Electronic journal "Secrets of self-hypnosis and auto-training" Issue 128

Hello dear subscriber!

About a year ago, I read Timothy Galwey's book "Work as an Inner Game" and realized that I got another great technique in my arsenal.

Timothy Galwey is a well-known American coach, business coach and author of several bestsellers.

He started his professional career as coach(tennis, golf, cross-country skiing).

Watching his students and other coaches, he found that There are two main learning models:

The first and most common model based on the expert opinion of the trainer.

The second model (later called the Inner Game) advocates a non-judgmental approach, using the technique of focusing on the critical variables of the activity process(it sounds incomprehensible for now, but have a little patience and everything will become crystal clear). With this approach, learning occurs to a greater extent at an unconscious level without unnecessary stress and overloads.

So, The most common is the expert model. Its essence is that the expert has a “correct” model in his head and he compares it with the actions of the student and tells him what to do and what not to do.

The student, at the same time, is in the role of a performer and, as it were, responsibility for the learning process is removed from him. In addition, the student has a subconscious resistance.

By the way, about this internal resistance changes could be written a separate large article. I don’t want to be distracted now, I’ll only say that the essence of such self-sabotage is that we have a certain fear of “losing ourselves” (this is all, of course, on an unconscious level). That is, we perceive our mistakes and shortcomings as part of our personality and therefore we “meet with hostility” any attempts to change, even if it is positive.

Opening of the second model

Galwey noted that all athletes note that during their best performances they are completely focused on the process and they have no evaluative internal dialogue.

Self1 is essentially what I call the Social Self. It is like an image of a coach in the mind of a student who evaluates and gives instructions.

Self2 is the true self of the student.

Galwey illustrates these ideas with the example of a tennis player who is bad at receiving and backhanding.

When a ball flies towards him under his left hand, he actually sees not a ball (yellow round, flying object), he sees a THREAT. He "KNOWS" that he has poor left reception. He has certain expectations that it will turn out badly again. And then, he once again reinforces these negative attitudes by saying to himself something like: “This is the most terrible reception, you are not good for anything!”. This not only reinforces negative expectations, but further reduces the athlete's self-confidence.

Once again, I would like to recall the work of our famous hypnotherapist Vladimir Leonidovich Raikov, about which I have already written many times. When a person “knows” that he draws badly, he… draws badly :). Being in hypnosis, in the image of a great artist, he “knows” that he can draw well. And this simple change in his attitudes and expectations allows him to start drawing much better.

The main problem of the expert model in that it looks like a broken phone. Our unconscious, which controls our behavior, does not operate with words and linear logic. This is essentially a powerful computer that performs a huge number of operations per second. It relies on experience, input, and purpose. We cannot fully verbalize (describe in words) this process. We usually say that we feel we are doing the right thing or not. Therefore, the coach's instructions still need to be translated into the language of sensations.

In fact, all our unconscious needs for learning is a clearer goal and feedback.. And this is the essence of the Inner Game approach.

And by the way, these ideas are confirmed in biofeedback technology. It is very difficult to explain to a person what he needs to do in order to change the electrical activity of his brain in a certain way. But it is worth making this parameter perceptible and our unconscious is able to learn how to change it arbitrarily.

Also, Galvey's approach is very similar to the ideas of Csikszentmihalyi, who developed the theory of Flow (see issues 45 and 46). Both started with a simple observation and the question: “What is this state when everything works out very well?”

Csikszentmihalyi talks about WHAT it takes to make activities flow. Golvey shows HOW it can be done.

To illustrate the concept of the Inner Game, let's go back to the example of the tennis player who had a bad backhand.

Using his technique, Galwey did not give the athlete instructions such as not to retreat, but to step up to the ball and keep the racket lower when swinging, he simply suggested that he observe the ball more carefully and scrupulously.

For example, he could ask the student to note how the ball flies before contact with the racket - up, down, or parallel to the ground. At the same time, he clarified that he was not asking him to change anything, that the task was simply to observe.

