WEBVTT 00:00:20.786 --> 00:00:25.472 I'd like to introduce you to these five chairs 00:00:25.472 --> 00:00:30.244 because they are actually the real protagonists of my talk. 00:00:37.193 --> 00:00:42.742 what behaviors and attitudes we bring into the world in every moment. 00:00:34.680 --> 00:00:37.193 and the message is about 00:00:30.974 --> 00:00:34.680 They have a special message to give to all of us, 00:00:43.737 --> 00:00:45.740 Now, to show you what I mean, 00:00:45.740 --> 00:00:48.826 I have a story to tell you from my personal life. 00:00:48.826 --> 00:00:52.392 And I was trying to build a stronger relationship 00:00:52.392 --> 00:00:54.393 with a very important person, 00:00:54.393 --> 00:00:58.252 the daughter of my partner, 20-year-old daughter. 00:00:58.512 --> 00:00:59.755 To do that, I thought, 00:00:59.755 --> 00:01:02.926 "Let's have a great evening out, just the two girls together." 00:01:02.926 --> 00:01:07.000 And I chose a special venue, 00:01:07.390 --> 00:01:09.650 the Blue Note Jazz Club in Milan. 00:01:10.120 --> 00:01:14.052 That night, the Manhattan Transfer, which is my favorite jazz group, 00:01:14.052 --> 00:01:15.402 were playing. 00:01:15.402 --> 00:01:18.294 So, we meet, atmosphere is fantastic. 00:01:18.294 --> 00:01:20.001 We are getting on very well, 00:01:20.001 --> 00:01:21.795 and I'm happy. 00:01:24.475 --> 00:01:27.263 Being a baby boomer, loving the music, 00:01:28.508 --> 00:01:31.445 I thought, "Well, is she liking it as much as I am?" 00:01:31.445 --> 00:01:34.519 So in that moment, I just turned to look at her to check. 00:01:35.653 --> 00:01:38.823 And what did I see? I saw this. 00:01:39.893 --> 00:01:41.824 She was on her iPhone. 00:01:43.234 --> 00:01:45.816 Now, how to react? 00:01:45.816 --> 00:01:47.295 I had some choices. 00:01:48.075 --> 00:01:49.194 First choice. 00:01:52.904 --> 00:01:56.117 Excuse me. What is she doing? 00:01:56.117 --> 00:01:57.319 She's on her iPhone. 00:01:57.319 --> 00:01:59.274 I mean, I spent all this time and money 00:01:59.274 --> 00:02:02.346 thinking of a fantastic evening, I bring her here, and what? 00:02:02.346 --> 00:02:04.399 After two minutes I take my eyes off her, 00:02:04.399 --> 00:02:05.969 and she's on her phone? 00:02:05.969 --> 00:02:08.566 I mean, what is wrong with this generation? 00:02:08.566 --> 00:02:11.528 I mean, they got the attention span of a fruit fly, 00:02:11.528 --> 00:02:14.098 for God's sake. 00:02:14.098 --> 00:02:15.718 (Sighing) 00:02:18.088 --> 00:02:19.867 Choice number two. 00:02:23.807 --> 00:02:25.557 This was a mistake. 00:02:25.557 --> 00:02:27.076 (Laughter) 00:02:27.076 --> 00:02:28.779 Why did I bring her here? 00:02:28.779 --> 00:02:32.997 I mean, she's bored; she's not interested; she doesn't like the music. 00:02:32.997 --> 00:02:36.549 What was I thinking? I mean: Why should she like the music? 00:02:36.549 --> 00:02:39.567 I mean, this is stuff for baby boomers. 00:02:40.177 --> 00:02:43.459 She probably thinks she's spending the evening with a dinosaur. 00:02:44.249 --> 00:02:45.652 Oh, God! 00:02:46.622 --> 00:02:49.258 Choice number three. 00:02:52.638 --> 00:02:54.918 Hold your horses. 00:02:54.918 --> 00:02:57.489 Count to ten. Take a deep breath. 00:02:58.249 --> 00:03:00.559 Don't jump to conclusions. 00:03:00.559 --> 00:03:02.869 You don't know what she is doing on her iPhone. 00:03:02.869 --> 00:03:05.310 So just relax.Take it easy. 00:03:06.710 --> 00:03:08.151 Have another drink. 