H+ (Plus) a New Religion Read online

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  About the Book

  About the Author

  Also by Edward de Bono

  Praise

  Title Page

  H+

  Belief

  Compatible

  Different

  A Way of Life

  Positive and Negative

  Human+

  Happiness+

  Humour+

  Help+

  Hope+

  Health+

  Cool

  ‘Pons’

  Thinking up Pons

  Boasting and Showing-Off

  Failure, Fines and Achievement

  Projects

  Rituals

  Signals

  Organisation

  Communication

  Registration

  Headquarters

  Summary

  Copyright

  About the Book

  Edward de Bono has revolutionised the way we think. And now he’s about to change the way we live our lives …

  In this groundbreaking, thought-provoking book, Edward de Bono offers us a new way of living based on an entirely positive way of life. In H+ (Plus) he provides a framework for happiness through daily acts of help or contribution. Whether this is offering other people something to laugh at or helping an elderly person cross the road, these altruistic acts lead to a sense of achievement, and from achievement comes self-esteem and a belief in oneself.

  Discover the secret to leading a fuller, happier, healthier, more positive way of life.

  About the Author

  Edward de Bono is the leading authority in the field of creative thinking and the direct teaching of thinking as a skill. While there are thousands of people writing software for computers, Edward de Bono is the pioneer in writing software for the human brain. From an understanding of how the human brain works as a self-organising information system, he derived the formal creative tools of lateral thinking. He is also the originator of ‘parallel thinking’ and the Six Thinking Hats. His tools for perceptual thinking (CoRT and DATT) are widely used in both schools and business.

  Edward de Bono’s instruction in thinking has been sought by many of the leading corporations in the world, such as IBM, Microsoft, Prudential, BT (UK), NTT (Japan), Nokia (Finland) and Siemens (Germany). The Australian national cricket team also sought his help and became the most successful cricket team in history.

  A group of academics in South Africa included Dr de Bono as one of the 250 people who had most influenced humanity in the whole course of history. A leading Austrian business journal chose him as one of the 20 visionaries alive today. The leading consultancy company, Accenture, chose him as one of the 50 most influential business thinkers today.

  Edward de Bono’s methods are simple but powerful. The use of just one method produced 21,000 ideas for a steel company in one afternoon. He has taught thinking to Nobel prize winners and to young people with Down’s syndrome.

  Edward de Bono holds an MD (Malta), MA (Oxford), DPhil (Oxford), PhD (Cambridge), DDes (RMIT) and LLD (Dundee). He has had faculty appointments at the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, London and Harvard and was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford. He has written 70 books with translations into 40 languages and has been invited to lecture in 58 countries.

  The Edward de Bono Foundation is concerned with the teaching of constructive thinking in Education and Management. For further information contact:

  The Edward de Bono Foundation

  PO Box 2397

  Dublin 8

  Ireland

  Tel: +353 1 8250466

  Email: [email protected]

  Website: www.edwarddebonofoundation.com

  Also by Edward de Bono:

  How to Have a Beautiful Mind

  The Six Value Medals

  In praise of Edward de Bono

  ‘Edward doesn’t just think. He is a one-man global industry, whose work is gospel in government, universities, schools, corporates and even prisons all over the world’ Times 2

  ‘The master of creative thinking’ Independent on Sunday

  ‘Edward de Bono is a cult figure in developing tricks to sharpen the mind’ The Times

  ‘Edward de Bono is a toolmaker, his tools have been fashioned for thinking, to make more of the mind’ Peter Gabriel

  ‘de Bono’s work may be the best thing going in the world today’ George Gallup, originator of the Gallup Poll

  ‘The guru of clear thinking’ Marketing Week

  Is H+ a religion?

  … Maybe.

  Is H+ different from other religions?

  … Maybe.

  Is ‘maybe’ a good enough basis?

  … Maybe.

  Most religions focus on the ultimate ‘truth’.

  There seem to be different versions of this.

  Maybe ‘maybe’ is also useful.

  BELIEF

  MANY RELIGIONS HAVE a belief in the supernatural. This may be a belief in God or in supernatural forces. Some ask for a belief in many gods.

  In H+ there is only a belief in the potential of yourself and in the potential of your fellow human beings. H+ sets a framework for the development of this potential. You believe that you can act in a certain way or that you will eventually be able to act in this way.

  COMPATIBLE

  H+ IS A way of life that is fully compatible with any other religion or framework: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, etc.

  H+ does not impinge upon or compete with other belief systems.

  You can keep all the beliefs and values of those other religions and simply add H+ to them.

  H+ provides an ‘action framework’. Although action frameworks are implicit in many religions, they are not as explicit as in H+, which is based on action.

  This action framework can be added to any existing religion or belief system since there is no contradiction at all.

