The Agile Business Innovation‘s Podcast

The Difference Between Authentic Feelings And Racket Feelings

We've been talking about transactional analysis, which I use to help leaders, coaches and consultants to develop and to lead their people. We've been talking about ego states, transactions and ways that people maintain their own stories instead of being in the here and now. We've talked a little bit about what racket feelings are, but now I want to talk about how you recognize racket feelings.

Are You Running A Racket?

Rackets and Racket Feelings

Sometimes people show feelings and you think, is this real or not? Probably you've got a gut reaction that leads you to this thought. Perhaps when you see someone get hurt and they laugh, you find it a bit strange. Or instead of showing a scared feeling someone gets angry, or people who should be angry start to cry. You wonder, what's going on here? You might be witnessing the expression of a racket feeling.

Redefinition Limits Change

We just talked about the five ways people maintain their own stories. , Let’s talk about redefinition first.

 

Redefinition is when you distort your perception of reality to fit your own reality and your own story. For example, if I ask you a question “when” question and you answer with a “Who” response that’s a redefinition. For instance, I ask, “What time is it?” And you say, “Paul's not here yet.” That's a redefinition in its simplest form.

In Symbiosis You Diminish Yourself And Others

We've talked about ego states, we've talked about transactions, and we just talked about the five ways people keep their own reality going so that they're not able to solve their problems in the here and now.

We talked about the first way, which was redefinition, and now we're going to talk about the second way, which is called symbiosis. There are functional and dysfunctional types of symbiosis, so let's start with the definition. Symbiosis is when two or more people act as if they have less than three ego states each.

How Do We Miscommunicate?

One of the things we've been talking about in this series of videos is how people interact and communicate effectively. What happens if people don't communicate effectively?

What happens if people are more invested in wanting to keep their own reality and story than in actually being really in touch and changing? Within transactional analysis we distinguish five ways people keep their own reality going without getting into real contact and really changing.

The function of different communication styles – check the need or the contract

We talked about Structuring Parent, Nurturing Parent, Adult, Rebellious Child, Adapted Child and Free Child.

So, what are the effects on communication when you transact from those different ego states?

Recognizing ego states – alignment to change

How do you know where someone is coming from in terms of ego states?

• Behavioural diagnosis: words, tone, gestures, posture, facial expressions. (frequency count)

• Social diagnosis: From what ego state are you relating to the other? What does that say about the others’ ego state?

• Historical diagnosis: What were you like as a child? How did your parents behave?

• Phenomenological diagnosis: Re-experience of past with connected thinking, feeling, behaviour you had then and there.

To be absolutely sure where someone is coming from in terms of ego states you need at least three checks.

Master communicators adapt their ego state so that the other person can hear

Using Free Child as a style of communication in business is infectious and will get you going in an agile and innovative way.

The function of ego states – How to communicate effectively

When we talk about communication within transactional analysis, we actually analyze: from what ego state are you transacting?

Each ego state has a different effect.

It’s a Kind of Magic: The Art and Science of Executive Coaching

I decided to go back to basics now after the summer and back to basics for me is really individual coaching and executive coaching. I coach a lot of leaders, usually men over forty, who are at a crossroads in their career and their life. Sometimes they've gone up the ladder and they've developed patterns of behaviour that have brought them to that point but now they want a break through. Or they want to go to a different level but they don't know how to do it.

The other reason that people come to Executive Coaching is personally, they've become successful in their career and then they realize that they don't really have a personal life anymore because they're always busy working. They want to get that balance back.