There shouldn’t be lots of stuff on your mind. Having lots of stuff on your mind is like having someone tug your sleeve every 3 minutes.

The only thing that should be on your mind is the stuff you’re doing right now – the stuff that’s right in front of you. You should be “present”, in the moment, focused on what you’re doing. No sleeves being tugged.

The other stuff on your mind is stealing precious memory (think RAM) and is caused, I am afraid, by operator error. But as we’ve discussed before, the brain, although amazing, is tricky to use and there’s no manual.

The operator error is one of poor housekeeping. The operator has failed to do the hoovering and the tidying up.

The reason stuff is on your mind is because you have not managed it, faced up to it, dealt with it, scheduled it. Whatever you should have done you haven’t done it. The stuff on your mind is feeling neglected and is tugging your sleeve. Every three minutes. And you cannot hit it.

When your mind is like this there is a tendency to do what screams the loudest or is the easiest. That might be the right thing to do next, but probably isn’t.

So you get a double hit – the sleeve tugging makes it impossible to do your best on whatever it is you’re working on and whatever it is you’re working on is probably not the right thing anyway because you only chose it because it was screaming or because it appeared easy. Oh dear.

Our mind should be left alone to focus on the current, present task without any RAM being consumed by the sleeve tuggers.

So, what to do?

Take all of the stuff that’s on your mind and write it down on a piece of paper. For all the small stuff, diary an hour and just do it. Yes, I did just use diary as a verb. For the big stuff, decide if there’s anything you want to and can do about it. If there isn’t, just let it go. Kiss it goodbye, say sorry, accept it as part of the messiness of life – whatever you have to do to let it escape. And don’t chase after it.

If there is something you want to and can do about it, turn the issue into a goal. A SMART goal. Decide if you have the time to make this goal one of your current goals. If not, put it on a list of stuff to come back to later and make sure you do come back later.

If you do wish to adopt it as a current goal, decide on the next thing to do and put that activity in your diary. When the appointed time comes, do the thing, decide what the next thing is and put that in your diary. Repeat to fade.

You will have to do this housekeeping exercise regularly, maybe once a week.

You will be amazed at how this frees up your mind, your RAM. You have made an intelligent decision about what to do and it is in process – the next step is in the diary. There is no more you can do. You are in control. You have self-managed. And you have freed up the greatest thing ever seen in the universe – your mind – to actually focus on the things you have decided merit focus. A great resource used wisely by a skilled operator. It’s not a guarantee of success, but it’s pretty close.

What would you like to stop thinking about today?

This week’s Pearl of Leadership Wisdom is on Thinking.

“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” – Albert Einstein

In the boardroom…

“I’ve got this great idea. It’s a device you speak into and you can talk to other people who are far away. It’ll allow us to speak to people in the next county!”

“But I don’t know anyone in the next county.”

“I know, but think how good it would be if you did!”

“But I don’t…”

Kiss your comfort zone goodbye…

We develop habits of thinking. We become comfortable in our habits. And more certain of our correctness. We stifle creative thought. We suppress full and rational discussion and in so doing, miss the opportunity.

Edward de Bono is having none of it. The inventor of “lateral thinking” speaks of his Six Hats Thinking.

Put your hat on…

Choose a hat. You can wear many. And should.

White hat – think “neutrality”.

A focus on information and facts. What’s available and what can be found out. All the facts, not just the ones you like. No selective memory. No force-fitting. No post-event rationale.

Red Hat – think “fire!”

Emotions and feelings. “What do you feel about this?” No need to explain. Just state the feelings. Emotions are legitimate. They are not dirty secrets. It is said that women are, stereotypically, more emotional than men. And men make decisions based on objective rationality. This is, of course, poo. All decisions are emotional. It’s just that men go through the post-event rational of thinking up good, “objective” reasons as to why their emotions are correct. And “objectivity” has a value in our society. Women tend to have moved on by this point.

Black Hat – think “judgemental”.

Critical. Why it won’t work. This is called “logical negative”. Very common with technocrats with no vision. “Ooh, it’ll never work.” And those who are small and secretly think it’s a great idea but only if it’s their idea.

Yellow Hat – think “sunshine”.

Optimism. It’s all about benefits. What’s good. This is called “logical positive”. Sunshine and optimism – sounds flaky, doesn’t it? You must be British. That’s conditioning. Nothing wrong with sunshine and optimism. And remember, this is just one hat and you must wear them all.

Green Hat – think “vegetation”.

Growth. Creative thinking. Possibilities. New ideas. Be a dreamer. But not only a dreamer. Why do we go to the moon – because it’s there. Why do we map the human genome. Because we can, and who knows…

Blue Hat – think “sky”.

Cool. Calm. Overview. Control of process. The chairperson…organiser. Thinking about thinking. Someone has to. Otherwise it’s a bun fight.

Know your enemy…

It’s not about fighting a battle to see who’s wearing the right hat. It’s about wearing all the hats, and fighting a battle against our comfort zones, to solve the problem, or realise the opportunity.

It’s about removing the barrier that is our individual ego. That puts us before the problem or the opportunity.

Don’t get me wrong – ego is great. Without it we’d be pond life. But it’s a double edged sword. To be used, with caution. Make ego–gratification equal to solving the problem or realising the opportunity, not “winning” a fight with your colleagues.

Here’s how to do it…

Get a facilitator to do white hat, blue hat and manage the process.

Then challenge people.

“Yes I know you can see how this will not work.” “And we welcome that” (We really do – a sceptic is usually worth their weight in gold.)

“But we ask more of you. We ask you to contribute more fully. To think about what might be; how we can make it happen; how good it could be.”

Then we’ll make a decision. Based on a full and open discussion. Not on who has the greatest ability to argue. My wife sometimes says to me “you haven’t won the argument, you’re just better at arguing. “

She has a point.

And the lesson is…

That the objective needs to be to arrive smiling at the best result for the issue at hand.

No ego is required.

The six hats are required.

Try this…it works.

Mark