I read the story of stone soup when I was in primary school, I did not understand how someone made soup with a stone. It was too deep a concept to understand as a kid. It is about moving something from 0 to 1,  from then on there are plenty of ways and people to take care to take it forward.

Why is it hard to move something from 0 to 1? Our brains are hardwired to be anxiety neutral. It hates ambiguities and new things to do, that is why things like driving becomes a sub conscious activity by becoming motor memory, once we start driving often. On a day to day basis you can observe your tendency to be anxiety neutral, it may take up only 15 minutes a week to clean a table but it is too difficult to get started with it. When that thought is going on your mind, if someone starts cleaning it up, then you are more likely to join the task and get it done.

My last post was about getting started with something and getting people to join. The first person who does something new is perceived to be the lone nut, there is a fear of judgement that prevents people to start something. This was very evident in a aum meditation session where there were only few of us and we need to chant aum but every person was waiting for the other to start, I took the lead after the first two half hearted attempts by being the first person to start the chant and the rest followed.

There are two things needed for people to start doing new things,

• Provide an environment which helps them to shed their fear of judgement
• Be the lone nut and start something which someone else has in mind, it is for sure that someone will follow.

The first point is not easy to address but it is too easy to be someone who starts doing things to facilitate change. We should shed our fear of judgement and be okay to do something that will be criticised. The results are surprising, what might take days to nudge someone to do something from scratch is way too easy to make them pick up a rough draft and take it to completion. Making stone soup is not deception, it is a tool to help people come out of their anxiety neutrality.