The Rashomon effect is the effect of the subjectivity of perception on recollection, by which observers of an event are able to produce substantially different but equally plausible accounts of it. A useful demonstration of this principle in scientific understanding can be found in an article by that name authored by Karl G. Heider.^[1]

It is named for Akira Kurosawa‘s film Rashomon, in which a crime witnessed by four individuals is described in four mutually contradictory ways. The film is based on two short stories by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, “Rashōmon” (for the setting) and “Yabu no naka”, otherwise known as “In a Grove” (for the story line).

This post written by the famed Colin Wright of the very excellent, informative, entertaining and well written exilelifestyle.com aka @colinismyname and is the second of three reports from three different people from the same day. Andi and Colin are both friends and both brilliant and excellent humans. I was fortunate to have visitors at the table who wanted to see what I do at the table in Union Square and wanted to participate as well.

According to Colin…this is what happened that day.

I was conscious that I would probably end up with tan-lines from my shirt. A farmer’s tan from time spent in New York. There’s poetry in that.

The Rashomon effect is the effect of the subjectivity of perception on recollection, by which observers of an event are able to produce substantially different but equally plausible accounts of it. A useful demonstration of this principle in scientific understanding can be found in an article by that name authored by Karl G. Heider.^[1]

It is named for Akira Kurosawa‘s film Rashomon, in which a crime witnessed by four individuals is described in four mutually contradictory ways. The film is based on two short stories by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, “Rashōmon” (for the setting) and “Yabu no naka”, otherwise known as “In a Grove” (for the story line).

This post written by @andiawesome is the first of three reports from three different people from the same day. I was fortunate to have visitors at the table who wanted to see what I do at the table in Union Square and wanted to participate as well.

This is Andi’s perspective.

New York City. Steamy. Sticky. Sunny. Summer.

Union Square.

It’s sometime around noon, at least that’s what it feels like. But then again, the summer in New York pretty much always feels like that, so I wouldn’t trust me as a particularly reliable source on the time.

We’re seated at a tall table with scattered books and a jar of cash and a note:

“Pay What You Like or Take What You Need”

Today my colleagues and I make up the Stillman Says team, ‘Creative Approaches to What You’ve Been Thinking About.’ Needless to say, I’m nervous, fidgety, quiet and contemplative as Matt dives right in listening and responding to the stories, questions and thoughts of the strangers who stop and chat.

I can’t recollect this day without recounting the amazement I felt watching Matt work. Never in my life had I met someone who had so many thoughts and had read up on so many different topics and remembered them well enough to use them to back up his theories and suggestions. He isn’t just well read and intelligent, Matt is a pro at reading people from their body language, as well as what they do and don’t say. All in all, experiencing that interaction happen person after person after person is by far the most memorable aspect of the day.

That memory wouldn’t have physicalized, however, without a few noteworthy conversations.

Most of the day, I sit silently sunburning in awe, but one conversation catches me unawares, in a position to offer valuable perspective that neither Matt nor Colin is capable of possessing.

I don’t believe that as either males or females, we innately have specific reactions or responses. As humans, there is probably some primal residue that colors how we interpret events. Gender differences can be, I believe, primarily attributed to how we are raised. Regardless, being female in a society that is ‘liberated’ and demands equality but expects physical, psychological and emotional differences, we are raised in conflict. Feel, but don’t reveal, unless revealing will get you ahead and since you’re already behind because of your skirt, it’s fair game to do what it takes.

I speak crassly. I won’t argue that males don’t encounter similar conflicts. I am not a ‘woe is me’ female; I do understand the frustration and desperate feeling of losing a significant other, the inability to justify the sadness and anger and the resulting ebb and flow of severe and often uncontrollable emotion.

Not only is she asked to cope with mourning the loss of a best friend, lover, confidante, advisor…but then she’s faced with guilt and blame for letting it ‘get to her,’ lowering her personal resolve and threatening her self-esteem. She’s a liberated woman. If he’s stupid enough to let her go, fuck him! she can do better!

We’re raised to pursue a partner who can care for us and support us. Even in this age of equality, there is still a fundamental expectation of marriage sometime in your 20s-30s, and the plans for a family soon after. She quits working to stay at home with the kids, he seeks promotions or a better paying job to more effectively provide the means for a comfortable standard of living.

Obviously, not everyone does this and not everyone feels a draw to do this, but as far as society wide generalizations and trends, this is as clear as looking up high school friends on Facebook. I’m not saying it’s good or bad, just acknowledging that it exists and it affects the way we view relationships and their importance in our life, especially during our 20s.

Enough of that preamble. Rachel is a strong woman. She’s solid on her feet and confident in her walk. Inside, she’s broken and barely holding it together. You’d never know if you didn’t take the time to listen.

We’re listening. Collectively, the Stillman Says team is listening to everything she’s saying. Individually, we’re hearing her on different wavelengths.

Her boyfriend is gone. Unexpected, the breakup has come as quite a shock and it continues to burn knowing he’s just around the corner. Everything seems based on him and their relationship. Her career has no meaning now. Her writing is uninspired. Her motivation to move forward has dissipated. How reliant was she on him?

This realization, perhaps more so than the actual breakup, shocks the independent woman. Am I not who I thought I was? Am I less of a person, less of a woman, because of this obvious dependency? How could I not even see it happening?