00:03:08.151 --> 00:03:10.527 (Laughter) 00:03:11.277 --> 00:03:13.031 Choice number four. 00:03:14.991 --> 00:03:17.498 Now, you know, what's really important for me 00:03:17.498 --> 00:03:20.880 is that this evening together is special, 00:03:20.880 --> 00:03:24.711 that she feels that after this evening, she can really open up to me; 00:03:24.711 --> 00:03:27.051 she can feel safe with me, and that - 00:03:27.051 --> 00:03:30.622 I'm always an open door for her, that's what's really important for me. 00:03:31.332 --> 00:03:33.210 I just hope it's going to happen - 00:03:33.210 --> 00:03:34.602 I just hope. 00:03:36.382 --> 00:03:38.462 Choice number five. 00:03:43.832 --> 00:03:45.867 What's important for her? 00:03:45.867 --> 00:03:48.642 What's going on in her world right now? 00:03:49.412 --> 00:03:50.838 What's important for her? 00:03:50.838 --> 00:03:53.042 I really would love to connect to her. 00:03:53.042 --> 00:03:54.562 What do I need to do that? 00:03:55.212 --> 00:03:56.432 (Sighing) 00:03:56.432 --> 00:03:59.812 You know, I was having real problems trying to answer that question. 00:03:59.812 --> 00:04:04.056 And in that moment, she turned to me and she said, 00:04:05.183 --> 00:04:08.112 "Louise, did you know that this is the only Blue Note 00:04:08.112 --> 00:04:09.922 in the whole of Europe? 00:04:09.922 --> 00:04:13.142 And there's one in New York, and then there's two in Japan, 00:04:13.142 --> 00:04:15.011 but this is the only one here in Milan. 00:04:15.011 --> 00:04:17.484 That's incredible; the Italians have got it." 00:04:17.484 --> 00:04:21.186 And she said, "Oh, and I've looked up the Manhattan Transfer. 00:04:21.186 --> 00:04:24.942 Do you know that they've been playing and singing together for 40 years? 00:04:24.942 --> 00:04:26.511 That's incredible!" 00:04:27.421 --> 00:04:30.044 And she said, "Also, look." 00:04:30.604 --> 00:04:34.614 She handed me her iPhone; she'd sent a message out on Facebook; 00:04:34.614 --> 00:04:37.752 it said, "In the Blue Note in Milan, 00:04:38.603 --> 00:04:43.373 with the Manhattan transfer and Louise, the best!" 00:04:46.223 --> 00:04:49.102 Now, that was a close shave. 00:04:49.102 --> 00:04:51.194 I mean, I could've really spoiled that. 00:04:51.194 --> 00:04:55.513 Because I could have sent her a disapproving look from this chair. 00:04:56.243 --> 00:04:59.883 And she could've started telling herself about me, things about me, 00:04:59.883 --> 00:05:04.092 like, Louise, she's controlling. 00:05:04.092 --> 00:05:05.794 She's difficult. 00:05:05.794 --> 00:05:08.115 It's not easy to be around her. 00:05:08.115 --> 00:05:10.505 And that was not my intention at all. 00:05:10.505 --> 00:05:13.648 And in fact, she was completely engaged. 00:05:13.648 --> 00:05:14.702 She was there, 00:05:14.702 --> 00:05:19.247 multitasking in her digital way, but she was enhancing our reality. 00:05:19.247 --> 00:05:21.394 So, in milliseconds, 00:05:21.394 --> 00:05:25.333 I could have destroyed that beautiful moment that we were creating together. 00:05:26.413 --> 00:05:29.395 And this is what we are doing all the time, 00:05:29.395 --> 00:05:34.152 we are making choices about the behaviors that we bring into the world. 00:05:34.796 --> 00:05:38.375 And the choices that we make have a direct impact 00:05:38.375 --> 00:05:41.405 on the conversations that we have, 00:05:41.405 --> 00:05:43.980 the relationships that we form, 00:05:43.980 --> 00:05:46.985 and the quality of our lives in general. 00:05:47.625 --> 00:05:52.815 So, what can we do at a practical level 00:05:52.815 --> 00:05:55.065 to help us be more conscious about this? 00:05:55.065 --> 00:05:57.061 Because they don't train us this in school. 00:05:57.061 --> 00:06:00.579 It's not on the school curriculum - how to behave well, really. 