FEBIassessment_4up

Driver: From Distracted to Dominating!

Posted by Anthony Attan

Jan 10, 2013 10:47:00 AM

Part 1 of this blog series called The Patterns of FEBI digs into the Driver.  In this five-part series, we explore each pattern measured by the FEBI.  The FEBI is a validated psychometric assessment and coaching tool that measures four fundamental patterns of personality and the various contexts in which they are expressed; cognition, physical movement, emotions, environment, etc.  Enjoy!

 

Have you ever had a day like this?

 

9:00am – Start work

9:15am – I’m off to a good start, better check that email

9:30am – Still checking emaildescribe the image

9:35am – I’m sick of email, but I’m one click way from Facebook

9:55am – Still have time to get work done before 10am, get off of Facebook

10:00am – Back on track working on that project!

10:01am – Ding! Is that my phone I hear?  My best friend texts me their latest crisis.

Noon – After more emails, phone calls and games of Angry Birds, I realize how behind my work is today.  Looks like I’m taking another “working lunch”

 

Many of us know this type of day, some more than others.  And who can blame us?  Our phones are practically mini-computers.  We get constant ding and ping noises occurring all around us, triggering us to check our email, text or social media accounts. Oh yes, accountS with a capital “S”, whether it is Twitter, Facebook, Blogger, Google+, LinkedIn or that yet-to-be-created site.  And if you work at home, which is an ever growing way to work these days, you also have the doorbell, those dirty dishes, and the dog to pull you away from your work.  Distracters like these can not only be an annoyance, they can do real damage to our ability to get anything done at all!  Not only does it take us away from our work, it takes us away from the good quality work we do when we are in the zone.  Every time we come back from a distraction, it takes us time to get back to that zone and, over the course of a day, all that time adds up.

 

With distracters all around us that can derail our day, how do we get back on track?  This looks like a job for the Driver!  The Driver is one of four energy patterns of personality measured by the FEBI.  The Driver is a pattern that gets things done, is laser focused, challenges others, and loves to win.  It is a pattern that embraces competition, pushes through barriers, and sets stretch goals.  In other words, the Driver is a warrior, fighting against the destructive force of distractions and making sure we get the job done!  Although it is certainly true that, like any personality characteristic, people vary in the degree the Driver shows up in them, the good news is that with a little practice, we can all bring up the power of the Driver to keep us on task and get stuff done!  Here is your first lesson:

 

To engage the laser focus of the Driver while sitting at your desk, start by planting your feet on the ground.  Really feel into the ground beneath you, especially through the balls of your feet, sitting on the edge of the seat as if you were ready to jump up at any moment.  As you do this, put your hands together and with your two index fingers, and point to a spot in front of you, siting down your fingers to the spot with intense focus.  Continue to press down with the balls of your feet.  Now, pay attention to how this feels, having uninterrupted focus on this single point.  Physically, you may notice your brow furrows and your hands naturally push against each other.  Emotionally, you may feel strong, powerful and focused.  Take this same intense focus with you as you go back to your agenda.  Ask yourself, “What’s next?”  Then, with your newly energized Driver to focus, EXECUTE!

 

For more ways to engage the Driver in you, download this Driver Pattern Energizer from the bestselling book Move to Greatness.  Next in our Patterns of FEBI blog series we will explore how the Organizer energy pattern can bring our great ideas to reality.  Stay tuned:-)

 

Want to learn more about FEBI?  Join us on February 12th for the free webinar, Energize Yourself, Energize Your Business with FEBI.

 

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, Coaching Tool, FEBI Certified Coach, leadership coaching, energy patterns, Driver, whole leadership. whole leadership development

Science of Somatics: Interview with Amanda Blake

Posted by Anthony Attan

Dec 7, 2012 12:14:00 PM

Amanda Blake is a FEBI-Certied Coach who is doing some amazing work around the Science of Somatics.  I recently caught up with Amanda about her work with leaders, her forthcoming book and how she utilizes the FEBI patterns in her work.


Amanda Blake HeadshotTell me about Stonewater Leadership.

I started Stonewater to support social change by helping people become more deeply embodied. New research is revealing - and yogis and martial artists have been telling us for generations - that as you increase self-awareness in physical, emotional, and mental domains all kinds of benefits open up, from increased health to reduced stress to greater empathy.

