THE SURPRISING AND UNCONVENTIONAL
Our Origin Story
"I have been asked several times over the last few months about how I got into this. Well, it's a story that started about 30 years ago.
I was running a community project where I had to engage individuals that were given many labels, such as vulnerable, harder to place, excluded excluded and many more variations similar to these. Many of these, I am sure, would have been used to describe me in my youth.
I must admit that I struggled; when I used what I had been trained in, it didn't work. When I used what I read from books, it didn't work. When I used what others advised, it didn't work. In fact, I was stuck in the “it didn't work” cycle for about two years. I was dissatisfied and frustrated, I really felt stuck. Then, I hit upon the idea of using illusions and I got some attention. The seeds of something were there. I started building my epiphany bridge.
So I thought and thought and then I started introducing a bit of magic (of the conjuring variety) and I got more attention. This was my aha moment; it was by breaking their expectations that I could at last start to get their attention. I then started to use the magic effects as metaphors and this led to me teaching the individuals some of the magic themselves. Suddenly, it started working! I was making progress. I was getting a sense of satisfaction from what I was doing.
These techniques captured people's attention, they involved them in learning, communicating with others, building their confidence and giving them back a sense of control. I started delivering at conferences, training others and performing more and more.
Excited by this, I went further and further. I learned more and more and haven't stopped since.
This journey has taken me from delivering in the community to boardrooms, to training NHS consultants and people with no numeracy and literacy. It has taken me from learning magic in Blackpool to meeting magicians in Las Vegas. It has taken me from the ideas of classical psychology to the cutting-edge findings of neuroscience and behavioural insights.
Mindsways' services are based on a culmination and a consolidation of all of this."
George Rowley - Director
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