What may seem surprising at first glance is that such a non-judgmental approach turned out to be much more effective than the standard way of teaching. The athlete's technique improved spontaneously.

In fact, there is nothing surprising in this. Full concentration on the flight of the ball allowed the student to do two important things.

Firstly, it “expelled” the evaluative social self, which only interfered with “speaking hand in hand”.

Secondly, it created a mode of that very clear feedback, which, as I said above, is necessary to create a state of flow in which the activity becomes most effective. That is, the student was fully concentrated on what was really happening at the moment. How his actions affect the result.

Clearly aware of the goal (to hit the ball in a certain area on the opponent's field) and receiving instant feedback from their actions, the athlete's unconscious automatically adjusted to the task. I just had to not disturb him.

That is, the task of the trainer was not to teach, but to create best conditions for natural learning. And for this, you can simply select the appropriate exercises and goals for focusing attention.

But, if Golvey had limited himself to using his internal game system only in sports, we would hardly have known about him. With time, he found that his system worked perfectly in almost any field of activity, for example, in business.

To make the main idea of ​​this system more clear, let me give some examples of its use, and only then I will make some generalizations.

To begin with, I myself have had some very impressive results using this system in personal coaching.

Not too long ago, I had a client (department manager at a large company) who asked me to help him solve a communication problem.

His difficulties were that in communicating with the management it was difficult for him to conduct a dialogue on an equal footing, and in communications with colleagues, he often felt coldness and alienation. In general, this led to the fact that he generally wanted to communicate less and more and more and more closed in on himself, which was not only unpleasant in itself, but also interfered with his career.

I suggested that in the process of communication, he simply concentrate on monitoring the level of interest that the interlocutor shows.

As a result, this simple exercise helped him not only in communicating with colleagues and management, but also in negotiating and closing deals. By the way, here's what he wrote:

“The course of individual personality correction made it easier to adapt to a new team, feel more confident, and most importantly, significantly increase productivity and focus on the main tasks, as well as build smooth relationships with people who seemed difficult to communicate. In the second part of the course, I learned how to attract and hold attention when negotiating and closing deals. The course helped not only to feel more confident, but also made it possible to highlight those communication skills that I had not used before, for example, the search for interest, the formation positive image at the opponent, behavior in conflict situation. In general, I appreciate the work and your qualifications as very high level. I can recommend your work to most people who need to improve their skills in effective communication and negotiations. I hope I will continue to work with you both individually and as part of collective and online courses. Once again, thank you very much!”

Continuing the theme of using the inner game in the context of business, I will give a few more examples of Golvey himself.

Once, he was invited to one “IT” company to work with call center employees. The problem was their high stress levels. often had to deal with dissatisfied clients, despite the fact that their work was constantly evaluated. Galwey offered them a peculiar game.

First, they had to listen carefully to the caller and try to assess the level of his “irritation” from 1 to 10 by his voice.

In the end, the task was to listen to the caller, determine his level of stress and respond to him with the appropriate level of warmth in his voice. That is, for example, if the client's stress was rated high, say 9 points, then this meant that he needed to respond with more warmth (also 9)

As a result, operators noted that they became much more interesting to work with, they experienced significantly less stress, and the overall assessment of call center courtesy increased significantly.

One of the simplest and yet most important ideas of the inner game system is that if you want to improve something, just start measuring and tracking it.

For example, in one dental clinic, they became concerned that clients were waiting too long for an appointment with a doctor.

Applying the ideas of the inner game, they started by simply asking all the clinic staff at the end of the day how many patients they thought were waiting for more than 20 minutes. In addition to these guesses (most of the staff could only guess, because they could not directly observe patients in the waiting room), the real numbers were also announced, based on the data of the secretary in the waiting room.

What was the surprise of the director of the clinic, when after five days there was no longer a single patient waiting for more than 15 minutes in the waiting room.