I’m hearing her on the conflict of emotion. She believed, at the time she made them, that she made life defining decisions in her best interest, separate from her relationship. Now every decision seems based on that joint structure and pointless without him.

They aren’t pointless though. Those decisions were made in her best interest. She may not have been fully cognizant of what her interests were at the time, or the effect of outside influences. Recognizing that she hasn’t been lying to herself, there’s just a bigger picture, is the start to welcoming the pain. The pain can teach her more about herself and her individual depth and desires.

She’s at a golden turning point now, everything she does is just for her. She can turn any way, she can fall flat on her face, she can achieve unparalleled success. Whatever she chooses is hers and hers alone.

Anything she chooses will be richer for this experience and this pain that seems stifling now.

You should have taken that bishop! Why didn’t you take that bishop? You had the game won!

———-

A dominant sound in professional, personal and spiritual development is to worships at the altar of BIG.

Play Bigger.

Play a Big Game.

Play a Bigger Game.

Play a Big Game You Can Dominate.

Play a Bigger Game You Are Destined to Win.

And it goes on quite hyperbolically. There is a point to this sort of expansive talk because we fall into the habit of seeing ourselves as quite limited. We are limited in some ways and in others we are not.

———-

When P first sat down at my table he just wanted to chat. But eventually he saw the chessboard there and wanted to play. The pieces slid out of their cardboard tube and were arranged on the board. Crowds bustled and strolled on that bright and windy day.

So we started to play. I know the rules of chess and appreciate the elegance of the game but I am an amateur of the first degree. I can rarely see more than a two or three moves ahead…if that and hardly show any skill for setting up grand traps or 11-dimensional strategies. But I enjoy the game and seeing the way the lines of force show up on the board. I like that a feminine piece is the most powerful on a board with 28 squares around the perimeter – each symbolizing a day in the phase of the moon.

Each game is a cosmic act.

P was an amateur as well, though a better player than I.

We chatted broadly and the whole experience was just lovely.

And then I inadvertently set a trap. All my pawns on the right side were in a big diagonal line and had trapped one of his bishops.

I saw that if I took his bishop that the game would be over in a few moves. The entire right side of the board would have been wide open and his King and Queen were trapped. The game was as good as over.

———-

Playing a game so that we can win it is an action filled with contradictions.

Because we play to win we feel the weight and the obligation to try to win. In so doing we take away or abrogate the freedom to simply play. Those who must play can’t actually play freely at all. The constant attention to progress towards winning makes every move critical…it must be made in order to secure the title of winner!

So in order to  play a game we must engage in some level of seriousness which is counter to the full spirit of play. When and if you “win” a game – chess or otherwise, you now have a title of “Winner” and this is a title that looks backwards in time. It points towards accomplishments you secured in the past. If you win enough you might be considered a “Master Player” who is so good at playing the game that this Master Player can’t even be approached on the field of play because they are so good. So in playing to win we drive towards a place and a space where play is no longer possible.

Winning a game (or an argument or a title or some kind of status) can be quite contradictory. Playing for the sake of playing can be quite paradoxical.

———-

So at that moment I saw that I had the game won. But I was enjoying the process of playing and the process of chatting with P. Knowing that I had essentially won was enough but to take it was a choke point. To win would be to end it at that moment. So I made an intentionally weak move on the left side of the board that allowed us to exchange Queens but not before P with anger and exasperation said

You should have taken that bishop! Why didn’t you take that bishop? You had the game won!

It was more fun for me to continue to play than to claim the title of winner. Not only was the act surprising to P but it freed me to be surprised for the rest of the game as well.

———-

In the cult or culture of winning and bigness we inadvertently cultivate a seriousness that kills our capacity to either be surprised or to be delighted by surprise. When we are playing big or playing to win or playing a game that we can dominate…surprises tend to be unwelcome.

Only in releasing our need to win and claim a title can we free ourselves from the exercise of power over others or situations and be free to embody the strength in ourselves. There true creativity arises.

If the point of our play is to be so good at playing that no more play is possible or necessary then our play has ceased. Why are we doing this?  For example…

“I want to be so successful that I’m a billionaire and I don’t need to do anything any more”

The cosmic act of chess or the cosmic act of our professional or personal activities and development can align with the way the cosmos acts itself…it does not seek to win or to lose. It simply seeks new ways to express itself. And if barriers for that come up…the cosmos uses those impediments as part of its approach to express itself.

Have you seen how playing to win and playing big impedes with actually playing? I’d love to hear your experiences on this.

Do you have a creative approach to getting higher paying clients?

We both laugh at the plainspokenness of it. M reinforces his statement

Seriously, I should have standards for myself financially speaking.

———–

There is no lack of instructions on bookshelves or online on how to not only make more money but to have a better relationship with it. Tara Gentile and Ramit Sethi of I Will Teach You To Be Rich, are two of many on the twitter-mall that offer excellent insights into not only making money but developing strategies to getting it. Jonathan Mead, Danielle La Porte… the list goes on and on. Books like “The Soul of Money” and “Your Money or Your Life” are also excellent resources to remapping our relationship with money which has inevitably been distorted because of the world we live in.

Bridget Pilloud has written loads of material on helping readers with their relationship with money. Mark Silver has a huge chunk of his website Heart of Business dedicated to helping people feel okay with strategies with making money. Hell, Bridget and I even wrote a piece there on how it is possible to do financial harm to people (and how you can stop it).

So there is lots out there. It is worth finding resources on this subject because we all need help and encouragement. But it also feels that there is a missing piece.

