so…

I’m moving!  All future blogs will be up at http://finchleymusic.wordpress.com and in time my http://www.ianfinch.net will point there too and this blog will be retired.

1. One with hot water in which you have your left hand in
2. One with cold water which you have your right hand in
3. one in the middle with luke warm water

So what happens when you put both hands in the middle one?

You guessed it, your right hand will feel hot and your left will feel cold and yet they’ll be in the same environment…

And this is why we need to balance what we think and what we feel.

We’ve all know ‘feelers’ who seem to bounce from one drama to another on the roller coaster of life.  And we all know thinkers – people who are so unruffled they go through the motions of life without seemingly a glimmer of emotion and often just ‘process’ the people they come into contact with.  The two types can often be dismissive of one another too – calling one another flakes or robots respectively.

The truth is both ways of living are limited.  The reality of the bowls example above is that whatever you might feel the environment is constant and it’s your previous experience and how that colours your senses which will determine what you understand.   To fully appreciate what’s going on you need to know what you are experiencing but fully appreciate where you’ve been to get the full truth.  If all you did was go on your feelings you’d come up with a nonsensical view of the water.  If all you did was say what you knew to be true it would deny the impact on your body and your sense of what the new enviroment is like in comparison to your past.

….and so I’ve been mulling on this in a company context.  Whatever we do, say, create or act out will be interpreted differently by every single person.  Our way to be truly effective in creating our culture or environment is to understand how people are experiencing it and communicate accordingly.  Otherwise we’ll kid ourselves that it what it is and everyone needs to get in line.  By the same token we can’t go too much on what individuals might say about it – we need to stay focused on what we’re intent on creating.  In addition we need to coach everyone to take a step back and work on taking a rounded view of what they’re involved in.  This way we all better ourselves, understanding more and communicating more effectively.

The same will be true of family life, church and any other form of community where you’re shaping something

>>>>>>>>>>>

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is doing awesome!.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 1,900 times in 2010. That’s about 5 full 747s.

In 2010, there were 8 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 35 posts. There were 17 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 3mb. That’s about a picture per month.

The busiest day of the year was February 13th with 73 views. The most popular post that day was 5 year plan update.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were twitter.com, facebook.com, obama-scandal-exposed.co.cc, en-thuse.com, and digg.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for mando group md, ian finch, ian finch music, ian finch wordpress, finchley contraflow lyrics, and ian finch facebook.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

5 year plan update February 2010
1 comment

everything July 2010

‘Strengths’ February 2010

Being Intentional November 2006
2 comments

remind me why I live in the city again?… November 2010

view at 7am Monday morning before going to work!:… sigh……

spiritual and physical

a father and a son

domestic and untamed

on the mountain and in the valley

in the office and in the ocean

logical and intuitive

rationale and instinctual

creative and technical

a blank page and a worked up plan

ordered and chaotic

minimal and extravagant

linear and non-linear

argumentive and contemplative

expansive and focused

dynamic and static

known and unknown

free and constrained

led and leading

given and received

relaxed and intense

hopeful and concerned

risky and safe

open and closed

noisy and silent

solo and relational

unassuming and evangelistic

pragmatic and OCD

detailed and high-level

inspired and frustrated

content and ambitious

in my head and discussed with everyone…

…and I’ve learned that everything is everything.

everything is connected

everything has importance

and it’s in the tension of keeping it all together in harmony…

that you find truth

where you find illumination

and how you know what next step to take

This EP has been released in a response to the humanitarian crisis faced by the people of Haiti. One hundred percent of the money received by me, Finchley, will go towards rebuilding that nation.

The EP itself is a collection of acoustic songs recorded in one late night session with me on guitar and vocals and my friends Greg Schofield and Shane Beales on guitar and piano respectively, all recorded by Chris Taylor at Rooftop studios. It was a session that was all about capturing the moment while we performed some simple songs about love and relationships – romantic, familial, spiritual or otherwise.

The project has been funded by an interesting source:

Like many musicians I work a day job as well and in my case I’m lucky enough to manage a Digital Agency – Mando Group. 2010 will see us officially launch the Mando Group Foundation, an arm of the business that will allow us to deliver a minimum of 10% of it’s profits to be donated to good causes. The company’s charitable foundation is managed by The Community Foundation for Merseyside and the first fund they will manage for us will be for the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) which is raising money for the victims of the recent tragedy in Haiti.

As an inaugural event to launch the foundation we laid down ‘The £100 Challenge’ where each of the company’s 45 staff have been handed £100 and challenged to grow that fund as much as they can.  All the proceeds raised will be added to the fund for the ..he Challenge will run throughout the first quarter of 2010 and the only rules are that the methods used to raise the cash must be legal, honest and decent!

