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This week we talk to Michael Bungay Stanier about habits
Michael Bungay Stanier is the founder of Box of Crayons, a company that helps organizations do less Good Work and more Great Work. He’s the author of several books, including The Coaching Habit and Do More Great Work. Michael has written for or been featured in numerous publications including Business Insider, Fast Company, Forbes, The Globe & Mail and The Huffington Post.
He was the 2006 Canadian Coach of the Year. He was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University and holds a Masters of Philosophy from Oxford, and law and arts degrees with highest honors from the Australian National University.
In This Interview, Michael Bungay Stanier and I Discuss…
- The One You Feed parable
- His new book, The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More and Change the Way You Lead Forever
- The way that the question, How do you stay curious for just a little bit longer? Can transform the way you show up in your life
- How feeling safe can help us access our highest selves
- The power of sitting in the ambiguity of asking a question rather than jumping to the feeling of certainty of telling someone an answer
- The Karpman Drama Triangle: the victim, the persecutor & the rescuer
- The heart of the Victim role: There’s only one way to do this, but you don’t like the way it’s being done.
- The best coaching question in the world: And what else?
- That the first answer someone gives you isn’t their only answer and it’s rarely their best answer.
- It’s a great self-management tool for rescuers because it keeps you from jumping in, it allows you to stay curious a little bit longer
- It’s a great question for the victim role because it helps give them other options
- Most people only consider two options before making a decision: should I stay or should I go? Asking this question can give you a third option
- The five essential components to building an effective new habit
- That 45% of our waking behavior is habitual
- The 95% of our brain activity happens in the unconscious brain
- Since it’s inevitable that when building a new habit you will “fall off the bus” or fail, it’s important that you have a plan for what you’ll do at that point
- How do you hold yourself firmly but compassionately accountable when it comes to changing your behavior?
- The kickstart question – a good way to start conversation with anybody: What’s on your mind?
- The focus question: What’s the real challenge here for you?
Michael Bungay Stanier Links
A grandfather is talking with his grandson and he says there are two wolves inside of us which are always at war with each other.
One of them is a good wolf which represents things like kindness, bravery and love. The other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed, hatred and fear.
The grandson stops and thinks about it for a second then he looks up at his grandfather and says, “Grandfather, which one wins?”
The grandfather quietly replies, the one you feedThe Tale of Two Wolves is often attributed to the Cherokee indians but there seems to be no real proof of this. It has also been attributed to evangelical preacher Billy Graham and Irish Playwright George Bernard Shaw. It appears no one knows for sure but this does not diminish the power of the parable.
This parable goes by many names including:
The Tale of Two Wolves
The Parable of the Two Wolves
Two Wolves
Which Wolf Do You Feed
Which Wolf are You Feeding
Which Wolf Will You Feed
It also often features different animals, mainly two dogs.
Mavrick says
And to think I was going to talk to somenoe in person about this.