In my line of work as a Master Somatic Coach I primarily apply those insights to the challenges of leadership. When done right, cultivating mindful embodiment can have practical leadership benefits as well as personal benefits.

Through Stonewater I work with two groups of people: practitioners who want to learn more about the science of embodiment, and leaders - primarily social entrepreneurs - who want to increase their capacity to lead during these challenging and turbulent times.


What can we expect in your forthcoming book, Your Body Is Your Brain?

The big promise behind the book is that it will help people get smarter about what matters to them by harnessing their full intelligence, including the wisdom of the body. Your Body Is Your Brain surveys the research landscape in a wide variety of fields - biopsychology, embodied cognition, neuroscience, and psychoneuroimmunology, to name a few - and connects that research to powerful and compelling stories of change told by somatic coaching clients worldwide.

In the book, I explore how leaders can cultivate the social and emotional intelligence they need to effectively galvanize people around their vision, manage their mood when the going gets tough, handle conflict when it arises, and so on. Most importantly, I explore why it’s imperative - really, truly non-optional - to include the physical body in any kind of personal development. There are sound neurobiological reasons why this is so, and in the book I explore those reasons.


During a recent FEBI Certified Coach webinar, you discussed how subtle changes in body posture can induce powerful changes in ourselves and those around us. Can you speak more to this phenomenon?

Sure. Dr. Stephen Porges, a prominent researcher focused on the autonomic nervous system - a part of our nervous system involved in stress and relaxation - collaborated with bodyworkers to study the effects of Rolfing on stress. They found that changing the angle of the pelvic bowl from a slight anterior tilt to a more balanced position was associated with a sustained increase in parasympathetic tone. What this means, in lay terms, is that people experienced a greater sense of calm when their hips were in a healthier and more efficient anatomical position. This is because the parasympathetic nerves involved in calming physiobodybrainbehavior V2 resized 600logical systems run right through your pelvic bowl. Your everyday posture actually plays a role in your resilience to stress.

So what does this have to do with leadership and organizations? What I and other somatic coaches consistently see in our clients is that as they make sustained postural changes, several things shift in conjunction with that, including their typical mood, their sense of confidence, and their capacity to take actions that were previously difficult for them. This can include speaking up in meetings, or modulating their flashes of anger, for example. This claim that posture impacts more than just physiological health is supported by Amy Cuddy’s research on power postures at Harvard Business School, which I mentioned during the webinar.


How are you utilizing FEBI in your work? How do the patterns connect with your work?

Obviously, FEBI is a great fit with my work. Most of my work is about helping people learn how to be in their body in a new way so they can take different actions. FEBI is the only instrument I know of that goes beyond increasing self-awareness to help people actually move differently in the world, both literally and metaphorically. For this reason, it’s the only leadership assessment that I use.

I often play a little game with myself: I tend to guess at people’s FEBI profiles by watching them move, and then when I have a look at their FEBI results, I check how close I was. This has really helped me hone my ability to see how clients’ behavior and personality shows up in their gestures and comportment. Sometimes I teach in programs that don’t include use of the FEBI. In those circumstances I’ll still observe participants through the lens of the patterns and help them access new options and actions through other qualities of movement. Overall, I have found the FEBI to be a really helpful tool.

I should also add that I have written about the patterns in Your Body Is Your Brain and I refer to them as well in my Body = Brain practitioners class. I interviewed Betsy Wetzig, Ginny Whitelaw's co-author on Moving to Greatness, to get a deeper understanding of how she came to her understanding of the patterns. And several FEBI coaching clients have been generous with their time and stories as well. Many thanks to all of the wonderful folks at Focus Leadership for supporting the effort!

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, Coaching Tool, FEBI Certified Coach, leadership coaching, energy patterns, leadership development, embodied learning, managing stress, mindful practice

What Differentiates FEBI as a Coaching Tool?