———-

M has stopped by before to chat at the table in Union Square but today he swung by to talk again on a different matter. M and I have a snappy rapport together full of intelligent engagement and candor.

After telling me some good news about a showing of some of his recent artwork coming up he launched into his situation regarding work.

M does mostly freelance design work from home and gets fairly well compensated per project but with the downturn in the economy he is finding that is changing and he is finding himself a bit financially strapped.

But it isn’t for lack of work. His bigger clients have shrunk their normal requests. He is now taking on hourly wages instead of project fees. Within even a few months his regular clients and new potential clients are offering him less than half (per hour) than what he was making a few months ago. So M has taken on less work because at the moment he feels that his work is worth X and isn’t going to go below that.

———-

The common way the money equation works is this…

How can I have a better relationship with money? And how can I get more of it?

There are ways to dress this up so it sounds deeper and more spiritual (abundant flow that align with my deepest values…I kid because I understand) but it is predicated on two obvious thoughts and at least one subtler one…

1) I don’t have a good relationship with money currently and,

2) I currently don’t have enough money to satisfy my wants/needs.

These both may well be true but… this leads us to a subtle mental model buried in this perspective.

———-

I understood where M was coming from. I have been there. I think we all have had that well justified wall set up in our mind that has tagged across it

Seriously, I am worth getting paid $200,000 and not a penny less!

Or whatever your number is.

He was ready with the defense that he knew the economy was bad and that he should be grateful for opportunities but he felt like there was a principle to stand up for here. Besides, being paid hourly was a disincentive to do good and timely work.

So I first took the tack of not being creative first – and I told him so.

I chucked out the old chestnut…

You are only worth what someone will pay and that if you continually stand up for your principles so strictly you’ll find yourself with the barest of cupboards and you’ll discover that your principles are more bendy than previously thought.

Taking some of these lower paying short jobs could open up contacts for him. It could get him out of the house and out of his solitary existence (which I reminded him that I had helped him with that the first time he came around).

But M stood firm in his attitude. So I tried a different tact, moving in the more creative direction.

———-

The mental model buried in the phrase

How can I have a better relationship with money? And how can I get more of it?

Is that is springs from a  ”me-centered” universe. We look at virtually all events and occurrences in terms of their impact on “me.”

Your wife wants to move out of the house for two weeks? How will this affect my relationship with her?

Thinking of shaving your head and getting a a full sleeve tatoo? How will I be judged?

The drumbeat of war in Iran or Sudan or anywhere? How will this affect the election for the ideas I consider most important?

Even our best intentions are often laced with a gooey center of “me.” We all want to do good in the world but do we want recognition for it? Either in fame or money? We want to be found funny and be listened to….

There is nothing wrong with this constant dedication of all of our actions to “I”, “Me” and “Mine”…but it largely unconscious and we don’t practice another way. And because it is unconscious and we don’t practice another way and we are always looking out there for fulfillment of your desires for ME in whatever currency you can get (dollars, respects, laughs, position etc…) we find ourselves exhausted, over-extended and feeling hollow and often bereft.

But there is another way.

———-

I told M that the boundaries that he had established were self imposed ones and that he could change them as easily as he established them. We talked about when playing football as a kid with no adults around that at some point in some game someone runs a play out of bounds and play continues. You keep running left and everyone follows because they love playing. The score doesn’t matter – just the playing. And changing the established boundaries allows the play to continue and to discover something new about the game.

Is your skill any better now than it was a year ago? Has your monetary value changed in the last year?

M said that his skill was mostly the same but that he probably had an internal sense of his value going up by about 10%. I pushed him on this and he admitted that this was just a justification for feeling “secure in his skills”. Furthermore M recalled that even two years ago he remembered thinking that all he needed was to make 60 bucks an hour and then he would be happy. So M and I started to decouple the idea that more money, or money at a certain level was going to make him feel satisfied.

But M wasn’t done. He didn’t look or feel resolved with this yet. I waited for a moment to see what might come out – just listening. And then he came out with it:

I think that I just want high paying gigs so that I don’t need to work as much. It’s a kind of laziness.

He backtracked a bit and re-explained:

I guess since I am working less right now I feel like that is the normal thing. But I want more than I have right now but the only way to get that is by getting something really big. But that seems unattainable because I am in this circle at the moment.

M had really showed his belly here. For an accomplished, good looking, talented guy to say “I’m lazy and it is getting in the way of me doing the things I want to do” and not be joking is a very open place to be. I felt that and acknowledged the insight with accepting raised eyebrows, a cocked head and gently shrugged shoulders.

This is the wordless way that men sometimes speak to each other.

So I asked M

What do you think you are missing that is not allowing you to confront this laziness?

M thought and I waited to see what M would deliver now.

Just motivation.

———-

Another way is the opposite of a “me-centered universe”… an “other-centered universe”. This is hard to do because we have spent so much time in a me-centered space but is possible to practice. If you are speaking with someone you can not wait for a moment to show off your brilliance but only be concerned with listening and offering service to them. You can provide care and kindness and service to people anonymously. You can do it for one person, for a group, to people you know, to strangers or the whole world.

———-

If you think you lack something you must give it. So here is what I would like to offer you as a creative approach – become a mentor to a high school student. Motivate someone else as volunteer for some organization. You have the time. In motivating them you’ll end up saying things you need to hear, putting money and opportunities in new contexts and shifting these ideas around in an interesting way.

