rethink PERFECT

Single 50 yo male, looking for female between 30 to 40 who is willing to be responsible for her relating as I am. i.e.

• Willing to seek and give an Acceptable Apology when you or I lose our cool.
• Willing to Appreciate and Acknowledge what we say, even if we don’t necessarily like or agree with it.
• Willing to use Adjustable and Accountable language during this process.

With relationships failing at an appalling rate, I think we need to start and build a relationship on a firm foundation. The above treaty is my serious proposal for this, any takers? (I am willing to relocate)

What is wrong with this?
“I am sorry I got angry, it is just that time of the month!”
And
“I am sorry I got angry, it was my male hormones!”

They are both unacceptable to me as an apology for aggression.
I dare say they would not be acceptable to a judge either.

Why?
Because both people are failing to be accountable for their actions.
What would be acceptable to me is if both took responsibility for their actions.
i.e.
“I am sorry I got angry. I chose aggression to deal with my frustrations rather than a more constructive action. I would like to get an agreement on helping me act more constructively next time I get frustrated and possibly help me find a way for me to avoid getting frustrated in the first place.”

To me, the second apology is like chalk and cheese between the first. I believe that most people are tending to throw out the baby with the bathwater with regards using apology to resolve disputes.

I think that the giving and accepting of poor and unacceptable apologies could be even more destructive than no apology at all.

My definition of conversation is to convert my concepts, through feedback, into agreements and possible solutions to problems.

So basically I am saying that conversing can be one of the best tool for assisting creativity.
Now I happen to have proof of this. It is no coincidence that some of the greatest creative movements of our time were based on such conversational groups. Think of the Bauhaus, Impressionism Movement in Paris, Heidelberg School, The Manhattan Project,
and of course the Apollo Program. Think how many conversations that would have taken place that influenced each participant in these movements or projects. Without such conversations would such creative periods in our history have existed? Somehow I doubt it.

Now imagine we had an improved method of conversing that facilitated the converting of our own concepts even more. Conversing on steroids! Well I guess I am hoping that someday Rethink Perfect will be able to do just that.

The Statement: “It is a religious problem!”
If we prefix it with “I think …” so it now becomes “I think it is a religious problem”, then, in my view, it changes the whole complexion of the statement.
Now, I would feel confident that we could share our converse ideas and pretty soon come up with a point that we could both agree upon. By using just “It is…” seems to me to make the issue very simplistic and if it really was that simple then I am sure it could and would have been solved years ago.

I think that it is the “it is…” in statements that is the cause of what we deem to be the problem with religions or religious beliefs. That is forming an idea or faith into an absolute statement of fact. Alone, a faith or belief is a personal experience, I think,  and adding “it is…” makes it into a statement of fact that can’t and shouldn’t be disputed. Gone is the belief and now it is replaced with a dogma. A dogma that some people, now, could be willing to kill or die for.

I think that by simply prefixing our statements with “I think…” we are reminding ourselves and others that this is just our own personal belief and of course it is open and encouraged to be challenged. And that I have not fallen into the same trap that I am accusing others of by leaving their faith and forming a dogma.

To me, religious beliefs alone do not cause the problem but the dogmas that they bring along that causes the hatred, intolerance, blindness and violence.

It would be remiss of me to continue if I did not mention how I got to this point in my thinking.

My heartfelt thanks goes out to my “ex”. Not my ex-wife but more so my ex-perimental relationship. It was some 12 years ago, in August 1998 that I was propositioned by a young woman to help her to stay in Australia while she helped me test all my theories on love and relationships. What an offer, I thought. How could I resist that, considering that I had been working on my concepts for some 13 years at that point. So I took up her offer and we spent the next 2 years testing my ideas/concepts. Well I have to be honest, they failed me miserably. I had to rethink them all and basically have had to start from scratch since. Two years to the day, in August 2000 we parted company, with Kate getting her Australian residency and me getting my incredible experience which included so many things, that I could of written a book alone, one these two years.

But the most important thing that I learned was when I asked her how I should act when she was complaining to me irresponsibly. She replied that I could simply say; “Thanks for letting me know that you have a problem, but now can you talk to me in a way that is going to encourage me to help you”. As soon as I heard this I knew I had found something special. But it is only now some 10 years later that I am truly appreciating what she had taught me.