Again, note that no special measures have been taken to reduce waiting times. The unconscious of the employees took care of everything 🙂 having received enough information.

Let's summarize all of the above a little. One of the most important questions is how to choose the right critical variable to keep the focus on in order to increase the effectiveness of work or training?

Gallwey identifies three important criteria.

First, this variable must be observable here and now

Secondly, it is desirable that it be interesting. For example, listening to the shades of feelings and intentions of the interlocutor is usually more interesting than simply following the content of the conversation.

Third, this variable must match the purpose of your task. For example, in the process of the same communication, you can highlight many variables that you can focus on. Level of trust, respect, control, clarity, motivation, pressure, etc. It is impossible to keep attention on several variables at once. Therefore, you need to choose the one that best suits your needs.

For example, if your task is to establish a more trusting relationship, then it is the level of trust (which can be tracked by the non-verbal components of the interlocutor's behavior) that you need to choose as an object for focusing attention in the communication process.

Ceteris paribus, it is better, of course, to choose a variable that is easier to observe.

I encourage you to experiment with this method on your own. Please write in the comments to this article about your results. What variables did you use to improve some of your skills. Or, write about the activity in which you would like to improve and apply the technique of the inner game, and I will try to tell you what you can focus on for greater effect.

Timothy Galwey

Work is like an inside game. Disclosure of personal potential

Published with permission from Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC and Nova Littera Ltd.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the written permission of the copyright holders.

© W. Timothy Gallwey, 2000 This translation is published by arrangement with Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC

© Translation into Russian, edition in Russian, design. LLC "Mann, Ivanov and Ferber", 2018

* * *

without whose love, care, support and patience this book would not have been completed.

Foreword

The way we do business is changing so dramatically that our ability to adapt and re-engineer our thinking is becoming an integral part of success. We are faced with the challenge of how to transform institutions designed as coherent, controlled, and predictable structures into organizations with a culture that truly values ​​learning, passion, and discovery.

The book Work as an Inner Game helps to define one's own direction in the landscape of what is now called the "organization of learning." Every manager or employee with the courage and need to know what training is will find concepts and examples in it to help turn training plans into everyday practice.

B about Most of the traditional learning strategies involve complementary activities. We conduct trainings, organize special programs and meetings to create a culture of learning. One of side effects such activities is to strengthen the belief that training and work are two different, competing activities, which acts as a limiting factor. We are busy deciding how much training we can afford before it gets in the way. production process. We are worried about the "transfer" of learning: how to take yes and "return" it to workplace. Methods Inner game eliminate the conflict between training and work, showing us that both are parts of one big whole.

Tim Gallwey's ideas about learning from the very beginning were surprisingly deep and highly practical. In 1976, his book The Inner Game of Tennis completely changed my understanding of not only tennis, but many other things. And twenty-three years later, her influence on me is still strong. She showed me for the first time that our self-improvement and performance efforts are actually getting in the way of our goals. Tim's views contradict many ideas about teaching methods and show that about Most of our educational programs are hostile to our learning. Work as an Inner Game brings these insights directly to the workplace.

The idea that standard methods of teaching and coaching are detrimental to our performance is truly revolutionary. Majority educational institutions and organizations rely heavily on guidance and direction, but if all their improvement efforts are not working, we might need to reconsider. If the instructions do not help, then what should we do? Many authors describe processes that require improvement, but when it comes time for real action, they are limited to theories and abstractions.

The special thing about Tim's book is that he not only defines the nature of our intervention, but also offers some wonderful concrete ways to enhance learning and increase performance while minimizing instruction and direction. This is his genius. He understands how we learn and has spent his life working on how we can organize ourselves for higher achievement. Methodology Inner game has changed the way people think about work and, perhaps more importantly, offers organizations a way to simultaneously deliver learning, improve performance and create a more engaging work environment.

The formation of a learning culture is a very responsible process. It asks for more than most of us realize, and asks leaders for enough commitment to learning and performance so they can let go of the reins a bit.