M hung his head. We had gone a long way from where we started. I could tell that this idea was not discordant but a huge surprise. M offered “I have always enjoyed teaching.” But then trailed off with a disbelieving

Wow, that is crazy…I don’t know, it sounds amazing and I see the connection. Maybe it would great. I need to think about it. Thanks for grilling me.

It was cool and it wasn’t really a grilling at all.

———-

In practicing living in an other-centered universe we can discover how much wealth we actually have access to inwardly and the relationship we have with that wealth. In giving what we think we lack we discover how much we have.

So I’d love to know about your experience in living in an other-centered universe or giving what you lack?

What would you do about the pirate situation off the coast of Somalia?

**********

There is nothing simple about the country of Somalia on the eastern Horn of Africa. It achieved  independence from Britain and Italy in 1960 and because of its important strategic location near the mouth of the Red Sea and Saudi Arabia a proxy war was fought there between the USSR and the United States during the Cold War. The Red Sea (and the Suez Canal at the north end of it) is where much of the shipping of the world travels through and certainly much of the oil that travels by tanker. Because of this valuable location the country was flooded with weapons for thirty years to change the flow of commerce and determine regional influence. Both nations disrupted the economy and the politics there for two generations to say nothing of the English and Italians before them.

**********

A young man named S walked up to my table and chairs and after briefly chatting asked me one of the most unusual questions I have been asked at the table.  

What would you do about the pirate situation off the coast of Somalia?

If you don’t know there is a serious problem with Somali pirates off the eastern coast of Africa hijacking boats and causing all sorts of problems. But it isn’t as simple as that.

I am no stranger to weird questions at the table but at least the strangest among those looking for a creative approach to something usually have a relationship to the problem.

S wasn’t Somali. He had never been an investor who had a boat hijacked. He had no connection to Somalia or hijacking or pirates at all except for having read about it and felt like it was important.

**********

Somalia, despite being a poor nation, is a country rich in natural resources. It has the longest coastline of any country in Africa so much of its economy, such that it is, relies on the sea. It also has untapped oil reserves but the colonial powers that dominated the country for the last 250 years have crippled the country and the IMF did particular damage in the late 80′s. When the country was pushed towards ruin by Western interests in 1989/1990 and in 1991 the government collapsed three things happened

1. poverty soared in the country.
2. nuclear waste started to be dumped in Somali harbors and marshes by unmarked ships and people started getting sick and dying up and down the coast.
3. unmarked trawlers started heavily fishing the coast illegally and suddenly the coastal subsistence lifestyle was no longer possible.

A confluence of forces gave Somalis little choice but to try to protect their shores from toxic dumping and from food being stolen. They started becoming pirates and using all the spare weapons sitting around the country they started taking hostages, halting boats, getting some money and stopping the dumping and the fishing. Of course some reveled and prospered in the crime but the majority are just doing their best to get by at all.

**********

I tried with S to clarify the question because while I could theoretically give a creative approach to this problem, it wasn’t very practical to S. But he persisted with his query. So I obliged by suggesting that we role play not having a clue of where we were going. He plays a pirate and I play a hostage negotiator. We never went into the history of Somalia or what actually brought the pirates into existence…we just talked.

Negotiator
So Mister Pirate, what is it that you want?

Pirate
Money.

N
For what?

P
Houses, cars, and girls.

N
And what do you want those for?

P
So I can feel powerful.

N
And why do you want to feel powerful?

P
So people wont fuck with me. So my dad wont fuck with me.

this is clearly not about pirates anymore

N
So once your dad wont fuck with you , then what?

P
Then I’ll be happy.

N
So you want to be happy?

P
Yes.

N
Ok, has there ever been a time when you didn’t have cars and houses and girls and your dad fucked with you that you have been happy?

P
Hell yes.

N
What allowed you to be happy then?

P
My faith.

N
Say more on that.

P
Job in the Bible is my hero. He had everything, lost it and took all that suffering and wouldn’t curse God and then was rewarded one hundred times over.

N
So you want to be more like Job?

P
Yeah, if I was more like Job I would stop being a pirate and realize that I can be happy right now.

This dialogue took perhaps two minutes and then stopped. S had gone from clever questioner to suddenly exposing something he hadn’t known he was looking for. He was shocked that his seemingly casual interest in Somali pirates was intimately connected to his own well being.

He wasn’t being glib when he said that this was ” a pretty good solution to the pirate problem.”

**********

We all seek happiness to be sure. The nation of Somalia has much to work out but Somalia is a metaphor. Somalia is just like us and the pirates are part of ourselves. Like Somalia we each have a rich heritage, tremendous wealth, an open door on rich thoroughfares and have also been beset by difficulties from within and without. In being beset we put up defenses. We send out pirates to protect us from the sieges that we experience in our lives – criticism, judgement, stress and the like.

These inner pirates have a job to do – protect us from the outside world. But there comes a point that they have forgotten their original rationale for being pirates – to simply be happy. They get stuck in the role of pirating and hence lose connection with the original goal.

There is a place for defending ourselves from the world. There is a place for throwing up pirates. But there must come a time for us to call them back and, like Job, and like S, give our selves an opportunity to stop the struggle and be happy now.

Perhaps this is a tall order but seeing that we are habitually struggling may open up a new door on our struggle.

