26 March 2020

Day 1 of our 31 day Lockdown Challenge, The game. 

The Game is a process that we developed while Richard was working in Egypt, and Patricia was alone in Pigeon Valley.  We were thousands of kilometres apart, and twelve hours, and it was July - a cold winter in the Nelson area, and a very hot summer in Egypt.  We wanted something that would give us a strong connection to each other, and an understanding of things that were really important to each other.  We played The Game by exchanging emails.  Mostly we sent the first one in the early evening, and the second one in the early morning.

What we suggest you do is choose a partner, preferably someone on their own, who would appreciate a deep connection with you during this time. 

Each email has a series of headings as follows

Greatest success.  The key here is to write one thing only.  Sometimes this was not easy as it was not easy to choose which of a number of successes was the greatest, and sometimes it was not really easy to find any success much.  We gave just enough detail for it to make sense to the other person.  Initially Richard's tended to be longer as things were so different in Egypt.

Off track.  Again, one area where we feel that we were off track.  While it may have been associated with the greatest success, on other occasions, it may have been something quite different - for example, Richard eating too many of the delicious pastries served for afternoon tea in Egypt.

Correction.   This is how we plan to self-correct.  For example, consider going for a short walk at afternoon tea time.

For us, that was the evening email each day, and by the following morning, we would have received an email from our partner with those headings, and we would respond with the headings below.

For people in the same time zone, we suggest you and your partner both send an email with the first three components at the end of each day, and when you receive your partner's email, you do the validation and challenge so that they receive it at an agreed time at the end of the same day. 

Validation.  Where we validate our partner on their greatest success, often looking to generalise it into what we see as a strength that they have.

Challenge.  Where we look to challenge them to do something that we believe will be for their health and well-being in the next period. 

Tomorrow's session is Beliefs and how to change them.  We look forward to seeing you again tomorrow at 2 pm.