00:06:00.579 --> 00:06:02.274 So, what can we do? 00:06:02.274 --> 00:06:05.532 The idea of the five chairs came to me 00:06:05.532 --> 00:06:11.836 when I went and attended a nine-day course in nonviolent communication 00:06:11.836 --> 00:06:16.325 with its late founder, Marshall Rosenberg, an extraordinary man, 00:06:16.325 --> 00:06:19.327 who did so much for world peace. 00:06:19.327 --> 00:06:21.867 And after that, it sort of changed my life. 00:06:21.867 --> 00:06:24.537 After that, I decided that it was a message 00:06:24.537 --> 00:06:28.347 that I needed to get into our workplaces. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:28.347 --> 00:06:30.797 Workplaces where I spend most of my time 00:06:30.797 --> 00:06:35.182 being a coach, a facilitator, and the trainer. 00:06:35.717 --> 00:06:41.646 And also, where we produce some of our most questionable behaviors, 00:06:41.646 --> 00:06:44.277 sometimes toxic behaviors. 00:06:44.667 --> 00:06:49.691 So, the idea of the five chairs is to help us slow down 00:06:49.691 --> 00:06:53.559 how we are behaving in every moment of our lives 00:06:53.559 --> 00:06:55.332 and to analyze what's going on. 00:06:55.933 --> 00:06:57.655 So, what I would like to do 00:06:57.655 --> 00:07:02.294 is look at the chairs more closely and explain them. 00:07:02.294 --> 00:07:03.833 The red chair. 00:07:08.323 --> 00:07:11.017 This is the jackal chair. 00:07:11.017 --> 00:07:16.607 I mean, jackals are incredibly clever, incredibly opportunistic animals. 00:07:16.607 --> 00:07:19.419 They always on the lookout to attack. 00:07:20.119 --> 00:07:25.778 And in fact, this chair here is the chair where we misbehave the most. 00:07:26.375 --> 00:07:33.030 In this chair we love to blame, to complain, to punish, to gossip; 00:07:33.469 --> 00:07:37.798 but our supreme game in this chair is to judge. 00:07:38.478 --> 00:07:43.178 And if you don't believe me, I invite you to go on a mental diet; 00:07:43.751 --> 00:07:49.214 I invite you to spend one hour with some human beings 00:07:49.801 --> 00:07:53.629 and see if you can do it without one single judgment 00:07:53.629 --> 00:07:55.366 going through your mind. 00:07:56.139 --> 00:07:57.682 I mean, watch ourselves. 00:07:57.682 --> 00:08:00.439 Somebody walks in the door, we go: bzzzzzzzzz, 00:08:01.199 --> 00:08:03.995 I like, don't like, not really interested. 00:08:04.425 --> 00:08:07.010 And we don't know anything about them at all. 00:08:07.010 --> 00:08:08.994 So, this chair here 00:08:09.964 --> 00:08:11.442 is a judging chair. 00:08:11.442 --> 00:08:14.507 There's actually another game that I love in this chair, 00:08:14.507 --> 00:08:17.164 it's the "I'm right" game. 00:08:17.164 --> 00:08:19.680 And I used to do that all time, all the time 00:08:19.680 --> 00:08:22.330 until my brother gave me some feedback. 00:08:22.330 --> 00:08:25.602 I used to do it with my mother because my mother likes to exaggerate. 00:08:25.602 --> 00:08:27.668 So she would say something like, 00:08:27.668 --> 00:08:31.095 "Oh yes, there were 30 people at the family gathering." 00:08:32.010 --> 00:08:33.712 And my job was to correct her. 00:08:33.712 --> 00:08:37.532 I'm saying, "No, Mom, they weren't 30, they were 13." 00:08:38.172 --> 00:08:41.241 So, I was the policewoman of the situation. 00:08:42.541 --> 00:08:44.561 My brother touched me on the arm, 00:08:44.561 --> 00:08:49.836 and he said, "It doesn't matter," to which I reacted, 00:08:49.836 --> 00:08:53.272 "What do you mean it doesn't matter? Of course, it matters. She's wrong. 