CHAPTER 3

The Choice Map

Maps don’t just help us locate where we are but where we are coming from and where we might be going.

Gabrielle Roth

When we resumed our conversation, Joseph pointed to a mural on his office wall. I’d noticed it before but hadn’t paid much attention to it. “This is the Choice Map,” he explained. (It appears later in this chapter.) “It helps us to become better observers of the two basic paths we take in life—the Learner Mindset path and the Judger Mindset path. As the name implies, the map is all about our ability to make choices. On the left side of the Choice Map, notice the figure standing above the Start arrow, at the crossroads between the two paths. That figure represents you and me—every one of us. In every moment of our lives we’re faced with choosing between the Learner Mindset path and the Judger Mindset path. Now look at the thought bubble above the other figures’ heads. Note how there’s a relationship between the kinds of questions these people ask, the path they’re on, and where each path takes them.”

Joseph then directed my attention to two little signs near that Start arrow on the left of the map: The sign above the Learner Mindset path said “Choose”; the sign by the Judger Mindset path said “React.” I looked at the Learner Mindset path with the figures happily jogging along. That path, associated with choosing, looked pretty inviting to me.

I then looked at the Judger Mindset path, with the sign that said React. The figures there looked downright troubled and bleak as the path took them toward the billboard labeled Judger. No happy joggers here. And then I noticed that fellow sinking in the mud of the Judger Pit. I started to chuckle but then swallowed hard. Was this Joseph’s impression of me? My shoulders tightened up. What if he was right?

“I hope you’re not thinking I’m like that loser in the Judger Pit,” I said guardedly.

“You wouldn’t be in this office if anybody believed you were a loser,” Joseph replied. “Every single one of us has Judger moments, including me. It’s a natural part of being human. The Choice Map is about observing yourself and others in a more conscious way; it’s about helping us to see what path we’re on at any moment. It’s not about labeling people or putting them in boxes. Think of the Choice Map* as a tool that helps us to chart more effective paths through our lives—and for getting better outcomes in whatever we do.”

I began to relax a little.

“At nearly every moment of our lives, we’re faced with choosing between taking the Learner or Judger path,” Joseph continued. “Whether we recognize it or not, we’re making choices moment by moment by moment. Those choices take us along the Learner path or the Judger Path. These are our mindsets. As you can see, by choosing Learner mindset we can discover new possibilities. By jumping into Judger mindset we can eventually end up stuck in the mud.

“Most of the time, we’re shifting back and forth between Learner and Judger mindsets, barely aware we have any control or choice. Choice begins when we are mindful enough to observe our own thoughts and feelings and the language we use to express them. This is the key to success— building the muscles of the observer self. Self-coaching is impossible without a strong observer! It’s as simple as asking ourselves, What’s going on? Where am I right now? Am I in Judger or Learner? Choice begins with observing our own thinking, and our own mindsets. It’s simpler than you think.”

I nodded, still skeptical.

“Let’s put it to the test,” Joseph said. “We’ve got a perfect issue to work with, too. Look at what happened in that moment when you asked if I thought you were a loser and a Judger.”

“Okay,” I said, nodding uneasily.

“Imagine that it’s you standing at the crossroads between the Learner and Judger paths,” Joseph said, pointing to that Start arrow on the Choice Map. “Notice the words that circle that figure’s head—Anything that impacts us at any moment. That can be Thoughts, Feelings, Circumstances. The circumstances might be something unpleasant, such as getting an unexpected bill or a phone call with distressing news. Maybe a truck scraped the fender of your new car in the parking lot. The whole world begins to look like that mud pit at the end of the Judger path. Stuff happens. Right?”

I rolled my eyes and thought, he doesn’t know the half of it!

“But circumstances that feel positive impact us, too,” Joseph continued. “Your favorite team has an unexpected win. Your boss gives you a promotion, or your spouse sends an invitation to spend a romantic evening together.”

“I could stand more of the good stuff!” I grumbled. “So what’s the point here?”

“Things happen to us all the time,” Joseph said. “We don’t have much choice about that but we do have choice about what we do next about whatever just happened. Case in point: let’s examine what happened the exact moment when I first showed you the Choice Map. Just looking at it led to thoughts and feelings that put you on the Judger Path. What do you think happened?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Something just pushed my buttons and off I went.” I remembered the questions that ran through my mind at that moment: Does Joseph think I’m a Judger and a loser? Does he think I’m like that guy sinking in the mud?

“Yeah, I admit it,” I said. “I went into a pretty bad mindset.”

“Whoa!” Joseph exclaimed. “There’s no good or bad, no right or wrong here. There’s just observing what happens and what you do with what happens. Remember the little signs at the beginning of the paths—Choose and React. In those first instants, you reacted to what happened and bombarded yourself with negative Judger questions.”