Posted by Anthony Attan

Sep 4, 2012 11:01:00 AM

 

Blog Rewind:  This short post was written by Zen Leader author Ginny Whitelaw responding to a question that came up in a FEBI Certification session.  This recently came up again when I was working with one of our FEBI Certified Coaches, so I thought it would be good to repost Ginny's answer.  Like many, this practitioner was great at coaching with FEBI, but was struggling with the step before the coaching even began, describing the instrument to people that have never heard of it.  This can be an important step for practitioners that are in the 'selling' phase of a coaching engagements, which as we know, sometimes continues after a contract is signed.   

 

Near the end of our FEBI certification webinar yesterday, I was asked how I would – in a 30 sec pitch to a client - differentiate the FEBI from other assessments. What are 3-4 key talking points? Great question! Here’s my answer:

1- Connects Being with Doing

Creates an immersion experience where leaders feel on the inside how they need to be FEBI Patterns logoto authentically behave in a certain way or create a certain climate or performance around them; FEBI can then be linked to all other course content

2- Is both Descriptive and Prescriptive

Many assessments give insight into personality, but only the FEBI prescribes specific, mind-body practices to enable and support desired shifts

3- Scales from Individual to Groups

Gives insight into individual personality, as well as how these same patterns emerge in relationships, on teams, in organizations, and across demographic, professional, and national cultures. In all cases, leaders learn levers for bringing out more of a needed energy pattern, and can tie that back into themselves, and how they need to be

4- Accelerates Development

Study after study has shown that mind-body awareness accelerates awareness and development in general; the FEBI makes this crucial link

 

13a41325-1aae-4d4e-8b0f-d97e64bccee3  

Not FEBI Certified but want to learn more about this coaching tool?  Join us on September 10th for a free webinar: Energize Yourself, Energize Your Business with FEBISign up today!

 

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, Coaching Tool, FEBI Certified Coach, leadership coaching, energy patterns, leadership development, business coaching tool, Ginny Whitelaw, coach training

FEBI and Puppetry Training: Finding and Sharing Energy Using FEBI

Posted by Anthony Attan

Jul 22, 2012 10:25:00 AM

Article by Dr. Mark Seton, a consultant in Higher Education Performing and Media Arts and a Certified FEBI facilitator, Sydney, AUSTRALIA.

In July this year I was privileged to be invited to give a keynote paper entitled Resilient Vulnerability at the 4th National Puppetry and Animatronics Summit in Melbourne, Australia.  Over the past few years I have been using training practices associated with FEBI to enable performing arts practitioners to identify their own energetic preferences so that they can have a more sustainable working practice.

What was interesting as I prepared to speak to the puppeteers was to learn that they have a very real recognition of the primacy of energy in their practice.  In Penny Francis’ Reader in Puppetry Theatre Practice (2012), she observes that “the perceived investment of the inanimate with anima or spirit is effected through the convincing transference of a performer’s energy - endowing the puppet/object with motion (normally), voice (sometimes) and presence (always).”  I drew upon this insight as a foundation for engaging puppeteers with the consideration that they need to have a more ecological approach to how they draw upon and channel appropriate energies to be both fully present in the performance space and give their energy to animate the puppets or objects they manipulate.  In particular, I encouraged them to think about approaching the creation of ‘character’ as energetic shape or form, rather than via psychological motivation.  This would not only allow them to consider how to manage their use of energy like a marathon runner, but it would also allow them a means by which to alter their embodied engagement in character in a way that they could debrief and ‘shake off’ aspects of the performance afterwards.

FEBI Patterns logoThis work on resilient vulnerability has emerged from my years of research into actor training in which actors are valued for their vulnerability – their capacity to affect and be affected by an ‘other’, whether it is a text, a person, or a situation.  Performance training is often very effective at enabling artists to be vulnerable.  But there is little training in how to manage that vulnerability so that it is resilient and sustainable for a career that is full of ups and downs, rejections and uncertainties.  I make use of FEBI as a foundational awareness tool when helping actors build up their resilience.  I encourage actors to identify their own energetic preferences and tendencies, and then physically ‘play with’ how they might use their preferences to build up the other qualities of energy they might require for a particular character or performance task.