00:08:53.272 --> 00:08:55.603 And she needs to be corrected for her own good." 00:08:57.549 --> 00:09:00.414 He touched me on the arm again, and he said, 00:09:00.414 --> 00:09:03.352 "Do you want to be in a relationship with your mother, 00:09:03.352 --> 00:09:06.043 or do you want to be right?" 00:09:08.192 --> 00:09:09.923 Big lesson. 00:09:09.923 --> 00:09:10.935 From then on, 00:09:10.935 --> 00:09:16.362 I always looked upon my mother's exaggeration as a form of abundance. 00:09:17.682 --> 00:09:20.478 So, here in this chair, what we tend to do 00:09:20.478 --> 00:09:23.381 is we tend to see what is wrong with other people 00:09:23.381 --> 00:09:24.984 rather than what is right. 00:09:24.984 --> 00:09:27.282 Mother Teresa reminds us, 00:09:27.282 --> 00:09:32.473 "The more we judge people, the less time we have to love them." 00:09:34.334 --> 00:09:37.019 The next chair is the hedgehog chair, 00:09:37.019 --> 00:09:38.019 the yellow chair. 00:09:38.019 --> 00:09:40.103 Now, the hedgehog - 00:09:40.103 --> 00:09:43.127 When we behave like hedgehogs, we feel very vulnerable, 00:09:43.127 --> 00:09:49.243 and we curl up, we protect ourselves against what we feel is an evil world. 00:09:49.652 --> 00:09:54.459 And what we do is we mercilessly judge ourselves in this chair. 00:09:54.459 --> 00:09:59.152 So we turn this chair, the red chair, on ourselves. 00:09:59.612 --> 00:10:02.216 And we say things like, "I'm not intelligent enough. 00:10:02.216 --> 00:10:05.314 I cannot do this. Nobody believes in me." 00:10:05.714 --> 00:10:07.403 And we have certain fears, 00:10:07.403 --> 00:10:14.068 we have fears of being rejected, fears of disappointing, fears of failing. 00:10:14.493 --> 00:10:16.214 And we also play the victim. 00:10:16.214 --> 00:10:20.515 So it's, "Nobody cares for me, nobody loves me." 00:10:21.425 --> 00:10:23.004 But in fact, 00:10:23.004 --> 00:10:27.105 when I use this in companies, and I ask managers, and I say, 00:10:27.105 --> 00:10:29.749 "Where do you spend the most of your time?" 00:10:30.699 --> 00:10:33.695 Hardly anybody comes and sits here. 00:10:33.695 --> 00:10:37.732 Because it's quite difficult to admit our weaknesses sometimes. 00:10:37.732 --> 00:10:39.396 We need a lot of courage. 00:10:39.396 --> 00:10:43.144 And yet, we all suffer from self-doubt. 00:10:43.144 --> 00:10:46.224 But it's really, what do we do with our self-doubt? 00:10:47.214 --> 00:10:49.195 Do we give up and give in? 00:10:50.005 --> 00:10:51.491 Or do we say no? 00:10:51.491 --> 00:10:53.647 I want to find the resources and grow. 00:10:54.387 --> 00:10:57.114 And Krishnamurti says something wonderful, 00:10:57.114 --> 00:11:00.214 he says, "The highest form of intelligence 00:11:00.214 --> 00:11:04.803 is the ability to observe ourselves without judging." 00:11:05.993 --> 00:11:08.585 So, next chair. 00:11:10.845 --> 00:11:13.515 This is the meerkat chair. 00:11:13.515 --> 00:11:16.226 I don't know if you've ever seen a meerkat. 00:11:16.226 --> 00:11:20.758 They are not many in Italy, but they are incredible. 00:11:20.758 --> 00:11:22.787 When they are on sentinel duty, 00:11:22.787 --> 00:11:26.246 they can stay for one hour just like this: 00:11:26.246 --> 00:11:29.886 one hour moving their head and only their head. 00:11:29.886 --> 00:11:31.678 Incredibly vigilant. 00:11:31.678 --> 00:11:34.965 And when we are in this chair, this is what we do. 00:11:34.965 --> 00:11:37.327 We're mindful; we're very aware; 00:11:37.327 --> 00:11:40.236 we are observant; we stop; we pause. 00:11:40.236 --> 00:11:43.098 We take a deep breath, and we're conscious. 00:11:43.098 --> 00:11:47.436 This is the WAIT chair. W-A-I-T. 00:11:48.006 --> 00:11:52.488 What am I thinking? What am I telling myself? 