The executive part of our brain that’s meant to be in charge of decision-making, planning, and frankly - our experience - is the pre-frontal cortex (PFC).

During this time of uncertainty, if our constant internal chatter is filled with what-ifs … “my speaking engagements are cancelled …. what if I never work again?” “I’ve just lost $450k in the market, what if it goes to zero and I’m penniless?” “What if we all just, like, die?”

Fear-based “What-ifs” hold hostage the thinking part of our brain by causing survival chemicals to flood the body. Our immune system shuts down because it thinks that the body has more serious work to do right now, and thus we are even more vulnerable to what is coming at us. Finally, survival chemicals turn into a toxic closed-loop fear circuit that inevitably lead to more serious illness.

Although there is almost universal agreement, what needs to be taught has been missing. We now know the behaviors and attitudes of those who have been known to thrive with disruptive change.

Before, or simultaneously with, Change Leadership teachings, make sure that people have the basic change skills by teaching the basic change skills of flexibility, optimism and boldness/courage. Studies show that change programs without mindset and behavior change fail at a 70% rate; those efforts that involve ‘Change Ready’ people yield over a 70% success rate - a complete inversion!

One of the only antidotes to the poisonous black-sap from the Méxican chechén tree is nectar from another tree called chaca, which grows very near it. From this Mayan legend* has grown the lore that in the wild, every poison is accompanied by an antidote within the radius of human vision.

For example, for poison ivy, poison oak, and poison sumac, the jewelweed grows nearby. The antidote ‘horsetail plant’ grows very near ‘stinging nettle.’ I believe that these seemingly opposite and contradictory elements aren’t limited to the physical realm. They form the basis for psychological growth and healing.

Years ago, my honour's thesis at Concordia University in Montréal was on Event-Related Slow Potentials of the Brain. The findings of the studies we conducted were compelling.

In that pre fMRI era, we did surface EEG recordings of three “diagnosed” groups and compared results with a “normal” control group. The experimental paradigm was as follows: subjects listed for a “warning’ tone (P1) that signaled that another tone (P2) was about to occur. On the second tone, the job was to push a button and – task done. Without exception, an expectancy wave arose in the brain while it was anticipating the second tone. 

Blocks refer to either persistent outdated beliefs of a company, or to a description of people who are stuck in the past through denial. If you have a critical mass of an outdated belief system and stuck people (33% or more), you’ll spin your wheels no matter how hard you push on the gas.

How to Identify Blocks:

Behaviors vary according to style and situation, but these are tell-tale language cues: “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”  “We’ve always done it this way.”  “That would never work here.” “We tried that once and it didn’t work.”  “This is just another fad, it’ll pass.” “I’ll hide until this computer trend passes.”