A Week Of Monsters

One thing that I learned from the movie "Monster's Inc", is that monsters don't need to be scary. They can also be supportive.

Last week, I had the privilege of co-hosting a public workshop with Alexandra Götzfried, on the book Atlas of the Heart where she suggested that we draw our emotions as monsters.

The instructions were:
✏️ Draw a Scary Monster, representing one of the following emotions: Stress, Overwhelm, Fear, Anxiety, Worry, Confusion

Then we offered a reframe:

✏️ Draw a new Benevolent Monster, representing the same emotion. This monster is not trying to hurt you, but help you. What is it trying to tell you?

The participants went from fighting their monsters, to listening to their monsters.

It was amazing!

I was so inspired, that I decided to host another monster drawing session with a group of leaders on Thursday.

The book we were exploring was The Advice Trap by Michael Bungay Stanier, and since he specifically talks about our advice monsters, there wasn't much of a stretch.

👉 There was a "tell it" monster with tiny ears and a big fat mouth.
👉 There was a "save it" monster with lots of legs carrying around a life raft.
👉There was a "control it" monster with a clipboard and whistles.

It's always a joy to invite play and creativity into a group -- especially a group of finance leaders, in their suits and their serious faces.

Monsters for the win!

Originally posted on LinkedIn with comments.

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