It did for S. What war have you  been fighting for so long that you forgot what you were fighting for? Can you cease that to tap into your wealth?

I am pretty sure I have met the perfect woman for me. And if she isn’t a lesbian she is open to being with women. 

**********
Jennifer was late and had called about her being turned around and lost twice by that point. I didn’t mind at all, it was actually quite funny and endearing. When she finally arrived and we started talking we just found out with zero discussion that we could be playfully rude and horrible to each other in a way that made us both feel very accepted by each other.
**********

I am pretty sure I have met the perfect woman for me. And if she isn’t a lesbian she is open to being with women. But it is tricky – she is my superior at work though we don’t work in the same area.

**********
And it perhaps shouldn’t have been that way since this was a number of years ago when I was interviewing someone to be a potential housemate – one would think that a certain decorum would have been the starting point of that sort of relationship.

By the way Jennifer Haase has a great new folky album out that has the esteemed Rosanne Cash singing with her on one of the tracks…

I mention this because when A came to me at the table we playfully sneered at each other virtually right away and got to be very forward with each other. It was almost like we assumed our friendship had started at the three year point instead of the three second point.

A was a very, very pretty dyke (her term). Early 30′s Short blonde hair and a classically gorgeous face. She was dressed in white top that was 49% blouse and 51% men’s tailored dress dress shirt with a pinstripe vest and slacks to match. It was upscale butchyness to a severe and androgynous T.

She just had that  cool carriage and the sort of sexual energy that just shone out of her while raising a questioning eyebrow at you that signified both interest and playful disdain. And then she laid out what was going on with her.

I am pretty sure I have met the pefect woman for me. And if she isn’t a lesbian she is open to being with women. But it is tricky – she is my superior at work though we don’t work in the same area. We are about the same age. We get along really well. I have never met anyone like her. I was obsessed. Thinking about her all the time.

So I finally got up the nerve and asked her out. But I was rebuffed. Nicely. But rebuffed. Despite that, my obsession grew. Months later I ended up going to a conference that she was speaking at just to give myself another shot. I went to her panel discussion, I didn’t stalk her.

Well, I sort of stalked her.

We ended up having drinks alone talking about business and I asked her out again and I was turned down again. How can I stop thinking of her? It is distracting. I can’t be in other relationships. I think about her at work all the time. It’s insane. And the fact that she doesn’t want me doesn’t change one thing.

I smiled as she was telling me the story. And I teasingly replied to A

Oh, it must be hard for someone as sexy and desirable as you to get turned down -twice.?

A stuck her tongue out at me and I scrunched my nose back at her.

I said to A that this was a case of “don”t think of a pink elephant” – that once mentioned the idea of a  pink elephant indelibly sits in the mind. It was a funny trick of our language/brain connection that when negative  descriptors/instructions are given they are seen/experienced as positives. So when a parent says “Don’t spill that juice” to a child, the child sees spilled juice in their mind and then after seeing that spreading pool of  sticky juice suddenly there is a little “don’t” that gets tagged on afterward. Atheism is understood as theism – but not. So in asking “how can I stop thinking about her?” – you can’t as long as you are asking the question.

So I offered to A what might be the sort of counter approach that a good girlfriend might give. I suggested that A totally embrace the obsession. Currently her obsession was about a mile wide – all over her life – and a few inches deep. All her current obsession with Woman X was doing was disrupting her daily activities but A was getting none of the benefit.

I told A that she would have to make a very particular time that she would indulge in her obsession. Nightly at 9pm for 15 minutes. Weekly on Saturdays at 4pm – she would select the appropriate time and interval. But during the day when the obsessing distraction came up she would need to clearly tell her mind:

Not right now Mind. I promise you we will think all about her soon. I will indulge every thought but right now we are working.

At the time of her indulgence she would use that time to focus and contain her obsession. She would dress differently than she normally would – ceremonially. She would make paper cut out dolls of the two of them, draw pictures in celebration of their connection, write poems, sing songs, recite prayers, write her name on a sex toy of choice.

The whole thing was sounding pretty erotic even before I mentioned the sex toy and A was sexily biting her lower lip as I was telling her a way to actually dive deep into this thing. I implored her to feel into this experiment like “the discovery of the curve of a new lovers hip as it moves into her leg”. I teased A further “But you probably have never had a lover before and don’t know how nice that feels…”

Jackass. That is pretty cool. In truth I don’t want to get rid of the feeling I  just want to stop being distracted so badly. Thank you for not making me get rid of this.

I made a kissy face in reply.

In indulging in the obsession and actually letting it move through her body (physically and otherwise) she could stop asking the question “why can’t I have her?” because then the simulacrum would stop the mind from asking and allowing her to move on at some point.

We all have great raging fights with distractions and because the fight is constant the distraction is constant. There is no need to fight distractions we only need to create specific spaces for  distraction to live. Be friends with distractions and eventually you will both be friends.

What obsession do you need to stop fighting and embrace?

Matt, I don’t know if you remember me but we went on two or possibly three dates in 1997. I remember that you were a really good guy and I was a jerk and totally blew you off and never called you back even though you were really interesting and nice. I am so sorry I wasn’t kinder to you then. But seeing you here this weekend has shown me what a truly remarkable person you are more than even in those dates. You have helped so many people in stunning and surprising ways. I really should have dated you then.

I don’t always start off with the punchline but this is a different sort of post.

