About
Whatever your views are on Brexit or Trump, or the environment (or take your pick of virtually anywhere in the world at the moment), there’s one thing we can all surely agree on…
And that is that our world has fractured, and all of our shameful, broken pieces are out on display RIGHT NOW, for the whole world to see.
But rather than seizing this unique opportunity to pick up and explore each other’s broken pieces from a place of learning and curiosity, we’re all stuck in ‘fight mode’ - ‘amygdala hijack’.
(Right, here comes the science bit…)
When we are in fight mode, we can no longer access our ‘learning and thinking’ brain (pre-frontal cortex). This part of the brain controls so many things, including our social responses and how we behave with each other.
When we are in fight mode, we can become stuck.
And when we’re stuck in this mode, we become more entrenched in our own views and worst of all, our rage, frustration and hatred of those with views that challenge our own.
As a recently diagnosed autistic person, I’ve realised I have spent a large amount of my life in ‘amygdala hijack’ and when I become stuck in this mode, I start to feel toxic and I can very quickly become ill. When I’m angry I feel it physically polluting my water courses and tainting every thought and feeling.
Over the years, I’ve learnt that if I can approach the source of the rage from a place of learning and curiosity, that I can create just enough of a gap, to loosen the grip of rage, and to let in the tiniest bit of compassion.
If I can start to understand the logic of something, then I feel less hijacked by the rage, and I can feel myself starting to access my learning and thinking brain. Suddenly, I feel slightly elevated above the fight, and my thirst for learning starts to overtake my, erm, thirst for blood! This is when I can start to feel the light of compassion start to creep in, and finally, a movement in the direction towards healing.
I’m sure you’ve all had similar experiences in your own lives, a time when you ‘lost it’ because you simply COULD NOT see something from someone else’s point of view? Remember that feeling of the frustration turning to anger, and how it starts to grip you and take you over? And if you’re the kind of person who has a tendency to ruminate on an intrusive thought that has no answers, maybe you couldn’t actually hold it in any longer and you (and everyone else) had to deal with the messy (then shameful) consequences of the explosion?
If any of this is striking a chord with you, and you’re looking for some medicine to feel better about the world right now, try the Get Curious Challenge.
Can we create ‘just enough of a gap’ to move us all towards a place of healing?
the challenge - what you need to do
The challenge is to ‘Get Curious’ with just one person from outside of your own echo chamber.
The rules are to have that conversation from a place of learning and curiosity about the other person (and especially their broken bits!)
The aim of the conversation is not to get your own point across or to change their minds.
It’s to be an anthropologist. A scientist. A researcher. A curious observer.
Can taking on the role of curious observer create the gap you need to let in the tiniest amount of compassion, and then move you towards a place of healing?
the rules
Pick a person with whom you previously had a good relationship. Try and think back to the things you loved or respected about them and make a note of them.
Explain the challenge to them, and that the aim of the conversation is for YOU to try and understand THEIR thinking behind their views - not for you to get yours across! You just want to listen and understand.
Explain that just because you will be listening, rather than putting your putting your own view across doesn’t mean you agree with their point of view. The point is not to agree, the point is to UNDERSTAND WHY.
Agree a safe word or a safe topic that they can use at any point to stop the conversation and turn it to something neutral.
Ask if you can record the conversation on your phone so that you can analyse and learn from it afterwards. Reassure them that you will not share anything without their permission.
If they are happy to share the content of your conversation, ask them to complete the publicity consent form here and tell them they can ask for it to be permanently deleted at any time if they change their mind. And take a pic of the two of you if they are up for it!
share your story
Once we’ve had our conversations, let’s not paper over the cracks and pretend that this never happened, because that’s exactly what got us into this mess in the first place - those in power ignoring the broken pieces of those without power.
Instead, let us adopt an approach similar to the the Japanese art form of ‘Kintsugi’ - golden joinery - the art of repairing broken pottery with powdered gold.
((SLIDE KINTSUGI))
Let’s treat our breakage and repair as part of a history to learn from, rather than something to be hidden or disguised.
And let’s start putting our world back together…with powdered gold.
Share your story - email your sound file, or a content for a blog, ideally with a picture of the two of you and a signed consent form to:
How the ‘Get Curious’ challenge came about
Three years ago, I set out on a quest to ‘get curious’ about myself and especially how to deal with my meltdowns, rage and all my other broken pieces that I’d tried so desperately to keep a lid on all these years.
This eventually led me to a diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (Aspergers), aged 45 (and three quarters).
Getting a diagnosis helped me get curious and learn about myself. And the more I learnt, the more i could feel a physical shift inside myself.
It was a shift from shame, rage and blame.. to ‘ooo that’s interesting!’
Somewhere in the midst of that shift, I found I’d created just enough of a gap to let in the light of self-compassion and move me towards a place of healing.
((SLIDE RAGE AND BLAME SHIFT))
Of course I still get angry, I still have meltdowns, I still have the struggles that many people with Autism Spectrum Disorder face. But on a daily basis, I feel less angry. Less frustrated, because I’m much kinder with myself when I mess up. This is because I understand my triggers so much better and many of these come from being Autistic, so you feel like your batting with just one hand tied behind your back, rather than both… in the dark.
what does this have to do with brexit?
This is a picture of me and my dog Stan outside our local pub.
((me and stanny!))
That is, it was our local pub into several pints into a friendly chat with the lovely owner, turned to the topic of…Brexit. And then U.S politics. And BANG! There I was back in full fight mode.
I wasn’t in learning mode! I wasn’t getting curious about his broken pieces and exploring them from a place of curiosity and compassion!
I was stuck. In fight mode. Reason, logic, understanding, compassion all left the building. And then. So. Did. We.
Now partly because I hate conflict - it physically taints me - and partly because they serve the best beer in Loxley - I needed to somehow put things right.
Not for any altruistic purpose - just so I could feel less polluted.
I was in the process of writing my talk for TEDx Doncaster, and my autistic drive to make connections between things suddenly made me write my talk to bring together how I was feeling about Brexit and the lessons I had learnt by getting curious about myself and my journey to an autism diagnosis.
What would happen if I got curious with the owner of the pub? Could that create the gap i needed to let in the light of compassion and move me from fight mode, towards learning mode?
So I plucked up the courage to go back to the pub and give it a go.
I’ll be publishing the results of our conversation in the next blog. But all I can say is, that for me, it worked. It has loosened the toxic grip of hatred and rage I was feeling.
So why not give it a go?!