I’ve taken a lot of trainings over the years.  When a coach colleague sent me information about a positive intelligence training program that was being granted to coaches, I honestly wasn’t all that interested. The program fee was being waived in order to grant coaches training they could use not only for themselves but to use with clients to accelerate their progress forward but even that didn’t lure me.  

I finally caved when several coaches I knew had taken the training and spoke highly of it.  I signed up with the understanding that I would commit to do the work of the six-week program which was a condition of the course.  

I have to admit I was intrigued by the program’s wording of developing your “inner Jedi,” a term coined by students of the creator, Shirzhad Chamine, at Stanford.  The training itself is designed to improve mental fitness while weakening old mindsets that no longer serve us.  

The program itself is about building one’s mental muscle to enable it to shift into neutral so that, instead of responding with old unproductive behaviors and reactions, a space is created.  This shift enables one to move into a state of mindfulness that can open the door to a more thoughtful choice of how to respond.  

The training could be described as mental muscle building and requires watching a weekly video and using an app to practice daily exercises for 15 minutes or so for six weeks. The promised outcome is to help one achieve their potential personally and professionally.

Positive Intelligence (PQ) measures the percentage of time your mind is serving you as opposed to sabotaging you.  It draws upon research and learning from neuroscience, cognitive psychology, positive psychology, and performance science.  The exercises change brain activation over time and enable one to focus with more calmness and clarity in the way they handle their work and life challenges.  Scientifically speaking, the exercises (PQ reps) activate the parasympathetic nervous system, the network of nerves that relaxes our body after periods of stress or danger.  At the same time, the exercises serve to calm our sympathetic nervous system, often referred to as the fight or flight response. The end result is more composure and clear-headedness in the midst of dealing with challenging situations.

My experience?  It didn’t happen overnight but after practicing the exercises a few weeks I began to notice that I was more present and focused as I went about my day.  I found myself less ruffled by problems that came up, and more deliberate about how I met challenges in general.  I’m more centered and content, and less apt to worry. What I can say is that doing these exercises has provided me with a practical framework that helps me to align more with my personal and professional objectives. Not bad for the small investment of time it takes each day.  

The basic premise is that this “mental fitness training” reorganizes our brain to increase its positive responses and decrease its negative ones.

If you would like to learn more or are interested in the six-week training program, get in touch. I’d be happy to have a chat about how you might experience the same for yourself.  Likewise, if you are interested in experiencing this in a small (4-6 participants) group setting, let me know so that I can put you on the waiting list for when this group starts.

Warm wishes!