Procrastination and Shame

I have stopped doing time-management trainings and coaching long time ago, when I realised that I cannot get my own time management right. Although I am normally well organised and planned ahead, certain pieces of work get delayed and delayed.

The most recent and most painful such piece of work was a research paper on “Stress in the field of Humanitarian Aid” that I had promised long time ago. I have collected the data, installed the software and knew more or less what needed to be done and how to do it. Nevertheless, it was painful to think about it whenever I saw the pile of literature and questionnaires in the corner of my office. And if someone dared ask what finally (!) the outcome of my research was, the rest of the day was spoilt. In quiet moments, I would beat myself up as “undisciplined” and messy, “stupid” and blaming myself for all the guilt feelings: I didn’t deserve better. Not good at all. From time to time I would make an attempt to start working on it, but when I met with the faintest obstacle, I would dump it again and the papers continued to yellow in the corner.

Then I came across a presentation on shame and addiction that mentioned procrastination as shame avoidance behaviour – next to addiction, perfectionism, depression or hiding, which are more known or obvious avoidance strategies. I was irritated – procrastination and shame? Really?? But the more I thought about it, the more sense it made. Especially, as the tasks I tend to postpone and delay had to do with making myself visible: writing a research paper that would be published, writing a blog (how much time elapsed since I wrote my last piece in this blog???), marketing OD programmes by advertising them broadly (and not just among established clients), etc. It all made sense, especially as I was very timely with all kind of non-exposing tasks, that were even boring (like designing a new programme, doing research,   filing and bookkeeping, even doing my tax declaration, etc.).

Behind all this shame is the fear of being seen as incompetent, unprofessional, stupid, etc. Nothing for which there is any evidence in the present – on the contrary: I get more requests for consultancies, workshop facilitation and coachings than I can accommodate and most of them by referrals from clients who know me and were happy with how I supported them. They often think I am creative, innovative, fearless, direct, honest and can create trust and confidence.

So where does this shame come from? Mostly it is “old stuff” or trauma that gets triggered easily. If I think of shame and early memories, I immediately see images of my mother interrogating me, reproaching me with being dishonest or a lyer, or criticising me for having done wrong and shouting at me and downloading her anger. All kind of behaviours that easily induce shame and shame patterns.

So and then? How to get out of these unhealty patterns? Well, for me it was helpful to realise, that this was not ME, but something that had to do with my early field. It was induces, came from outside and meant I was not per se undisciplined or bad or lazy, but that my behaviour was a reaction to something old, something that came from others. That in itself is a relief. But then there is the possibility to rationalise, to match the fears with the reality (as I did) and to start to talk about it and share my experiences.

“If your are not working on your own self-development, you should not be working on others”

Hi Tony,

Your 3^rd point about self-examination and how to do it (in your last comment on “Underpinning OD with Data”) caught my interest: you were talking about the Gestalt Centre’s In-service group that you are a member of and with whom you meet twice a year for a 3-day retreat and who “hold you to account” and help to explore your “vulnerable, stuck and damaged parts of yourself”.

I have wanted to be part of such a group myself for a while and a couple of years ago made an effort to bring together Gestalt OD practitioners from Europe and the US. We met in different formations several times and had Gary Yontef facilitate the group retreats in a place outside Berlin and Munich. But the group did not continue for several reasons. First, they had different motivations to come (some wanted to join just for once, others wanted an ongoing group; some only came to work with Gary), nobody took the lead in organising future retreats in a timely manner so that people could block dates and then it was always a struggle to find enough participants willing and able to pay for it (costs including travel, accommodation and facilitation, can make a 3d programme cost around 1000 €); I had the feeling everyone was waiting for me to organise it, but I did not really have the time and energy and motivation to do so, as I am also going for supervision every month and in addition join the Pacific Gestalt Institutes annual retreats in Santa Barbara to work on my self-development.

