February 13, 2010

Meeting Keith in Delhi

I met Keith in Delhi today. We went to Akshardham temple. We talked about a variety of things- stammering ofcourse-but not limited to it. Then, we had lunch at Wimpy in CP. Deepak Sanothra joined us. We talked and talked. Keith is very good at providing alternative readings of the given situation. Lateral thinking skills. This is very much needed to guide an evolving movement dealing with an issue which is difficult to undersatnd- even for people who have dealt with it all their life. He shared his experinces and insights from Toastmaster and from his days of regular 9-5 job in UK.

2 comments:

I am Santosh said...

Sichin Sir
Can you please elobareate What is laterel thinking?

Keith Boss said...

Lateral thinking.

A way to explain it is to look at the same situation from a different point of view.

An example.
Imagine you are a very rich married man with many children. You have a lovely home and a walled garden.

You are walking around your garden one day and are near a wall. You sense something is on the other side of the wall. You are curious. What is it?

You ask a gardener to drill a hole in the wall. You look through. You see something grey. You move to the left a little and ask for another hole. You look through. You see what looks like a grey wrinkled wide rope. You move right and ask for another hole. You see what looks like a grey wriggly snake.

You still are not sure what is there. You ask yourself how can I find out what is there? You have an inspiration. You ask the gardener to go to your children's play area and bring the trampoline. She brings it and sets it up near the wall, and helps you to stand on it.

You begin jumping, and jumping and jumping. Your head gets nearer the top of the wall with every bounce. Suddenly you can see over the wall. You briefly see what looks to be the top of a grey hippopotamus.

You still are not convinced, because you know a hippopotamus has short legs.

Finally you ring up your neighbour, ask him to look into his garden near your wall and tell you what he sees. He does so and says it is an elephant.

So you looked through the wall once. Then looked through the wall in two more places. Then over the top of the wall. Then from the other side of the wall. This is a complex example of looking at one thing from different points of view. You see things differently.

Help!!!! does anyone have a better explanation?

Take care,

Keith