00:11:53.129 --> 00:11:55.608 So here we become very curious. 00:11:55.608 --> 00:12:00.206 If somebody is angry, instead of saying, "For God sake: grow up, will you?" 00:12:00.557 --> 00:12:03.936 We think, "I wonder why that person is angry?" 00:12:03.936 --> 00:12:05.858 And we feel interested. 00:12:05.858 --> 00:12:07.882 So this chair here is ... 00:12:09.312 --> 00:12:10.622 When I think of Nietzsche, 00:12:10.622 --> 00:12:12.818 this is such an important quote for this chair. 00:12:12.818 --> 00:12:17.068 He says, "You have your way; I have my way. 00:12:17.068 --> 00:12:21.831 As for the right way and the only way, it does not exist." 00:12:22.648 --> 00:12:24.719 So here we have a choice. 00:12:26.259 --> 00:12:29.157 The red pill or the blue pill? 00:12:29.157 --> 00:12:31.517 It's the sliding door chair. 00:12:31.517 --> 00:12:35.132 And in this moment when we make the right choice, 00:12:35.132 --> 00:12:38.544 we move into this successful living. 00:12:39.634 --> 00:12:41.023 Next chair. 00:12:41.813 --> 00:12:44.518 Here we go into the world of detect. 00:12:44.518 --> 00:12:46.337 Now, why detect? 00:12:46.337 --> 00:12:49.987 Detect because we become detective of ourselves, 00:12:49.987 --> 00:12:51.815 like Sherlock Holmes of ourselves. 00:12:51.815 --> 00:12:56.443 We take a magnifying glass, and we look at our behaviors. 00:12:56.443 --> 00:13:00.128 It's a beautiful chair because we become self-aware. 00:13:00.132 --> 00:13:02.517 We know who we are. We know what we want. 00:13:02.517 --> 00:13:06.160 We know where we're going. We're not afraid to speak our truth. 00:13:06.160 --> 00:13:08.856 But we also create our boundaries. 00:13:08.856 --> 00:13:10.976 We look after ourselves in this chair. 00:13:10.976 --> 00:13:12.642 But we're very very powerful. 00:13:12.642 --> 00:13:14.449 We don't give our power away. 00:13:14.569 --> 00:13:16.501 Here we give our power away. 00:13:16.501 --> 00:13:19.947 So here we grow, we become free. 00:13:19.947 --> 00:13:22.091 We come into our full power. 00:13:22.091 --> 00:13:25.880 We become assertive, but not aggressive. 00:13:26.530 --> 00:13:32.024 Aristotle said, "Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom." 00:13:32.024 --> 00:13:35.334 We can be here for our whole lives. 00:13:35.334 --> 00:13:36.901 Why the dolphin? 00:13:36.901 --> 00:13:41.872 The dolphin because it's such a wonderful animal. 00:13:41.872 --> 00:13:46.031 It's playful; it's intelligent; it communicates beautifully. 00:13:46.031 --> 00:13:47.471 When I think of the dolphin, 00:13:47.471 --> 00:13:52.150 I think of us at our very best as human beings. 00:13:53.661 --> 00:13:55.672 So, next chair. 00:14:01.872 --> 00:14:05.230 This is the giraffe chair. 00:14:06.330 --> 00:14:08.183 Very beautiful chair, 00:14:09.043 --> 00:14:10.759 very difficult. 00:14:10.759 --> 00:14:13.332 I don't know if you know, 00:14:13.332 --> 00:14:19.613 but the giraffe has the biggest heart of all land animals; 00:14:19.613 --> 00:14:21.123 it's that size. 00:14:21.123 --> 00:14:24.067 And not only does it have the biggest heart, 00:14:24.067 --> 00:14:27.032 it also has the longest neck. 00:14:27.532 --> 00:14:29.831 So it has incredible vision. 00:14:30.261 --> 00:14:33.420 So when we are in this chair, 00:14:33.420 --> 00:14:38.653 we are displaying empathy, compassion, and understanding. 00:14:39.374 --> 00:14:43.514 And in this chair, we put our egos on the back burner, 00:14:44.214 --> 00:14:46.224 and we listen to people. 00:14:46.224 --> 00:14:50.531 We hold people in our presence, and we care for them. 00:14:52.527 --> 00:14:56.612 Stepping into somebody else's shoes and understanding them 00:14:56.612 --> 00:14:59.280 is a great act of generosity. 