Methodology Inner game requires faith and - to a large extent - the rejection of bad habits when learning. It requires that we value awareness, consciousness and pay attention to what is happening in ourselves and around us. This is not an easy task. In Western culture, when the words "awareness" and "attention" are spoken, the label "new age" appears, and the theory is dismissed as a kind of "California dream". But it's not.

The fundamental question is: what can be done in the workplace? Can we deliver good performance while still enjoying and learning? This raises an even more serious question about what the purpose of the work is. Is the goal to achieve institutional outcomes—greater profits, higher levels of service, market dominance? Economists, the financial community, and the business press have a simple answer to this question: that goal is money.

For most people, however, the question of purpose is much more complex. They agree on the need for financial success, but work isn't just about filling your wallet. People care about the culture of the workplace, relationships with colleagues, the opportunity to realize their potential, learn and improve their skills. We often see this as a conflict between managers and employees, but that's not the point. The main thing is an individual, internal struggle. We are constantly torn between results for the company and a life that would be fulfilling.

And here we are given hope by the method Inner game. Tim constantly brings up the question of what game we are playing. Can we play Inner game which would bring us satisfaction and at the same time meet the requirements of the external game?

However, the search for integration between inside and outside requires a series of radical experiments. To deal with this complex issue, we need to try new structures, new tools, new ways.

Many years ago, Tim and I attended a conference held by a large American corporation for sales people across the country. It goes without saying that these people love to compete. Not only do they like to compete, they believe in the power of competition. The meaning for them lies in the competition, winning in the market is both a goal and a reward. This is true for both business and the individual. The whole conference was, in fact, a gathering of winners, a confirmation that they were the best in their company and, perhaps, the best in the industry, and even in the whole world.

After his presentation on coaching Inner game, Tim agreed to host the annual tennis tournament, which has already become a tradition at such sales conferences. After all, winners love tournaments, and here the famous coach, the author of a book about tennis, acted as the master of the event. But Tim was not enough just to lead the tournament. He decided that this could be a unique opportunity for each participant to answer the question: "What game do you really play?"

Tim proposed to arrange everything so that the winner of each game left the tournament, and the loser moved on to the next round. Just think: the loser was rewarded for the loss, and the winner was kicked off the court. What is the point in a game where “winning” does nothing? In this and It was a business. Each player had to answer the question of why he plays this game. The traditional answer, especially for sales managers: "To win." Tim's answer said that there is a more interesting game, and it consists in playing for the sake of learning, for the sake of realizing one's own potential. Ironically, if you do this, your game performance will increase.

In a tournament where the losers moved on and the winners went home, it wasn't clear to the players whether it was in their best interests to win or lose? If they defeated the enemy, then, in fact, they lost. If they lost, they were honored as winners. Under such conditions, participants could play for the sake of the game itself, and not for the sake of winning or losing, to play and see what good players they could become. Philosophically speaking, they were asked to stop "dancing to the music of the world" and play according to their own inner messages. A tennis tournament is a metaphor for what can happen in the workplace. No matter what structure we have in front of us, there is always the possibility of transforming a dominant cultural habit into an unpredictable event where the likelihood of learning is much higher.

Inner Game at Work

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• About the book
• about the author
• Reviews (3)
• Reviews

Quote

The essence of everything I learned from exploring the Inner Game can be summed up in one sentence: I found a better path to change.

Timothy Galwey

What is the book “Work as an Inner Game: Unleashing Personal Potential” about?

About how to maximize the potential of your "I", achieve high results, while avoiding overload and gaining new knowledge and pleasure from work.

Why the book "Work as an inner game" is worth reading

• "Work as an inner game" is the fruit of more than twenty years practical work Tim Gallwey, one of the greatest teachers of our time.
• This book is a magic wand: what was causing you stress becomes just interesting, what you avoided becomes attractive, and what seemed futile becomes a source of opportunity.
• The Inner Game method is universal: it can be successfully applied to any kind of activity and in all professional areas.