“Am I a hopeless case?” I said, cracking a feeble smile.

Joseph smiled back. “That’s a good example of a negative Self-Question, or Self-Q, as I call them, which sends us right into the Judger Pit.”

“So how do I get out?”

“You observe your mindset and then choose. I believe that the secret of being really effective and satisfied in our lives begins with our ability to distinguish between Judger and Learner. That’s a key part of Question Thinking. Change your questions, change your thinking. Change your thinking, change your results. If only for a second, you become an observer watching a movie of your life. You simply notice whatever moods, thoughts, and behaviors are going on, without interpretation or judgment. That mindfulness sets the stage for just accepting what is, which also sets the stage for change, for choosing the mindset you’re going to operate from. This is very different from being so immersed in the situation that you can’t imagine any other possibility than the way it already is.”

I nodded. “With engineering problems, I use something like this observer self to cross-check my calculations and conclusions and make sure I haven’t missed anything. You’re saying the Choice Map gives me a way of developing this observer self to cross-check myself—to observe whatever moods and thoughts might be shaping my choices—not just about numbers but also about myself and other people. That gives me the power to make a course correction.”

“Exactly! I’m sure you’ve had the experience of catching yourself calling somebody by the wrong name or nearly putting your foot in your mouth. We all do it. It’s your observer self that catches the error. You see, it’s a natural capacity, something everyone has—and the Choice Map increases that capacity. It gives us a chance to focus on the bigger picture. Until you develop this ability you’re running on automatic pilot, reacting mindlessly. The Choice Map is about developing ways to make intentional, conscious choices rather than being controlled by events around us or by our emotions. These are essential leadership qualities for being aware, awake, and responsive to the business at hand.”

Joseph paused. Then his face broke into a smile. “Let me tell you a little story about me,” he said. “A few months ago I was in a coaching session with the superintendent of a large construction company. I spent 15 long minutes listening to his complaining and putting down everyone and blaming all his company’s woes on everybody else. According to him, the world is filled with idiots. I was getting pretty fed up with all his judgmental chatter. I felt like kicking him out of my office! Judger questions were coursing wildly through my mind. What did I do to deserve this guy? Who does he think he is, God’s gift to mankind? When I suddenly realized what I was doing I almost laughed out loud. Here I was judging this man for judging other people! I was in Judger mindset as much as he was. I’d been hijacked by Judger! Going Judger on Judger is a real trap.”

Joseph obviously enjoyed telling this story on himself. “So how did the Choice Map help?” I wanted him to tell me the whole process.

“First, you just notice that something’s not quite right,” he said. “Maybe you feel tense, or upset, or just plain blocked. That’s your observer self starting to click in, making you more aware. Then you ask yourself, Am I in Judger? Is this where I want to be? Of course, in the story I’m telling you, it wasn’t. If I stayed in Judger, I couldn’t help this guy. No one can help anyone else from a Judger place.”

“Sounds like you should have cut your losses and backed out,” I suggested.

“Not at all,” Joseph replied. “As soon as our observer self recognizes we’re in Judger, that’s when we begin to gain control and personal power. Now we have choice. We can choose to switch our thinking from Judger to Learner. There’s a specific kind of question that helps us here; it’s what I call a Switching question. That’s what provides the how-to for changing. The Switching question that worked for me that day was, How else can I think about him?

“That question gave me the freedom to wonder: What does he need? Instead of wanting to write him off, that question helped me to become curious about him. The Choice Map simplifies this whole process for observing yourself. You discover more options and can choose more wisely, even under pressure. Choosing is easy when things are going well. It’s when we’re under pressure that we really get tested.”

Something in what he said made me think about that awful moment with Grace at the airport. “It seems like people go into Judger whenever there’s any kind of conflict,” I reflected. “I mean, both people go Judger at the same time. That’s pretty normal, isn’t it?”

“Very normal,” Joseph said. “And then everything escalates and the possibility of a good resolution comes to a screeching halt. But here’s a million dollar tip for you: When two people are in Judger, the one who wakes up first has an advantage. That person can choose to go Learner and turn the situation around for both of them.”

Something clicked for me. When Grace and I had a disagreement, she would often switch from stubbornness to open-mindedness in the blink of an eye. Her ability to switch always lightened things up. I had often wondered if she did this naturally or if it was some inner trick. She once told me she just took a deep breath and reminded herself of the big picture—that our relationship was more important than proving she was right. If Joseph’s techniques could teach me how to do this by choice, I’d be way ahead of the game with Charles, my nemesis at work.

“I’m willing to give it a try,” I told Joseph. “Where do I begin?”