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In the Winter of 2009 I took a course called “Creativity and Personal Mastery” that was offered by Srikumar Rao. It was a course that was originally offered at Columbia Business School. The course is a mixture of philosophically based introspection, creativity, mindset shifting via certain exercises and practices and new leadership/business paradigms. It became one of the most popular courses at CBS that was signed up for years in advance and regularly referred to by graduates as the most significant class they took in business school.

The course moved to London Business School and Haas Business school to similar acclaim. The people who take the course tend to be really achievy, smart and thoughtful people and there is a strong alumni community with people all over the world who meet up regularly to do the exercises Rao offers and to discourse with others of like mind.

While I did not get a lot of the class in terms of content (I had practiced virtually all of the material covered and had gone over a lot of the same ground on my own and in other forums) I loved taking the class and connecting with these new people who are interested in many of the same things I am. I am very glad that I took the course and am part of the community. It has been good to me. Many great friends of mine have been made there. I recommend the course.

There are also annual alumni retreats where these smart and achievy people get together for a long weekend to connect and reconnect with each other and the work of CPM.

The last retreat was outside of San Francisco at the spectacular Stillheart Institute.

I live in New York. The retreat was in San Francisco. Just flying there was expensive. The retreat itself wasn’t cheap either. Amazingly I got a call from one of the organizers who said that there was an anonymous benefactor who claimed that my value to the community was so great that it was important that I be at the retreat and that all costs of getting to and being at the retreat were covered.

This was an amazing and generous gift.

At the retreat I certainly contributed and gave as fully as I could – just as I would have if I had paid for it myself. There was a woman there who seemed familiar somehow and by the second full day of the retreat I recognized this woman as someone I had gone on a date or two with almost fifteen years ago. I didn’t want to bring any attention to this and didn’t mention it. But I ended up being in a few different workshops with her and we shared a table with some others over dinner.

On the last day of the retreat she came up to me and said:

Matt, I don’t know if you remember me but we went on two or possibly three dates in 1997. I remember that you were a really good guy and I was a jerk and totally blew you off and never called you back even though you were really interesting and nice. I am so sorry I wasn’t kinder to you then. But seeing you here this weekend has shown me what a truly remarkable person you are more than even in those dates. You have helped so many people in stunning and surprising ways. I really should have dated you then.

I was really touched by this and we then proceeded to catch up more formally.

The point of the story is this. You can metaphorically date me now…you don’t need to wait. I am available.

T. Thorn Coyle recently said on G+

People read my blog and social media pages every day without buying any of my books, CDs, or taking a class. I’m happy to post what inspiration flows though me, but without those dedicated people who spread the word, and offer money in exchange for my effort, my public work would go away. Those who give back, I thank you from the bottom of my black heart.

While I don’t have any CD’s or classes (at the moment) the sentiment is very much the same. All the creative approaches I offer these people and write about for you… I can do the same for you.

Here is what I am offering.

Lets do a brainvergence and bring my brain to your situation.

You are contending with something big or small, personal or professional and need help looking at this certain situation in new ways.

I am thrilled to help you in any mode of communication I can do so in person, on the phone, skype, tin can with string, smoke signals, carrier pigeon…

In weird and creative ways I have helped :

name novels
deal with unrequited love
resolve disputes
a rapper find his rhyme flows
find spirit animals
cope with boredom
deal with theft in the workplace
re-imagine an oboe career
restructure a business plan
eliminate stress related stomach pains

I even helped one person with a creative approach to avoid getting murdered.

I can help you.

email me at m@stillmansays.com or call at 212 864 8728 if you have questions.

The standard session with me is a gem.
$225 for a session and a 40 minute follow up (to be used within 30 days)

If you have a more tangled knot that needs reweaving with more support and more accountability. You can schedule a series of spoonfuls of Steady Stillman for what ails you.

$650 for three sessions with three 40-minute follow ups
(each to be used within 30 days of call)

“This is something else I can blame my mother for – her cancer is ruining my comedy career.”

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I have been very fortunate to have been involved with the Upright Citizens Brigade since they first arrived in New York City from Chicago in 1996. I stumbled into their first show in New York by accident in the Winter of 1996 during Christmas Break in my senior year of college and was blown away by them and when I graduated in May 1996 I looked them up and signed up for classes before I even graduated. I’ll be forever grateful to Amy Poehler, Ian Roberts, Matt Walsh and Matt Besser for all they taught me in the three years they were my only teachers about comedy and improvisation – and I took classes constantly, concurrently, devotedly. They opened a vision for the world and to being on an improv stage to me that is still opening 15 years later.

Hey, did you know that I wrote a book about this?

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S has been a professional comedian for 12 years. We had a nice chat about New York City comedy – people we knew and liked. We did bits with each other – as comedy people do.

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There are innumerable things I have learned from performing and studying improvisational comedy but one thing is to play until you find the first unusual thing and then explore that. If that unusual thing is true, then what else is true? Then to look closely what a scene needs and only add that. Once you find all these things you can heighten a scene in remarkable ways. Another thing my improv teachers taught is that the only important thing in a scene is to tell the truth from the perspective of the character you are playing. Don’t try to be funny, just be truthful to that reality. There is truth in comedy and conversely there is comedy in truth if expressed in the right way.

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So S and I brainstorm a bit together on solutions for her which was actually really fun but nothing was clicking. She then mentioned that her mother was really sick and that was another thing that wasn’t helping her feel funny. S quipped

This is something else I can blame my mother for – her cancer is ruining my comedy career.