Who is this book for?

If you feel like you're having another moral crisis at work, then this book is for you.

Who is the author

Timothy Galwey - one of the founders of coaching as a way to unlock a person's potential in order to maximize its effectiveness. World best-selling author, creator of the Inner Game corporation, which applies the principles and methods of the Inner Game to develop skills in groups and individual people. He lectures all over the world, conducts group trainings and seminars as a coach-consultant.

Key Concepts

What is our life? That's it...

This is the third edition. The first is “Work as an internal game. Focus, Learning, Pleasure and Mobility in the Workplace, published in 2005. The commercial success of the 10,000th edition spurred a re-release in 2010 under the title Maximum Self-Realization: Work as an Inner Game. And here's another one. Circulation, however, fell five times, but in the era of ...

You need to focus on the book, it is not one of those that you quickly run "diagonally". This is not a book-thought, but a whole collection of deep, fundamental approaches to work, learning, life ... and in general - to yourself and your self-consciousness.

Who will benefit from "Work as an Inner Game"? One of the images in the book seemed very bright and clear to me. Ask yourself the question: are you driving the car of your life, driving it confidently and without tension, do you know where you are going and enjoy the picture around you? Or is the steering wheel in the hands of someone - the boss, organization, fate, and you in the back seat can only grit your teeth, suffer from shocks and complain about the gloomy landscape outside the window? If your life and especially your work activity at least partially resembles the second picture, be sure to read this book!

One of the important concepts of the book is the duel between the two selves that live within us. “I1” is the “invented” part of myself. She constantly evaluates, uses the “should” operator, undermines our confidence in herself, restrains the desire for freedom, “whispers” in different voices: the voice of parents, boss, society, the crowd. “I2” is the “original”, real part of yourself. Galwey suggests ignoring the "I1 whisperers" and listening to and following the "I2" voice the way children do - freely and with natural ambition.

Awareness, choice and trust are the three pillars on which the "inner game" is built. Be aware of what you are doing, select and monitor critical variables; be mobile, freely choosing a direction, following it, constantly learning and changing; trusting your abilities, listening carefully to "R2" is the formula for successfully running your inner game.

The concept of the "triangle of work", proposed by the author, seems so obvious and fair that one feels bitter, agreeing with Galwey: in most companies, the triangle is highly unbalanced towards performance, while learning and pleasure from work practically fall out of focus. But there is a solution - to take responsibility for your “triangle” (to move from conformism to mobility), to realize the need for balance and work purposefully to restore it: set goals not only “productive”, but also “learning”, and make room for pleasure in work .

There is a whole set of "magic wands" in the book. One of them is the STOP technique (step back, think, organize your thoughts, proceed), which is simple to the point of genius. But ... a simple and obvious technique seems only in theory. The most difficult thing to start using this technique is for those who entered the NONSTOP mode, turned into a “Maserati without brakes” (another bright image from the author) and rushes at full speed through tasks, projects and functions, unable to stop, look back at the path traveled, draw conclusions and correct - or rebuild - your route.

In addition to "small STOPs" at the beginning and end of the day, before the start and after the end of the project, the author suggests making a "big STOP" and introducing yourself CEO your corporation. A very provocative item on the STOP agenda is “Do I own all the shares in my corporation? If not, to whom and for what they were sold? Can – and should I – buy them back?” Doing this practice can lead to amazing results.

A separate value of the book lies in the chapter on coaching. Even if you, as a modern manager, are well aware of the concepts of coaching and even apply them in practice, it will be interesting for you to follow the author's thoughts on coaching in the context of the "inner game".

In addition to a rich set of concepts and tools, the cases of company transformation from the author's practice seemed very interesting to me. Readers who manage change processes in their companies will find the comments on these case studies useful in their activities.

Although the word “work” appears in the title of the book, the concept of “inner game” can be successfully applied in any activity and in any context, whether it be personal life, parenting, or hobbies.