So I guess I have learned two valuable lessons. 1. That the value of conversing is not necessarily at the time of doing it but more so the time after and that can stretch to as long as 40 years later in some cases, for me. Wow! And 2. That feedback can be split up during the conversing. That is split up into content i.e. ‘”thanks for letting me know” (content)

Delivery “…can you talk to me in a way that will encourage me to help you” (delivery).

It is only now that I am really starting to see the value of this in the context of conversing and feedback and as part of this whole concept of Rethink Perfect.

So, I can truly thank Kate from the bottom of my heart for these 2 of the most valuable and trying years of my life. Although I would not like to have to repeat this time, with only the tools that I had then, I do believe that I am finally ready to try again with my latest ideas that form this book Rethink Perfect.

I think that if everyone had the conversation about what are the costs of having sex that we would all be a lot more cautious about who we had it with. So what are the costs? Well as Clair Weaver reports in her article The Problem with Marriage and Relationships Sunday Telegraph January 13, 2008

“It is estimated that in Australia some $100 million per month is lost in settlements due to the failure of marriages or cohabitation relationships. In the US it is estimated that this figure is around $1.5 – 2 billion per month and worldwide the figure is upwards of a staggering $10 – 15 billion per month. This constitutes the world’s largest ongoing financial and social catastrophe.”

But this is mainly the financial costs born by the men. On top of this is the social costs to women that have to bear the main burden of bringing up the children after the divorce. And then most importantly the costs born by their offspring and dealing with such breakups. Imagine if all of these costs that are rendered after a relationship breakup were fully discussed before such a relationship even began. That is before we had sex with them. Maybe this is one way to curb such social and financial “catastrophic” costs associated with breakups.

I have decided that this would be one of the first conversations that I would have with a woman if I felt that we might have a chance of having a sexual relationship. To talk about the costs that we are willing to render if we were to have sex and a child resulted from our actions. I think we all need to remind each other of these costs and be vigilante to avoid such catastrophic results that seems to be an epidemic proportions today.

One question that has had me stumped for years is who should initiate with whom? That is, should the man take the initiative or the woman? Now, when I ask this question most people tell me that either can and do initiate, and that it is equally done now days. Well at least they admit, that in the past it has been expected that they guy will make the first move.

So now it is apparently equal. Well even if this were the case I believe that it is incumbent upon the woman to initiate and I will explain why.

I am talking about the mating cycle here. That is, when couples get together initially, with the long term goal of eventually producing a family. In this situation, I think it would be far better for a woman to initiate than a man. As, in this situation they are forming a partnership to have a child or children. She physically has the children and so is the child producer. He is the assistant to her, the child producer. She takes 9 months to produce this baby and he spends 9 seconds and any assistance he offers during this production process.

It is her baby, for all intents and purposes. She has the right to abort if she so chooses even if he does not agree. She does the bulk of work during the gestation period and during birth. No one could argue with this. So she is responsible for production and he is the assistant. Wouldn’t it make sense then, that she would advertise for her “assistant’s” position to be filled. And that she interview the candidates to make sure that he is going to be suited for this very important position?

So she advertises and he responds. How does this play out in the mating cycle? I am not sure but I do not believe that guys going up to as many women as they can and playing the numbers game is going to achieve the appropriate result for such a mating cycle. When a man initiates it can only be for one reason, sex for enjoyment. When a woman initiates it could be for one of two reasons, sex for enjoyment or sex for producing offspring. This will always keep a man on his toes as he would never really know her end goal. When a man initiates, it is pretty obvious what his “end” goal is.

Knowing this I have been reluctant to initiate and have waited patiently over the past 25 years for a woman that understands her duty in the mating cycle. Most people have scoffed at this, siting that I will be waiting a long time. They have been right so far, but at least this awareness has kept me out of trouble to date. I still have the hope that there is a woman out there that understands this principle and is willing to take the initiative.

Any feedback much appreciated.

People don’t converse any more, generally, unless it is for work, business, on TV or in political forums. But one on one conversing seems to have disappeared. So what do we have in its place? Well, people pretend to agree, acquiesce or obsequiously smile. Even nod and can even say yes when they mean no, but still not share their converse opinion one on one.

