"Peter H. Jones" <phj@actrix.gen.nz> nearly knocked me of my feet when I
read his reply:
...snip...
>One of the keys I feel is to nip anger in the bud before it gets out of
>control. Also William van den Heuvel has posted some great papers at
>http://www.muc.de/~heuvel/papers/ that make clear for me that emotions
>like anger are not real. William would say (I think) that these emotional
>thoughts are "virtual" and therefore created by the mind. And as such can
>be overcome by the mind.
If emotions are "virtual" what were they before the concept "virtual" was
even invented? How real do things have to be? Three years ago my car was
totally wrecked in a kollisjon with a tractor. By miracle(?) I had only
some scratches. What do you think I felt afterwards? Were those emotions
made up by my mind? Not real? I primairely reacted on the experience with
strong emotions. Afterwards I started to replay the occurance in my mind
and realized what HAD happened and what COULD have happened. It still has
great impact on the way I live and work today.
(Repeated) traumatic experiences in business-environments have the same
effect on competences, performance and learning. If they aren't intrinsic
controled they change mindsets and motivations.
IMHO Personal Mastery starts with learning to be aware of your emotions,
to name them and give them a function. If you don't give your emotions a
function, your emotions will grab you. Your emotions will polut your mind,
and paralize your will.
Our emotions are the primary inner reaction to events brought to us from
"outside". The more traumatic an experience is, the more heavy the
emotional respons will be. If you take your emotions serious = for real,
they can work for you as a compass and guide you. The "question as such"
is the vehicle to gain insight and make decisions. Questions have the
abillity to transform emotions into clear insight and good decisions.
I use a formula of six basic questions that you can ask to your self or to
someone else:
What do I feel?
What has happened?
How do I think of it?
What do I want?
How am I going to do this?
What problem will I have solved?
Personal Mastery = Personal Mastery when you evelop the abillity to use
"the question as an answer". And that's what I learn my cliknts. I am
deeply satisfied when a client after a training-programm has discovered
that asking the right question is much more effectiv, destressing and
powerfull then trying to give the right answer.
Peter, ( and other listizens) I quote again:
>William would say (I think) that these emotional thoughts are "virtual" and
>therefore created by the mind. And as such can be overcome by the mind.<
Is this right? I don't think so.
There are no such things as emotional thoughts. It's the other way around:
emotions are two faced: emotions are both un-christalized thoughts AND
unrealized will.
Other opinions?
Examples/experiences that prove I am right or wrong?
greetings from the foggy, autumly flatlands of Holland
Winfried Deijmann
NB! PLEASE NOTE THAT WE HAVE TWO WINFRIED'S ON THE LIST!
--Winfried M. Deijmann - Deijmann & Partners - Zutphen - The Netherlands Artists, Consultants and Facilitators for Organizational Learning and Action Learning <Winfried@universal.nl> Phone: +31-(0)575-522076 Fax:+31 (0)575-527310
"An educated mind is useless without a focussed will and dangerous without a loving heart" (unknown source)
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>