Often I discover that actors have been traumatised by past vulnerabilities that were not appropriately negotiated through an embodied process.  Dr Peter Levine, a pioneer in somatic (embodied) treatment of trauma, has noted, firstly, that the perception and manifestation of trauma and stress are particular to each individual.  Secondly, the resilience of a person, in the face of inevitable vulnerability to stress and/or trauma, is a consequence of both personal history and a supportive network of relationships.  And, thirdly, and most crucially, that any trauma triggered is “‘locked’ in the body, and it’s through the body that it must be accessed and processed (Levine 1997). By using FEBI, alongside another somatic creative and improvisational practice known as InterPlay (which shares the same lineage with FEBI with regard to the work of Betsy Wetzig), I find that I am helping performers, including actors and puppeteers, find their own unique embodied pathways to wellbeing and becoming empowered to be resiliently vulnerable in their creative practice.

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To use FEBI with your clients, register for the upcoming FEBI Certification.  

Still don't know about FEBI? Join us Monday, September 10th for a free webinar, Energize Yourself, Energize Your Business with FEBI

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, Coaching Tool, FEBI Certified Coach, energy patterns, energy, actor training, puppetry

Interview with FEBI Coach, Dr. Nika Quirk

Posted by Anthony Attan

May 18, 2012 8:26:00 AM

I recently caught up with FEBI Certified Coach, Nika Quirk, to talk about her recent academic work and what's next now that she is Dr. Quirk. 

Tell me about your doctoral research?

NikaQuirk1

My curiosity about what supports collaboration to emerge in a group of people lies at the heart of my doctoral inquiry.  For the last 25 years, I've worked as a corporate director, a program and project manager, and as a coach for entrepreneurs, while simultaneously integrating the improvisational methodology of InterPlay into my daily life and work.  As you know, InterPlay and the FEBI have some common roots in looking at life performance from a body-based perspective. This juxtaposition of experience made me intrigued by how ease-filled the connection and collaboration typically was in improvisational contexts and what a struggle it was to create and maintain really successful partnerships and teams in the workplace.  I brought these questions into my transdisciplinary work at California Institute of Integral Studies.  My research explored my theory that the emergence of collaboration is sparked by creating a social space for ongoing leadership team development that provides the time for increasing bonds of mutuality (the formation of "We").  In this space, the group inquires into their own collaborative group performance as well as their organizational progress towards the vision and current objectives through an ongoing cycle of action, reflection, and group dialog utilizing extended ways of knowing such as storytelling, movement and visual art making.  This builds the capacity to imagine and think together, and optimally over time to build and benefit from synergy.

The relevance and timeliness of my doctoral research is grounded in our "new normal", the increasing complexity and uncertainty of our lives on this planet.  With others, I believe that the 21st Century is an era of Great Change for humanity and we are called to retool the unsustainable aspects of modern civilization, and personally evolve as well.  To be the highly adaptable and resilient people who can co-create a life-sustaining society and ride the waves of change, we need to re-engage with our intuitive, relational and artful intelligence, becoming whole-brain, embodied thinkers and actors.  These themes are surfacing in diverse domains such as brain science, theories of developing sustainability, and new perspectives on leadership that is more shared, relational and learning-oriented.

What is next for you?

Well, Anthony, my life is overlapping endings and beginnings right now.  My degree is being formally conferred and my dissertation published in the next two months.  ("Open Yet Unbroken" will be an open access publication downloadable through Google Scholar).  Simultaneously, I've begun co-designing and managing a new research project for Women's Initiative for Self-Employment here in the San Francisco Bay Area with funding provided by the Fetzer Institute.  Essentially, we're inquiring into what happens when people in a workplace engage with experiences of love and forgiveness, their own and others.  What is the ripple effect in their leadership, their work, and in the organization's culture?  It's a very rich opportunity.

I'm networking and interviewing to find academic opportunities as a mentor and/or faculty, preferably in a Green MBA program or a leadership program focused on transformative and sustainable development.  Continuing my doctoral research is very important to me and I have a few ideas about projects for 2013 that will extend the inquiry into different populations and contexts.

And I'm expanding my coaching practice beyond the individual entrepreneurs I've mainly been working with to focus on developing business collectives, partnerships and organizational teams in business or non-profit sectors.

What benefit do you bring to collectives, partnerships and teams?  Who are your clients?

