The Dangers of Positive Thinking

In a recent discussion about the dangers of positive thinking in an Appreciative Inquiry listserve, I enjoyed the following comment from Jerry Kaiser of http://www.caringmatters.com/. It's a nice complement to last week's Provision on The Help of Hope. Enjoy and let me know what you think.

Sure positive thinking is dangerous...if you think you can fly off a building. But that's delusional.

Hope is positive thinking, and there would be no success without hope: no invention, no motivational energy to meet a challenge. Hope is what helped Viktor Frankl live through the concentration camps; why dying grandparents miraculously hang on to see their grandchild married; and, according to Suzanne Kobasa's research, why some managers thrive in difficult circumstances, while those who don't have it wither.

The absence of hope is despair, which is why, post WW II, the Soviet bloc countries had the highest suicide rates...and Hope is what made my grandparents leave their homeland with nothing to journey thousands of miles in a cramped ship to a place they'd never seen that spoke a different language...and where they knew that "their kind" were still discriminated against.

If that's the "danger" of positive thinking, let me have more!

Coaching Inquiries: What has been your experience with positive thinking? How intentional are you about practicing it? How has it helped or hurt your quality of life? How can you enhance your experience of positive thinking so that it serves you even more fully?

If you would like to learn more about our Coaching Programs and to arrange for a complementary coaching session, Click Here or Email Us.

The Fun Theory

I love the theory: make it fun to be good. That's what TheFunTheory.com is all about. here's their blurb:

"This site is dedicated to the thought that something as simple as fun is the easiest way to change people’s behavior for the better. Be it for yourself, for the environment, or for something entirely different, the only thing that matters is that it’s change for the better."

Want to see how it works? Watch this video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lXh2n0aPyw

Now, think for yourself as to how you can make it fun to do better. That is another aspect of the help of hope.

Coaching Inquiries: How do you experience life and work? How can you make them more fun? How can that fun contribute to making the planet a better place to be? How can you become part of the movement? Who would you like to have fun with in this way?

If you would like to learn more about our Coaching Programs and to arrange for a complementary coaching session, Click Here or Email Us.

Evocative Coaching Unveiled

Now that we have gotten the final draft of our book off to our publisher, we've started to focus on supporting materials and training opportunities. The book, Evocative Coaching: Transforming Schools Once Conversation At A Time, will be in bookstores next June. The focus of the book is how teachers, coaches, and school leaders can have enjoyable conversations that evoke motivation and performance-enhancing movement.


What school couldn't use that! This seems like a book whose time has come, especially given the way it brings together my background in coaching with my wife's background in educational leadership. It's a perfect marriage, in more ways than one.

Although the book will be a while in coming, we have unveiled our companion website, http://www.evocativecoaching.com/, in advance of our trip to and presentation at the upcoming School Administrators' Conference in the Philippines. We encourage you to visit the site, since it will give you a sense of our orientation and approach. You will also read, in the training section, about a unique opportunity to participate in a pilot training program, starting next April, based upon the book.

If you are a teacher, coach, school leader, or otherwise tasked with the responsibility to improve the performance of schools, then this training program may be just what you've been looking for. The opportunity to take the training program at a cost of US $100 reflects that we are field testing the program and will not come again. Since it is all conducted by telephone and over the Internet, just about anyone will be able to participate. I encourage you to take a look and to sign up if you are both interested and involved with school improvement.

Coaching Inquiries: What has been your relationship to school improvement? How could you strengthen your capacities? What interest might you have in learning the Evocative Coaching process? Who could you tell about the program and how could you share the training together?

If you would like to learn more about our Coaching Programs and to arrange for a complementary coaching session, Click Here or Email Us.

Vitamin D3

Dr. Andrew Weil recently updated his recommendation as to how much supplementary Vitamin D₃ an adult should be taking on a daily basis to 2,000 International Units. Dr. Mercola (not a medical doctor) thinks that should be even higher. Probably 5,000 IUs. He notes that a day of summer sun can generate about 20,000 units of Vitamin D, and that that is probably what our bodies are evolutionarily suited for.

The current U.S. RDA of 400 IUs is grossly inadequate for anything other than preventing rickets. Yet Vitamin D has a documented role in preventing many chronic diseases, such as cancer and heart disease, as well as infections. To be protected from those maladies, we need more Vitamin D coursing through our veins.

The only way to know for sure how much supplementary Vitamin D₃ one should take is to have a blood test. That combines what you are taking as a supplement with what your body is able to produce naturally from the sun. The farther away from the equator you live, the more Vitamin D₃ you will need.

My wife and I have been taking 2,000 IUs of Vitamin D3 for many years. She recently had her blood levels checked and the doctor was pleasantly surprised to find her in the acceptable range (32-56 ng/ml). "No one ever tests out in the acceptable range!" he exclaimed. Guess it helps to read health literature and to act upon science-based recommendations. I encourage you to do the same.

Coaching Inquiries: How much supplementary Vitamin D₃ do you take on a daily basis? Where could you go to get your blood checked? What would stop you from taking at least 2,000 IUs of Vitamin D₃ right now, with or without the blood test? I encourage you to make the change.

If you would like to learn more about our Coaching Programs and to arrange for a complementary coaching session, Click Here or Email Us.

Autonomy and Life

A friend and reader of Provisions alerted me this past week to the website and blog of Arnold Siegel: http://autonomyandlife.com/. It sure goes along with today's Provision on deepening your focus. Listen to how Siegel describes the Autonomy and Life process:

Autonomy and Life is a new discipline that imaginatively captures history’s evolving design of the self to enable each student to create and work toward goals tailored to individual temperament, talent, sensibilities and circumstances. Autonomy and Life offers a new technology for change -- rooted in pragmatic reasoning, insight and practical wisdom.

Autonomy and Life offers a new 21st century perspective on the best understandings of nature, history, language and culture that serve as a means for sovereign authority over our lives, and for a fuller and more fulfilling experience of our humanity.

Autonomy and Life provides an artful new vocabulary that distinguishes that which was undifferentiated and rediscovers that which has lost meaning — to re-enchant the world, to re-establish our affinity with others, and to re-awaken our hopes for tomorrow.

Autonomy and Life provides the new freedom to distance ourselves from the confines of our own unquestioned assumptions and to interrogate the typically unexamined and unevaluated cultural constraints to which we are born.

Sound interesting? You might want to check out the site for yourself. Here's the link to his blog: http://autonomyandlife.com/#/blog.

Coaching Inquiries: What are your unquestioned assumptions? How could you enhance your experience of autonomy and life? What would your life look like if your were crafting it according to your own vision: your destiny, cause, and calling? Who could share the journey with you to a "fuller and more fulfilling experience of our humanity"?

If you would like to learn more about our Coaching Programs and to arrange for a complementary coaching session, Click Here or Email Us.