps it will morph into something else; perhaps I’ll end up doing something completely different. ^_^

[Le Roi]

The most important thing that I got out of this CGW is that I can't try to go alone on creating my career without taking the time to set up a social support network. Most of my action steps as a result of CGW will be around creating a social support network.

I also learned that the things that are neutral in our map of connections are actually a negative since they don't allow something positive in.

I also love the productivity tool that Steve shared at the end of day 2. I'll be testing it for myself.

[Andrew Wilcox]

The idea of broadcasting my desires and letting my social network adjust itself is so simple and yet never, ever occurred to me

When I know that someone likes some things and not others, I've always tried to adjust my communication to fit.

For example, I love tying up women, and I have a good collection of bondage how-to books, extra comfy restraints, special Japanese hemp rope for elegant shibari style bondage, and so on. It's a big hobby of mine. But I know that some people are offended and upset by bondage, I've even been unfriended by people who couldn't deal with being associated with someone who was into it. So I've been careful who I share my interest with, to avoid upsetting anyone.

Yet I've undoubtedly missed out on a lot of opportunities. People who happen to desire to be tied up and helpless might possibly prefer in some cases to be tied up by someone who is warm, friendly, and empathetic instead of, say, someone who has suppressed anger issues

[momo313]

Originally Posted by Andrew Wilcox

I'll start... I learned at lot of things, and here's one:

I had come to the workshop with a new career path in mind that I was stalled on. Steve’s approach is to look at career / relationships / etc. in four quadrants:

body (i.e. the physical reality): looks good for this idea

mind: yes, a good fit

heart: very low; feel very little desire

spirit: yes, this would be a good contribution to make to help other people

What I uncovered during the relationship part of the workshop is that I’ve been unwittingly starving myself of the affection I need. My heart’s reaction to the idea of any project is to say, “no more! enough!”

So my intention now is to focus first on my relationship needs, and see what happens with the career idea… perhaps I will feel reinvigorated with relationship abundance in my life; perhaps it will morph into something else; perhaps I’ll end up doing something completely different. ^_^

I believe I'm in a similar situation to you. Could you expand on what you learnt about relationships and their relation to career choice?

[Andrew Wilcox]

Originally Posted by momo313

I believe I'm in a similar situation to you. Could you expand on what you learnt about relationships and their relation to career choice?

Of the three core principles of personal growth (truth, love, and power), the one that I'm most naturally strongest in is truth. I don't need to "try" to see clearly in a situation, I just do, without particular effort on my part.

Love on the other hand -- connection and relationships with other people -- is for me rather hit or miss, largely dependent on my environment instead of something I actively create (if I'm not paying conscious, deliberate attention). I'll find myself in one situation and look around and see friends and colleagues, and then I'll find myself in another situation and look around mournfully, noticing that I'm alone.

So I was putting together a plan for the steps for this new project I was contemplating, that would begin a shift in this new career direction I was thinking about. The steps were all about my doing things by myself: first I would read this book, and then I'd write this web application, and so on. In my current career situation I'm working in a team with other people, so in my original conception of the plan there would be a shift in working with other people to working alone.

Working alone part of the time might not be a problem if I had strong community of friends and personal relationships in my life. But I also happened to be transitioning out of a personal relationship and, while I have acquaintances and people who like me, I lack strong personal friendships. The project would take a lot of time, energy, and attention to get started, so it's unlikely that I'd also have the time and energy to develop new relationships at the same time.

Thus when the workshop caused me to think of considering the relationship aspect of the original plan, it was pretty easy to play the movie forward and see that I was setting myself up for a bleak and lonely existence