“You begin with the questions you ask yourself, with the realization that the kinds of questions you ask literally put you either in Learner or Judger mode. And we’re most effective at virtually everything we do when we’re in Learner. That’s when we’re most resourceful and flexible and have the most options.

“But don’t worry if you take the Judger path every once in a while. That’s just human. As your observer self gets stronger and more dependable, you’ll find it increasingly easy to switch your questions and get back in Learner. That’s where things open up again and you go toward the results you’re seeking.”

“You make it sound so easy,” I said.

“It’s easier than you think,” Joseph said, “because everything you need is already built in. Continually asking Switching questions is what helps us to build a resilient observer and a robust Learner mindset. And along the way you’re building your immunity to Judger mindset.

“The signals for catching yourself in Judger are difficult to argue with, since they’re your body’s reactions and your moods. Remember what happened to me with the superintendent? The clues that I was in Judger were in my own moods and attitudes, which I’ve learned to associate with Judger— self-righteousness, arrogance, superiority, and defensiveness. For example, you might be thinking, I sure showed that guy! Or, Maybe that’ll teach him to listen to me next time. Or, what an idiot that so-and-so is! I’ve learned that any time I get into negative moods, Judger questions and attitudes are involved. Once I observe this state in myself I can change my questions and turn things around pretty easily, for a very different result.”

He paused for a moment, then said, “Let’s do an experiment. This is a way for you to actually experience what I’m talking about, so that you’ll have more than just an intellectual understanding of the power of questions and mindsets. I’m going to recite two different sets of questions. As I do, notice how each set of questions affects you. Pay attention to your breathing, your muscles, your posture, and what you’re feeling in different areas of your body. “He got up and walked over to the Choice Map. “Ask yourself these questions:

Whose fault is it?

What’s wrong with me?

Why am I such a failure?

Why can’t I ever do anything right?

Why is everybody so stupid and frustrating?

Haven’t we already been there, done that?

Why bother?”

As he recited these questions, my chest tightened up. My shoulders stiffened. I was clutching up like a rookie pitcher in the last inning of an important game. I laughed uncomfortably, “Yeah, I definitely feel some tension here and there.”

“Okay. How would you describe how you feel?”

I shrugged. “To be honest,” I said. “I feel like that guy in the Judger Pit.” I grappled for words to describe what I was feeling. Finally I came up with: Hopeless and helpless. Pessimistic. Negative. Depleted. Depressed. Uptight. Victim. Loser. I was relieved Joseph didn’t insist I share everything going on with me.

“Now give yourself a moment or two to breathe and just observe whatever is going on with you right now. Imagine you’re an observer watching yourself sitting here in my office. As you do this also notice if any feelings and sensations start to shift.”

Learner/Judger Questions*

*Each of us asks ourselves and others questions from both mindsets. With awareness, we have the capacity to choose at any moment which questions will frame our thinking, listening, spaking and relating.

I did what he said. The changes were subtle at first. It seemed like those negative sensations were starting to diminish. I nodded. “Yes. I like that,” I said.

“That’s just a taste of the power of self-coaching and how the observer self serves that process,” Joseph said. “Later on, we’ll explore more tools for strengthening your observer self. You’ll be able to zero in on the kinds of questions that get you stuck and craft new questions that launch you right into Learner territory. A friend of mine had a very clever way of saying this: ‘Either you have your questions, or your questions have you.’”

Joseph strode easily around the room, stroking his chin as if he were considering something. Finally he stopped and faced me again. “How about checking out the Learner path,” he asked. “Again, listen to the questions as if you were asking them of yourself:

What happened?

What do I want?

What’s useful about this?

What can I learn?

What’s the other person thinking, feeling, and wanting? What are my choices?

What’s best to do now?

What’s possible?”

With these questions I experienced a quiet excitement, very different from what I’d experienced with the Judger questions. My breathing got easier. My mood got lighter. I suddenly had more energy. I sensed a willingness and openness I certainly hadn’t felt with the first set of questions. My shoulders relaxed. I hadn’t felt this good in quite a while!

“What are some words you’d use to describe your experience now?” he asked.

I took a deep, easy breath. “Open. Lighter. Upbeat. Curious. Energetic. Optimistic.” I chuckled. “I’m a damn-sight more hopeful than I felt this morning . . . maybe there are solutions to my problems after all.”

“Good,” Joseph said. “Those feelings signal that you’ve stepped into Learner mindset. You’re on the Learner path.”

I heaved a sigh of relief. Even if I wasn’t totally sold on everything Joseph was saying, maybe there was something to this coaching after all. I had to admit I was feeling more hopeful than I’d felt in a long time. Could it be that this guy actually was as good as Alexa seemed to believe he was? In spite of that big question mark on his business card, maybe he did have tools that could make a difference for me . . . as nutty as that might seem.