  DIFFERENT

  MOST RELIGIONS FOCUS on avoiding sins and wrongdoing. With H+ the emphasis is entirely on positive action. You have to contribute and make a difference. Being free of sin is not enough. The emphasis is on action and involvement with the world. Many religions suggest detachment from the world and the peace of tranquillity. With H+ there is action and achievement. Your self-worth arises from your achievements, not from meditation.

  There is no intrinsic belief system in H+ except the belief in yourself – not necessarily as you are but as you can be. At the same time any belief system belonging to any other religion is fully acceptable. This is unlike most religions, that do not tolerate other belief systems.

  A WAY OF LIFE

  H+ IS A religion in the sense that Buddhism is a religion.

  H+ is a way of life.

  Maybe we should invent a new term of ‘woligion’ to cover ‘a way of life religion’.

  POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE

  MOST RELIGIONS EMPHASISE the negative.

  Most religions tell us what we should not do. There are defined sins and guilt and punishment – even in eternal fire.

  H+ is entirely positive. The emphasis is not on sins that are to be avoided but on things that are to be done.

  The original purpose of the negativity of most religions was to keep order in society by ensuring that people behaved in a suitable way. H+ uses the negativity that is already in place from laws, other religions, moral precepts, social behaviour, etc. All these continue to operate in the same way. To them is added the positive nature of H+.

  In H+ the emphasis is on:

  POSITIVE

  CONSTRUCTIVE

  CONTRIBUTING

  In H+ it is not enough to detach yourself from the ills of the world. It is not enough to sit in a corner and perfect y
ourself. You perfect yourself only by contributing to your fellow human beings and the world around.

  You help yourself by helping others. There are no hermits in the desert unless they are thinking big thoughts that will eventually help others.

  The intention of helping others and the effort of helping others is what matters. The effectiveness of that help may need to be developed over time.

  Every ‘plusser’ (which may become the general term for those who know about H+) will have a private agenda of actions that could help others.

  You assess yourself on how successful you have been in helping others.

  There is emphasis. There is attitude. There are actions. The emphasis on certain matters leads to the development of specific attitudes. These matters are listed in the following pages and are all part of the H+ framework.

  Then there are the actions. There are no sins as in most religions. Instead there are positive actions. When these are carried out they develop a sense of achievement, an increase in self-esteem and the habit of contributing – instead of being self-centred and passive. These positive actions are called ‘pons’. Their role and nature will be described later (see here).

  HUMAN+

  H+ STANDS FOR Human+. The ‘plus’ indicates the best or positive aspects of humanity. There are also well-known negative aspects, such as fear, violence, aggression, deceit, etc.

  There is, for example, hatred. In the H+ framework, the only thing you hate is hatred itself.

  Just as there is no doubt that humans can be very nasty creatures, so there is no doubt that humans can also be wonderful creatures. The emphasis is on the positive aspects.

  There is no wish that people should be perfected robots. On the contrary, they should be even more human – but on the positive side.

  There will be lapses, failures and deflations of positive energy. But there is hope that the negative phase will come to an end and the plus factors re-establish themselves.

  HAPPINESS+

  HAPPINESS IS ALSO central to H+. Happiness needs to become a deliberate habit and not just the feeling when everything is perfect.

  For too long literature has encouraged the idea that tragedy, disaster, despair and anguish are the true stuff of life. Everything else is seen as trivial and superficial.

  Every town has a hospital and every hospital has an emergency department into which accident victims are brought. There is plenty of agony, tragedy and despair. Do we go and sit in those emergency departments for entertainment or to learn about life?

  It is true that unhappiness is an important part of life, but so is happiness. The media tend to celebrate disaster, criticism, wrongdoing and scandal because that is the easy way to arouse interest. It requires rather more skill to arouse interest from happiness. It is also that the media, rightly, sees its role as the conscience of society, that should expose defects and failures.

  Maybe there should be a ‘happiness rating’ for movies. There could be an HH film or even an HHHH film. Viewers would know in advance that they were to going to see a ‘bang-bang’ shoot-out or a neurotic ballet of emotions.

  There is more truth in happiness than in despair.

  Happiness is not just the absence of pain and suffering. Just as we need to value things and to become more sensitive to value, so we also need to foster happiness in a deliberate manner, for example by seeking out those things which make us happy.

  Thinking is very important for happiness, because with thinking we take charge of our lives instead of being like a cork in a stream pushed around by the currents. Thinking can change our perceptions and these control our emotions. Thinking can provide us with ways of doing things and solving problems. Thinking can enable us to understand other people and to get on with them. Thinking has been shown to reduce crime dramatically in young people.