So with my ‘£100 challenge’ I created a ‘legal, honest and decent’ music recording! – I pulled in some favours from my session musician and engineer friends mentioned above and managed to make this fully professional recording in a commercial studio and set up distribution courtesy of the team at CDBaby for the princely sum of £100! It’s my hope that this small sum spent can see £100′s or even £1000′s raised for the people of Haiti!

The simple plan is Your talent x Your investment = Your Strength.

It’s my plan that Mando Group can be structured in such a way so that all staff can play to strengths and combined with some NLP analysis and training we can all learn how to understand and communicate with one another effectively and help each other play to strengths.

My Top 5 ‘strengths’ come out as the following:

ARRANGER
People who are especially talented in the Arranger theme can organize, but they also have a flexibility that complements this ability. They like to figure out how all of the pieces and resources can be arranged for maximum productivity.

It’s very likely that you volunteer for additional duties. You really enjoy being given authority over projects, individuals, or groups. You expect to be held accountable for the results you produce as well as your words and deeds. Because of your strengths, you are frequently asked to study data for your team. Numbers make sense to you. Interestingly, the same data baffle, confound — that is, confuse — and frustrate others in the group. These individuals likely are appreciative of your proficiency with mathematics. Chances are good that you may have a gift for noticing the differences between people. You might think variety is a good thing, not a bad thing. You might help individuals from diverse backgrounds discover ways they can cooperate so the team succeeds. Driven by your talents, you embrace life with more gusto when you can work or play alongside your teammates, classmates, coworkers, or peers. You normally figure out ways you can participate in a variety of group-oriented activities. Instinctively, you are the team member who keeps everyone else informed about newsworthy events in your family, neighborhood, community, school, or workplace. You usually have a plan for collecting information from a wide variety of sources.

STRATEGIC
People who are especially talented in the Strategic theme create alternative ways to proceed. Faced with any given scenario, they can quickly spot the relevant patterns and issues.

By nature, you probably feel very good about yourself and life in general when you know the exact words to express an idea or a feeling. Language has fascinated you since childhood. Your ever-expanding vocabulary often earns you compliments. Chances are good that you long to know more so you remain on the cutting edge of your field or areas of interest. Your inventive mind usually generates more possibilities than you can handle or fund. Nonetheless, you are committed to acquiring knowledge and/or skills. You study everything involved in a situation and conceive entirely new ways of seeing or doing things. What you already know prompts you to ask questions and delve even deeper into a subject or problem. Because of your strengths, you notice that multiple solutions to nagging problems automatically pop into your mind. You usually study each option from many different angles. After carefully evaluating the entire situation, you likely choose the alternative that makes the most sense. Why? You habitually aim to outscore or outperform most of your rivals most of the time. Instinctively, you work diligently to invent alternative courses of action. You notice new as well as unusual configurations in facts, evidence, or data. Others, however, can see only separate, unrelated bits of information. You are fascinated by problems that puzzle, confound, or frustrate most people. Driven by your talents, you select the right combination of words to convey your ideas or feelings. In the middle of discussions, your vocabulary provides you with precise phrases and terminology. You probably express yourself with ease and grace.

RELATOR
People who are especially talented in the Relator theme enjoy close relationships with others. They find deep satisfaction in working hard with friends to achieve a goal.

Instinctively, you are determined to share your knowledge and skills with people you coach, mentor, or train. Because of your strengths, you embrace life more fully when you are surrounded by people whose personal aims or professional ambitions are clearly defined. Driven by your talents, you may welcome the questions or concerns voiced by people. You might listen compassionately to some and offer counsel to others. People sometimes seek you out because your insights are helpful. Maybe they appreciate the way you occasionally cause them to think in new ways. By nature, you have close companions who frequently seek your guidance. You help them find answers to their personal and professional problems. This makes you a valuable friend. It’s very likely that you are comfortable offering suggestions to people who regularly seek your counsel — that is, recommendations about a decision or course of action they are considering. These individuals usually feel deep affection for you. You are likely to spend time together socializing as well as working or studying.

LEARNER
People who are especially talented in the Learner theme have a great desire to learn and want to continuously improve. In particular, the process of learning, rather than the outcome, excites them.

