BreakState Presents...Fiddling with your senses!
Two action packed mind-boggling silly group games followed by explanations of its relevance to personal and working life…… Useful?
Sight, sound, touch/movement and self-talk/internal dialogue. Some may know this as Visual, Auditory, Kinaesthetic and Auditory Digital. Day to day life is experienced mainly through these channels, but how much do you know about them? Do you know its effect on how you communicate: in conversation and in writing? How you learn? How you create meaning? How you decide whether something is good or bad? And how other people do these things? If you’re intrigued, pop down for an evening of play, challenge and discovery.
Leave your inhibitions at the door, wear comfy clothes and show us your playful side!
When?
Monday 28th March 2011
7.30pm to 9pm
Where?
Nexus Art Cafe (just off Oldham street, opposite Vinyl Exchange)
2 Dale Street
Manchester
M1 1JW
Price?
£10 entry for the session.
Book online here
Wigan Council did it to me. They energised me. They saved me. I had been doing the odd bit of work here and there for them, and now they wanted me to work with them on a full time basis! Words can’t articulate how I felt. A meeting was held, we talked about the role and money involved. A Local Authority Agreement. I got home and burst into t_ _ _ _, the thing men are taught not to do. Thank you ACE (Alternative and Complementary Education) Centre, Thank you x
Regular income. Bills are paid. I don’t check my bank balance day to day. A friend of mine felt down in the dumps one day, I treated him to a meal at Nandos…I could actually pay for him. I could actually buy a packet of crisps every now and then on a whim…wow. The scrappage scheme treated me well…I buy a brand new car.
In collaboration with a youth organisation called 16 to live by and Hip Hop group Foreign Beggars, I create a project that facilitates personal development through music workshops. We get funding. We are doing workshops in Brighton, Southampton, Maidstone, Reading, Bristol, Oxford, Cambridge and London. This was the beginning, big plans were in place. This could take off. This was going to take off. The follow on plans from this are big and they are feasible. The potential is colossal.
The better things get, the lazier I get. Then I start questioning things. And for some reason, something has changed. It’s gone. Completely gone. The urgency. The tension. The fear. The motivation. The hustle. It’s depleted. I can barely remember the reason why anymore, why I was driven. So at the height of it all, I stop it. I stop Wigan and I stop the other project. I start something new, but this time I’m starting it with different thoughts. And these thoughts make things very interesting for the new venture…
To learn more about these new thoughts and to understand some things about money in relation to your own life, come down on Thursday 17th March
To recap on Chapter one, click here
To recap on Chapter two, click here
‘Don’t work hard, work smart’ he said. I don’t know if I completely get what he means, but I’m changing things. So far I’ve been chasing people to work with them. What if I create something, and then chase people to work with me? YES! I’ll do a summer holiday play scheme for young people based on music making; they’ll love that!
So it starts. The intensity of my networking increases dramatically as I’ve GOT to get people to pay to come on my course, I’ve GOT to be paid. Hmmmmm. How do I promote? Free taster sessions at school’s with students. Call it a try before you buy…perfect! I incessantly hound teachers. I persuade numerous schools for me to hijack one lesson of their day to do my taster session. Some are fun. All are petrifying. Some students were enthusiastic. Some thought I was an over enthusiastic stranger who was trying too hard for someone whom they just met…trying to sell them something to sell to their parents so they would pay for their child’s attendance.
Swings and roundabouts. A day starts with a phone call from the bank wanting a credit card payment I haven’t done…I begin to hound teachers even more to get into schools, borderline stalker tendencies at times. I can’t even buy my dad a small birthday present…so I go to an event in Leicester, a two hour drive just in the hope of getting ‘the contact’ which could ‘make’ my business.
All the promotion I can do is done. I sit and wait for phone calls and bookings. I aggressively stare at the phone and I yearn for the beep of a new message from Mac mail on my laptop. Silence. A few rings and conversations but no follow through. One cheque! YEEEEESSS! It’s just one. It remains the only one. The project can’t happen. I cancel it.
