Whack on the Side of the Head Wednesday: Purple Rain

Newcomers to our site. Today is Whack on the Side of the Head Wednesday. It's the day we join forces with Roger von Oech, creator of the Whack Pack. He presents a creative principle and we, in turn, use the principle to advance an idea.

Today's idea... more rain.

Monday we joined together and created a rainstorm by filling buckets with droplets of thoughtfulness. Tuesday we danced in the rain while wearing red boots. That is to say we embraced our inner child by continuing to send notes, but this time in secret code. One more day of rain couldn't hurt, especially when so many of us are experiencing droughts (literally and figuratively).

Today, fun rain. Creative rain. Purple rain.

To get us going... von Oech.

Get Out of the Dogma House: Nothing clouds your decision-making abilities like dogma. Example: none other than Plato himself dictated that the circle was the perfect form of celestial movement, and for the next two thousand years, astronomers said that planetary orbits were circular - even though their observational data suggested otherwise. Even Copernicus used circles in his heliocentric model of the universe. Only after much soul-searching did Kepler use the ellipse to describe the heavenly paths. Everyone has externally imposed "shoulds" and values that influence their thinking. What dogma is clouding your mind?

Ms. Manners and others provide us with plenty of dogma about thank you notes and other notes of recognition. In fact, to prove the point I did a poll of all the people in my afternoon meeting yesterday. What preconceived notions do you have about writing or sending someone a note," I asked.

Answers. Billy, they should be prompt and brief; Tiffany, they should be sincere; Sharon, they should be unexpected and handmade; Philip, they should be personal; and Katie, a note should be specific.

If prompt, brief, sincere, unexpected, handmade, personal, and specific is some of the dogma associated with sending a note, then how might that be clouding our thinking? That's what I spent yesterday thinking about.

Long about 4:15 p.m. it hit me. By ascribing to the dogma that ALL notes have to be personal, I miss out on the impact that an impersonal, yet uplifting message might have on an unsuspecting passer-by.

By 5:00 p.m. Matthew and I were kneeling on the pavement outside our local Starbucks. We were using side walk chalk to write customers an impersonal, but uplifting message. So much fun were we having, we immediately zoomed over to his preschool and left a message on the steps for this morning. After that the post office, then the supermarket, and finally a welcome home message to the neighbors in the culdesac.

Never has an impersonal and non-specific message felt so good!

So how about you? Use my dogma or come up with your own. How is it clouding your thinking? And, how can you whack your thinking to create purple rain that even Ms. Manners would approve of?

Signing off until tomorrow...