Hello Friends,
Greetings from Barcelona☀️where the holidays are not over yet! People in Spain are getting ready to celebrate “Reyes“. It’s the day that the three wise kings bring presents, and it’s more important than Christmas.
🙌Many thanks for reading The Quest.
If you are joining for the first time, welcome to our deep dive into facilitation, learning, and how to live a creative life.
You can catch up on the last edition 📝The Power of An Annual Review and all past editions here.
“To live a creative life we must lose our fear of being wrong.”
As soon as my co-facilitator Eric read these words from American author Joseph Chilton Pearce the room fell silent. It’s as if the quote surfaced a sentiment that had not yet been expressed. I could feel tingling energy moving through this group as they embarked on a 2-day creative facilitation training.
Those few words instantly connected the group to a larger purpose. The quote crystalized why they were in that room together at that moment in time. It tapped into a deeper source of inspiration and motivation. And it elevated the group’s experience to a whole new level.
Eric was using what we call in facilitation an “invocation”. He is one of the exceptional facilitators I know who carefully selects and uses quotes to begin a group session. Invocations are not new. Humans have used proverbs, stories, and prayers to invoke a higher purpose since the dawn of ages. In facilitation, an invocation is often a quote, a short poem, or a song connected to the session aim that resonates with the group.
Invocations can help us make meaning of our struggles. These pearls of well-expressed wisdom can help us to see the bigger picture. They often help us to see something that we want to strive toward. That’s what makes them so powerful in work with groups.
What is an invocation, and how can you use them to take your groups to new heights?
That’s our Quest as we start 2022.
👉The Science Behind Why Inspirational Quotes Inspire Us
👉The Power of Poetry in Politics
👉30 Quotes That Will Inspire Your Groups
Plus:
💥We are gearing up for our next cohort of my 4-week online course Breakthrough Facilitation. It will run in March. Spaces will be capped at 30 participants. Join the waitlist to receive the latest course updates, demo session invites, discounts, and more. Thanks to the 27 Quest readers already on the list!
🔬The Science Behind Why Inspirational Quotes Inspire Us
A Fast Company article that explains why, when things get tough, people turn to motivational quotes for a bit of inspiration. The answer?
It looks like it’s the combination of:
- Good wordsmithing
- An splash of coaching and
- A pinch of motivational psychology
But not all quotes are created equal. And some can be downright corny. So what makes some turns of phrase so resonant?
Read the full article 👉here.
What is it about a good quote that resonates with you?
📖The Power of Poetry in Politics
My research on invocations led me to a string of articles about last year’s presidential inauguration. I went happily down the rabbit hole of the power of poetry in politics, which included Amanda Gorman’s poem “The Hill We Climb”.
22-year old poet laureate Amanda Gorman started her five-minute poem at Biden’s inauguration with a question. It expressed a crucial moment in time in her country and to a collective aspiration.
“When day comes we ask ourselves, where can we find light in this never-ending shade?” Amanda Gorman
That led me to more presidential inauguration poems (there are fewer than you think). One famous poet even switched poems at the last minute for Kennedy’s inauguration. Can you guess who it was?
Read all of the presidential inauguration poems 👉 here.
✨30 Quotes That Will Inspire Your Groups
I didn’t use to like quotes. I thought they were cheesy. They reminded me of the cringe-worthy institutional posters on the walls of my 10th-grade classroom.
It wasn’t until I started facilitating that I learned tbat there is a skill in using quotes. I learned that in facilitation this is called an “invocation”.
A few years ago I started collecting powerful quotes in Evernote that struck a chord with me. I now have a bank of quotes that I can tailor to my session’s aims and the specific groups I am working with.
Here are 30 of my favorite facilitation invocations and quotes that I want to share with you.
What quotes would you include in your collection?
💡Quote of the Week
Here’s an invocation that I would like to offer you as we start our Quest for the new year:
“In the word question, there is a beautiful word – quest. I love that word.” Elie Weisel, Romanian-born American Writer, Professor, & Political Activist
💌Thanks for reading The Quest
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Creatively yours,