Heartbroken. Failure. Embarrassment. Shame. A small part of me gives up, whilst on the whole I have hope but feel confused why I have hope. Time to be realistic. Dominoes pizza application…delivery driver. Could a parent see me one day delivering a pizza to their door? Likely…oh well. I go home after applying, to just stare at my computer screen and wait for the verdict If I’m to work for dominoes or not. Then the council did something to me…
Come back in a couple of days for Chapter three
To recap on Chapter one, click here
This story has three chapters. This story was an experience of mine. It reminded me of some valuable lessons I have learned and inspired me to plan the upcoming seminar I’m doing on the 17th March. I’m sure many people have experienced different versions of this story, and that’s what makes it important. This is personal. This is chapter one:
June 2008, I’ve graduated. Yeeees! BA (Hons) Youth and Community Work. Grade 2.1. Yes I was close to a 1st as so many others say, blah blah. Anyway, Mum can’t contain herself. Dad is beaming, but playing it cool. Family members come up for the day from London. We have a big table at Chiquitos. Dad is telling jokes; we never knew he knew jokes. The future is so exciting. I actually have a few years experience of what I studied as well, before I even did the degree. I’m not a wide-eyed student. I’ve got perspective I say. I know the score…wow the possibilities.
Interviews begin. Formalities. 100% success rate for interviews so far in my life. I’ve turned down jobs. Child’s play. Interviews don’t come. The one that did come I didn’t get. Funny thing is the position I applied for is what I was doing before university and I quit that, deciding to study and ‘better myself’ on the corporate pay ladder… steep learning curve. I was in a better situation before university.
My optimism and confidence/arrogance is being attacked. Bills need to be paid and I’m not generating enough money. Variations of pasta and rice get me by. Confidence goes. Hope begins to go. Confusion builds. Desperation sets in. And anger comes out of nowhere…it’s fuelled by my pride being attacked.
F*** this, I’ll do it myself. Self employed. How hard can it be? I know this sector of youth work, I do music, combine the two, money and a glamorous do what I want, when I want lifestyle right? Now I really start hustling. Work comes in, only in spurts though, and at the moment in time it’s not enough. Each bill that comes through the post spurs me on more and more. On my travels I’m hit with the saying ‘Don’t’ work hard, work smart.’ That’s what the wise old soul said to me. Hmmmmm. I STOP. Yes STOP. For long enough, to plan do something with my business that is truly worthwhile…
Come back in a couple of days for Chapter two
Learn some fascinating insights into how the mind works, which leads nicely into playing a frantic game explaining all the theory you’ve just been taught, followed by an activity that helps you to create that light bulb moment, leaving the session feeling energised. And it’s all to do with the thing we call money…useful?
We all have a relationship with money, whether it is good, bad or indifferent. And we all have personal ideas about what poverty, getting by or wealth means to us.
Pop down to our session to find out what your thoughts about money really are, how it’s helping or hindering your personal/working life and how to change it in a way that benefits yourself and others.
When: Thursday 17th March 2011
Time: 5.45pm – 8pm
For the rest of the details and to book now, click here
AND
To read the article we recently wrote for the social solutions academy on this topic, download it below. The article is on page 5 of the PDF, or page 9 if your looking at the actual images of the document.
Let me tell you something. This boy knows his tunes. If I want to find out about new music, I’ll ask him. Even more important, if I want to find out about music I will probably like, I’ll ask him. I found out I could trust his judgement over time.
I know where I stand with my mate with music. If he loves a rapper, band or singer he will scream about them from the rooftops as if he is selling on their behalf. If he doesn’t like them, he won’t talk about them at all. And if he hates them, well his mother wouldn’t be impressed with his language! He inspires me through his enthusiasm for the good and sometimes offends me through what he dislikes or hates. Friction happens when I like something he hates, but through this I trust him. There’s consistency and I just know it.
His opinion matters and I have a feeling I’m not the only person that feels this way about him. In Seth Godin’s words, he is a powerful sneezer.
So consider this for a moment… does your opinion matter to people? Are your views clear? Do others trust your internal filter of what’s good or bad in the world? And do others know what they are getting from you when you recommend something?