00:15:00.710 --> 00:15:02.903 Abraham Lincoln once said, 00:15:02.903 --> 00:15:07.282 "I don't like that man. I must get to know him better." 00:15:08.752 --> 00:15:11.724 So in this chair, it's an invitation 00:15:12.504 --> 00:15:14.754 to look at other perspectives, 00:15:14.754 --> 00:15:17.484 to embrace other realities, 00:15:17.484 --> 00:15:20.134 to embrace diversity, 00:15:20.134 --> 00:15:22.475 and to become tolerant. 00:15:23.445 --> 00:15:28.324 And the most important question in this chair is what is important 00:15:28.324 --> 00:15:30.927 for him or her in front of me? 00:15:30.927 --> 00:15:36.375 And the intention in this chair is to stay connected whatever happens. 00:15:37.365 --> 00:15:39.306 So these are the chairs. 00:15:40.386 --> 00:15:42.772 How do we translate this into daily life? 00:15:42.772 --> 00:15:45.766 Well, you can imagine, if you go to work, 00:15:46.366 --> 00:15:49.232 maybe you can go, and you give a presentation, 00:15:49.232 --> 00:15:50.743 and it goes really well. 00:15:50.743 --> 00:15:54.106 So you are here, thinking, "Great, fantastic!" 00:15:54.106 --> 00:15:58.030 Then, maybe you have a meeting and things go badly, 00:15:58.030 --> 00:16:00.956 and we sink into these chairs. 00:16:00.956 --> 00:16:06.266 Now our challenge every day is to understand how to find the balance 00:16:06.776 --> 00:16:09.987 between sitting here and sitting here. 00:16:09.987 --> 00:16:13.001 Because if we're sitting here, life is not that happy. 00:16:14.645 --> 00:16:16.818 But if we're sitting here, in these chairs, 00:16:16.818 --> 00:16:18.886 we're more rational; we're more open; 00:16:18.886 --> 00:16:21.825 we're more intelligent; we're more thoughtful. 00:16:27.075 --> 00:16:30.517 Something that really moved me very very deeply when I first read it 00:16:30.517 --> 00:16:35.377 was this: Viktor Frankl, in his book Man's Search for Meaning, 00:16:35.377 --> 00:16:39.876 said, "Everything can be taken from man but one thing. 00:16:40.409 --> 00:16:43.279 The last of human freedoms - 00:16:43.279 --> 00:16:48.340 to choose our attitude in any given set of circumstances." 00:16:49.200 --> 00:16:51.236 This is so powerful. 00:16:51.236 --> 00:16:55.217 So when you next want to snap at your children, 00:16:55.937 --> 00:16:58.229 or argue with your partner, 00:16:58.229 --> 00:17:01.135 or punish someone at work, 00:17:01.135 --> 00:17:03.518 try and come into this chair here and think. 00:17:04.678 --> 00:17:08.757 And if by chance, you end up in this chair - 00:17:08.757 --> 00:17:10.739 which very often happens - 00:17:11.729 --> 00:17:15.397 can we find the courage to say "I'm sorry" 00:17:15.397 --> 00:17:17.850 and make everything right again? 00:17:18.820 --> 00:17:23.802 So, my invitation to you is to take these chairs home with you. 00:17:24.842 --> 00:17:27.189 Play with them. Make them your own. 00:17:27.189 --> 00:17:30.017 Teach them to your kids; they get this immediately. 00:17:30.017 --> 00:17:32.715 Put five of them in the boardroom at work 00:17:32.715 --> 00:17:35.090 and watch how your meetings will improve. 00:17:35.570 --> 00:17:40.984 And the next time somebody presses one of your red buttons, 00:17:41.938 --> 00:17:47.839 just think: five chairs, five choices. 00:17:49.899 --> 00:17:55.121 Can we all commit to making our homes, 00:17:55.121 --> 00:17:59.402 our workplaces, and this world a better place? 00:18:00.192 --> 00:18:02.992 One behavior at a time. 00:18:04.372 --> 00:18:05.658 Thank you. 00:18:05.658 --> 00:18:08.437 (Applause)