The second sketchnote I created today, again from The Collaboration Code (by Rob Evans) was around fear. I certainly remember my first facilitation roles and how anxious I was.

Luckily I had worked for over a year on a project (back in 1994 / 1995) that had over 30 skilled facilitators working on it. I learnt a great deal from them and this really helped reduce my fear and anxiety when starting to work live. In reality I was  at that time, without knowing it, serving an apprenticeship.

Anxiety is not so bad if managed well. Someone once said to me “butterflies in the stomach is a sign of tension and the trick is to get them all to fly in the same direction”. 

In order to do this we do need to pay attention, through our emotional intelligence, to how we are feeling and ensure we use the “stress” to positive effect. One of the techniques I use is “Stop – Challenge – Choose”, which I learnt early on in my work.

Movetowardthefear thecollaborationcodebook