People seem to trust and respect those who are consistently honest. So mate…I salute you. Let’s be more like him and see what happens with work colleagues, family and friends.
She did something. Walking and eating on the move as busy people do. She was peeling the skin off an orange with her hands. A small amount of orange peel fell on the ground. She bent down, picked it up, put it in her pocket and walked on. That speaks volumes.
She didn’t look around to see if anyone else saw; she just did it. Based on what’s important to her, it was the right thing to do, the only thing to do, the natural thing to do. No approval from others, just approval from herself.
Can you remember when you last had an orange peel moment? Maybe you’re a self employed freelancer and you questioned your client instead of automatically doing what they asked you to do. That’s an orange peel moment. Or maybe you were socialising amongst a group of people and someone said something you were unfamiliar with. You didn’t understand what they were talking about and you could have just nodded and smiled, but instead you said ‘What’s that?’ That’s another one. Or maybe you made toast for your boyfriend or girlfriend without being asked, for no apparent reason: just because you wanted to. The orange peel moment.
So what if the orange peel moment didn’t happen? Others would be none the wiser. But you’d know and that can’t be a good feeling, can it?
To those who have told me they are coming, looking forward to seeing you, it's going to be fun! And to those who don't know, we are doing the first of our monthly evenings in Manchester tomorrow. Sharing our idea with you. Doing things with it. Seeing what it means to you. And telling you about the weird and wonderful things we've got coming up in the near future that you can get involved in. We're very excited! All this over tea and cake on comfy sofa's. Fancy ending your day and starting your evening in a different way? If so see further details here
Your mobile phone contacts build up over time. Mine have. I received a phone call. It showed the person’s name with ‘Music’ in brackets next to it. I racked my brain. Who is it? Oh yeah It’s….The guy who…we met through…the really good guitarist! I pick up. ‘Hey _ _ _ _, How ya doing?’
Adding an association next to the name helped me to remember who it was. There are a few descriptions in my phone next to names such as work, a company name, uni, the name of the boyfriend/girlfriend I met them through, NLP and music amongst others.
Some of the descriptions on my phone aren’t needed anymore as that name automatically triggers my memory, even if the name itself isn’t memorable, but the person is. I wonder what description I have on other people’s phones that makes me distinctive? ‘Paul Lewis’ (???). Actually for those that know me maybe you could comment below and tell me, and I’ll tell you what your stored as if you’re interested.
For everyone else, what about yourself? Who have you been stored as? What’s distinctive? Do you have an association by your name or are you a name?
A really nice guy got himself in a bit of a muddle the other day. Let me tell you about the young lady that was involved in the drama!
Lee wanted a new tele for his flat. He walked into a shop and looked around. On one of the isles, a tele caught his attention. ‘Psssst’ she said to him. ‘Buy me, buy me’ she said. Her name was Samantha; she insisted he called her Sam for short. Lee asked if she was showing the footie that evening. ‘Of course’ she answered. He was sold. In a box she went, paid for and off to her new home she went.
8pm comes. Its kick off time! Lee turns Sam on. Scans through the channels. No football! ‘You lied’ Lee said. At that moment he realised the match was on Sky sports, not a freeview channel.
Samantha Sung said she could show the football and truthfully didn’t know what channel it would be on. BBC would of worked. Sky sports wouldn’t of. Lee assumed Sam knew what she was on about.
Assuming everybody can do everything is dangerous. She didn’t lie deliberately but she ended up lying, as she didn’t know the full story. She assumed she knew. Now Lee doesn’t trust her and the honeymoon period has tension!
She feared being left on the shelf if she didn’t please him but now he doesn’t trust her, as she didn’t meet his expectations. Instead of lying about the channels she could get without any Virgin or Sky help, what if she mentioned her giraffe feature; the HDMI input she has that he could use to connect his laptop to? Using this feature he could watch a stream of the game on the Internet through her 32-inch face instead of his laptop’s tiny 15-inch screen. She’s good at that. And she knows 100% she can actually do it.