Think of any popular band, orchestra or dance troupe that you think are amazing performers.  This type of ensemble performance is what I aim to bring to people working and leading together in groups.  From the audience view, it looks so easy, seamless, flowing, harmonic.  That fluid ensemble performance hangs on a solid framework of trust, play, practice and intimate knowledge of each other's competencies and capacities that takes an investment of time, energy and talent to construct.  For these groups, perfection of ensemble expression is the goal.  When we hold the same kind of prioriSharedreflectionty in other workplaces and are willing to make that kind of investment, we can achieve the efficiency, elegance, creativity and sustainability in performance.

In working with business partnerships, entrepreneur problem-solving groups, and the non-profit team I did my doctoral research with, I find there are several aspects of this work.  I believe in the leadership potential in everyone. Like individuals, I believe duos and groups are unique entities who are enhanced by facilitation of their own self-organizing process.  I assist their discovery and development through using the FEBI individual and team profiles, and inquiry and dialog activities.  Ideally, these group inquiry sessions are occurring several times a week. Remember, the goal is to learn to imagine, think and act together.  We gather data about key questions, such as those below, and reflect on the results of actions that arise from these questions.  

  • What is our shared imagined vision and our ideal outcomes?

  • What brings us together and what separates us?

  • For the group - Who are We?  Who do We need to become?

  • For the individual - What are my multiple possibilities for contribution in this group? What are my learning edges?

  • What are the current and next priorities for action?  How do We best deploy our resources to succeed?


I also help them to design the kind of social space they require to maintain a culture of collaboration for their group.  This is often a challenge in larger organizations.  Eventually, the partnership or group has put a collaborative practice into place that works for them, and they consult with me as needed.

Recent business coaching clients include partners in a permaculture landscape architecture firm and a video production company.  Now that my academic work is completed, I'm looking for a few collectives or teams who want to take their collaborative performance to the next level.

 

To contact Dr. Quirk or other FEBI Certified Coaches, visit the FEBI Certified Coach Directory.

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Topics: FEBI, FEBI Certified Coach, energy patterns, energy, collaboration

There Should Be an “I” in Team

Posted by Mark Kiefaber

Mar 30, 2012 12:20:00 PM

In almost every team locker room anywhere, there is a banner that says, “There’s No “I” in Team.  The intent is clear.  Don’t be selfish, and make sure you suppress your individual ego for the good of the team.  But there is a possible downside to this sentiment.  Imagine a swimming relay team where one of the simmers gains 30 pounds and starts smoking, or less dramatically, just doesn’t stay in the best possible condition.  S/he is not likely going to help the team much.  S/he is not focusing very much on being the best possible “I”.

Think of all the teams that operate in organizations.  Sometimes they work in series, like a relay team, and sometimes they work in parallel like a rugby team.  In all cases, they need each of the team members to maintain a maximum level of both competence and energy.  In the organization sense, maximum competence means technically up to date, and a critical part of maximum energy means matching the right energy type to whatever task needs to be accomplished.  There are four basic energy types (Driver, Organizer, Collaborator, Visionary), and each of us has access to all four types.  We also, however, have preferences among types, so we don’t access them all the same.  Learning your preference hierarchy and how to strengthen your weaker preferences is key to being the best “I” for any team. An online assessment called the FEBI will help you learn about and strengthen your energy.

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, energy patterns, leadership development, business coaching tool, teamwork, teams

Business Coaching Tool: What Differentiates FEBI

Posted by Anthony Attan

Feb 27, 2012 9:10:00 AM

Blog Rewind:  We went back to our archives to bring you our most popular posts from the old blog.  Here is a response from Ginny Whitelaw around the question of what makes the FEBI assessment different from other business coaching tools.

 

Title:  What Differentiates FEBI?

Near the end of our FEBI certification webinar yesterday, I was asked how I would – in a 30 sec pitch to a client - differentiate the FEBI from other assessments. What are 3-4 key talking points? Great question! Here’s my answer:

1- Connects Being with Doing

Creates an immersion experience where leaders feel on the inside how they need to be to authentically behave in a certain way or create a certain climate or performance around them; FEBI can then be linked to all other course content.

2- Is both Descriptive and Prescriptive

Many assessments give insight into personality, but only the FEBI prescribes specific, mind-body practices to enable and support desired shifts.