But recently I have several times been approached by colleagues and clients who were keen to find an ongoing self-development group. Most of them from Berlin and wider Germany, but also from England (mostly those who had participated in our Core Concepts and In-Practice programmes at the Gestalt Centre). That made me wonder whether I should give this another try: establish a peer group of Gestalt practitioners (OD and/or psychotherapists – all of whom need at least a good understanding of Gestalt) from Germany and England to meet 2-3 times a year;

Entry criteria would be:

• A good understanding of Gestalt;
• A willingness to fully participate in a group of peers and to take responsibility for oneself;
• A willingness and ability to support others
• Shared responsibility for group processes
• A commitment to confidentiality
• Membership is ongoing, i.e. there must be a strong willingness to come to all – at least most retreats (with exceptions to be defined),
• Ability to cover costs of the retreats
• Organisation of retreats is responsibility of all members (rotation of person responsible for organising the event in terms of housing and facilitation)
• Dates to be determined a year in advance

Why England and Germany? Well, apparently I work in both cultures, but I also think it would be enriching to have some culture mix and English is the most common language for Germans; and it would not be more expensive to go from say Munich to London than from Munich to Berlin.

I would like you (and others) to help me think how this could work, as I imagine that your experience would be really helpful.

Any suggestions, comments, ideas???

The ‘Cycle of Experience’ is perhaps the core idea that Gestalt Therapy has contributed to our understanding of the human condition. It explains how more or less consciously we all have needs, concerns and intentions moment by moment in our lives. The idea is that we recognise and pursue these needs concerns and intentions(more or less effectively) until they have been dealt with and something else pops up to direct our thoughts and behaviour.

The cycle can be represented like this  Blog-The fertile void- Cycle of Experience

This cycle of needs arising, being addressed and falling away – the process of Gestalt formation and destruction – is seen as characteristic of healthy functioning. OD practitioners have increasingly recognised that the cycle has useful applications for working with teams, departments and whole organisations to enable them to function more effectively.

The fit, though, isn’t always perfect and sometimes is hard to recognise. So in a Gestalt in OD discussion group on Linked In (https://www.linkedin.com/groups?home=&gid=3708219) the question was put by Marianne Chidiac – “How often do we encourage our clients to do nothing? Or even take that advice ourselves?” linking the idea of doing nothing with the Fertile Void.

My understanding of the Fertile Void does not equate to doing nothing. The notion of the Fertile Void seems to me less to concerned with activity versus inactivity and more to do with Purpose and Awareness. The Fertile Void is the phase of the cycle of Gestalt formation and destruction where there are no ‘Figures’, nothing stands out as being of particular interest and no energy is being directed to Sensations or Awareness. So the fertile void is the natural consequence of Withdrawal after Completion there is no unfinished situation or unresolved need that pulls my attention for the moment.

The great difficulty in organisations is that the compulsive and incessant drive to achieve and deliver more leads to the short circuiting of the cycle with people going from the Action phase straight ‘across’ the cycle to Awareness or Mobilisation without allowing any sense of Contact, Completion, Withdrawal, or the Fertile Void. Senior leaders caught on this ‘hamster wheel’ often report a sense of exhaustion and despair. they have no sense of making progress. The missing phases of the cycle can be experienced, for example, by taking a few minutes for some kind of ceremony or ritual in which the achievement is named, appreciations are exchanged and that particular phase or event is marked as finished. In this context, the few moments of inner quiet engendered by a sense of satisfaction and withdrawal from one thing, generates the few moments of Fertile Void before starting once again to pay attention and select from all the competing priorities the next thing that needs to get done. So the Fertile Void is that space between “that’s done” and “what next?”.

I found one of the best exponents of this approach was the IT Director of a large financial institution where I was Head of Manpower and Organisation Development . I knew he worked late, so I would often wait until ‘after hours’ to wander up to his office to catch up on issues of mutual interest – stuff he was doing for my function or stuff I was doing for his large IT Division. He would be on his own, working through the day’s ‘to do’ list and removing what had been accomplished and preparing the list of priorities for the next day. If I interrupted this process he would ask me to come back later. I particularly remember one occasion when I did return and he was just staring out of the window. I asked if he was OK – did he have something on his mind?