The delivery was just right and we both laughed. This was the unusual thing to pursue. It suddenly struck me absolutely clearly what S needed to do – Stand Up Tragedy. By eliminating her goal of being funny and doing the opposite of funny she could actually be free to be funny.

This sort of oblique approach can actually move you in remarkable ways. For example when you go from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean via the Panama Canal you will find yourself approximately 75 miles further East than where you entered it. In the short term you actually go backwards – yet it is still the fastest way to get from the Atlantic to the Pacific by ship. This is totally counterintuitive but has broad application – short term backwardness actually can move you forward in stunning ways.

Though we don’t see each other very often (sadly, since I love him and his wife so much) one of my old improv friends Ari Voukydis, a few years ago, became interested in exploring tragedy improvisationally.

He directed a great run of a show called “Harsh” that never tried to be funny while it explored very dark subjects but often was hilarious because the scenes were so real and so truthful that laughter emerged. It is said that comedy emerges from pain and I think there is much truth to this. I was fortunate to be in a class that Ari gave exploring the same subject again which gave birth to a short lived (but really good in my opinion) improv tragedy group called Bedtime Stories for Kidnapped Children that Ari coached. The women in that class and that group inspired me and I saw some of the best acting on a stage that I have ever been a part of. Some of the sickest and saddest stuff that fearlessly went there and regularly was brilliantly funny because it was true.

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If S stood for Stella – she suddenly got her groove back. The idea of not trying to get people to laugh was totally freeing and from there her powers of observation could explore tragedy. She instantly got the connection and said that material was coming to her right then and there. I told her some other recollections of tragic scenes that BS4KC did and we both clapped and laughed with glee as she started telling me some outlines of her sad and miserable stories.

So Ari, Ari, Christina, Megan, Crystal, Jessica, and CeCe – you changed a comedians life. She said so. But you all still inspire me too. Thanks!

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So where does this leave you, the reader? We seek happiness and satisfaction and all sorts of good things. So we point ourselves in that direction and go for them – don’t spare the horses. But we may end up actually taking the long route. Like the Panama Canal there may be an inner short cut we can all take that from a micro-perspective appears to go backwards. I encourage you to have the courage to look at the opposite of your goals and see if they are worth pursuing.

Let’s choose a very simple example to explore so we don’t get the wrong idea.

You want to train to run a marathon. At first blush your thought might be “the opposite of training to run a marathon is sitting on the couch eating Twinkies.” Well, maybe. But S didn’t acquiesce to stopping writing, she opened up to stop trying to be funny. She was just as willing to write. So the opposite of training for a marathon might be running simply for pleasure for all the  same time on all the days you were planning to run an 80 mile week.

S got back to me and said that her new material was killing because she wasn’t driving towards punchlines and she was just deeply expressing her philosophy about the tragic things she was seeing in the world through her wry sensibilities.

I would love to hear what some of your goals are and speculate what their opposites might be and how that might open a new direction for you.

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We all think that the process of decision making is not only our own but fairly straight forward. We look at the decision that needs to be made, anticipate some likely outcome, weigh them against each other and then make the decision and then go from there. In some ways it is quite simple because we have made zillions of decisions over our many years. The majority , if not most, had very little thought at all. But in truth the process is much more interesting than that. 

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N and C were a young couple in the sweet throes of young love. N did most of the talking. As they sweetly batted eyes at each other they explained that they were in still in college but graduating soon and they were pretty sure they would be getting married. But their sticking point was where to live.

C is a singer/songwriter and N is an aspiring film maker. N feels like for his career to start he needs to go to LA and C feels like her singing career needs to be in New York. They have talked about it every which way and have come to no agreement.

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The decisions that we make are indeed made ultimately but there are a number of voices that can chime in and allow the decision to go forward. Some internal voices that weigh in on potential decisions are the voice of practicality,

• the voice of greed
• the voice of sloth
• the voice of fear
• the voice of action
• the voice of anger
• the voice of longing
• the voice of passion…

of course there are many others. Because we can’t reasonably use all of them for every decision we have streamlined the process. We have a few voices that we like and trust and that we use frequently in most decisions or at least particular types of decisions. There is nothing bad about this but it simply means that we end up leaning on the same advisors so we get similar outcomes. It also means that we leave out many voices. When we hit sticking points we are so practiced at asking and hearing the same voices within us that we hardly know what to do. It is as if we suddenly were forced to write with our toes – none of us are practiced at that.

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I asked them a bit more about their arguments and defenses of their respective positions in the process I noticed a slim gold chain around N’s neck. There was a pucker near the collar of his shirt where a pendant would be but what it was remained unknown. But it looked like the sort of chain that was intentionally put there. It wasn’t decorative, it meant something. It had something on it that I needed to listen to. So I turned the conversation on the proverbial dime:

Are you religious?

N said he was a lapsed Catholic. I asked if he had any lingering connection to the faith of his youth. He thought and said that he had always loved Saint Anthony.

Saint Anthony is most well known for being the patron saint of lost or misplaced things and travelers but also he is a patron saint of marriage in Brazil and Portugal. N knew the first part but not the marriage part. C liked the idea that her boyfriends favorite spiritual figure was somehow looking over them.