In conclusion: "Work as an inner game" is a complex, multi-layered book with a long semantic trail. Last tip: before you read - stock up on a huge notebook!

Essential Coaching Tools for the Inner Game

1. Transpose (put yourself in the place of another).
One of basic tools coaching - put yourself in the client's shoes ("you can't judge another person until you've walked a mile in their shoes"). The coach teaches the same technique to his clients: put yourself in the place of the key people with whom you interact. Thus, awareness of the situation increases, it becomes possible to look at it from a different perspective.

2. STOP.
Coaching is like a moment of stopping and understanding the situation in order to move on.

3. Focus on critical variables.
For any situation or activity, critical variables can be identified. It is better to limit ourselves to seven variables. A variable is not an instruction to do something. This is the focus. To use an example from tennis, the motion of a tennis ball can be thought of as a general variable with speed, direction, spin, and height as subvariables.

4. Control questions - an indication of critical variables.
What is out of your control here?
What were you trying to control?
- What could you control from what is currently out of your control?

Understanding questions:
- What's happening?
- What's in the foreground?
- What do you understand in a situation that you do not understand?
- How would you formulate the main problem?
- How would you define the task?

Choice Questions:
- What are you really want to?
- Why would you want to do that?
- What are the benefits of A?
What happens if you don't do A?
- What will happen if this is not done in n months, years?
Who or what are you doing this for?
- What will success mean?
- What alternative possibilities can you consider?
Questions about trust (=creative problem solving):
- If you had any means at your disposal, how would you do it?
Have you been successful in solving similar problems before?
- What qualities and abilities did you use in a similar situation in the best case?
- What is the most difficult aspect of this task?
- How do you see the first steps?
- How comfortable are you? Do you feel confident?
- What do you need to feel more comfortable, more confident?
- Where can you turn for help in solving this problem?

5. Feedback.
- Based on observation of facts
- Focused on the action, not the performer
- The goal is to increase awareness or push the client's thought
- Carried out according to pre-agreed standards
- Carried out in the interests of mobility, i.e. greater clarity or future action.

More quotes:

Coaching as not-doing:
“There is nothing wrong with the coach having expert knowledge on the subject, as long as it is not used to make the coachee feel like a fool or prevent him from learning. When you know a lot, it is very easy to start learning. But coaching is not about telling the client what you know, but about helping him discover what he already knows or can learn for himself. Teaching takes a significant amount of time and can be seen as a transfer of knowledge. Coaching, on the other hand, can be seen not as a process of addition, but as a process subtraction or weaning from what hinders the movement forward towards the intended goal.
Listen to the feeling you feel:
- What are you really want to?
How clear are you about what you want?
- How strongly do you feel connected with your passion, with the inexhaustible source of your desire?
- Have you ever felt more connected? When and with what?
- Where do your desires come from - from thoughts or from feelings?
- How well can you distinguish your desires from the expectations of other people?
- To what extent do you feel that you "rule" your desires, or do they guide you?
- Do you feel free during work?
- What does it mean to you to be free?

“It has always been clear in sports that great results require desire. Talent and intelligence without a heart will never win.”
“Do I want to work, or is work what I do when I stop doing what I want?”
“As long as I define work as what is done outside of me, it will inevitably be a one-dimensional reward. But when I recognize that the work has a clear impact on the worker, it is already a multi-dimensional game.
“The impulse to free work is not just freedom from external restrictions. It is not just freedom from excess demands or lack of resources. This means achieving both external and internal mobility. It is the freedom to enjoy, grow and fulfill. This is the freedom of oneself, who from birth wanted to rejoice and learn in everything, no matter what he did. It is very easy to lose touch with our natural selves in the face of external demands, and especially when important institutions or people tell us that they matter most. When we are surrounded by this idea for many years from all sides, it is difficult not to start believing in it and forget ourselves.<…>Clearly, the only way to remedy the situation is to become your own close friend.”