3- Scales from Individual to Groups

Gives insight into individual personality, as well as how these same patterns emerge in relationships, on teams, in organizations, and across demographic, professional, and national cultures. In all cases, leaders learn levers for bringing out more of a needed energy pattern, and can tie that back into themselves, and how they need to be.

4- Accelerates Development

Study after study has shown that mind-body awareness accelerates awareness and development in general; the FEBI makes this crucial link.

  download-febi-coaching-guide

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, Coaching Tool, FEBI Certified Coach, leadership coaching, energy patterns, leadership, change management, whole leadership development, business coaching tool

What is Whole Leadership?

Posted by Anthony Attan

Feb 24, 2012 1:39:00 PM

If you are reading this post you have likely heard the term ‘whole leadership’ and are wondering what in the world we are talking about.  You also likely care enough about leadership to wonder in the first place.  Fear not, you are in the right place.

Picture these scenarios, the leader who…

  • Has brilliant ideas but lacks the follow through to do anything with them.

  • Is incredibly hard working when alone but lacks the ability to connect or work with others.

  • Is laser focused on ambitious goals but fails to anticipate where the industry is going.

Do these people sound like the next successful leader?  The next great CEO?  Our research says most likely they are not.  Why?  They are all partial leaders. 

Although leaders should know their strengths and use them to reach desired goals, those same strengths can also get in the way of success when overused.  For example, you could have a real strength of breaking down big processes, analyzing all of the individual parts and get stuck in those details, not seeing the forest for the trees.  Or you’re a great innovator but you spend so much energy creating that nothing gets done. Whole leaders know how to use their strengths AND know when something else is needed.  Recognizing that AND often means a paradox. Whole leaders know how to strike the right balance between leveraging strengths while not becoming a victim of them. 

To further describe whole leadership let me concentrate the discussion on the ‘what’ and the ‘how’ of whole leadership.  First the ‘what’.  One thing that is certainly not new about leadership, or personality in general, is that we take on preferences in how we show up in the world.   These preferences have been call personality types, cognitive modes of thinking or behavioral tendencies.  From our research, and similar to many models in the past, there are four main preferences, which we call energy patterns of personality

  • Driver – laser focused, drives for results, challenges barriers, stretches for goals, loves to win, gets to the point, fast and direct, and independent. 

  • Organizer - does the right thing, moves step by step, proper, likes order, plans and lists, neat and tidy, stable and reliable. 

  • Collaborator - engages people, has fun, rolls with the punches, sees both sides, works around obstacles, plays in the give and take, builds teams and networks. 

  • Visionary - goes with the flow, lets go, thinks in leaps, sees the big picture, seeks harmony, thinks strategically, future-oriented.

Our research has found that although we tend to favor one or two of these patterns, which we call Home Patterns, the most successful leaders are those that can easily access all four and are able to use the right pattern at the right time.  These whole leaders are able to thrive with their strengths, while not getting stuck in them.  They are able to recognize what the situation demands, what pattern is best aligned with that demand and effectively enter into that pattern to approach the situation with the right energy. Whole leaders know their strengths but have also developed a full tool box so that when their home pattern isn’t best, they can flip into what pattern is. 

This brings us to the ‘how’.  To become a whole leader means developing your whole self.  As models on personality have evolved, we now know that patterns of personality are actually impacted by a range of interconnected elements such as cognition, behavior, communication styles, our environment, our emotions and how we physically move.  The whole leader uses all of these elements collectively to develop these patterns.  At Focus Leadership, we have developed a tool called the Focus Energy Balance Indicator (FEBI) to measure these energy patterns and help leaders develop their whole self.   

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, FEBI Certified Coach, energy patterns, leadership, leadership development, whole leadership development, embodied learning, whole leadership

Why Driver Matters and, for that Matter, Why FEBI Matters

Posted by Ginny Whitelaw

Feb 10, 2012 10:06:00 AM

The patterns are always teaching me something.  I just had a FEBI debrief session yesterday with a terrific physical therapist.  Her specialty is working with pelvic floor dysfunction (related to incontinence, chronic pelvic and abdominal pain etc.).  I was telling her about this base-of-the-abdomen area also being the Driver center – which you can feel anytime you start pushing.  She mentioned that studies show that these base muscles are triggered before one initiates any sort of movement – from taking a step to opening a door knob – to stabilize the body.  Often when people are weak in this area, she notices they’re not assertive, don’t get to the point, and other signs of low Driver.  She’s doing some great work helping people regain health in this area, and now she knows even more about the energy her work enables.

