Simple things are powerful. The title ‘Whatever You Think, Think the Opposite’ is one of those powerful simple things. To refresh the memory: it’s the title of a great little book by Paul Arden. It reads in about 15 minutes and puts a lot of your thoughts upside down.

And my thought came to this book when I was leading a workshop on personal change.

Move into the vulnerable zone

One of the participants was struggling with her fear to be in the spotlights. Normally she would shun centre stage as much as possible, however this was increasingly problematic as she was running her own business. Public speaking was a necessity, as was being the centre of discussion. Not always but the occasions were it was needed were already an unbearable burden. So she wrote in big letters on a flipchart: ‘I don’t like being the centre of attention’.

At first it worried her to write this down. Like everyone, she was reluctant to share her own shortcomings. But I asked all participants to do the same with their own pattern, making it acceptable for her to do so. And thus we ended up with a room filled with short personal statements.

This is always a powerful moment in the workshop. Suddenly you see all these sentences around you, sentences showing the vulnerability of everyone in the room.

And now… think the opposite

I then asked all participants to turn around their sentence, to search for the opposite. And I gave an example. ‘Say, you have written restaurants have menus, then you could write a restaurant without menu.’ By turning around the pattern, the perspective on the pattern changes drastically. It suddenly opens possibilities to act and change.

She looked at me puzzled, not quite understanding what to do. So I gave it a try: ‘Maybe you could remove the word don’t.’ She looked at me again, uncertain. ‘Yeah, just write it down, it’s just a simple exercise, nothing more…’ And then she wrote: ‘I like being the centre of attention.’

Followed a powerful silence. I could hear her mind making several ‘clicks’ one after the other.

End with a brainstorm

She then turned towards me and nodded: ‘That’s great, I could definitely do with a few ideas on how to achieve that.’ This was the starting point for a brainstorm involving everyone. The harvest was overwhelming. She chose 2 ideas and decided to act upon those.

Thinking the opposite proved to be a powerful tool!

N.B. If you haven’t got the book yet, then in my humble opinion, it’s worth purchasing here