It’s very likely that you spend considerable time examining exactly why something has gone wrong. Whenever you experience a personal or professional loss, make a mistake, or experience failure, you tend to investigate. You are likely to be restless until you have answers to all your basic questions: What? How? When? Where? Who? Why? Because of your strengths, you habitually bring together all sorts of information so you can refer to it later. At the instant you collect a fact, example, story, or piece of data, typically you are eager to use it. You trust it is valuable. Your fascination with knowledge has probably been part of you even before you formed the words to ask your first question. Instinctively, you thirst for new ideas and knowledge. Often you lose yourself in a book. You pore over the ideas contained on its pages for long stretches of time. Why? You want to absorb as much information as you can. Driven by your talents, you are a history buff — that is, someone ardently devoted to studying the past. You are especially drawn to firsthand accounts of global conflicts. You link people to events and trace timelines. You are likely to examine major battles from the perspective of foes and allies as well as neutral parties. The sum of your findings probably allows you to determine what started and eventually ended each war. Chances are good that you yearn to acquire additional knowledge and skills. Often you use these to do something better, more perfectly, or more completely than you have in the past. You seek opportunities to enhance your capacity for fixing things, correcting mistakes, or overcoming weaknesses.

SELF-ASSURANCE
People who are especially talented in the Self-Assurance theme feel confident in their ability to manage their own lives. They possess an inner compass that gives them confidence that their decisions are right.

Driven by your talents, you routinely engage in exciting and adventurous activities. You refuse to settle for a boring existence. You probably sense that you have much to offer individuals and groups. Purposeful challenges combined with your realized potential impel you to take risks others avoid. It’s very likely that you like advancing on your own. You enjoy defying the odds. You find limited satisfaction in pursuing the easiest, the most popular, or the accepted course of action. By nature, you describe the good life as taking the dare, walking to the edge, running toward the unknown, or working high in the air without a net to stop your fall. You probably enjoy the rush of adrenalin that accompanies risky deeds or decisions. Instinctively, you prefer to register for rigorous courses of study rather than take easy classes. This often satisfies your need to do things that do not come naturally. You trust you can endure the unpleasantness and difficulties that accompany the expansion of your knowledge base, the acquisition of skills, and the conquest of deficiencies. Because of your strengths, you may like to get together with certain colleagues, associates, coworkers, or fellow students. Perhaps you relish talking about large-scale concepts, opinions, or theories.

It’s caused some time for reflection and focus but generally speaking it’s remarkably on track – back in the summer of 2007 I wrote that by the summer of 2012 I wrote that I wanted:

To be a parent

After a fair while in the making our first, Asher, made his debut performance of 4th Jan this year and being a dad is just THE BEST experience in the world.  The boy is a legend

To refocus my MD role at Mando Group to allow more creativity and client interaction / consultancy.

We’ve been steadily growing a fantastic management team over the last couple of years to help share the operational tasks of the business and the benefits are really starting to show.  This is both in the individuals who are taking more responsibility but also in me – particularly the whole ‘awesomeness’ concept for the business plan (check the mando site in March for more info! and the new R&D dept at Mando Group which have happened.  They are both positive signs that there’s a bit more headspace to look at the world differently and it’s sparking great stuff in me and others.

To set up and be running a surf / extreme sports business and have 3 bases /  locations of operation internationally.

After initially slow progress this finally gathered some momentum and took form soon after a 2 month sabbatical in early 2008 where we’d traveled to South America, New Zealand, Fiji and Japan.   By late 2008 we had set up ROAM (www.keep-roaming.com) and in early 2009 we cemented something real and a proper starting point in the acquisition of Point Breaks down in Devon (www.pointbreaks.com) .

I think it’s unlikely there’ll be 3 places by 2012 but there could easily be 2 and research being made on a 3rd…

Musically for me to be on my third album and touring internationally.

First album was solid and well respected and got good me gigs at festivals. Since then I’ve done an acoustic EP which I’m about to release as a way of raising money for Haiti  (watch this space)

The biggest change here is that at the beginning of 2009 through a series of circumstances I felt it was actually time to give up the striving for bigger and better gigs and just go back to having fun with music.  This decision has led to coaching and leading a small music group at a local church, a general release of creativity and songwriting and also a passionate embrace of the drums – got myself an electric kit and I’m learning as best I can and LOVING it in much the same way as I did at 16 when learning guitar

This rather flies in the face of releasing 3 albums and touring internationally but I must say I’m enjoying music more now than I’ve done for ages and so it’s a win / win for me. Also, interestingly 6 months into my downing of tools with regards performance and releasing records 2 people contacted me independantly out the blue and gave me free studio time and I’ve now got 6 demo’s of new songs which I’m passionate about.  I have no idea where this might end up but I’m really enjoying the creative process and am blessed to be free of any “what if this song went stella’ thought processes that could take the fun away and make it a striving thing again.

So all in all I’m not doing too bad.   Worth saying within all this there was a desire to get fit again and in the last 18month I went from no running at all to doing a 10k and then continuing the discipline thereafter which led to training for a triathlon and passing a lifeguard qualification!

yay for me