Suzanne, one of our FEBI Certified Coaches, wrote to me today saying how much the FEBI was helping her in her leadership coaching, and how she was spreading word of it all over.  I wish there were a million Suzannes, because then millions more people would find FEBI, and millions more people would find that it has a way of expanding one’s capacity like no other tool I’ve come across.  Most of you who come here are already FEBI certified, but with our winter certification starting soon (Feb 27), this would be a great time to spread the word all over.  And if you’ve been thinking about FEBI, and thinking you’ll get to certification eventually, dive in now, and maybe what you learn will make you better equipped to handle all your other demands.  And if you don’t even know what FEBI stands for, but could use a great coaching tool or leadership consulting tool, talk to us (anthony@focusleadership.com). 

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, Coaching Tool, FEBI Certified Coach, leadership coaching, energy patterns

Energy Patterns Helping To Form New Habits

Posted by Anthony Attan

Feb 9, 2012 9:18:00 AM

We are now five weeks into the New Year and for many this means resolutions are beginning to fade in lieu of old habits.  What is the best intention on January 1st often becomes just another a failed resolution by now.  By March, many of us have for forgotten them all together.  So, what will make this year different?

I should first point out that I am not against resolutions.  In fact, quite the contrary, I think it is really important to take the time when the calendar changes to reflect on the past year and verbalize goals for the future.  Take the time to stop and reflect on all that you have accomplished in the past year, what your greatest challenges were and your greatest victories.  I find myself getting so caught up in the daily grind that I lose sight of all that has occurred over the past year.  So I encourage everyone to take the time to reflect, celebrate those victories and learn from those struggles.  

Next, think of what you want to accomplish this year.  What needs to happen so that on January 1st, 2013, you will look back on your year and say, “2012 was a great year!”  The energy patterns can help with this effort.  Enter the Visionary pattern to help you broaden your thinking to be more future oriented and picture what would have to happen to make 2012 a successful year.  Stay in this pattern and envision what the emotion is and really feel into what a great 2012 would feel like.  You don’t have to do this alone, in fact, you shouldn’t do this alone.  Enter Collaborator and share your thoughts and this feeling with others, building on the collective energy of those around you.  Next, enter the Organizer pattern and capture what needs to happen to make it a great year.  Think of the steps that must occur for those things to happen and write those down too.

So, how do we prevent this year from being just another year of broken resolutions?  For this we will summon our inner warrior, which we call the Driver energy pattern.  The key is to turn good intentions into habits that define us.  The Driver energy can help as the best way to form a new habit is to start today.  It’s really that simple: every day enter Driver and get it done!  If ‘it’ is working out, the best way to form an exercise habit is to workout TODAY!  Not tomorrow, not next week, but today.  And tomorrow will turn into your new today so guess what, it's again time to summon the Driver and workout today.  Eventually, this will become a habit, as the activity will occur with minimum thought and more psychological distress will arise when not doing the activity - even when the activity is hard.  Until then, let your Driver be your inner warrior, fighting for today.

As we see in leadership, the patterns can support your efforts in making 2012 a great year.  Just as whole leadership has shown to be best practice in business, so can all the patterns support you in forming new habits, reaching goals and creating an amazing year.  This year, let your whole self, with all the potential within you and all the support around you, make it the best one yet!

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Topics: FEBI, Focus Energy Balance Indicator, energy patterns, leadership, leadership development, whole leadership development, energy, whole leadership, managing energy, managing stress

Welcome to the FEBI Learning Lounge

The official FEBI blog

The FEBI Learning Lounge is the official blog of FEBI Assessment.  In this blog we discuss all things related to the energy patterns of FEBI, digging more into each of the patterns of personality and discussing various applications that can benefit from a pattern perspective.

Also visit the Zen Leader Blog

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