Some days it is difficult to think of anything that others might want to read.  I like to write ABOUT something.  Share an opinion or an event but for the last week I haven’t had much interesting to think about or to say.  The Wayne Dyer stuff is kind of interesting but It hasn’t grabbed my attention the way I had hoped.  I just seem to be waiting for the next adventure.

Tuesday we leave for Barcelona and I have promised my Tuesday night friends that I will blog while I am away and especially while we are crossing the Atlantic to Puerto Rico.  I have already packed my clothes and my toiletries and only have my computer and printer to throw in along with some well chosen reading.  The plan is to work at least a little on board … to put together the next PULSE book.

I feel excited and ambivalent about the trip.  Seeing new places is always exciting, and spending time at sea will be as well.  I like the thought.  Metaphors abound.  I am sure we will have fun as the sea adventure mingles with the writing of the POWER of PULSE book.

So I have prepared for the trip.  I have uncovered what I hope to resolve and now it is the learning from the experience of the trip that I anticipate.  After ward I will search for possible ways to put the learning to work and explain a plan for meeting the criteria that I identify on the journey.  While I am travelling I hope to have a pleasant mixture of exciting experiences and rest; work and play; accomplishment and leisure.  I hope to experience what Dyer calls “Living creatively”.

“Some people structure conversations naturally”  That’s what my friend Laurie said at coffee today.  I don’t think that is true.  I think everyone learns the structure of good communication somewhere.  Applying it to conversation may not be as deliberate but somewher  along the way they have internalized the structure of an essay of a research report or the writing of a speech.  What do you think?

In this world where words create worlds and define our lives, it is interesting to consider the idea of pleasure.  What does it mean?  Where do you get pleasure?  What ‘turns you on’ as we used to say in the 70’s.  Pleasure, like most states, can be described nine different ways.  Pleasure for me is the excitement of seeing new sites or doing new things.  I also get pleasure from rearranging my house or my book collection so I can experience it differently.  I get energy and pleasure from new perspectives.

Other people on different PULSE BEACHs experience pleasure as something different… a clear decision, a caring smile, a pat on the back, a creative moment, a moment alone, a safe place, a new experience, a chance to lead or a peaceful conversation.  So there are nine possible ways to define or consider pleasure.  There are three categories; heart pleasure, body pleasure and head pleasure.

As human beings we experience physical, emotional and mental pleasure and pain.  The other side of pleasure is pain.  What does pain mean to you?  Again there are nine possibilities.  For me pain is often found in sameness or routine.  That would describe what would cause my mental pain.  Physical pain in the body is also something I experience from time to time but if you would ask me to say what causes me pain I would be more inclined to describe the mental situation because I live on a “head” BEACH.  I also experience emotional pain and yet for me it does not draw my attention whereas for others it may.

Pain and pleasure are individual.  Each of us describes them for our selves.  Where we get caught is when we assume that everyone feels the way we do, or is motivated by the same definitions of pain and pleasure.

Just talking with one of our potential PULSE Professionals who is interested in and working with Emotional Intellegence.  It is a great idea and works well to explain how and why people decide to do what they do.  It is also the piece that explains how PULSE practitionners will notice a shift in the conversation and people change BEACHs.  People come into a PULSE conversation at one level of emotional maturity or intellegence and leave at another level.  If there is anything that is transformational about the PULSE conversation it is that.  Emotional Intellegence is a factor in these types of conversations and the fact of participating in one allows participants to change their own world view and improve their ability to deal with OTHER situations as well, thus improving their emotioanl intellegence.

Emotional Intellegence is a measure.  Emotional Fitness, a la Warren Redman, is a program that expects people to exercise their emotional muscles in order to improve performance.  How do you improve your emotional fitness?  By listening.  Listening is the key to improving your ability to relate to others and yourself.  Does emotional fitness lead to improved emotional intellegence?  Well, the least we can say is that it leads to a more emotionally mature state.  Emotional maturity is what PULSE practitionners strive for … that state of balance and impartiality that is vital to leading a PULSE conversation.

Now … the other piece of this puzzle relates to somatic intellegence, the intellegence of the body.  I have been reading a book called “The Body has a Mind of its Own”.  It is helping me connect the body intellegence with the emotional intellegence and the intellegence of the mind.  Somatic senses are the flesh bound senses that help us make sense of our world.  It is a great read by Blakeslee and Blakeslee and on the front of the cover is a quote from  – Daniel Goleman – the Emotional Intellegence guru whose most recent volumn is called Social Intellegence.