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Writing with your toes may not be really practical but generally we are pretty disconnected from  our feet. We wear shoes with thick soles that cut off any possibility of dynamic reaction to the earth. Babies have these wonderfully articulated toes where even the little toes can stretch all by itself. For most adults toe articulation and full fooe sensitivity is long gone from a lifetime of wearing shoes with chunky heels, thick cushioning and  support straps. Our feet hardly have had a chance to be feet and do what they do – adjust, grip, spread out.  It is the same with our unused and unheard inner voices. We have dulled our relationship to them and so they virtually atrophy. We have lost something that we should have.

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I was excited that a new possibility suddenly seemed open to their question. I told N that since he and C had gone back and forth with little change that perhaps adding a third point into the discussion might open up new possibilities.

I encouraged N to set up a little shrine to Saint Anthony and start regularly asking him for guidance on where they should go. Just start asking and don’t assume the answer will be one of the two choices. Accept that there might be a few steps involved and see what Anthony says back.

N was reticent for a moment and said that he hadn’t prayed in years. I told him that he wasn’t praying – just asking for guidance or advice. He saw the difference and said

It can’t hurt can it? It has been a long time since I had a chat with Saint Anthony. Just talking to you made me remember how much he meant or means to me.

C said

Maybe he’ll say to just propose already!

And that was that. The two thanked me and walked away with fingers entangled.

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Asking for help from Saint Anthony while sitting at a little make shift shrine is a small way to start to reconnect with a lost or exiled voice within N. It is a voice that he, by his very own admission, was one that he hadn’t heard in a long time. Creating a small ritual space can help to allow any of us to summon one of these different forgotten voices within us. They are worth calling on because we haven’t heard from them in so long that what they say can  be quite surprising. When are surprised we are open…and when we are open all sorts of things can be seen and all  sorts of things can happen.

What voices have you forgotten to listen to?

1. Things need to be disposable so that we keep on buying to spur growth which makes trash
2. Hurting nature has no cost

Trash becomes ubiquitous and it literally becomes part of the landscape by way of landfills but even more perniciously is just sort of accepting that cups and wrappers and wadded up circulars are just standard fare. While there is external trash. There is also internal stuff floating around our minds or hearts as well that functions just like trash does. This problem of inner trash didn’t come up with E when she sat down in Union Square for a creative approach with me. But the problem of inner trash will be considered in a moment.

E felt like a crunchy sort from the moment she stepped to the table. Her Birkenstocks and her Central Americany looking patterened shirt and army pants paired with her broad and handsome face was the very picture of an eco-traveler.

But E upped my impressions.

She told me that she is concerned by the amount of trash in the world. Particularly where she lives in Ecuador.

Not that I disagreed at all about the amount of trash and the problem of it – we chatted about the North Pacific Garbage Gyre and other problems of consumption and trash. But E more specifically put her finger on the problem of trash in Ecuador.

It disconnects people from nature. Here we are in this beautiful country and people who live there don’t see it. They only see it as a place to dump their stuff. And they are losing chances to save it.

It was a full and honest appraisal of her adopted country but certainly it could be applied to any nation.

So I asked her:

What are you being cut off from? What is your experience in the Ecuadorian nature?

The first word she said indicated the depth of her presence: “Open.”

She paused and continued “and connected.”

I waited a moment and felt the simplicity and richness of her simple statement. What shot into my mind was the hope that she was artistic…but I didn’t know what sort of art might be relevant.

So I asked with fingers crossed “Are you really artistic?”

E said haltingly “I teach ceramics at a college there.”

She looked at me like I had done a low grade job of reading her mind – impressive but not terribly specific.

I lit up and said

Incorporate trash into your ceramics! Make new shapes guided by the trash! Embed the stuff into clay! Reclaim traditional techniques and forms with the trash within!

E looked at me and noted

That is really interesting. I wonder about outgassing when you fire them… But it is a really good idea to repurpose the trash and render it functionally inert and use it for counter-purposes.

I had no idea about the outgassing being a problem or not at all but suggested that it might be possible to do low heat firing or sun baked firing like in traditional ceramics. E liked that addition tremendously because it solved the outgassing problem entirely – if it was indeed a problem. We suddenly went into a small riff on how traditional thick walled ceramic styles of pots and sculpture reclaimed could partially rehab the Ecuadorian landscape or the trash could perhaps be buried in bricks and used for housing. The bricks would have less clay in them but might be just a strong.

How cool is that? She said she would look into the outgassing problem but was certainly going to start seeing how trash and clay would start to work together.

This creative approach went really well but what about the notion of inner trash? We don’t want our inner environments constantly polluted by anger, bitterness, hatred, bad habits and the like. Our experience of inner trash can be the same to exterior trash.

• We can just become numb to it – it is always there.
• We can try to pick it up and tuck it away – out of sight, out of mind.
• We can rail against it’s presence and say that we should never have it in the first place.

I am sure there are others.

Trash at one point served a purpose. But it only becomes trash when it was discarded unconsciously. So one way to deal with the inner trash (which was at one point useful) that we experience is to approach it with consciousness and incorporate it into new places that fire your creativity.

Use your anger to power an art project.

Build a temple to sloth.

Write a song about being bitter

Choreograph a dance piece about hatred.

In doing so you will have a new relationship with your anger, sloth, bitterness and hatred. In being reclaimed you will have forged a relationship with it. You’ll be unlikely to trash it again in the same way.

The idea isn’t to do these exact things but to use what we have cast away unconsciously and reclaim it as our own for new purposes.

What sort of art have you made from your inner trash?