Leading with NLP

Change and Challenge 203

Our lives are as complex as any organization, although in a
different way, and I think it is very interesting to apply these
metaphors to our personal lives as well. Let us speculate that
perhaps we too need to change and renew ourselves. We too
need to find a balance between structure and creativity, we
too need to sail the straits between a life too mired in habit,
which is the personal equivalent of organizational proce-
dure, and one that is too chaotic to give us the chance to
express ourselves fully.
The Flow State of creativity and ease may be the individual
equivalent of the edge of chaos. The Flow State has been de-
scribed as one of ‘alert and effortless control’, one of ‘active
relaxation’.^6 For the body, health and well-being are the
equivalent of the edge of chaos. Here too we need to find a
balance between trust and rules, between formal and infor-
mal communication. We know that a lack of social contact is
bad for our health – perhaps it is also possible to lose our-
selves in too much social contact. And how well and how
often do we communicate with ourselves on the inside? How
well do we know ourselves? What do we organize ourselves
around? What are we drawn towards?
For a leader it is a vision.

Anxiety

Confusion

Disorder

Inability to concentrate

Edge of chaos Habit

Rigidity

Fixed routine

Boredom

Obsessional behaviour

Flow

Chaos Order

Individual