Storytelling

Imagine: Instead of saying "I have a dream", Martin Luther King would have started his speech differently: "I was reflecting on the options of a reciprocal perception of racial issues". His speech would probably never have gone down in history as one of the most important.

Not making a decision is a decision too

A lot of problems happen because of your internal state. When you're calm, happy, and fulfilled, you don't pick fights, create drama, or keep score.

“We need very little in life to make us happy, provided we have the frame of mind to enjoy whatever we have.”

The secret race - Taylor Hamilton

•  Its not the size of the dog in the fight, its the size of the fight in the dog.
• Instead of focusing on himself, he focused on the motives and credibility of his attackers.
• In a meeting call the one attacking out: "Why do you want this / point this out?"
• Here's another pattern I later noticed: whenever anybody emphasized how safe something was, it often turned out to be the opposite.
• The press didnt understand that our job was to throw the kitchen sink at the test, to cast its credibilitiy into doubt. (Law, I was discovering, works like bike racing: try everything, just in case it works.)
• I learned that if youre vague enough, you dont have to lie
• I learned that if you repeat something often enough, you begin to believe it.
• that old saying that when god closes a door he opens a window.
  

The Rider - Tim Krabbe

• And then, suddenly, like a bolt of lightning, absolutely nothing happens.
• The qay you can mull endlessly over getting up in the morning - and suddenly you find yourself standing next to the bed. Your body got up, and you were in it.
• Hey: are my brains making thoughts again? There's even a landscape here.

The Sorceres apprentice - Lisa Abend - A season in the kitchen at Ferran Adrias Elbulli

 

The Sorcerers apprentices

„I dont want to hear any screaming in this resturant. No one insults anyone else, no one belittles anyone else. If you have a criticism, you raise it calmly, in a meeting. We're team. And if I hear of anyone insulting anyone else, they're out.“ - „When I started“, Ferran continues, „insults, shouting, outbursts were normal. But by now we've created an environment of respect so that when others come here they admire us.“

Learning required the utmost dedication and focus, and he would not tolerate a moments lapse in himself or, for that matter, in anyone else. (…) But Luke remained centered on the task at hand. „The only thing I think in my head while I am working“, he said, „is faster, faster, faster“.

In fact, they expect their chefs to have privileges; they want them to be different. After all, those same privileges may someday await them when they are chef, and the chance to receive your plate of lentils before anyone else seems like fair reward for all those years of scut work.

But anger is not just an uncontrollable reflex, it's also a tool: it keeps people focussed. As one otherwise mild-mannered New York chef says in reference to the staff he regularly screams at, „Your need their fear. Otherwise it all goes to shit.“

I like it when someone gives me shit if I fuck up. Dont say, „Oh you poor thing, are you having a bad day?“ Get in my face.“