That is what conversation is. Not chit chat, small talk or gossip but con-ver-sation, as in “conversely speaking” or “on the converse”.

So where has the conversing gone? Heck when I point out what conversing is really for they look at me dumbfounded as though I was speaking a different language.

I think that we have collectively spent so long in this non-conversing state that if/when this conversing takes place it ends up much more in conflict, as an argument or as a fight than an actual conversation. Most seem to be out of practice and have forgotten the rules or more so have never learned them in the first place.
How long has this been going on?
This is what “conversation” means to me.

If true, it is no wonder there are so many failed marriages, conflict with work mates, and generally no relationship that I have ever aspired to emulate, save one. Without a forum to air grievances or add constructive criticisms without the fear of the situation escalating, abuse becomes a real possibility to most people I think.

“Does my bum look big in this?” Is the joke that everyone in a relationship can identify with, especially us blokes. Most men, I believe, live in perpetual fear of saying the “wrong” thing. All jokes aside, feedback today, is not only disagreed with but the individual can be punished for delivering it.
It is no wonder that conversation is lost with feedback making up such an important half of conversation.

How can we disagree with feedback? Of course logically we can’t disagree with its content as it is only someone else’s thought on our thought or action. What we can disagree with is the delivery. This is basically the premise that the concept of Rethink Perfect rests on. That if we could agree upon this and had the tools to help filter the feedback delivery from the content, we could possibly find ourselves listening to well delivered content of feedback that could represent the pure thought of another person. This could change life as we know it.

You see her question is a trap and she knows it. She didn’t ask him what he thinks, which would have been an easier question to answer. She asked him a general question or what the world would think of her bum. By answering “yes” then of course he is going to be in trouble because his feedback content and delivery is flawed. I bet you agree with me on his fate. But real issues arise because he can get in “trouble” in the first place. He is not a six year old boy that stole six pence. He contributed his flawed feedback and this should be first and foremost be appreciated.

So, what is it that made his delivery flawed? Well as mentioned I do not believe that we can disagree with his content as it is only his opion but his delivery was flawed because he did not emphasise this. i.e. “I think it does look big” or “to me it looks big” ( I can’t help but snigger as I write this) Even if he had of answered ‘no” it would still have been flawed feedback in the delivery and he would possibly suffer for this answer too, some time later.

I think that if we can learn to understand this principle of splitting up feedback into content and delivery, and not disagree or agree with the content but only return our feedback on their delivery, some very interesting results could be achieved in conversation. The conversing treasure, that has been lost for so long, could return.

Edward De Bono claims in one of his latest books “Think before it is too late”, that if we can understand the brain’s mechanisms then we can create the thinking “software” to cope with these processes. He also talks about self organising systems and how our brain is one. Self organising systems can simply be explained as systems that take the path of least resistance.

Rethink Perfect is about understanding the brain’s mechanisms to be always right or more so its desire to be always right. Being right combined with the desire to be always right forms our path of least resistance in our thinking and also forms a major problem, I think. Our desire to be always right is so strong that we seem to insist in making what is not right into “right” so that we can claim that we have found the path of least resistance.

If we don’t have the patience required to find what is actually “right” or the honesty to say that it is “not quite right”, then we will continue to create falsehoods to others and most importantly ourselves.

So what thinking software am I proposing to counter this problem? Well, I think that it already exists and is called “conversation”. It is through conversation that we can convert our concepts, through people’s feedback, from what we thought was right into something that more closely resembles “right”. If this does not come so easy to us as we still strive to be right through our desire to be always right, then there are a number of tools that we can also use, in conversation, to counter these desires.

Rethink Perfect has a number of these tools that, once agreed to, can counter our desires and get us a little closer to perfection or more so move a little bit further away for imperfection.

I think that the content of feedback could possibly be perfect, in that it cannot be legitimately judged as being right or wrong as it is only someone’s thought.
It is only the delivery that can be commented on through someone else’s feedback. This is, done using equally perfect content and imperfect delivery.
Saying that “I think” and how I prefer to be treated could be the closest thing to speaking perfectly or is what I call the Golden Treaty.