PULSE is a path to Social Intellegence, one that integrates head, heart and body intellegence, and acknowledges each as a piece of the puzzle.  I know that when Oprah reads the book she will understand the significance of this discovery and that many others will become aware of the path to integrated intellegence presented by PULSE.

Have you written to Oprah yet to encourage her to read PULSE Conversations for Change?

Renewing an interest or a friendship is always a bit of a dance.  How much of the past do you bring and how much do you leave behind?  The same can be said for renewing yourself.  RENEW is another of my favourite acronyms or acrostics. ( I am never really sure which is word made from the first letters of a meaningful string of words and which is a shorter title for something more complex)  Anyway – RENEW – Rest, Exercise, Nutrition, Energy and Water – things you need everyday to renew yourself.

It was interesting to watch Marjorie come back after a week in KC doing an intensive Level 2 program and then come down with a cold in the two days she had in the office to catch her breath before training 3 more days with the practice course here in Calgary.  She was trying to get out a Newsletter and do a million other things and I knew exactly how she felt.  That scattered, confused , overwhemedness that follows travel and intense training with the added anticipation of more training to do is at once invigorating and exhausting.  I recognize that state.

I am grateful that more of the travel and intensity is shifting away from me to others giving me a chance to have a new perspective on PULSE and its future.  What to do with PULSE?   How to get it out to the world?  How to make a difference with PULSE?  I am feeling uncertain today.  A few days ago I was writing Oprah and asking her to read my book and see what she thought.  What else can I do to get the message out there?  Email works for me when I have been encouraged to call and speak to people.  To confess, I don’t like talking on the phone.  I avoid it as much as possible. A thoughtful note or a meeting face to face are my preferred means of contacting people.  I get Energy from those kind of encounters where the phone takes energy from me.

So as I RENEW my perspective on PULSE I look for ways to create the Energy it will take to move this forward, to push the wave.  Rest will reinvigorate. Exercise will restore stamina. Nutrition for the body will improve health and vitality. Energy will come from reading and interacting with others.  Water, at least 5 glasses a day, to hydrate and cleanse on the inside and a nice soak in the hot tub everyday will be good for the soul.  RENEW the head, heart and body of the individuals and of the organization that is PULSE.  What you pay attention to improves.  We are paying attention with an aim to improve the visibility of PULSE – World Peace One Conversation at a Time.

I have been thinking about rewriting the PULSE Conversations for Change book so that it has a greater degree of explanation. Now it serves its purpose of supplementing the training that we offer.  What I hope for it is to be more of an off the shelve Oprah book club kind of read so I am hoping to find the time to rewrite with attention to greater detail.  I am hoping that all of you who have read the book will provide input into what ought to be “beefed up” so to speak.  I think I would like to call it the “World Edition” because of the borader nature of the audience for which it will be intended.

Of course it will be written from nine perspectives on the world and it will take into account the past, present, future aspects of explanation and demonstration through expamples necessary to have people understand PULSE as a concept, a process, and as a response to the world as we know, do and feel it.  I like the idea of the rewrite becuase it allows me to encorporate the things I left out the first time knowing that trainers would be filling in the gaps.  I am not looking forward to the long, lonely hours of concentration that it will take to actually do the writing.  It makes me feel tired just thinking about it.

One thing that PhD’s do for you is teach you the discipline of writing.  It is lonely work. As a seven, I of course resist anything alone that has the potentional to be boring.  It took that call to discipline of the PhD to PULL me to the five perspective where I learned to detach and enjoy the time to think and write.  I am much better prepared for that work than I was before hand.  I really feel different about it, more prepared to deal with the boredom that may ensue if I do not organize to have four or five writing projects underway at the same time.  Juggling is what sevens do best.

This morning two things happened that made me think.  I had a great discussion with my friend about the work of Eckhart Tolle.  We were talking about people and being present and he was mentionning how much the book that Oprah supported had helped him understand his own reaction to others.  I am not as convinced as he as tot he value of the Eckhart Tolle work.  Having only had the opportunity to listen to tapes of his, I was unimpressed.  The conversation convinced me that I might want to read some his work.

The Oprah discussion is fun.  Many of my participatns have suggested that I would make a good Oprah guest.  I love the idea and am following the advice of those who know how to get on the show.  Some have suggested applying to do something on her satelite radio station.  I think it would be fun to do a phone in piece with people who have read my little book.  One of the goals for PULSE this year remains to be on Oprah.  This is me putting that out to the Universe as I do whenever the possiblity presents itself.