  CoRT stands for Cognitive Research Trust. This is a programme of thinking lessons that is now widely used in schools all around the world. The lessons are aimed at broadening and enriching perception. Very simple tools can be learned, used and become a habit. For example, the OPV (Other People’s View) encourages the thinker deliberately to explore the thinking of another person. Once this is done, many conflicts just disappear. The C&S (Consequence & Sequel) encourages the thinker to look at the immediate, short-term, medium-term and long-term consequences of a choice or action. Doing this deliberately is very different from believing that you do it. One group of very senior executives was asked to assess a suggestion. Eighty-six per cent were in favour of the suggestion. They were then asked to do a formal C&S. The percentage in favour dropped to just 15. Yet every one of the executives would claim that his or her job demanded a constant look at consequences.

  Happiness is very much to do with expectations. There are expectations that the world and other people should treat you in a certain way – and unhappiness when this is not the case. There are expectations that you should achieve something and unhappiness when your talent or circumstances fall short of your aim.

  Happiness should be the natural state and unhappiness an interruption, just as a cold or a headache are interruptions in your normal state of health.

  Adjust and change

  If you learn to adjust to the present situation, you may be happier about it. Failure to adjust has no advantage.

  It may be claimed that if you adjust too well you will not try to change the situation. But it is only an assumption that adjust and change are opposites. You can adjust and continue to seek change at the same time. The motivation for change does not have to be your unhappiness, but the will to change and make things better.

  A ‘proto-truth’ is a truth that we hold to be true so long as we are seeking to change it.

  Happiness is a matter of attention. If we get into the habit of focusing attention on negative aspects, we are likely to be unhappy. If we learn to focus on more positive aspects, we can be happier. A young woman was born without legs but seems to be a happy person. She takes part in athletics and is a catwalk model.

  Usually our attention is pulled or drawn by things around us. If we develop the habit of ‘directing’ our attention where we want to, the habit of happiness becomes easier.

  Thinking and happiness

  Society has paid far too little attention to thinking. This is unfortunate because thinking is the most fundamental human skill and determines both our happiness and our achievements.

  Our traditional thinking habits are based on recognising a standard situation and providing a standard answer. They are ‘judgement’ based. Then there is argument, logical deduction and ‘proving that you are right’. All this is excellent, just as the front left wheel of a motor car is excellent – but it is not enough.

  We have neglected to develop constructive thinking; creative thinking; perceptual thinking; and design thinking. You can analyse the past but you have to design the way forward.

  Judgement brings the past into the future. Design brings the future into the present.

  Critical thinking is never enough when you need design to put together what you have to deliver, the values you want.

  Over the years I have developed various frames and methods of thinking that are now widely used in thousands of schools and hundreds of organisations around the world.

  Instead of argument, there is the method of ‘parallel thinking’ to explore the subject (with the ‘Six Thinking Hats’). One corporation that used to take 30 days on their multinational project development now does it in two days. A small Canadian corporation reckoned they saved $20 million the first year they used the method.

  There are also the ‘Six Action Shoes’, dealing with styles of action. The ‘Six Value Medals’ provide a frame for value scanning.

  Then there are the formal creative methods of lateral thinking based on an understanding of the brain as a ‘self-organising information system’. These tools can be powerful. Using just one of these tools, a group of workshops in South Africa generated 21,000 ideas in a single after
noon.

  Then there are the ways of improving perception incorporated in the CoRT programme, that is widely used in schools throughout the world. Teaching this programme for just five hours to unemployed youngsters in the UK (the Holst Group) brought a 500 per cent improvement in the employment rate. In Australia, Jennifer O’Sullivan taught these methods to unemployed young people who were completely deaf – and achieved a huge increase in employment.

  Young people who have been told by schools that they are stupid find that they are not stupid at all but can think and take control of their lives. Their self-esteem rises and everything else follows.

  There is a close relationship between thinking and taking control of your life and happiness. This is not ‘thinking’ in terms of philosophical intellectualising, but simple, practical thinking tools and methods that can be used equally by Nobel prize laureates and young people with Down’s syndrome. Teaching thinking to unemployed young people increased the employment rate five fold. Teaching thinking to young people too violent to be taught in mainstream schools reduced the rate of criminal convictions to one tenth (compared to those not taught thinking).

  Some religions appear to discourage people from thinking and prefer them to act out of faith and belief. This may make sense, since much thinking may be confusing and misleading. With H+ you are encouraged to think – even if you are wrong.

  Habit

  Happiness is an intended habit – just like dieting. You may fail from time to time, or even most of the time, but you just keep on trying.

  HUMOUR+

  NO RELIGION EMPHASISES the importance of humour. Buddhism in general and Zen Buddhism in particular emphasise the need to change perceptions. This is indeed how humour works but the emphasis in Buddhism is not on humour, as such, and its role in human behaviour and human society.