“On the contrary”, he said, ”I’ve finished thinking and was just allowing myself a few moments drifting in neutral ….it helps me let go at the end of a hard day.” I told him my stuff could wait and I’d come back another time!

By providing a process and encouraging these few valuable moments in which to let go of getting on with things, the day to day experience of working in an organisation can be changed from a feeling of endless grind to one of renewed energy and fresh starts.

Hi Tony,

Thanks for the article you sent me called “Underpinning OD Practice with Data”* – which in my view is a brilliant response to “What constitutes Data in OD practice?”

Brilliant beause it inspired my thinking, made lots of connections to my own working and consulting experiences and raised my energy level quite a bit: I got excited about the ideas spread out and the complexity and beauty of the work of a good OD practitioner – and of how it ressembles what we teach in our Gestalt-in-OD programmes!

The author – James Traeger (who I understand was a participant in one of our first programmes…) unfolds the topic vividly with metaphors and stories, clever questions and simple explanations to help understand rather complex issues. He mixes with a lot of self-reflection, examples from his practice and a good sense of humour – all imbedded in the story of two OD practitioners sitting on a fence in the country and having a dialogue on the use of data in OD (I think there must be cows in the background too…)

…and while I write all this, I ask myself what the data is that underpins these conclusions and interpretations of mine…what has to do with the article – what has to do with me….what is the interacton ? Am I really getting to the jist of it? Or do I read in something that is very different from what the focus of the author was…? What do I want to say really?

Ok, I will try to be a bit less emotional and more serious and “professional” (whatever that is…).

So what does the article talk about?

• Firstly, it describes the dilemma of what data to collect when you don’t really know what is important and the “distortion” when subjectively reading or interpreting data; (in Gestalt terms: what are the patterns or Gestalten that come up for me?)
• Then it addresses the question of appropriate indicators or what data really measures or tells you what you want to know
• …which leads to the question whether there is such a thing as “truth” or whether everything is in flow (in the process of becoming). The issue of static vs. systemic and process views and cause-effect chains vs. patterns and fields etc. (Newtonian vs. Field perspective)
• It gives examples of the fact that everything an OD practitioner does has an effect or impact, e.g. “only” asking questions or “just” observing and highlights the idea of “presence” as an intervention per se. (The author describes sitting in a restaurant watching the staff serve breakfast, considering what data to use when applying different OD perspectives to this situation, e.g. taylorist, motivational,…; but as he notices the staff, he notices that they notice him noticing them. And in turn this impacts on them making them more self-conscious and slightly embarrassed) (In other terms: the change in the field that changes the field and the issues around presence)
• Scientific data vs. individual experience and the importance of meeting the client where s/he is rather than imposing “the truth” or in the author’s words: how do we use what we know or select to know to have an impact towards an agenda? (In Gestalt terms: the Paradoxical Theory of change, meaning that change happens when we accept what is and not when we impose what should be and push for a change of views…)
• Looking inwards (at yourself) before looking outwards as an indication of what is going on in the wider field (parallel processes)

The way in which the article is written is conversational and dialogic (in the authors definition: focussing on the truth as the space inbetween and not being nicy-nicy with the aim of building a relationship between the author and the reader) — and as said great fun to read.

James Traeger has 3 recommendations for dealing with data:

1. Use of the term “capta” rather than “data” to express the subjective aspects of how we perceive the world; (data = what is “given”, capta = what we “take”); applied to OD it could mean shifting the discussion with a client towards a more honest thinking.
2. Shift the diagnostic perspective from “data analysis” to “pattern spotting” (or looking for Gestalten and making sense/meaning)
3. OD work should focus on fostering “organisational health” rather than “organisational improvement”, i.e. apply a wider perspective going beyond the goal of making more money or being more efficient and “making organisations places that are fit for people to dwell in and thrive”.

I am curious to hear your response !

^*  James Traeger: Underpinning OD with Data.
In: Ed Griffin, Mike Alsop, Martin Saville, Grahame Smith (ed), 2014: A field Guide für Organisation Development — Taking Theory into Practice; Gower Publishing

Data-interpretation